Survival

by Julie E. Czerneda

  “That was quick thinking, Persephone,” Mac complimented as they walked into what appeared to be a deserted med-clinic.

  “Part of the job description,” came the offhand response, but she seemed pleased. “There should be a gown in the cubicle over there, Mac. I’ll call the doc in to dress those cuts.”

  “Don’t call anyone.” Mac’s smile and greeting died on her lips as Nikolai Trojanowski stormed into the clinic, his face dark with anger. “What the hell are you doing here?”

  “Sir, the situation—” His look was nothing short of lethal. Persephone closed her mouth and, with a sympathetic glance at Mac, turned and left the room, shutting the door behind her.

  Mac frowned. “I was supposed to let them take me away?”

  “Shh!” From his suit pocket, Nik pulled a thin silver rod, giving it a shake to extend it to a length of over two meters. With his weapon ready in his right hand, rod in his left, he proceeded around the room, swinging the rod so that it brushed ceiling and walls, moving so quickly Mac found it hard to keep safely out of his way. She watched the anger fade from his face as he worked, replaced by concentration.

  When Nik was satisfied, he shook the rod one more time to shrink it to pocket-size. His eyes found and fixed on her. Behind the glasses, they were smudged with exhaustion, but fiercely alert. Probably stimmed to the gills, she thought uncharitably. “Low-tech,” he said, “but effective in an enclosed area.”

  “Whatever works.” Mac couldn’t believe she’d forgotten, even for an instant, that their foe could be hiding anywhere in plain sight. “You shouldn’t blame your staff.”

  “You’re right,” he surprised her by saying. He leaned against the examination platform like a man conserving the last of his resources by any means possible. “I was trying to keep info splatter to an absolute minimum— which meant ’Sephe didn’t know better than to back your decision.”

  “Info splatter?” Was no Human activity safe from jargon? “Have you heard anything more from Base?” she demanded, her voice feathering at the edges. “Any—names? Do they know I’m okay? What’s . . . ?” Mac stopped herself. “I’m sorry. I’m anxious for news.”

  His expression softened. “I know. I’ve asked for the—for a list. I wish I could tell you more.” When she kept looking at him, he continued, perhaps to comfort her. “Your people look to be good in emergencies: coolheaded, smart. I’m sure they did all the right things even before the rescue teams arrived.”

  “Real ones, or more of yours?” Mac asked. “I did figure out those police were nothing of the kind, you know.”

  A raised eyebrow. “Here we thought they were flawless. But yes, the rescuers were local.”

  Mac realized with a sinking feeling he’d avoided one of her questions. “You did tell them I’m okay, didn’t you? And my dad . . . You’d promised to call him.” Mac put a hand to her throat, something she’d thought only melodramatic movie heroines did until now, when it felt impossible to catch a full breath through the painful tightness of her throat. “Oh, god. You didn’t tell him I was dead.”

  “Of course not!”

  He could be lying and she’d have no way to know. Her father could be mourning her and she’d have no way to tell him the truth.

  All her doubt and fear must have shown on her face, because Nik spread his hands out and said with unexpected honesty: “I would have, Mac, if faking your death would have thrown the Ro off your trail. Enough people saw you launched into the ocean with Brymn to make it credible that you drowned.” When she began to sputter indignantly, he gave a faint smile. “Don’t worry. Morality aside, it wouldn’t have worked. Imagine the media uproar if the first and only Dhryn to visit Earth was killed. No, the Honorable Delegate had to make a very visible, very routine departure. When your friends catch the news and see Brymn escaped the attack at Base, and they know he took you with him, how could you be anything but well?”

  Mac couldn’t decide if she was more confused than relieved. “So what did you tell them? You had to explain my disappearance from the face of the Earth—” literally! “—somehow.”

  He looked insufferably smug. “You, Dr. Mackenzie Connor, have sent reassuring vid messages to Base and to your father.”

  Of course. As she’d spent years working with people capable of that type of forgery and more, if they hadn’t been busier using their skills to investigate the natural world, Mac felt herself blush. “What did you—did I—say?”

  “Oh, you explained how you’d been picked up by a police boat. Confirmed, naturally, by the ‘police.’ You related how Brymn was so unnerved by his brush with death—and you, so grateful for his help in escaping—that you accompanied him to the Consulate.”

  “And?” Mac prompted when Nik paused, as fascinated by this skewing of events as she would have been watching a skim about to crash. There was the same sense of inevitable disaster. Her friends and family would never believe this.

  “And? As a parting gift,” Nik told her, “Brymn arranged for you to access files he’d stored at the Consulate in hopes of finding something to assist the search for Emily and identify those who’d attacked Base. Because of understandably tight security there, you can only access those files within the compound and they will not let you leave, then return. So you are staying as long as it takes. There was more—your confidence in Kammie, condolences and wishes to be kept informed, reassurances to your father. I can arrange for you to view the recordings, if you like.”

  Mac gulped. “That’s just—that’s just—”

  “Amazing?” he offered helpfully. “Brilliant?”

  “Uncanny,” Mac said, staring at Nik. “I would do that.” They’d all believe it, too. Even her father, though he’d voice his opinion. She fought a wave of homesick-ness. “How could you know?”

  His lips quirked. “You study salmon. I study people. Don’t worry, Mac. We’ll keep up ‘your’ messages and cover your absence as long as necessary. Right now, we’d better get you to the Dhryn. They aren’t the most patient beings and, with the Ro as adversaries, I can’t argue.”

  “Where’s Brymn now?”

  “He’s aboard the Pasunah, waiting for you.” An unnecessary stress on the last word.

  “He can wait.” Mac went to cross her arms, then decided against it when her rib protested. “I’m not leaving to go anywhere—especially a Dhryn ship—until I’ve cleaned up and had a Human doctor seal these cuts.”

  He’d either anticipated her reaction or knew better than to argue. “Shower’s that way,” Nik pointed with his chin. “It’s got a sterile field. Thirty seconds ought to do it.” He swung the office pouch from under his shoulder to the platform. “Here. This is for you.”

  “Supper? Is there time?” Mac said, trying to smile at her own joke.

  “Sorry.” He patted the pouch. “Clothes, hopefully your size. The rest of your luggage is already on the Pasunah .” At her highly doubtful look, he smiled. “We had staff do some discreet shopping in the way station’s stores while you were en route. Nothing fancy—don’t worry. I did my homework.”

  For some reason, Mac immediately resented his assumption she preferred plain. Not that Nik had any reason to assume otherwise, she admitted.

  The idea of being clean made every scratch and bite on Mac’s body itch. She looked at the shower longingly. But first . . . “This is going to take time to undo,” she waggled the end of the intricate braid at him.

  “It’s quite—thorough.”

  That surprised a laugh out of her. “That bad?”

  “I confess I’m curious what you did to annoy ’Sephe.”

  Despite everything, Mac found herself grinning at him. “Let this be a warning to you. Never leave two bored women alone in a box.”

  “Warning taken,” Nik said. “Here. Let me.”

  Mac turned to offer him her back, standing close enough that his knee brushed her leg. “Just get it started, thanks. I can work out the rest in the shower.”

  She felt him pick up
the thick braid and run its length through his hands before his fingers began to puzzle at the knot at the end. “I had time to talk with Brymn on the way here,” Nik told her. With each word, his breath tickled her neck in a way that made Mac suddenly aware of a problem.

  She liked the way his breath tickled her neck.

  She liked it in a way that sent waves of shivering warmth into places that should have been politely noncommittal, thank you very much, given where she was and who he was. Not to mention the why of it all.

  Worse, she couldn’t edge out of range of his breath without being obvious; by the movements of his hands, he’d found his way into the braid by now and was busy undoing it.

  Mac gritted her teeth. A cold shower. “Did Brymn tell you anything more about the Ro?” she asked.

  “Nothing to help us find or contact them. We’ll probably learn more from the shroud the Dhryn used over your box.”

  The pile of dark fabric. “What was it?”

  “Apparently the Ro can limpet themselves—more accurately, some kind of travel pod or suit—to other vehicles in either an atmosphere or in space. The Dhryn claim their shroud emits an energy pulse of some kind on contact that interferes with the attachment mechanism, shaking loose any such hitchhikers. It forms the basis of their defense for oomlings. They also told us they believe it stuns or kills any Ro inside, but that’s never been confirmed. They haven’t been able to retrieve any of these devices or their passengers.”

  Mac stiffened, fear rinsing away thoughts of warmth, in water or otherwise. “Then one or more could have come with us—could be on the ’station now.”

  “Given their capabilities?” She felt Nik spread apart the braids which had been twisted together, then begin to untwist the tiny braids of the one over her left shoulder. No denying he was undoing the mass more quickly than she could. “If not with you, then on any ship. All we can do is make sure we keep what secrets we can from them. It might be for the best that you refused to go with the Dhryn. That may have confused the issue, forced any Ro who were watching to decide which of you to follow.”

  Mac squeezed her eyes closed. Squeezed her hands into fists. Squeezed her thoughts into the tightest possible focus. Amazingly, her voice came out sounding almost calm. “I said my name. Outside the box. In the open. Anyone—anything—could have heard.”

  “Irrelevant.” A tug. “They already know who you are.”

  “You could at least try to be reassuring,” she protested, eyes flashing open.

  “Could I?” a chuckle. Dozens of tiny braids tumbled free over her shoulder, a few spontaneously unwinding, and he went to work on the next twisted strand. “What’s reassuring, Mackenzie Winifred Elizabeth Wright Connor, is that the Dhryn, particularly our busy Brymn, but also the captain of the Pasunah and apparently what passes for their government, also know who you are. And for reasons of their own, they are offering you what they never grant aliens—access to the heart of established Dhryn society, on a Dhryn-only world. Even your Emily didn’t manage that, as far as we know.” He sounded like a proud parent.

  The lie had been larger than she could have imagined . Mac saw it with the stunning clarity of a lightning flash in a darkened room, her mind reeling with the afterimage of truth. Licking her lips, groping for calm, she said it out loud: “Which is exactly what you and the Ministry of Extra-Sol Human Affairs were hoping for all along.”

  His hands paused the barest instant, then kept un-braiding. “What do you mean?” Casual, but she didn’t need to see Nik’s face to know its expression. Wary.

  “You—those who sent you—could have cared less about Brymn’s reason for seeking me out. You never thought I’d be of any help either. It was the Nulls—the Ro—you’ve been after. You’ve known they were preying on the Dhryn. You let Brymn come to Earth and contact me to bring him where you could watch what happened! You were hoping he’d reveal something about the Nulls. You’re probably glad they attacked us!” With that, Mac jerked away and whirled to face him, loose hair and unraveling braids flying in slow motion over her shoulders, breathing heavily with rage that finally had a target. She fumbled at the fastening of the pocket that had kept her envelope safe, drove her hand inside, then pulled it out and threw it at him.

  It struck his chest and fell to the floor.

  Nik held up the desiccated remains of a banana slug he must have found in her hair, then tossed it after the envelope. “You could be right,” he said, each word slow and distinct. “I wouldn’t know. I wouldn’t have to know. And I wouldn’t ask.” His eyes became chips of stone in a face turned to ice. “A threat to the species, Dr. Connor. What part of that didn’t you grasp? Where on the scale of that do you and I fall?”

  “You put my people at risk—”

  “They were at risk already. What’s happening out here—” his violent gesture swept in an arc to encompass everything but the planet below, “—is destroying all life in its path. All life! If the Ro are responsible, yes, we’ll do anything to stop them. I’ll do anything. And from what I know of you, you would, too.”

  “I wouldn’t put innocent people in danger without at least telling them why! Without giving them a chance to protect themselves!”

  Nik surged to his feet. “Haven’t you noticed? We don’t know how to protect anyone! I can’t—I can’t even protect you!”

  The words rang in the room as they stood, eyes locked. Mac inhaled air warm and moist from his lungs and didn’t know which of them moved first to remove any distance between them, didn’t know whose lips were more desperate, whose arms held tighter.

  She did know Nik was the first to break away.

  He thrust her from him so quickly she staggered a step to regain her balance. His face—she might have imagined that flash of vulnerability—became cold and still once more. “It’s time to go, Dr. Connor,” he said harshly. “We can’t risk the Dhryn leaving without you. I’ll let them know you’re coming; don’t take long getting ready. There’s a field med kit in your luggage. You’ll have to treat yourself.”

  Treat herself? Mac pressed one hand over the thrill of pain from her rib, brought the other to her throbbing lips. When she pulled it away, there was blood on her fingers. She stared at it, her eyes wide.

  His hand appeared in her sight, pressed the envelope into her bloodied one. Her name rippled across the surface in mindless mauve. “Keep that safe and with you at all times,” she heard him say. “No matter what you think of how you got involved, this message authorizes you to claim help and equipment from any Human you encounter.”

  Mac lifted her eyes to his face, seeing a smear of blood on his mouth too. Heat flushed her cheeks, but she held her voice as steady as his. “I won’t encounter any Humans, will I?”

  Instead of answering, Nik went on with a rapid-fire briefing. Mac struggled to pay attention, to quiet the pounding in her ears and chest. “There’s a beacon in the handle of the smaller piece of luggage,” he told her. “When the Pasunah sets her transect exit, it will send us those coordinates. There’s also an imp—use it instead of yours. It has an automated transmitter and whenever you enter a transect, it will squeal a burst containing your latest log entries, coded so only we can translate.”

  “How will you find me if I’m not entering a transect?” Mac asked, all too familiar with the unreliability of beacons and transmitters once out of the lab and in the field. Not to mention some unique problems. “The Ro can wipe out stored power,” she reminded him. At least in civilian equipment, like that at Norcoast. “And what if the Dhryn take these things away from me? What will happen then?”

  “There is a backup.” Nik reached into an inner pocket of his jacket. He drew out what looked like a pen.

  “I take it—this time—that’s not a pen,” Mac ventured, eyeing the thing suspiciously.

  “No, it’s not.” He held out his empty hand. When she gave him hers, thinking that was what he wanted, he grasped her upper arm instead. “Don’t move,” Nik warned as he pressed the tip o
f the pen to her skin, taking advantage of the tear in her shirt.

  Mac yelped as her arm went on fire from shoulder to wrist. “What are you—?” But the pain was gone before she could complete the protest.

  Nik released her and Mac ran her fingers over intact skin. “Bioamplifier. The nans will replicate your DNA signature, then concentrate in your liver and bone marrow.”

  “So you can still find me if I’m in pieces.”

  He paid her the compliment of not disputing the point. “Yes. Potentially even a century from now, under the right conditions.”

  “Good to know.” But not the happiest thought, Mac decided, rubbing her arm, although the technology had interesting potential for her work. She wondered if she could get the specs.

  If she ever worked again.

  “There are some important limitations,” Nik continued. “The one of concern to you is that it only works reliably if you’re on a planet surface. The artificial gravity of ship or station tends to blur sigs together.”

  She appreciated his candor, especially when it answered questions she’d been ready to ask. “So, my orders are to stay on the ground. You don’t mind if that’s in one piece, do you?” God, she was getting punchy, Mac thought. There’d better not be any important decisions in her immediate future.

  He frowned. “We are doing everything to minimize any risk—”

  “So you can retrieve whatever I learn from the Dhryn about the Ro. I know my value.” The moment the words were out, a gauntlet between them, Mac flushed again. “Nik, I didn’t mean . . . I know you . . . This is . . . I’m not . . .” He was looking at her in a way that made it impossible to finish any of it. Mac knew her face had to show everything she was feeling: the bewilderment, the longing, the fear, all served with a hearty dose of pine sap, scratches, healing flash burn, and dirt.

  Awkward didn’t begin to cover it.

  “You can do this, Mac.”

  “If you say so, Mr. Trojanowski,” she replied, fighting to stay calm.

  It didn’t help Mac’s equilibrium when Nik traced her swollen lower lip with a fingertip, his eyes following his finger as if mesmerized. “Just don’t get close,” he whispered, as if to himself, then leaned forward and kissed her again, so lightly it might have been a dream.