by Rachel Caine
“They’re eating our score!” Suncross was seriously pissed off. “We must stop them, Zeerakull. But little we can do hand to hand here. Not equipped for battle.”
I was still watching. Something odd was going on with these Phage. Generally, they existed in an eating frenzy; eat and move, eat and move. But these Phage seemed to be resting. Curled up as if nesting together . . .
A small one moved from the pack and devoured a chunk of the metallic hydrogen. The most interesting aspect of this was that in the larval state, it lacked any exoskeleton, more like a snake or a segmented worm, though it still had the devouring capacity, judging by the way it was chowing down on Suncross’s cache. The thing wasn’t defenseless, though. There was a stinger in the tail, and it undulated like a snake.
I’d never considered how the Phage were born; I guess I’d assumed that they came out fully formed and ready to kill. But this one looked young. As if to confirm my hypothesis, a grown Phage broke free of the group and pulled it back to the nest. Parent behavior. That couldn’t be right.
I triggered my comms. “Hey, Bea? Put me on with Xyll.”
“Xyll?” she repeated, startled. “Are you sure?”
“Very damn sure.”
“Okay.” She sounded doubtful, but in a few seconds I heard the subtle shift in sound, and then Xyll’s processed, mechanical voice said, “Yes, Zara Cole, I listen.”
“Are there Phage on this asteroid?” I wished I could send images or even video, but we were too far for a visual connection.
“Specify location please.”
Please? Maybe the translation matrix gratuitously added that part. Either that, or a Phage cell was learning manners, which was mind-blowing. “Sending coordinates.” I did with a rapid press of fingers on my handheld.
There was a delay of only a few moments before Xyll responded. “Yes, there are Phage cells present.”
“What the hell are they doing?”
“Doing?”
I never thought I’d call Xyll for a chat, and it was as frustrating as I could have envisioned. “Why are they here? Is it on Lifekiller’s orders? Are they, I don’t know, mining something that could be used as a weapon? Or a fuel source?”
“No,” Xyll said. “They are separate.”
“Separate?” I got that meant not part of the hive mind, but I didn’t even know that was possible. It seemed like Xyll had been the first to awaken. Wait, were these Phage cells self-determinate as well?
“Meaning they are not part of the swarm. They are . . . splintered.”
“Like you?” That was . . . worrying.
“Not like me. I am me. Alone. They are together.” Maybe I was imagining things, but Xyll sounded wistful, as if it wished for a similar connection.
“So . . . a different Phage group?”
“Broken from group. Not listening to Lifekiller or the rest of the Phage. Separated.”
“Like you, then.”
“No.” I could hear a hint of emotion in that blunt statement, frustration, probably, at my failure to grasp the point. “I think. They do not. They . . . drift.”
“Are they dangerous?” I’d never been this close to Phage who weren’t trying to eat my face. Under these circumstances, we could even study them, if we had time.
Xyll replied, “No. They have food. No anger. No hunger. They spawn to create new core, not to harm.”
I thought about that for a second. “Any idea why they broke off from the main group of Phage?”
“Unknown,” Xyll said. “Perhaps discord within the hive mind. Confusion. They may rejoin. They may not. Depends on Lifekiller’s influence.”
“Or yours, maybe?” I threw the suggestion out there, wondering how much power Xyll could exert over its brethren. Clearly our resident Phage cell could sense its kindred, but I wasn’t sure if the ability could expand to making contact.
The long pause told me Xyll was thinking about the possibility. “Perhaps.”
“Well, if you can reach them, try to persuade them to stay away from Lifekiller’s army. Okay?” If this worked, maybe we had a foothold with the Phage. Maybe this splinter group could be turned, the way Xyll had been. Maybe they could become . . . rational.
Ambitious. But short of the destruction of an entire species, it was the only strategy we had.
“Will try. Anything else, Zara Cole?”
“No. That’s it. Thank you,” I added, testing whether that earlier please was a fluke or not.
“You are welcome. Will advise if I succeed.”
Damn. EMITU had hobbies, our Phage cell had manners—the universe was turning upside down right now.
I switched back to Bea and thanked her, then talked to Suncross. He didn’t like the idea of the Phage snacking down on his incredible treasure, but better that than having more of them fighting us. We took the ruthenium back aboard Suncross’s ship, and after the ramp shut and the bay repressurized, Suncross and his boys took off their helmets with expressions of hissed pleasure.
I took mine off too, and this time the musky smell of the Bruqvisz ship seemed almost homey to me.
“Thanks,” I said to Suncross. “That was fun.” I looked down into the bin. The ruthenium was starting to look dull. Then dark. “What’s it doing?”
“That? Nothing. Is harmless,” Suncross said. “Smells nice.”
I couldn’t smell anything at all, at least nothing that got past the general aroma of the ship. And then I couldn’t breathe.
My entire bronchial system just inflated. Lungs, throat, nose, everything suddenly swelled closed. I made a choking sound and flailed, and Suncross caught me, shouting questions as I panicked. I could not breathe.
Suncross got my helmet back on, and that helped a little; I could breathe in tiny gasps, but it wasn’t enough, not nearly enough. And how the hell were the Bruqvisz supposed to help me? They didn’t have any experience with Earth biology, even if they had a med unit. I needed EMITU. Desperately.
Across the distance, I could feel Nadim’s urgent concern and I heard Bea’s voice on the comm. The sounds wouldn’t coalesce into words, but I felt him trying to help, feeding me strength and warmth. It wasn’t enough to counter physiological symptoms.
My vision went gray as I clung to consciousness. If I blacked out here, that might be the end. I can’t maneuver out there. If I go out into vacuum, I’ll drift away in the dark.
It didn’t sound so bad.
Suncross was shouting at me and I wished he’d stop. I couldn’t understand what was going on. I just wanted quiet. To let myself feel Nadim’s love and let it sing me to sleep.
But Suncross wouldn’t let me, and neither would Nadim. Bright orange flashes of emotion popped in my head, almost like slaps. Suncross dragged me out of the ship, then we were floating, spinning together, me in the Bruqvisz’s four arms. I couldn’t see well anymore, but I had the impression of motion and the sickly bright spiral of starlight flashing inside my helmet. We clanked against something, the landing bay, maybe? I was holding on as hard as I could, but my throat was so tight and pain spread through my chest.
I collapsed as soon as Suncross let me go. Good. This is good. I can sleep.
ZARA!
The shout echoed in my head like a clap of thunder back on Earth, and I twitched and tried to open my eyes. Suncross was carrying me, and Bea was running ahead of us. Felt like I was gliding, eerily detached. Everything seemed too slick to grab on to. I tried to watch Beatriz; I caught the slice of her anxious face turned toward me, the tears in her eyes, but the effort was too much. I closed my eyes again.
Zara, please wake up. Nadim, in my head. It wasn’t a lizard’s muscular four arms carrying me; it was Nadim, wrapping me in his embrace. Please. I can’t lose you, I can’t. Please don’t die, please . . .
I’m sorry, I whispered. I was a cloud.
Floating away.
Interlude: Nadim
I can’t bear this, but I must. Zara’s life hangs by a delicate thread and EMITU’s skill, and
all I can do is watch and wait and grieve. Is this pain worth the joy? Is love and the rich strength of our bond enough to sustain me when she risks such pain and goes so far away?
Beatriz is with me, and I cling to her; I am as hungry for her love and peace as I am for starlight, but even she is remote now, weeping tears I can’t comfort as she waits to see if Zara will come back to us.
I can’t feel Zara. Without her, what is there? A universe gone half-silent. Typhon warned me of the desperate depths of losing a bondmate, of knowing their song will never ring through the universe. He holds his fragile humans at a distance for a reason.
But I can’t. I love their fire, their strength, their joy; I love their quiet, their tears, their rages. I love how they love, and I can’t stay separated from that wonder. I will orbit it like the brightest, most joyous star for as long as that star can burn, and I will mourn its darkness forever.
Please come back to me, Zara. Losing you in battle would be a terrible thing, but I would know you chose it freely, went to it bravely. But this? A misadventure, a careless mistake? No. Zara Cole’s story does not end this way.
COME BACK.
CHAPTER SIX
Lost Time
SOMEONE WAS SHOUTING my name.
I woke screaming.
My voice exploded from my aching throat, and my eyes opened wide under the pressure of the sheer, red pain that screeched along every single nerve ending in my body, rippling up from my feet to my head. It was fast, at least. But now I knew what being set on fire would feel like.
I tried to move, but I was strapped to the bed in Medbay, and a whirling nightmare of metal, plastic, and sharp poking instruments hovered above me.
EMITU said, “Well, this is a surprise. You died. That would have been regrettable if it had been permanent. You’d have spoiled my perfect record.”
My lips felt dry. So did my tongue. My entire mouth and throat. No wonder it had hurt to yell. I croaked out “Water,” and EMITU squirted some in my mouth from one of his nozzles. At least, I hoped it was water. With our med unit, you could never be too sure. But the taste was deliciously refreshing and coated me in sweet relief. “More.”
“When I’m ready,” EMITU said. Not, I noticed, when I was ready. “How is your pain level, Honor Cole?”
“Not bad.” Apart from the thirst, there were some lingering (and unsettling) deep aches in my lungs, but other than that, my body seemed to be holding together fine. My eyes felt dry too. And ached. “What happened?”
“Ruthenium tetroxide,” EMITU replied smoothly. “The fuel you mined for the Bruqvisz ship was stable until introduced to their atmosphere on board the ship, when it rapidly decomposed into the oxidized version, which is highly toxic to humans.”
“But not Bruqvisz?”
“Happily, no. They think it smells quite enticing.”
Great. Lizard catnip was poison gas. Somehow that didn’t surprise me. “Am I okay?”
“You died, Zara. That is generally not regarded as okay. But after wasting my medical supplies in counteracting the poison, I was not satisfied with failure.” He suddenly held something up in a claw. I blinked. It was a folded origami crane. “Would you like a present?”
I didn’t want to offend a med bot that had just saved my ass. “Thanks. It’s nice.”
“I can fold seven thousand four hundred and twenty-two designs,” EMITU said. “Very soothing. Two hundred eight of those are original to me.”
“That’s awesome,” I said. “Where are Bea and Suncross?”
“Outside,” he said. I didn’t know when EMITU had switched from it to he in my head, but he had. “Honor Teixeira was wailing and Suncross threatened to rip three of my extensors off. He called me junk.”
“I can see how that would be hurtful. Could you please let them back in now?” If I sounded careful, it was because I was still strapped down.
EMITU’s expression couldn’t change, but I had the weird impression he was glad about me using my good manners. My restraints unlocked at the same time the Medbay door slid open.
Bea charged in first and immediately unbuckled the straps on my arms and legs. Her tense expression eased when I sat up. She rushed to me and would have kissed me, except EMITU inserted a flat metal plate between us. “Honor Cole requires a complete decon shower before close personal contact,” he said. “Kiss the tray.”
“I will not!” Bea said. She backed up, but only a little, and her dark brown eyes searched my face anxiously. She tried to touch my cheek, then checked herself at a warning squawk from EMITU. “You’re okay, though?”
“Yeah, I’m good,” I said. I swung my legs over the side of the bed and tested my strength. Not bad. Whatever cocktail of medicines EMITU had whipped up, it seemed to have done the trick. “Suncross?”
“He went back to his ship,” she said. “Since I wouldn’t let him destroy EMITU—”
“Hmph,” EMITU said. “As if.”
“—he said he could oversee the refining of the fuel while you recovered. I’ll let him know you’re okay.” She smiled softly. “You should take that shower because I really, really want to kiss you right now.”
That got me up and moving, staggering to the small cubicle in the corner. I stripped and stood with my eyes shut as the chemicals rained down on me. They burned, and I cringed over what they must be doing to my hair, but thankfully a warm-water shower followed, and I asked Bea to bring my products. She did, along with a silky caftan that was not mine. Bea was the first girl I’d fallen for, though not the first I’d been attracted to, and reaching clothes-sharing status felt like a milestone.
An application of leave-in conditioner later and dressed in Beatriz’s loungewear, I stepped out of the shower—right into her arms—and oh, that kiss. It was a summer day, all the sweet dreams I never wanted to awaken from. Heat and softness and Bea, nuzzling against me until the top of my head tingled.
And that was when I realized that though I could feel Nadim hovering, he hadn’t said a word since I’d opened my eyes. Not a single word.
“Nadim?” I stepped back from Bea and waited. This would not be good.
“I’m here,” he said quietly. His tone was entirely neutral, but I wasn’t fooled.
“Hey, baby,” I said, and put my hand against the warm skin of his wall. “What’s wrong? I’m okay. You can see I am.”
“You were not,” he said. “You were not, Zara. For a moment, you were . . . not. Not here. Not alive. I could not feel you any longer and it was . . .”
He sounded so afraid. No, terrified. My mouth went dry again, the cold creeping into my veins; he was right. I’d been dead. I’d been taken away from him and given back by the miracle of EMITU’s ingenuity. I didn’t know that I deserved the second chance, but I was so grateful for it.
I fell into Nadim. I let go, launching myself free of my body and into him, swimming in his heat and light and beauty, and felt his shock and the lingering bitter fear. I lost you, he whispered, and I heard the mourning in it. I do not know how to lose you, Zara. I cannot—
I know, I told him, and sank deep into the bond. Deeper than was safe, fresh from my deathbed. But he needed to know. He needed to feel me here and know how much I wanted this. How much I would fight to stay.
We spiraled together, light and color and sound and heat and something more, a binding that knitted us together stronger than we’d ever been.
I reached out for Bea and pulled her in, and her rich orange light blended and wove with ours into an unbreakable skein of colors as strong as armor, as rich as gold, as hard as diamond.
True bond.
We spiraled together, slowly at first, and then faster, faster, an ecstasy past anything I’d ever felt from flesh, and exploded upward into the universe like a star. I felt Nadim’s entire skin pulse with it, light rippling beneath armor in rich rainbows, and when it finally faded, I sank down into my body light as a feather. Not alone now. Never alone.
Bea was in my arms. Nadim was with us and ar
ound us and part of us.
“What is this?” Bea asked me. She sounded drunk on it, blinded with the joy of it, and I kissed her and told her, without words, exactly what it was. What it meant.
“Excuse me,” EMITU said, “‘The soft sound shivers / Flowering goddesses stir / This time far away.’ Which means, get the hell out of my space.”
He turned on music. Twentieth-century musical theater, apparently. I wasn’t sure I knew the songs, but they sounded too sweet and pretty for my taste, and I grabbed Bea’s hand and rushed her outside into the hall. Kissed her soft fingers. “First things first,” I said. “Let’s tell Suncross what’s going on.”
“How much of it?” She laughed, and I wanted her to laugh like that again. A lot.
“Just what he needs to know.” I winked, and we went to send the message. Suncross came up on the screen, his crew crowded around him. They’d all gathered, looked like. Prepared for bad news.
Suncross saw my face, and his ruff went up. So did the ruffs of all the others. They trembled and shifted colors into a brilliant red. Suncross lifted all four arms; so did all the others. It was an arm forest.
“You are not dead, Zeerakull,” he said. “We prayed. We were rewarded.”
“You prayed for me? Thank you.”
“Is a rare thing,” he said. “Rare and costly. Each of us gets only handful of prayers in our lifetime. We do not waste them.”
“Well, I’m going to pray for all of you, then. Does that help restore your prayers?”
“Yes,” he said, and clasped all four hands together. The others followed suit. “It is a solemn gift. Thank you.”
“Hey, thank you. If you hadn’t gotten me back to EMITU in time . . .”
“I do not think your machine likes me,” Suncross said. “It told me to die in a fire.”
“He’s eccentric.”
“I do not like fire.” I didn’t know what to say to that, but turned out Suncross wasn’t waiting. “Do you know anything of the Phage? Should we hunt them down? Destroy?”