by K. Gorman
“And that’s not your problem.”
“Yes, it is!” She made a hard, sweeping gesture toward the people around them. “Charise was right! If I am the only person who can do it, then it is my problem.”
“No, it fucking isn’t.”
Soo-jin looked like she was going to say something else, but she bit it back with a jerk of her head. The outburst had caused some heads to swing in their direction, but the bridge had quieted some time ago. When she glanced around, several people averted their gaze, turning to their work.
Soo-jin put her hands on her hips and took a step back, shaking her head as she let out a noisy breath.
“What about Marc, then?” she asked, softer this time, not looking at Karin. “What’ll he do?”
“I’ll leave a message on the relay. Tell him to meet us at Caishen.”
“And that Alliance cruiser won’t catch up?”
“No. I…” She hesitated. “I’ve done the math.”
Soo-jin’s sharp eyes snapped to her. Her frown grew as she read Karin’s expression. “How close?”
“They’ll be less than an hour behind him.”
The cruiser had a higher sustained top speed than the Nemina, but the Nemina beat it in acceleration. That’s why she’d needed them both to break atmo on Amosi.
Of course, everything could be lost if they’d decided to get heavy with their fighters.
Soo-jin chewed her lips, her features pinching in worry. “I don’t like this.”
“Neither do I,” she agreed.
A silent pause shifted between them. Soo-jin leaned away, her head toward the rest of the bridge, but her gaze held in the middle distance, not focusing on anything. The furrow between her brows deepened as she switched her head back, her attention dragging back to Karin as she worked through the puzzle she’d found. “There’s something more, isn’t there? What aren’t you telling me?”
Her spine went rigid. Although she forced it to relax, she couldn’t shake the feeling of dread that pressed into her shoulders as she met Soo-jin’s gaze.
“Christops said ‘Help us.’”
“Yeah, and he also said ‘Eh-yos,’ like some station sim-hopper stoney,” Soo-jin said with a roll of her eyes, shaking her head—but she stopped when she caught the look on Karin’s face. “Wait. Did that mean anything to you?”
Karin’s mouth felt dry. A gauzy sensation put a shroud over her frontal lobe, but she fought it off, hunching her shoulders as she crossed her arms in front of her.
“It’s ‘Eos,’ actually,” she said. “And he said ‘help us,’ which makes me think he was talking about more than himself. And he doesn’t remember saying anything at all. How do we know it wasn’t the Shadow talking?”
“Because Shadows don’t talk. They can’t.”
But, even as she said it, Soo-jin frowned.
As much as they wanted to deny it, they’d both been raised with a sense of logic. Karin saw the exact moment Soo-jin’s engineering brain overruled her denial.
“Oh, fuck us,” she said. “Seriously?”
“Eos was my project codename from my childhood,” Karin said. “I doubt Christops would have known it.”
“And the Shadows already have connections to your mad scientist origins.” Soo-jin shook her head. “Yeah, yeah. It doesn’t make sense, but I see your point.”
“I’ll ask him about it,” she said. “Who knows? The gate only closed seven years ago, and I know Nomiki found some of the corporation on this side of the gate—and he’s from Nova Earth. It’s possible he’s some kind of ex lab tech or something.”
“Possible, but not probable. Definitely ask him.” Soo-jin made a sound of frustrated disgust in the back of her throat and shook her head again. “I still think you’re making a huge mistake. You don’t have to help them.”
“No, but I think it’s the right thing to do. If I don’t, no one else can.” She tightened her grip on her arms, fingers digging into her elbows. “Besides, Caishen has a do-able population. Assuming Hopper hasn’t managed to lose any more.”
He shouldn’t have. One would hope a military op like his could keep proper sleep watches. They had more than enough weapons to take out any Shadows that showed up. So long as they were careful. And those Shadows didn’t wander away from the sleeper to hide in other parts of the ship like she suspected they’d started to.
“Sol, you are going to get us all captured.”
Karin said nothing, only stared.
A few seconds ticked by, then Soo-jin through up her hands. “Fine. Whatever. It’s not my ass they’ll do medical experiments on.”
She strode toward the exit, but Ethan appeared just as she reached the door. He jumped to the side as she stalked past him. As his confused gaze shifted to Karin, his eyebrows arched into his forehead.
Gods, he’s using Marc’s mannerisms now. Clearly a sign he’d spent too much time with them—and yet another reason why she needed to do this.
Without her, Ethan would probably never have seen his dad again. How many other kids out there were like him? She couldn’t save them all, but she could at least help some.
Caishen was doable.
Soo-jin would understand. Karin suspected she did already, but that didn’t mean she had to like it.
Christops appeared in the threshold behind Ethan, his head turned back and eyebrows lifting after Soo-jin, as well. He glanced down as he bumped into Ethan, then gave him a quick, gentle nudge forward.
His attention slipped back up as they continued, swiftly finding her by the second nav desk.
A raw set of emotions rolled through his face, but he quickly hid them. When he came close enough to extend a hand to her, his smile looked stiff and forced. “You must be Karin.”
“I am.”
His hand had a cool, damp feel to it, and his grip shook. Bringing her attention back to his face, she realized what was wrong.
Still recovering.
It had only been, what? Twenty minutes? Thirty? She hadn’t checked much on her other patients, but she knew Soo-jin had elected to stay seated for over an hour after her stint as a Lost—and she’d only been a Lost for five minutes.
Christops had been one for at least two weeks.
“I understand some thanks are in order, and not just for my crew.” He glanced down, one hand slipping over Ethan’s shoulder. His mouth worked, jaw tense and tight. “I’m not sure what we would have done. I—”
Hearing his breath stutter, and seeing the earlier emotions ripple across his expression, she cut in smoothly,
“Ethan’s the one you should be thanking. If it weren’t for him signaling us, we would have left.” She gave him a smile. “Was it you who taught him Morse code?”
“His mother, actually. She was an encryption specialist during the war. Morse was one of her summer projects with him.” He glanced up, nudging Ethan in the arm. “You know, I don’t think we’ve been introduced yet.”
“Not formally, no.”
He held his hand out again. “Well, I’m Christops Grivas, and it’s nice to meet you.”
“Karin Makos.”
He let go and gave her nav screen a glance. “I understand we’re heading to Caishen?”
“Yes, I thought it best…” She trailed off, then gave a vague gesture to the bridge. A fresh blaster mark scorched the corner of one of the dashboards, but its display still worked. “Well, actually, I’m scheming.”
A frown had come across Ethan’s face in the last few seconds. He glanced up at her. “Are you going to heal Hopper’s wife?”
She gave him a tight smile. “I’m going to try, anyway.”
“What about the rest of them? And what if they catch you? You said before…” His frown had changed in tone, from puzzling to accusatory. “I thought you couldn’t.”
“We’ll have five days before Marc and the Enmerkar catch us up. I might be able to get them all.”
Might. Depending on her need for sleep. And how much her light powers held.
She’d never actually tested them that much, which either made this an excellent opportunity to do so, or an excessively bad idea.
Probably the latter.
“What about Hopper? He’s going to try and catch you.”
“Actually, that’s where you come in.” She lifted her gaze to meet Christops’. “I was hoping to use your ship and get your crew’s help. There are a few complications with Caishen.”
“Are those complications related to us willfully missing an Alliance cruiser’s call in the last hour?”
She kept her smile steady. “Yes.”
Fortunately, Ethan did the work for her. He rounded his furrowed brow on his dad. “It’s not her fault. They’re trying to catch her. She didn’t do anything. She just tried to help.”
Christops frowned back at Ethan, then raised an eyebrow to Karin.
“It’s… complicated,” she said. “They found out what I could do after we… liberated a sanctuary there.” She pressed her lips together and took a deep breath through her nose before she continued. “I’d like to talk to them, but I can’t trust that they won’t lock me up in some kind of medical testing facility.”
“She’s been locked up before,” Ethan explained brightly. “They want her back.”
Karin winced. “That’s… not quite how it sounds.”
“Uh huh.” Christops straightened and rolled his shoulders, giving the bridge a lingering glance before he turned back to her. “What did you have in mind?”
“I’d like to get your support. If we can funnel the station’s Lost—those the Shadows have taken—onto the ship, maybe I could heal them in the Mess or something. If I have you guys as security, there’s less of a chance that Hopper and his station crew will try and grab me.”
“Might be best to stay off the station entirely, in that case,” Christops said. “Have them make shuttle trips back and forth. Less risk, more control.”
“Yes. That’s a better idea.” She swallowed, and her heart palpitated in her chest, suddenly hopeful. “Would you be willing to help?”
He gave a short huff. “Considering all you’ve done, and risked, for us, I think we can manage this.”
“We also have a ship coming back on full burn. Would you be willing to part with a few fuel rods? Open your shuttle hangar for them to land? That way, there’s no contact with Caishen, so we can go on our merry way when it’s time to land.”
“Yes, I think we can manage that, too.” He paused, turning his gaze to the rest of the bridge. “Now, where are we on start-up?”
She glanced at the holoscreen. “Engines are still cold. Need another forty-five minutes, it looks like.”
“Give them sixty, just to be sure,” he said. “Sometimes, the gauge slides. We still on a course?”
She reached over and switched to the route screen. “Drifted a bit from the sanctioned trade route, but it’s easy enough to get back on.”
“Good. I see you have things sorted here.” He glanced over her dashboard for a few seconds, then turned to scan the rest of the bridge. “I’ll check with the rest.”
Ethan lingered a moment before he followed, giving her an odd, hard-to-read look, then skipped to catch up with his father. He kept to Christops’ side like a shadow as he struck up a conversation with the person at the sensor station who had been working on life-support system logs.
She turned back to the screen, frowning at the clean arcs and lines that made her route, pausing when she came to the mapkey that marked Caishen.
A light feeling rose through her stomach, followed almost immediately by a tense, frigid sensation that stiffened all the muscles in her shoulders and back. She gripped the edge of the desk hard as the fear rolled through her.
This is going to work.
It has to.
Chapter 17
The care ward stretched in front of her in a slow curve, the outside light from the windows high on the right side of the hallway its only illumination. The sun had switched to the other side of the building, striking the front and western sides of the compound in full light, but to the south, the cypress and fir trees filtered the light into a blue tint.
Karin crept forward, her bare feet curling against the laminate floor with every step. Used as she was to the full sun, the hallways coolness and shade made an unpleasant sensation through the thin hospital gown she wore.
“Miki?”
Too quiet, her voice barely penetrated the hallway’s stillness. Birdsong came from up ahead, a kind of falling whistle she recognized from the gray-flecked sparrows that lived around the compound. Rays of sunlight slanted through a window in the lobby at the end of the hall, catching on the potted fig next to the main desk.
She cleared her throat and tried again. “Miki?”
“She’s not here. Ran off this morning with some of the other ones.”
Dr. Sasha’s sneakers made small squeaking sounds as she came up behind Karin. Her lab coat billowed from her sides, one pocket weighed down by something. As she caught Karin’s eye, she tilted her head back the way she’d come, toward the labs.
“Come on. We’ll get the treatment done before noon, then you can rest in recovery.”
A smile pulled the edges of her mouth. She wore lipstick today, and the deep magenta matched the dark purple shirt she wore under the lab coat.
Maybe she’s going on a date.
Except people never went on dates here. Not the kinds of dates they saw in the movies. Nomiki went off with the boys sometimes, but they mostly just threw sticks around the river and climbed through the forest. No one went to town.
When Karin didn’t move, Dr. Sasha’s smile broadened. She reached out and squeezed her shoulder. “There’s something new we’re trying today. It’ll be fun.”
Her stomach did a small flip. ‘Fun’ was the last word she’d use to describe treatment days, and the mention of anything new made her spine stiffen in apprehension. Normal treatments already left her in recovery for hours. What would this new one bring?
“Come on. I think you’ll like it.” Dr. Sasha brushed a thick, straightened wave of hair from her face. “It’s for a friend, actually.”
She held out her hand, expecting Karin to take it.
Karin hesitated, giving another glance back up toward the sun at the other end of the hall. Then, shoulders stiff, she put her hand inside Dr. Sasha’s.
Together, they walked back into the labs.
They didn’t have the fanciest set up. Most of the hospitals she saw on TV were prettier, but, guest areas and lodgings aside, the compound didn’t care for aesthetics. A special place, raised on funding from varying sources—she and Nomiki represented just two of a slowly growing number of children in its care. They carried special diseases in their DNA, and the compound was determined to fix them.
But it took a long time. Karin had been here since she was born.
Twelve years, almost.
Dropping down a low set of stairs, they ventured into the older section of the building. Cinderblock walls turned the outside heat away, keeping the coolness that made her tense beneath her gown. One of the old fluorescents flickered as they walked underneath, its buzz audible in the quiet space. Dr. Sasha led her to a small, windowless room at the end of one hallway, taking out her keys to open the door and let them in.
As she shut the door behind her, Karin got a sense of being cut off.
The air felt old. Stale. She crinkled her nose as she caught a whiff of antiseptic and manufactured plastic.
“Hop on up.” Dr. Sasha gestured to a hospital bed against the wall as she went for the medical bag on the counter, but then she paused, giving Karin an assessing glance. “Can you make it on your own, or do you need a hand?”
In answer, she nudged one of the plastic stools over from the wall and went to the bedside, leveraging herself up on its supports. Only a year younger than Nomiki, they’d already parted in similarities. Nomiki was athletic, bold, outgoing.
Karin… not so much.
Not that she didn’t try—her sister just seemed so much better at it than she was. Last summer, she’d broken a leg trying to follow Nomiki up a tree, and, even now, more than a few scrapes marked her hand and legs.
Only Nomiki seemed to succeed.
Karin always failed.
And the doctors were treating them differently now.
Dr. Sasha pulled a rubber tourniquet out of her bag and walked over. “Make a fist? Fierce like Diana?”
Diana, goddess of the hunt. And also the protagonist in one of the old TV shows Dr. Sasha forced them all to watch.
She closed her hand and, though she balled her fist hard, the skinniness in her arms made her not even remotely close to the warrior goddess.
“Good job! Very fierce!”
The words seemed more a habit than genuine. Dr. Sasha had been saying it to her since she’d turned five. Karin watched the doctor’s face as she bent over, and she ground her teeth as she felt her flick at the vein in her arm. An I.V. stood close, the clear solution of her treatment ready to drip down from the bag.
“You see that machine in the corner?” the doctor said.
She looked over. Impossible to overlook, the machine took up a third of the small room. Taller than Dr. Sasha, it had a round, cylindrical appearance that, to her eyes, looked suspiciously child-shaped.
She cleared her throat. “What is it?”
“Ah, she speaks! Thought I’d lost you.” A broad smile spread across Dr. Sasha’s face, and she puffed out her chest, making a dramatic gesture toward the machine. “This is going to do wonders for our lab. Do you know what an MRI is?”
Karin shook her head.
“It’s short for Magnetic Resonance Imaging. Old tech, but useful for our purposes. This one’s been updated and mixed with a couple other scanning technologies.” Dr. Sasha pursed her lips, looking down at Karin. “And this is where you come in. You know Brennan?”
She nodded.
“Well, you know how he fell during lunch last week? We’re trying to find out what happened, but he’s still in recovery. I think that if we take a picture of your brain, and compare it with Brennan’s, maybe we can figure out what happened and make him better. Of course, Nomiki’s brain would have been better, since their treatments are more similar than yours, but…” Dr. Sasha shrugged. “Your sister can be so unreliable, can’t she?”