by Mel Odom
Stampede picked up a nearby canteen and held it for her to drink.
Hella remained silent for a while, trying hard not to remember how bad her arm looked. Was the meat really so cooked that it was ready to fall off the bone?
“Scatter wanted to talk to you when you woke up, but Pardot won’t let him.” Stampede looked through the tent door. “Pardot put Scatter under lockdown. When he escaped and came to the swamp where we were, Pardot dropped all pretense of being friends.” He paused. “If you hadn’t been laid up, Red, we’d have bailed on them at that point.” He heaved a sigh. “I really should have already made that decision. That way maybe you wouldn’t be in the shape you’re in.”
“What did Scatter want?”
“When he found out Pardot wanted to amputate your hand, he got all worked up.”
“Why?”
Stampede hesitated. “He thinks he can save it. Or you can.”
“Because of the nanobots.”
“Something like that.”
Hella studied the thick gauze wrapped around her hand and wrist. Thinking of what she was about to do almost made her sick to her stomach. “Help me sit up.”
“You should rest.”
“According to Pardot, I should have my hand chopped off. And if we stay here, I don’t see a good ending happening for us. Do you?”
After a brief pause, Stampede shook his head and twitched his ears. “No. I don’t.”
“Then help me sit up.”
Stampede lifted her gently into a sitting position.
“I need this bandage removed.”
“You don’t want to do this. Trust me.”
“I’m going to have to see it sooner or later, and it’s going to have to be checked for infection.” Hella pushed away all her fear and sickness, but she was afraid it would snap and rush back in on her if she wasn’t strong enough to handle it. “I need to do this now.”
“All right.” Stampede pulled a small throwing knife from somewhere on his person and slit the white gauze that covered her wound. “You might lose some skin. Maybe more. Normally you don’t cover a burn because there’s a tendency for the wound to stick, but Pardot said the wound had to be covered to prevent infection.”
Hella nudged the bandage free. Her head swam as her blackened flesh came into view. It was raw and red in places, like meat that had been burned on the outside but not cooked all the way through. Threads of blood dripped onto her jeans.
She tried to move her fingers and couldn’t. She almost cried and gave up then. Everything was just too hard and too unfair. Blinking back tears, she concentrated on her arm and tried to re-create the rhythm Scatter had taught her.
At first nothing happened. The scarred, disfigured meat around her arm just sat there and nauseated her. Then almost imperceptibly, the rhythm grew stronger and more sure. Her flesh started to heal, tanned skin reclaiming the charred areas.
After a couple of minutes that left her dripping with perspiration, Hella could move her fingers. In spite of the new wave of pain that burned up her arm, she smiled at Stampede. “I don’t think it’s permanent. I think I’m going to be able to fix it.”
Without a word, Stampede leaned into her and hugged her tightly, the way he had when she’d been a little girl. It felt good. But she briefly felt just as frightened as she had back then, and she didn’t like that at all.
CHAPTER 25
Groggy the next morning, her arm still pulsing pain up into her skull, Hella woke when Stampede stepped into the tent. Through the flap, late-morning sunlight fought the shadows for ground space.
“We’re not moving?” Hella sat up by herself, quietly groaning in pain when she inadvertently used her injured arm.
“Not yet.” Stampede passed over a plate of food culled from their remaining supplies. Sausage links, boiled potatoes, and onions filled the tent with a pleasant odor.
“What are they waiting on?”
“Pardot isn’t convinced the fractoid female is going to survive her landing here.”
“If she doesn’t?”
Stampede rolled his shoulders. “I guess we’ll wait until Colleen Trammell has another vision.”
Using her injured arm to hold the plate, Hella lifted food to her mouth with her fingers. “Has she been having other visions?”
“If she is, nobody’s telling me.” Stampede’s ears twitched and his nostrils flared. “I think we’re getting frozen out of the information.”
“We were never inside the loop anyway.”
Stampede smiled, but it was a cold expression that only served to bare his teeth. “I know.” He scratched his chin. “Pardot is also keeping Scatter in a cage. Some kind of electromagnetic field that Scatter can’t pass through. I’ve seen him try a couple times. It’s strange watching him melt away and end up flattening against an invisible field.”
Hella lost her appetite at that bit of news, but she made herself keep eating. She needed to keep her strength up, and she’d been starving when she’d woken up. She suspected that had a lot to do with the energy the nanobots were using to heal her arm. “I don’t like the idea of leaving Scatter behind.”
Rolling an eye her way, Stampede looked at her. “Nobody said anything about leaving.”
Hella shook her head. “I can’t believe you’d think about staying after all this.”
After a brief hesitation, Stampede growled and shook his head. “Right now we’d be out here alone too, Red. With the Sheldons around, maybe that isn’t a good idea.”
“We can take care of ourselves.”
“You’re not at your best.”
“Getting better all the time.” Hella set the plate aside and flexed her hand. Her forearm hurt, but the pain wasn’t as bad as it had been the day before.
“Maybe. But what if that wound gets infected? Even with the healing you’ve done, maybe it’s all on the outside and you’ve left a lot of damage on the inside.” Stampede shook his head. “All this mojo you’re doing, Red, it’s all new to you. If you have problems with that wound and we don’t have medical help … things could go badly.”
Staring at her injured arm, Hella found the healing rhythm again and focused on it. More of the burned areas along her arm went away. After a while she’d gone as far as she could, and she just wanted to go back to sleep.
“For the time being, we’re going to ride with the expedition.” Stampede took her plate. “While they sit, you’re healing. If we’re running through the Amichi Mountains for our lives, you’re not going to be able to do that.” He stood and looked uncertain. “So you get some rest and heal up as fast as you’re able.”
Hella put her good arm across her eyes and sank back to sleep.
Minutes or hours later, a shadow hesitated at the front of the tent. The flickering shift of the person’s presence outside the flaps woke Hella. From the short, slender build, she knew her visitor was neither Stampede nor Riley.
A moment later Colleen cleared her throat outside the tent. “Hella? It’s Colleen Trammell. May I come in?”
“All right.” Hella sat up effortlessly on her bedroll. She cradled her injured arm in her lap.
Colleen entered with a medical case in one hand. She gazed around the tent briefly.
“Stampede’s not here.”
“I know.” Colleen sat beside Hella. “I thought maybe one of the fractoids might be in here.”
“I thought Scatter was being held in a cage and the female fractoid was hovering on the edge.”
“He is and she is.” Colleen rummaged in the medical case and came out with a fistful of hypodermics. “Still, they’ve surprised us so far. Scatter’s not like anything we expected, and the female has managed to survive in spite of everything she’s suffered.”
Hella nodded at the needles. “What’s that?”
“Antibiotics. Steroids. Medicine that will help you get better.”
“Nobody thought to give me these yesterday?”
Colleen eyed her levelly. “Yesterday no one
thought you were going to survive your wounds. I think even Stampede believed you were going to die.”
“I didn’t.”
Colleen smiled. “I know. Now we’re going to see if we can keep you alive. Roll up your sleeve, please.”
Hella didn’t move.
“You don’t trust me.” Colleen didn’t look surprised or offended.
“With all due respect, no.”
“Why?”
“Stampede would say that we have different agendas. He’s more polite than I am.”
“I see.” Colleen took another breath and let it out. “Is there anything I can do to change your mind?”
“Let me talk to Scatter.”
Colleen shook her head sadly. “That’s not going to happen. Dr. Pardot doesn’t like the influence the two of you have over Scatter.” She frowned. “Or the influence Scatter has over you two. Dr. Pardot isn’t sure which way that works. And, frankly, neither am I.”
“Then it looks like we don’t have a lot to talk about.”
Colleen sat for a moment longer. “I wish I could change that.”
Hella wanted to tell her that she did too, but she couldn’t lie to the woman like that because she kept remembering that Colleen was involved mostly because of her sick daughter.
Colleen stood and headed for the tent flaps. “I hope you get better. I do like you, Hella.”
Without a word, Hella watched her leave. She felt tired and sad and empty. Focusing, Hella unwrapped her wounded arm and looked at her burns. For a short time, she drew on the strength she’d built up, triggered the rhythm again, and watched as unblemished skin gradually replaced the burned, oozing flesh. When her head thrummed with pain and she couldn’t focus enough to maintain the healing effect, she rewrapped her arm and lay back down. After a few minutes, she slept.
Stampede returned after dark. He brought three rabbits on spits that were brazed almost to golden brown perfection and stuffed with vegetables and spices. The succulent smell filled Hella’s mouth with saliva, and her stomach grumbled. She couldn’t believe how hungry she was because she’d been eating jerky all day and had felt full until the rabbits appeared.
After handing her one of the rabbits, Stampede sat down with two of them. Dust covered him and dried mud clung to his hooves and lower legs.
“You’ve been exploring.” Hella pinched meat from the rabbit and popped it into her mouth. The grease was filled with flavor. She had been in only occasional contact with him over the comm link in between long naps that had taken up most of her day.
“Scouting the Sheldons.”
“They’re still in the area?”
Stampede nodded and rubbed a hand across one of his horns. “Yeah, but there’s something going on.”
Hella waited.
“They’ve started running patrols through the forest. I think they’re looking for something.”
“Us?”
“Don’t know.”
“If they were going to look around, you’d think they’d have looked around when the second fractoid came through the ripple.”
“They did. You just weren’t conscious when Riley and I had to hide you in the forest. We were lucky and got through them.”
“Oh.”
“The Sheldons weren’t too dedicated to the effort yesterday, but they’re spending more time at it now.”
“Does Riley know?”
“Riley has his men out there keeping the perimeter, but he’s not exploring much farther than that.”
“You haven’t told him about the Sheldon search parties?”
Stampede shook his head.
“Why?”
“Because we’re going to let the Sheldons be our distraction so we can get away from Pardot. We can’t wait any longer. We need to make our break while we’re still in the wilderness, where Riley and his troops won’t be able to run us down with their ATVs.”
Hella nodded and thought about it. The plan was solid enough, and that was all they had. “How long do you think we have before the Sheldons get here?”
“From the way it looks, the Sheldon foot patrols will find this campsite tomorrow.”
Hella thought about that, remembering how large the biker gang was and how well equipped Riley and his team were. “The Sheldons are going to get killed.”
“I think so too. But Riley and his people are going to take some damage too. During the confusion, we’re going to leave.”
“Abandoning the expedition isn’t exactly what we were hired to do.”
Stampede snorted. “Red, at this point if we can get out of this with a whole skin, I’m going to count that as paid in full and a bonus.”
Cold dread spread through Hella as she realized what Stampede was talking about. “You don’t think they’re going to let us leave.”
“No, I don’t. We know too much about their business. It’s a long way back across the Redblight. If we get away from them and tell someone about the fractoids, they could end up chased all the way back home. Pardot has got to know that. The only reason they haven’t locked us up is because you got injured and ended up being sidelined. I got to roam around today because you’ve been stuck here. If we were both able bodied, I think we’d be taking dirt naps or we’d be locked up the same as Scatter.”
Hella thought she would be sick, and the need to be outside and gone was overpowering.
“Chill, Red. You need to eat. Heal up. Get rested.”
“We’re just going to let this happen to us?”
Stampede snorted. “It’s already happened, Red. We’re just trying to manage damage control.”
A chill on Hella’s face woke her; then she heard Scatter’s hushed whisper. “Hella.”
She blinked at the darkness that filled the tent and looked around for Stampede. She relaxed a little when she realized he slept in his bedroll. He held his massive pistols in his hands across his chest.
“Scatter?” Hella started to get up, but the chill on her face pressed her down again.
“Please. Do not move. They are watching.”
“Riley?”
“His men, yes. They also have listening equipment planted near this tent. For the moment, I have nullified it so I can talk to you.”
“Stampede?” Hella had detected the subtle shift in Stampede’s breathing.
“I’m awake.” Stampede spoke softly. “I’m listening.”
The cold drew back from Hella. Nearly a meter from her face, Scatter’s face materialized in thin air and hovered. The fractoid’s features looked flat, like a two-dimensional curved mask.
“How did you get away?”
“I did not escape. I’ve managed to free this much of myself through the electromagnetic field, but maintaining control over this little of myself away from my body is difficult. I need your help, otherwise I am afraid Ocastya is going to die.”
“Ocastya?”
“My mate. Ocastya is the name Pardot gave her when he could not pronounce her real name.”
Hella figured her name was easily as impossible to pronounce as Scatter’s. “She’s your mate?”
“Yes.”
“She’s not recovering from her injuries?”
“Her body is repairing itself very well under the circumstances. I am referring to her self, that part of her that uniquely makes her Ocastya. She needs me with her to completely come back. I have endeavored to explain this to Pardot and Trammell, but neither of them will listen to me. They are only interested in keeping us both prisoner.”
“We know that, but there’s nothing we can do. Pardot isn’t going to listen to us. He’s got his own agenda.”
“I know but you two remain our only hope.” Scatter’s face wavered in midair. “Ocastya is running out of time.”
Stampede pushed out a short breath. “What’s happening to her?”
“Our present bodies are nearly indestructible, meant to last forever, and they very probably will. However, the psychological mind is not meant to do something like that. Experienc
es are layered into our minds, and eventually the core self becomes dissipated and loses its frame. Without proper anchoring, a fractoid self can become irrational. In order to prevent this, we are paired forever, always true to each other because each of us is half of a greater whole.”
Scatter’s face flickered and lost cohesion, drifting into a small Milky Way inside the tent. When he spoke again, he sounded more strained. “Every seventy or eighty years, roughly approximating our original life spans, we have to—for lack of a better explanation and this one simplifies the process far too much—reboot.”
“How do you do that?”
“We share our lives together. When the one of us that needs to reboot connects with the other, information, personality, memory, and self are exchanged. The core person gets rebuilt from the partner. But we have to be together, in physical contact, for that to take place. If Ocastya is not allowed to reboot soon, even if she survives her injuries and the remodeling of her body, she will never be herself again.” Scatter paused. “I cannot bear to lose her.”
Hella lay there quietly and didn’t know what to say.
“I know I am asking a lot.” Scatter sounded embarrassed and mournful all at the same time. “But there is no one else I can ask.”
Quietly Hella tried to figure out what to say, but she never got the chance to decide on a course of action. Gunfire erupted around the camp, chattering in the automatic triple bursts that signaled they were being fired from the security bots.
Stampede pushed himself to a sitting position, his face grim in the muted yellow-white light from an exploding shell that momentarily lit his features. “The Sheldons aren’t going to wait till morning.”
Hella pushed herself up and formed her good hand into a gun. She got to her feet and was surprised by her strength as well as the residual pain in her injured arm.
“We are under attack.” Scatter’s hovering face spun quickly in the darkness, flickering silver again and again as explosions tore through the campsite. In the next instant, the face dissolved and floated through the tent flaps.
“Grab as much gear as you can carry.” Stampede pulled on his backpack, holstered his pistols, and took up his rifle. “We’re only going to get one shot at getting out of—”