by Casey Lea
“No,” she croaked, but he was already gone, burrowing through the silver safety net and into the icy slush beyond. She dropped to all fours and into a flood of snow. It fountained through the breach made by Zak's departure to set her coughing and choking.
Darsey swam upward again, seeking the curve of the wall. Her hand found it and she gasped at the burn of cold metal. It cut straight through her security field to make her snatch her hand back. She gritted her teeth and persevered, trailing her fingers through pain, searching for a panel edge. She found it and pushed to release a segment of nest wall. It flipped aside and she sprawled into the passage beyond.
Darsey squirmed on her stomach, skidding over drifting snow to turn back to the nest. “Zak.” Her call was little more than a strained yelp, but she crawled on, over the drifts already forming between her and the boy. She wouldn’t lose her son again. Something curled around her ankle and then tightened, pulling her backward. She squawked and twisted to look at her legs. The silver cobwebs were back, but this time they were dragging her away from the snow. More wafted down the passage to lick around her calves and she kicked out. They gripped her anyway and pulled harder, so that she began to slide down the corridor. No.
Darsey closed her eyes and concentrated, then slowly relaxed the very special leash that she kept on her body at all times. All of her cells carried a trace of exotic matter and she normally tried to forget that legacy of her first exposure to a com carrying ExM, but for once she needed it. She let her skin connect with the microscopic passage points all around and felt it slide into them. The rest of her followed and she was abruptly free. She tucked her legs up tight, away from the strange thread, before springing to her feet.
Darsey turned to look for her son, just as fresh snow fountained into the corridor. A familiar voice cursed and spat, warming her numb body with a surge of relief. Zak staggered through the snow bank with Nikareon in his arms and she gave a glad cry, springing back down the passage, but her son responded with a withering look. “Going somewhere?” he asked coldly.
“No. Yes. The shuttle. Come on.” Darsey waded back through the snow to support Nikareon's legs. Zak nodded and shifted his grip, so they could carry his burden down the passage between them. Darsey grew warmer while they ran, until she finally started to shiver. Not a good sign. She must have been well into hypothermia, despite her com field. She dreaded to think what state Nikareon was in, but obviously Zak wasn't about to leave him.
The air grew warmer too and stopped knifing through Darsey's chest with every breath. Nikareon started to stir and she sighed. That was probably good news. He began to struggle, kicking out, so she dropped his feet which made Zak swear. He gave Darsey a look, but she smiled sweetly, or at least hoped she did. Her cheeks were still numb and it was hard to tell. “Rest?” she suggested and Zak grunted, before carefully lowering the rest of his father.
Nikareon started to shake and his eyes opened. “D-d-did I m-miss much?”
“Drakking blizzard in the nest,” Zak answered curtly. “Spreading faster than siphyloids in a brothel.” A chime from Darsey's com interrupted any response from Nikareon. “Don't,” Zak warned. “That frigid whore of a blizzard invaded through our com link.”
“I won't,” Darsey reassured him. “It's not a hologram though. Spoken message only...” Her breath hitched and Zak frowned, but that wasn’t about to stop her. “It's Jace,” she cried and accepted the call without hesitation.
“Mom.”
A sob caught in Darsey's throat and she had to clear it before she could answer. “Honey. What's happ-”
“Don't accept any holo calls. Not one. Understood?”
“Your timing sucks,” Zak grated and there was a brief silence.
“Who's that?” Jace asked softly and the sudden wariness in his voice made him sound like a stranger.
Darsey sent a frond plea to Zak, begging him not to introduce himself yet. She didn’t want her sons to meet now. Not like this. Anything would be better than this. “Don’t worry about him. We’ve more urgent concerns, honey, because your warning's too late. We took a call from Lamidia and our bridge is full of snow.”
“It's Santa's freaking wonderland over here,” Zak added. “What? I'm helping 'honey' paint the picture.”
There was further silence from the com and when Jace replied his voice was strained. “If the frost is aboard you don't have long. The snow's okay-” A sarcastic laugh from Zak and a wheeze from Nikareon contradicted that, but Jace continued undeterred. “Trust me, it is. It seems to be a product of the humidity present in areas claimed by this plague. It won't actually infect you, but anything that looks like ice, or frost will. A single touch and you'll be frozen. It pulls the energy from everything. Your com fields won't protect you. They'll do the opposite and draw it after you instead. It heads straight for the largest energy source it can find, so if it catches you try lobbing a few heat fields, or some torches to draw it off. You need to get out into space uninfected. The ice can’t cross the void.”
“Did you say ice,” Darsey whispered. “Like that?” Her peripheral vision registered Zak's head whipping round, but she kept staring past him at the dazzling tongues emerging from the dark. “Oh, this is bad.”
“Nope,” said Zak, “this is a hell of a lot worse than bad.” He twisted back to look down the corridor behind Darsey and she turned too. More frost settled while she watched, spreading feathery fingers toward them. The ice had them bracketed. It sifted on, to softly cover the last service way they could reach. The one that led to the shuttle bay.
Cold clutched at Darsey's chest long before the ice actually reached them. Her dream of a family reunion was about to die, along with her resurrected baby. Something brushed past her cheek and made her flinch, but it floated on without further contact. A silver web, its strands joined to form an intricate lace doily wafted past the huddled group. It settled over the leading edge of the frost and that frigid advance stopped.
“What the hail?” Zak wondered, but Nikareon slapped his son's boot.
“No d-day d-d-dreaming. M-make like a scared sphincter and v-anish. S-service way.”
Zak turned at once and bent to hoist Nikareon upright, but the Beserk pushed him away. Not me. Just you. I'm too slow. Go. He fell back to the chill floor, exhausted by the mental effort and unable to drag himself any further.
Darsey longed to run and leave him behind, but she knew Zak would never agree. Any plan she came up with would have to include Nikareon. It would also have to be quick. She looked back to the frost and started to shake. Spears of ice had appeared, like instant stalagmites, to saw at the web that blocked them. Its cut strands snapped free to whip through the frigid air and the frost advanced again.
Zak had managed to get Nikareon's arm around his shoulders to pull the older male upright. “Guano, Patri. When we get back to hole-sweet-hole you’re on a drakking diet.”
The Beserk thumped Zak on the back, but was ignored. “D-don't get romantic on me, b-boy. I'm a kidnapping bo-bo-borrage, not your f-father. L-leave me.”
However, Zak started sliding his burden toward the hidden service way and Darsey finally found a plan. She dropped a dozen button batteries from her com to her palm and swung her arm forward in an arc that scattered them down the corridor, past her companions. The fuzzy line of attack faltered, with strips of the frost turning back toward the batteries. It looked like the leading edge of a real frost that had been caught in partial sun to leave only fingers of white while the rest melted. She leaped past her son, aiming for those gaps of solid ground, before throwing more batteries to make her way down the corridor.
“St-stay here,” she yelled back to Zak.
“Where are you going?”
“To the hangar bay. Need a p-path.”
“T-take Zak w-w-with you,” Nikareon begged, but Darsey never looked back.
“The gat's running,” she heard her son state, “but I'll get you out of here, Patri. Easy as a second birth in heavy gees. We'll s
hoot right out.”
Darsey reached the serviceway and placed a hand on its edge, to hurtle through its decorative camouflage into a rainbow world of energy flows. She heard Zak behind her and the scuff of Nikareon's boots as he was dragged along the tunnel. She sprinted awkwardly in a crouch, but made good speed and when she dropped into the hangar at the far end there was no sign of the frost.
Darsey turned back straight away and Zak joined her, breathing hard with Nikareon draped over his shoulder. Darsey gestured them both aside and dropped a grenade from her com to her hand. Zak's eyes widened, but his wings instantly spread wide and he jetted his burden to the far end of the bay. She lobbed the bomb into the empty tunnel as hard as she could and ducked down with her com field on full. “F-fire in the hole,” she yelled and the other two landed to crouch behind a loader, just before a roar and jet of flame shot from the serviceway. The room shook and the roof above Darsey cracked, but that didn't slow the frost. It appeared at the gaping end of the ruined service way, flowing across that conduit’s floor, ceiling and walls to lap at the bright sun now burning in the ship's energy supply.
“You've just fed the drakking thing,” Zak called. “Rung the dinner gong and patted its tummy, orbs and all. Now what?”
Darsey blinked at her son. In the past ten minutes he'd strung together more words than she'd ever heard him use, more words than she thought he knew and half of them were profane. He never sounded angry though, simply abrupt. And honest. Yes, honest was a good word for Zak. She swallowed and found a tremulous smile. “You can make a dash for it now. Get out. Into space. Take a bubble. The frost can't cross space alone. I'm taking the shuttle.”
Zak's upper lip curled at that, but he didn't seem surprised. “Not without us.”
Darsey raised her arm and poured power into her com's blaster until her wrist was vibrating. The hum of her weapon charging carried clearly across the hanger. “Run,” she suggested. “Now.”
Zak turned away without hesitation, pulling Nikareon with him. He dragged his father back from the encroaching ice and directed a last sneer at his mother. “Take care of your hellaciously precious self.” He turned back to support Nikareon and half-carried him toward the landing bay door. Fingers of frost raced along the ceiling after them and Darsey finally stopped staring, to move.
She ran forward, into the cold and fired her com at the hangar floor. The metal buckled and kicked, making her fall and Zak stumble. He looked back at his mother, but she had no time for farewells. The frost stopped chasing him and surged back, to lap at the molten floor by her feet then slick it with ice. The frozen tongues spread so fast they almost caught her.
Darsey levitated upright and sprinted away at full combat speed. She kept her com pulling in power as quickly as it could and used that energy to make her metabolic field glow. The frost followed avidly at her heels and more curved back toward her from either side. She leapt for the shuttle's open door and skidded into the control room. She claimed the pilot's seat and simultaneously used her mind to slam the hatch. The engine spun to life at another thought and she forced it straight to full power. It whined, but then responded and she pushed all of the energy it could give through to the shuttle's shield. Not because she thought it could protect her from the cold. No, she was counting on exactly the opposite. There was only one way she could draw this monster away from her lost son.
Darsey checked the external sensors and despite the power flowing through the shuttle's shield, its hull temperature was plummeting. Perfect. She waited as long as she could, until she was almost blind in a fog of her own breath. Did she have all of that damned parasite clustered on her vessel yet? Impossible to tell, but the shuttle was groaning as its skin became brittle and she daren't wait. Darsey blasted out into space and away from her son. The shuttle shook and rattled and something crushed the cargo bay behind her.
Darsey pushed the engine harder and released the ship's small store of exotic matter into the dark ahead. Would it reach the closest passage point?
It did and the shuttle shuddered, then thrummed when she forced a subspace passage open ahead. The tiny craft made one final, heroic effort and jumped carrying Darsey with it, plus an alien stowaway that had sunk claws of ice through its back.
46
A Plan Comes Together
Amber slumped to the soft, pink floor of Zyl's nest and it rose to greet her with a warm hug. She looked vaguely around their returned vessel, but everything was a blur of red and pink. Her normal vision was swamped by emotion. Her grief alone would have been hard to bear, but everyone with her was reeling too.
Jace was braced against the wall he had fallen into after losing contact with his mother. Misty held him upright and tried to send hope, but his terror at what might be happening to Darsey was too great. His mind pulled Misty's deep into dread and Amber's despair joined theirs. Their fronds exchanged horror in a mutual feedback that started to cascade.
Amber knew she needed to fight it, send calm to break the cycle, but it was too much. Calm was an illusion. One that was beyond her right now. She sobbed and her fingers curled, to dig into the soft resistance of the nest floor. She couldn't do this anymore. She kept drakking everything up and it was all too much. She hunched lower into the ground and realized that its gentle warmth was spreading into her. It flowed through her body, even her fronds and very slowly she relaxed.
Amber sighed and her hands unclenched to lie flat, palms on the velvet carpet. It would be alright. All could be fixed. All would be well-... Wait. Those weren't her thoughts. Amber sat straight again and the deck rippled around her. Be still. There is no strategy to be found in despair.
“Zyl?” She wondered and there was a surge of fresh heat from the ship. “How can I hear you?”
I incorporated DNA from the Ace-father into my person. It seems we are now females with a shared genetic pool. We will always hear each other.
Amber's head fell and she let the warmth from the floor seep through her. This mental bond was a side effect she hadn’t expected when she included Darsey’s genes in her latest body. “But it's nice,” she whispered and felt amusement from Zyl.
It is biologically advantageous. We are stronger together. I note you carry the scent of the Falkyn-father. Is he a mate?
Amber gasped, unable to answer. No, not just unable. Unsure. She and Fal definitely shared a strange closeness, but as far as she could tell there was nothing sexual about it. Which was odd, but undeniable. Even when she’d kissed him to make a point, the emotion aroused hadn’t been lust. She sighed and relaxed, closing her eyes. Romance was a mistake she never wanted to make again. No, not a mate. A close friend.
He is in much pain. I cannot reach him.
Amber staggered upright without further thought. Falkyn needed her. She looked around properly, past Jace and Misty still in each others' arms and leaning on the wall, but the only other person in sight was a crouching figure with a head haloed by the soft rose light to show sharp spines in silhouette. Zariss.
Amber shuffled toward the t'ssaa and he rose from a bundle at his feet. He beckoned her closer and she made an effort to hurry. The dark mass on the deck twitched and her heart clenched. It was Falkyn, collapsed and twisted in upon himself. She rushed to his side and fell to her knees. Fal. I'm so sorry.
Warmth, Zyl added, making Amber jump.
Fal, I'm here, Amber reassured him. I'm with you.
Relax, Zyl purred in gentle counterpoint.
I'm not going anywhere, Amber promised.
Warm-home-relax.
We're all here. We love you.
Sleep.
Amber wrapped herself over Falkyn's huddled form and kissed his hair. Perhaps Zyl had the right idea. “Sleep,” she murmured, adding her thoughts to the ship's strange lullaby. She placed her cheek against his and held him tight, then started gently rocking. They moved together, forward and back... forward and back... while the shoulders beneath her tightened, before suddenly relaxing. Everything about Fal grew very sti
ll, including his grief.
Amber closed her eyes too, but Zyl's voice echoed through her skull, louder than before.
Target acquired.
“Where?” Zariss demanded, while Jace simultaneously said, “Show.”
Unknown vessel at co-ordinates... an image appeared in Amber's head, the solar system swimming around her, to show another ship, linked to theirs by a vector line. I see more, Zyl added and two specks appeared, floating beside the strange craft. The mental image enlarged and the forms grew to become fuzzy silhouettes. There was another jump in size and they could make out two pale ovals. Faces, but still too distant to show any features.
Two males. Their profiles match either mermaridian, or larger than average human.
Jace slumped against the wall again and Amber's despair returned. Clearly this ship had nothing to do with Darsey.
“Do you know them?” Zariss asked and Amber quickly rose to her feet.
“That doesn't matter. They're refugees. Look at their ship, it's completely iced. We have to save them.”
Zariss stared down at her and his tongue flickered. “We are already moving to do such. I was merely hoping to gain further data.”
Amber's hair stirred in embarrassment. She certain-sure hadn't meant to offend her rescuer. She folded her arms across her chest, trying to hold in panic and despair. Where was her mighty intelligence now? She hated danger. It ruined every thought process she had. “Of course. I'm sorry. I haven't offered my thanks either. For saving us.”
The image in her mind's eye moved closer still and the couple floating in space became clearer. Amber's eyes widened at the same moment that Jace hissed.
Misty pushed away from him and a knife appeared in her hand. Amber sighed, then shuddered. This rescue was about to get nasty. Zariss crossed the nest in two strides to tower over Misty. “What threat do you see?”
“Beserks,” she growled and a sword dropped from the reptile's com to his hand too. “A pair of bustwings called Zak and Nikareon.”