Toxic Page 4

  I gasp in surprise. He is younger than I thought at first—about my age. And he is unexpectedly handsome in a bewitching, irregular way. And suddenly, I can’t breathe. He opens his mouth. He’s frozen on the plank, staring at me, when he finally finds words to speak, the first words I’ve ever heard from a real boy.

  “Who the hell are you?”

  Chapter Four

  FENN

  She doesn’t answer me.

  It’s a girl. Sixteen, maybe seventeen. She’s hiding halfway behind the doorway exiting the ship’s bay. The shock of seeing her competes with the shock of seeing a real, live bioship, with its flashing gold colors against the blue membranous walls everywhere. The girl has straight hair past her shoulders, black as the space between stars but with a startling white lock of hair above her forehead, which flows down in a stripe. Her eyes are brown, skin somewhat wan and sickly looking, like she’s eating the wrong kind of food. She looks Asian, like the grandmother I never met on Asyx Seven. Her eyes are unblinking.

  A thousand questions in my head fire at once—why is she here? Who is she? Isn’t the ship supposed to be empty? But the questions collide with another weird consideration. She’s really pretty. An asinine consideration, because the last thing I should care about at the end of my stubby, short life is pretty girls, but I can’t help it. My face flushes with warmth as I take another step closer.

  She moves back from the door, and I can see now what she’s wearing—a flimsy short robe, mid-thigh, rippling against her body. A tiny pearl pendant glimmers against the hollow of her throat. She’s barefoot, too. What an unfortunate choice of clothing, considering she’s on a ship in the process of crumbling around her.

  She still hasn’t said anything. “What are you doing here?” I ask.

  Nothing. The girl just stares at me. Maybe she doesn’t speak my language. Gammand has stopped behind me and joined the staring match.

  “Who is that?” he asks me, as if I ought to know.

  I haven’t moved on the cargo ramp. Someone stomps behind us—Miki, probably—and the girl sways backward as she eyes the growing cluster of people. Miki moves to my side, and the girl gets a view of her ropy forearms, seeming in awe of her silvery-blue skin and wide shoulders.

  “No, wait—” I start, but it’s too late.

  The girl turns and bolts, her black and white hair whipping behind her.

  Miki shrugs. “They always run away from me.”

  “Who’s they?” Gammand asks.

  “Everyone,” she says, and lets out the signature sigh of the physically intimidating and chronically misunderstood.

  Portia exits the craft and barks, “Why are you all standing here? We have work to do.”

  “There’s a girl,” Miki says. Everything she voices sounds like a growl. “Here. On the Calathus.”

  Portia looks about. “What girl? The ship is empty. Doran and ReCOR confirmed this.”

  I smirk. “My sources say they’re wrong.”

  “Don’t be a smart-ass, Fenn. Well, we’ll have to report that the crew accidentally left someone behind. I suppose she might have come on another transport, too, though we were told there is no sanctioned interstellar traffic in this area,” Portia says.

  Gammand adds quietly, “Well, don’t just stand there, Fenn. Go get her.” He’s already turned his attention to recording our conversation and checking readouts from his own handheld data recorder.

  Portia pokes me hard the shoulder. “Go,” she orders.

  “Why me?”

  “Because you’re in the way, and because that’s your job. You fetch things,” Portia says. She points a long finger toward the exit door of the landing bay. “Go fetch, Fenn.”

  I roll my eyes. My first job here, and I’m only a glorified bird dog. But this isn’t about me anymore. It’s about Callandra and making things right for her. I think of her when she was three years old, with curly brown hair and a red mouth stained with brickberry juice. That was the first time she saw me, the first time her little hands reached for her big brother. Back then, I was the good guy. The sentiment didn’t last. I need to bring it back.

  Right now, I need to obey.

  I take a first, squishy step forward onto the Calathus’s bioskin floor. By God, this ship is really creeping me out.

  “They say that the ship can see and hear everything you do.” Miki grimaces. “It can even taste you.”

  Oh God. “Is it even safe to—”

  “GO!” The entire group behind me yells.

  “Fine!” I yell back.

  I jog forward through the exit. There’s a door on the right and a long corridor on the left. Walking on Cyclo is like running on a really freaking huge hamster wheel—it’s spinning slowly and creating gravity, but you don’t walk on the flat plane of the ship. You walk on the inside edge. There are periodic corridors that go up to another level, with either steps or sliding handrails. Weird.

  The right-hand door nearby is disappearing as a thin membrane closes toward the center, an open oval pinching shut rapidly. I hope it doesn’t grow teeth at the last minute, because I jump through the aperture just in time.

  On the other side is a long, curving corridor, bright blue, with windows strangely set in the floor as well as the walls. I can see the Selkirk embedded awkwardly in the side of the Calathus, as if it were more of a crash landing than a docking. But I can also see the windows of the craft further down, just as the girl whips around a corner and into a corridor blinking bright green at the edges. But I’m close. Very close. If I don’t get her, ReCOR might rescind my contract, and then I would die for nothing. I can’t have that happen.

  I dart forward, barreling down the hallway. There’s a door I didn’t realize was there, with another green, membranous aperture closing fast. I jump through it, and there she is. The girl is not a fast runner, thank the stars. She slows down to dart into a room that looks like someone’s living quarters, and that’s all I need. I leap forward, grab her small waist in both hands and we both crash onto the floor. The girl shrieks.

  “Hey. Hey! I don’t want to hurt you. I just need you to stop running. We need to know why you’re here.” I feel the lie filling my head, even as I say it. “We…just want to help.”

  The girl freezes, and her eyes go from squeezed shut to peeking at me—as if I am the brightest starlight she’s ever seen, and I’m going to burn her retinas out. I can feel her breathing, fast, quick, small-animal breaths, and her eyes study me. She says nothing, but licks her dry lips and keeps staring. This is actually the first time I’ve been this close to a human girl, ever, and my body just realized this. My neck is suddenly sweltering, and I feel a flash of heat down to my toes. God, calm down, Fenn. Calm down. Say something, at least.

  “Do you…do you understand me? Krkshik?” I try a different language. “Brawna? Uh, how about Parlez-vous Francais?”

  “Get off me,” she says in the smallest voice.

  “Okay, so you speak English.”

  “Get off me,” she repeats. After a beat, she raises her face closer to mine. She’s looking at my lips and getting closer and closer. What the hell is she doing? Is she trying to kiss me?

  I squeeze her waist tighter, in case this is a ploy to trick me somehow, but weirdly I’m having trouble feeling my fingertips. A strange numbness starts to creep over my hands and up my arms and legs. The girl is still looking at my lips, but now she’s smiling.

  “Never mind,” she whispers. Suddenly, she slips right out of my hands, which have very quickly stopped working. She wriggles away from me, and next thing I know, my knees are glued inextricably to the floor. I look left and right and see that the blue matrix of the room has risen up like goo and encircled my limbs. It hasn’t touched the girl at all, allowing her to scramble away from me. My body slowly melds downward, and the blood-warm floor starts to rise up against my cheek, near my mou
th, coming close to my nostrils.

  I yell, but there is only a tangled noise at the back of my throat. This ship, this goddamned gooey liquid thing, is trying to smother me. It’s going to kill me any second. All I can see is the wall and the floor rising over my cheekbones to eat me alive, when bare feet plant themselves in my field of vision, ever-so-slightly pressing into the soft floor.

  “Help!” I holler. Before I can stop myself, I cry out, “Callandra!” My sister. God, I’ve only just got here, and I’ve already failed. Callandra, I’m so sorry.

  “What’s Callandra?” the girl asks.

  I gurgle in response. My chest is frozen in place, and I can’t take a deep breath.

  The girl steps closer, and she studies the color flashes around me and through the goo encasing me. “I guess that’s a complicated answer. You should know, Cyclo is not trying to kill you.” Her voice is less high, more relaxed now. “She thinks you’re in distress and you need to calm down.” She stoops low, her hair tickling my forehead. “Were you really trying to help me? Don’t lie. She’ll know if you’re lying.”

  The flashes of color come so quickly in the matrix around me, I can barely register them. A rainbow of hues, plus muted shades, too. I remember that the translators embedded in the walls of the ship aren’t working, so I have no idea what this goddamn ship is saying. Most of my body is numb. Somehow, this thing has managed to transfer some sort of anesthetic into me.

  “Ah,” she says. Her finger touches my forehead, ever so gently. “Only partly lying. Hm. Afraid. And lonely, too, I see.”

  Despite my weakness, I writhe violently. Damn it. No one has a right to read my mind if I don’t want it. This ship is seriously pissing me off, even though it seems to be obeying the girl like it’s some sort of humongous jellied pet of hers. She seems to read the distress in my eyes as the ship itself has gone back to a placid blue color.

  “Let him go, Cyclo.”

  At her command, I can feel the goo begin to retreat. My skin starts to prickle painfully all over as sensation returns. As soon as I can, I get to my knees, forcing air in and out of my chest. The blue matrix is still covering my lower legs. My whole body feels like needles and rubber. Finally, I can breathe normally. I don’t know whether to thank her or yell at her.

  “What is Callandra?” she asks again, now that I can speak.

  “Not what, who.”

  “All right then. Who is Callandra?”

  “None of your goddamned business,” I growl.

  “Where is my mother, Dr. Um?” she asks.

  Before I can grunt that I know nothing about her parental problems, a shout issues from down the corridor. My calves are still entwined with the floor when Gammand rushes into the room.

  He takes one look at the girl standing there, and me half submerged in the ship, and aims a gun straight at the girl. Where the hell did he get a weapon?

  “No! Wait!” I holler, trying to hold up my hand. But it’s too late. Gammand pulls the trigger, his face icy and calm, and I hear a pfft as something flies over my head. The walls and floor of the room flash a bright, blood-red color. At first, I think the walls are actually bleeding, but the color blanches to white. For one eternal second, the girl looks at me with an expression that chills me straight through, like somehow, I’ve broken a promise I never actually made. Like I just broke her heart.

  And then her eyes roll up into her head, and she collapses onto the floor.

  Chapter Five

  HANA

  Oh, my body.

  It hurts all over. I’ve never felt pain like this before. My muscles feel battered, and my joints are like twisted, stiff paper. This is what wakes me up, the pain, not the gentle unfolding of consciousness that I usually experience, sleeping within Cyclo’s matrix. Instead of oxygen being buffed into my skin with blood-warm gel around me, my body is in the open air. The angled contours of my body rest on a hard, cold, surface, and my eyelids seem glued shut. I am ravenous, thirsty, and my bladder is uncomfortably full.

  I’m breathing. I’m alive. But everything feels awful. Worst of all, I am wretchedly rootless without Cyclo surrounding me. I have never, ever woken up like this, so separated from my Cyclo.

  There are murmurs nearby. I keep my eyes closed, pretending to sleep.

  “It should be wearing off by now. It’s been almost thirty-six hours,” a voice says. A young male voice. It’s smooth and warm, and reminds me of the boy who tackled me, which makes my lip twitch. “Did you see that? I think she moved.”

  Warm fingertips encase my wrist. It’s a strong hand, larger than mine. Against my will, my heart rate increases.

  “How much sedative did he give her?” This voice is from a girl, but she sounds angry.

  “Gammand said it was enough to drop a hundred-and-fifty-kilo male.” The hand releases me gently. Inwardly, I frown.

  “That’s a three-fold overdose. Maybe she won’t wake up. Good. Less work for us to do.”

  “Shut up, Miki.”

  Then, silence.

  I try to stay still, but I’m fully awake now, and I’m itching to stretch my sore legs and shoulders. How very odd, that when I need to stay still, all my body wishes to do is the opposite. I crack open one eye, and the bright light triggers a tickle in my nose.

  I sneeze violently, bolt upright, and a scorching sensation tears down my aching back. I nearly pee without wanting to. “Ooww.”

  “Good morning to you, too.”

  The boy who tackled me, and the blue girl, wider and larger than three of me, stand several feet away. Both have their arms crossed. The boy wears a reluctant, tiny smile, but the girl only scowls at me.

  “Where is my mother?” I ask.

  “Your mother? Who’s your mother?” the boy asks. “Why didn’t you evacuate with the Calathus crew?”

  The girl moves in front of the boy and blinks purposefully. A hologram of data shows up in front of her face, like a visor-shell of glowing green information. It scrolls too fast for me to read, and it’s backward for me, at that. There’s some sort of red bar graph on the edge that’s got only a sliver of green at the bottom. “What’s your name? Your universal ID?” Her voice is deep and biting. “The Morpho recognition program does not have you registered in its database. Your DNA is unregistered, too.”

  So while I slept, they scanned my face and took tissues samples without my permission. Should I say that I don’t exist because I’m not supposed to? I open my mouth and shut it again, unsure.

  “We don’t know who your mother is. I thought I heard you say her name. Doctor something?” the boy asks.

  I shouldn’t have asked. Won’t it get her in trouble? Won’t it get me in trouble? But I’m already in trouble, and there are other problems. And these problems are staring at me right now.

  “Why are you here?” I ask instead.

  This time, they are the ones staying silent. “Doran,” the blue girl says. The reverse face of an elderly man—blue like the girl—shows up on her holo visor. “The girl is awake. I’m going to my post to start my phase two. We’ve already attached the last fifty scanners on the ship. Fenn will finish up the examination.” She shuts off her holo visor and heads for the door.

  The boy, Fenn, looks angry. “What examination, Miki? I’m no doctor. I have my work to do, too, you know. Why do I always get stuck—”

  “The protocol’s in your files, Fenn.” She winks at him. “You studied it a month ago. Just get it done.” She heads to the door. “Remember, we’ve known you for nine months. And it only took one month before we all figured out your bullshit.” She grins. “Have fun babysitting.”

  Miki leaves before Fenn can say anything further.

  “I am not a baby,” I tell him. He ignores me, so I add, “I am sixteen years, ten months, and five days old.” I think for a second. “Perhaps six days.”

  He ignores me
and murmurs angrily with his back to me. I go to the tiny lavatory in the room to relieve myself, and I return to find him fiddling with an oblong, rounded box, touching the keypads on it here and there. It must be taking readings of my biometrics, because he keeps tapping away. Curiously, he wears a wristwatch. A completely unnecessary item to have when time is embedded into any ship or piece of equipment anywhere.

  “Is it mechanical?” I ask.

  “What?”

  “Your watch.”

  He looks up at me, surprised. He smiles quickly, before extinguishing it, as if afraid to show happiness. “Yes. It is.”

  “Automatic? Or manual?”

  He smiles again, this time without restraint. “It’s manual. I like having to wind it myself. It’s not quite right—off by about a second a day. Needs a thorough cleaning. You know what a watch is?”

  “Yes. I’ve a habit of studying old Earth culture. I like…cooking.”

  The boy beams. “Me, too. I mean, I wish I could cook. For real.”

  “And I like knitting. And writing. On paper. Mother did, too.”

  “I made paper once,” the boy says. His eyes are alight, as if he’s only just woken up for the day, though he’s been technically awake all this time. “So you’re an antiquist, like me. Why do you like it?”

  “It’s interesting,” I say. “Well, and also…I am establishing myself as a person knowledgeable in a vast number of subjects.”

  He laughs. “You sound like you’re applying for a job.”

  “I do really love antiquist things, but it helps if they think I’m useful.”

  “Who?”

  “The crew of the ship. That is, when I was going to meet them.” I frown. All that preparation, for nothing.

  “What are you saying? That if they don’t like you, they’d…get rid of you?”

  I say nothing, but of course, that’s the fear.

  “You don’t need to prove your worth to exist,” he says. And the words are a small supernova in my mind. What? How could that be? How could I possibly not need to prove my worth on this ship, when I was never allowed to exist to begin with? He can’t possibly be correct on this.