She slid down from the console and settled in against the warm panel door, like some cozy, enveloping pillow. A bent knee pressed in at her chest while the other leg lay flat, stretched out to the center of the pad. Fingers wrapped around her neck, seductively caressing, while the other hand pressed in between her legs.
Enjoy. There’s not another human in the world who gets to feel this.
Nothing new from Minerva since their DC broke. She’d managed to take care of both of them all this time with no help whatsoever from him, but John still worried, still felt that simmering dread in his gut. He had zero control over her fate. He was effectively useless. And when she’d last asked him to rate his pain, he’d replied with the trusty old five. It’d been more like a strong seven at the time, and now ranked a steady, searing eight.
Curled in his sleeping bag, heavy head pressed into the packed bag Minerva had thoughtfully slid beneath him before leaving, he rolled a capsule between thumb and forefinger. It was one of twenty-eight remaining diclomorph pills from their combined reserve. They’d already squandered twenty-two on him. Half of the medipads gone. Stem cream, antibiotics, gauze, tape, etset—all intended for a lifetime of rationing. Even if he had a chance at long-term survival, it’d be as a convalescent, a mouth to feed, an anchor, a risk. If they were somehow able to escape this lions’ den, Minerva would be forced to live out her days as a caretaker, and he as a burden.
John elbowed away the top of the survival bag and slowly raised his head. His ruined neck protested and punished. It hurt less to turn it the other way, but he could only lie on his back or left side.
His eyes adjusted to the glare from the cave opening and Ish’s EV sharpened into focus. Was Minerva deliberately keeping the medkits away from him? Wise, if so, but what if she didn’t return, or came back much later than anticipated? She’d only left him two pills. The first he’d taken shortly after she left; the second lay in the bowl of his upturned palm, nagging him for a trip down the hatch. How many more would it take to slam the door on existence, once and for all? Four? Five to be certain? Five more pills spent from Minerva’s lifetime supply. Or a single multiround from his MW. Another irreplaceable asset; however, not so scarce as meds. Though in two to three more days, those five pills would be used on him anyway.
John sucked in a deep breath and held it, gathered himself, and rolled onto his back as he let the air blast from his lungs. Acid seemed to spray at his wounds from the inside. The agony was worst on his torso and thigh, where the sensation of tearing flesh made him freeze in a full body grimace. He forced himself to sip tiny breaths as he waited for the pain scale to drop from 10 to 9… even just 9.5.
It took a long time. So long that the possibility occurred to him that it may never go back down. That he’d be stuck there like an overturned turtle, a dose of relief clenched in the fist at his side, unable to bring it to his mouth. But it did go down… 9.9, 9.75, 9.5, 8.5, all quite quickly once the peak had released its grip. The opportunity presented, he didn’t hesitate to fling the pill to the back of his throat. He swallowed, stuck his water tube in, and then slurped enough liquid to dissolve the capsule. T-minus twenty minutes until relief.
He once again lifted his head enough to see past his chest to the EV outside. His fone pegged it at 10.06 meters. He labored through raising his legs, planting both boots on the gritty floor, and used his left arm as a third lever to turn his body around. Pivoting on his back, he rotated, powering through without stopping, until the top of his head pointed out the cave.
Dust and gravel rolled beneath his back with a deep scritching sound as he slid, little by little, across the surface. Pushing his legs downward hurt worse than sideways. His right thigh screamed at him to stop, to at least take a break as re-formed and half-healed muscle fibers pulled and tore, delicate embryonic flesh detaching at the edges, leaking fluid.
Back up to 9.5, his body surrendered before his mind agreed. Stinging tears streamed from the corners of his eyes, into and around his ears.
He breathed and waited.
They say suicide is a coward’s escape. Partially true in this instance. He wished to be free from agony, to head off the unavoidably miserable existence ahead, the despair of a driven personality reduced to irrelevance. On the other hand, there was the freeing of Minerva, both physically and mentally, the preservation of her supplies, increased chances of survival. Still, there was a catch to all this.
He resumed sliding. Outside now. Three more meters. Thin clouds overhead. Two meters. One. The front of the EV moved slowly into view like a massive white sister planet eclipsing the violet sky. Zero.
Now for sitting up. Fortunately, the new pill was kicking in, overlapping with the meds already in his system. It would still hurt like hell, but at the very least his murky brain would care less. He wedged his fingers into a hull crevice, pulled with his abs while pushing with his better leg, and folded himself upward 90.
A moment later, the hatch glided up over the roof, revealing the medkit on the floor, just inside. With a guilty sense of triumph, he grasped the handle and set the kit in the dirt at his side.
What if Minerva had considered the possibility of him attempting to self-medicate and overdosing—accidentally or otherwise? What if she’d hid the meds somewhere else? These thoughts clumsied his fingers as he groped at the latches.
Open.
All meds present and accounted for. It wouldn’t be long now. He sighed relief, but it was short-lived. There was still that catch.
Assuming Ish had met with a less-than-pleasant fate, if John died, Minerva would be all alone, with only herself to support. This fact had fallen into the “pros” column of suicide contemplation, as his absence bolstered her ability to travel, eliminated the need to feed, house, and nurse a burdensome companion. However, absent those very liabilities, she could easily lose the will to survive. She might carry on for a time, try to make it to the coast on the slim chance that, despite the lack of any communication, others had actually survived evac and may come for her. That hope would dwindle away as weeks elapsed. Maybe she’d one day get on the skimmer, point it out to sea, toward Threck Country, knowing full well it wouldn’t make an eighth of the journey on a full charge. Or more likely, she’d intentionally set off her HSPD. Let it run its full course. A self-produced overdose.
She needed a reason to live. She needed hope.
Minnie purred as cool water streamed down her forehead, beading and sheeting over her face. A light breeze chilled it further. Her hand oozed lazily from her neck to her chest.
No one else knows this feeling.
Not another human in the world…
Another human…
Aether…
…gone.
John.
She opened her eyes. The throbbing in her chest began to ache, sharp and stabby, or maybe it’d hurt all along. She was hot—so hot. A tiny glimmer of clarity. Fingers grappled at her suit collar. The suit needed to be opened. She could cool down in the wind. But heat was only a symptom, not the real problem.
She closed her eyes once more, pulled her feet in, spread her knees wide, and rested her palms on them. Slow breaths. Prime numbers and… black holes. Primes and black holes, go.
2, NGC 1277, 3, Guthrie 13.09, 5, Cygnus X-1, 7…
After a few minutes, her pulse responded, slowing. Continuing meditation, she felt it safe to pull up biostats to monitor herself. Heart rate: 177. O2 leveclass="underline" 86%. Tyramine, dopamine, ABG, pH, SR, friction, metab: all gradually stabilizing. She ceased meditation at 1039, Messier 77. She’d won. Her mind was stronger than the evil hormones and electrochemical demons.