Aftermath - Ann Aguirre [76]
“Are you hurt?”
“Just sick,” he clicks in reply.
Odd, I can detect his misery when we speak his native tongue. The vocalizer only offers a limited number of normal human inflections, so I wouldn’t be able to hear his distress or confusion like I can right now. It’s a low thrum that coats each intonation, and I feel it inside my head, more than hear it with my too-human ears.
Pushing up, I find my limbs are shaky. This pad is similar to the one Dace showed us, but the arch has crumbled, and these crystals are broken, unlit. Powdery fragments litter the ground, as if the power has been expelled in a tremendous burst.
“Anything I can do?” Crawling over to him, I check for obvious physical damage and find none.
“It will pass. I think.”
At his gesture, I rest beside him and wait for the shakes to abate. I’m a little queasy myself, as if my bits and pieces might not be connected in the same order in which they flew apart. I take stock in our surroundings; it’s a mirror of Mareq, only brighter and more colorful. The plants are more vibrant, blooms in rainbow hues sprouting from the canopy.
Eventually, I ask, “Better?” because he’s rummaging in his pack. Thank Mary it made the journey with us, or we’d really be fragged.
“Much.”
“Any idea where we are?”
“I suspect we activated a gate of some sort.”
Yeah, I’ve been thinking along those lines myself. “Wonder if Dace made up that omen stuff, if she meant to dump us here in revenge?”
“I do not believe so. She seemed sincere.”
Which means she thinks there’s something on this side of the gate we need to see. I recall she believed we’re akin to the ancients and the gods they worship. Maybe the ancients passed through these gates. Maybe we’ll find them. Despite the lingering sickness, that sends a thrill through me. A discovery like that is almost as awe-inspiring as charting a new beacon. In fact, you could argue there are certain similarities though we’re exploring a new world, not grimspace.
But close enough to delight my adrenaline-junkie soul.
“So what now?”
“The logical course would be to attempt to find some means of returning whence we came.”
“Too bad this gate’s broken.” I think maybe our passage overloaded it.
“Indeed.”
I push to my feet and offer Vel a hand up. He regards me for a long moment, then accepts my aid. That makes me feel good, despite the generally catastrophic nature of our situation. I can’t think when I’ve ever helped him, except, maybe, for those moments in the swamp where we sang for Adele together. It’s always been him saving me . . . and I’m not used to that.
He activates his handheld . . . or tries to. He clicks in disgust as he spins with the device, trying to coax a spark of life. Even I can tell it’s not working properly. There’s no response at all, just a dead, flat screen.
“That doesn’t bode well.”
“Check your comm,” he says.
I tap it, and nothing happens. No juice. No signal. Wherever we’ve gone, it’s far the hell enough away that our technology can’t keep up. Frag me, that’s terrifying. This is the farthest I’ve ever jumped, no question about it, and I didn’t even do it on purpose. I guess that sums up my life, when you come right down to it.
“You have to question what she thought this would accomplish,” I say, shaking my head.
“We are destined,” he repeats with a mocking twitch of his mandible. “It is written.”
But Mary, I’m relieved to see him finding humor in anything. He got so cold and distant after Gehenna, pulled back to a place where I couldn’t reach him. And that hurt because he’s mine. The connection between us makes no sense on the surface; you’d think I would drive him crazy.
“Funny. In the absence of functional technology, I’m thinking we can only guess which way to go. Unless you have some idea?” I eye him hopefully.
Unfortunately, he shakes his head. “This is all new to me though I think it may become quite an adventure. Provided we survive it.”
“There is that.” I turn in a slow circle, studying the slant of the light, the way the trees are growing, and the tilt of the plants. “If my old science