Mirror Space - Marianne de Pierres [15]
‘Substandard? But that might as well be murder.’
‘Yes,’ said Lasper Farr. ‘It seems fate has intervened. He is fortunate that he didn’t receive the DNA vaccine. His immune system would have been completely defeated. He’d be dead now.’
‘Then you would have killed him.’ Her voice sounded cold and angry.
‘Circumstance would have killed him. Coincidence. Events. The things beyond most people’s control.’
Thales listened to their conversation, struggling to make sense of his whereabouts. Wasn’t he aboard The Last Aesthetic still? If not, then how long had he been unconscious?
He rolled his head to one side and it pounded. His skin felt raw and hot as though he’d been dipped in boiling water. He tried to think. Lasper Farr. They must be on Edo. And his HealthWatch? Was Lasper Farr saying someone had tampered with it? Someone on Scolar?
Sophos Mianos! Has my father-in-law tried to murder me?
The possibility sent a shot of adrenalin skimming through Thales’s inflamed body. Mianos surely had the authority and the conniving. HealthWatch was administered at birth on Scolar and renewed at yearly intervals. Thales had attended his father-in-law’s clinic since his marriage to Rene; on Mianos’s recommendation. He had been quite pressing, Thales recalled, that he should do so. Perhaps good luck had kept him healthy until now. Good luck? He had had little of that.
He opened his eyes.
Bethany was leaning over him but looking at her brother, her face pinched with worry.
He shifted his gaze to the end of the bed. Lasper Farr stood there, arms crossed, the expression in his grey eyes unreadable.
‘Beth?’ Thales croaked.
Her glance fell to him. It was full of tenderness and something else he couldn’t quite identify. ‘Thank Crux,’ she whispered. ‘Thales, you’ve been terribly ill.’
He groped for her hand. ‘I feel dreadful.’
She nodded. ‘They had to transfuse you. You’ll be weak for a few weeks. But I’ll help you. Lasper says you’ll make a full recovery.’
Thales licked his sore lips. They prickled as if the skin had been removed and his cheeks ached. ‘Why does everything hurt so? My face?’
‘The bacterium caused some necrosis.’ Her saw the look in her eyes again: a nervousness. ‘We’ve stopped it killing the tissue but there’s been some scarring.’
‘Where?’
‘In different places.’
‘On my face?’
‘Yes, Thales,’ she said huskily.
‘It can be reconstructed though. Anything can.’
Bethany bit her lip, her eyes darting in an accusatory manner at her brother. ‘The bacteria have damaged the cell structure. You’ll need to have a prosthetic. Nanites won’t be able to repair all of it.’
Thales let the information digest. In truth he felt so terrible it did not really mean anything.
‘The more you sleep, the quicker you’ll recover.’
He managed to move his head to nod. It was all he wanted to do anyway.
TEKTON
Edo entranced Tekton. Naturally he’d heard talk of the planet built solely of the larger cast-off items of billions of sentients but he had never expected for a moment that it might be beautiful. It was said the planet wasn’t solid but merely an accretion of rubbish held in place by the gravitational pull of an old space station. Because of that the outer layers were less compacted and inclined to move position. A kaleidoscope of reflective surfaces.
Not only that, but he’d the good fortune to arrive on the final day of the month-long annual Trade Fest. Even more fortunate was the appalling physical deterioration of the young scholar Thales, which meant that Lasper Farr and his sister Bethany were immediately engaged in saving the young man’s life, leaving Tekton time to explore.
One entire habitation chamber had been given over to the Fest. Tekton wandered amongst the stalls enjoying the sales talk and the inevitable boasting that went with displays of any kind. He also enjoyed the space and air in the chamber. Though The Last Aesthetic had been a most luxurious ship, space