Transformation Space - Marianne de Pierres [6]
‘Spread out and find spaces close to the sides. Leave a path free through the middle of the cave. Juno, set watch at the mouth. Then we shall eat and sleep.’
He heard more murmurs of approval as the carabinere surged past him to find resting places in the cooler dark. Juno and Josefia stayed closer to the light, sorting the remaining food from Djeserit’s last fishing trip.
A short time later they called everyone to them and handed out the last portions of the xoc. Several days old now, the sea creature tasted bitter. Yet its dry flesh filled the gnawing emptiness in his belly. Trin had ceased to think of food as a pleasure; it was merely a necessity, of which there was never enough.
‘I’ll fish again tonight,’ said Djes to the group.
‘And we will begin our search for other foods, and bring more water back,’ Trin added.
Despite the bitterness of the xoc and the discomfort of the gravelled cave floor on which they sat, people began to contribute ideas. Optimism sparked into a flame.
A few nights without constant wearing travel, dehydration and exposure would return even more of their confidence. And Trin would be there to steer them. He had been right not to mention the craft he and Djeserit saw from the mountaintop. His people were too fragile for false hope.
JO-JO RASTEROVICH
There had been very few instances in his life when Jo-Jo Rasterovich hadn’t been able think of a reply to a question. But this was one of them.
As he knelt beside the mercenaries Randall and Catchut, clawing at the inside wall of the Post-Species ship that held them captive, he had nothing to offer.
‘Rasterovich!’ Randall’s imperative was sharp and unhappy. ‘At the risk of repeating myself, how are we going to get us out of this fucking thing?’
Jo stared at the ridging on the ship’s smooth inner skin where Mira Fedor’s biozoon had torn itself away from the Medium. He shook his head. ‘I’m the one who had the idea that we should get out. Your turn to come up with how.’
Rast shot him a frantic intense stare. The mercenary looked worse than shit, Jo-Jo thought. Her hair was messed stiff with dry Extro goo, her skin was whiter than anything that had blood running beneath it should be, and her eyes … They reminded Jo-Jo of a trapped and vicious animal, one that would gnaw its arm off to get free. He had to think of a way to get out of the Extro ship, or Randall would likely kill herself, and possibly him, trying.
He sympathised with that feeling. His iniquitous confinement on Dowl station and then a recent stint paralysed beneath Extro goo with only his own thoughts for company were enough to convince Jo-Jo that death was preferable to further entrapment.
No doubt the stare he bestowed back on Randall matched hers for lunacy. But thanks to the interference of the newly discovered, and infinitely obtuse, Sole Entity he found he could still think, as well as panic. Randall’s unfocused terror suggested that she couldn’t.
Whatever Sole had done to Jo-Jo’s mind had given him the ability to think in two entirely different ways. It wasn’t like that all the time, but under pressure he felt the division like two slices of fruit sliding apart. Emotion and logic – clearly separated, not messily and inextricably interwoven as it was for most sentients.
He glanced at Catchut. The ’esque nursed a broken wrist and a groggy expression that ruled him out as a source of ideas.
‘If it’s anything like human tissue, the scar is always the strongest part. Like a broken bone. Let’s concentrate on an area close to the edge of the scar.’
Randall nodded. ‘Sounds right.’
No, it didn’t. Jo-Jo knew it as he said it. The Medium had travelled though space and res-shift; there would be no weakness. But he needed to keep Randall distracted and working on something while he thought of a solution.
He picked a spot near the corner of the scar and began pinching at it. It was surprisingly malleable. ‘Help me.’
Randall immediately began gouging with her fingers. Catchut leaned a hand on the wall but didn’t have