Transformation Space - Marianne de Pierres [7]
Jo-Jo pinched and pulled the area in front of him while he sought an idea. He couldn’t go back inside the Medium data flow now that the substance beneath them had solidified. Not that he wanted to. Being suspended within the Post-Species auditory space, deprived of most of his senses, had been the second worst experience of his life. The first was being shot out into space in an EVA suit with little air and no certainty of being rescued.
Perhaps he should just confess to Randall that he was out of ideas and—
‘Rasterovich!’ Randall shouted.
Jo-Jo couldn’t wrap his tongue around a reply because the floor buckled up underneath his feet and propelled him towards the wall. He tried to brace himself, but the momentum drove him head first into the area he’d been prodding.
Instead of the impact he expected to feel, though, his head was suddenly encased by the wall substance, and a smothering sensation overpowered him. He fought to pull back, to breathe, paddling his hands, pushing frantically. But the wall tightened around his head and began to suck him forward, encasing his shoulders and then his waist.
Again. The Medium was devouring him again.
But this time, as he let go of his spent breath, his head crowned into clear air and space. He blinked and gasped in sweet painfully pure oxygen. Dizziness came and went. His eyes cleared, then blurred, then cleared again. He felt wind on his skin, heat, and then he was falling.
This time the expected impact occurred, jarring every last piece of him, robbing him of breath again. And yet, miraculously, he was still alive. His brain began to organise images and sounds – moans of pain and garbled words.
He rolled over and spat out a mouthful of sand. Suddenly he was hot. Hotter than he’d ever been. His fingers moved convulsively, scraping at whatever coated his body. More sand. Warm grains stuck to his skin.
‘Jo-Jo!’
‘Yeah.’ It took a while, but he got the word out, spitting more sand with it.
Someone he knew had said his name. Mira? He’d been thinking about her, seemed to always be thinking of her. He wanted to look at her face, but sand stung his eyes, so he forced himself up onto his elbows. A haze hovered over his thoughts, his senses only working roughly, but the leverage gave him something to work with.
Darkness. Grades of it. Above him was an expansive gloom littered with sparkling beads. In front of him there was something denser and more … sinister. It struck him as funny that he could come up with that word just now. He wanted to laugh, but a stinging slap snatched that thought away.
‘RASTEROVICH!’
Abruptly his vision cleared. He was outside, under stars, with the Post-Species ship encroaching on the greater part of his vision. Rast Randall was talking to him, not Mira Fedor, and the mercenary was as belligerent as he’d ever heard her.
‘For fuck sakes, get with it! We’re out! We’re fucking out!’
‘How?’
‘We got spat out, maybe? You stink like shit. I dunno.
Let’s get Catchut moving before they change their minds and suck us back in. Or the Saqr find us.’
Saqr. He crawled over to Catchut, positioning himself alongside so that he could hook Catchut’s arm over his shoulder.
‘So far – I’ve had – all – the ideas. Now you – tell me – which – damn direction,’ he told Randall, thick-tongued.
The merc pointed without hesitation to rows of scant dotted lights, high above and beyond the dark shape of the spacecraft. ‘That’s gotta be Mount Pell over there. Which means we’re close to the landing port. Can’t see it till we get round the other side of this thing.’
Jo-Jo shouldered Catchut’s weight, his feet sinking into the sand and his legs trembling. He wouldn’t be able to walk far. ‘You’re sure we’re on Araldis?’
‘Smells and feels like the same dry piece of crap to me. Sure hot enough to be. Now shut up until we’re further away,’ said Rast.
Jo-Jo saved his breath for the effort needed to get past the Medium’s never-ending girth and over the dunes to the mountain.
He felt better as they walked, buoyed by the blood flow returning to