Enter the Shroud_In the Pursuit of Knowledge_The Shroud Discord by Bran Nicholls

Author:Bran Nicholls [Nicholls, Bran]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Aarluuk Press
Published: 2018-05-07T18:30:00+00:00

PART 7

The ten-year-old Martian warrior was in the room, watching as the arena’s medical team stuffed the tip of my broken femur back inside my thigh. It should have hurt more than it did, and I heard the doctor say something about slippery skin and steroids, but all I could think about was Synthea.

LeRoy stood to one side as the doctor clicked the last of the plastic bolts into the regenerating tube buzzing around my wound. She had repaired my collarbone with a quick concentrated blast of a trauma laser, and my heart, obviously, had started beating of its own accord, but the femur was another matter.

“You’re the one that augmented him?” the doctor asked LeRoy.

“Yes.”

“You should know better than to hang Martian muscles on a geriatric Earth frame.” She looked at me, and said, “This is going to cause you all kinds of problems.”

I stared back at her as I searched for the missing part of my soul, wondering if it was love or delusion, wondering too if synchronisation was legal, and understanding if it wasn’t. It was LeRoy’s fidgeting by the door, the rapid glances he shot at the corridor, and the way he tapped his thighs with the tips of his fingers that drew me out of my grief, if only out of curiosity.

He caught my eye, and said, “Whenever you are ready, Joe.”

“This man is going nowhere for at least forty minutes,” the doctor said.

“Joe.”

I nodded and slipped my leg over the side of the blood-grained bench.

“If you leave, you risk irreparable damage.”

“And if he stays,” said LeRoy, “he’ll die.”

“What about her?” I said, and pointed at the Martian girl.

“I don’t know what she’s doing here,” LeRoy said. “We’ll find out.”

I started to hobble towards the door, only to have the girl slip a black arm around my waist, and my arm around her shoulder. I let her take up my weight, and we followed LeRoy out of the hospital and beyond the doctor’s curses. LeRoy picked up the pace, pulling a slim triangular disc out of his pocket, he pasted it to the skin behind his ear.

“We’re on our way,” he said, paused, and then, “Two passengers, I think.” LeRoy glanced at the girl and she nodded. “Two, confirmed.”

LeRoy held up his hand when we reached the door at the end of the corridor. He waited for the girl to nod, and then opened it with his palm pressed against the pad in the centre of the door. It shushed open and the smells and sounds of the street bustled in.

“People here notice things,” LeRoy said. “We’re going to get some weird looks, attract all kinds of attention, but we don’t care, we just keep moving. Understood?”

The girl nodded and I followed her lead, too sad to object, only the pain in my thigh felt real, and I focused on it. The pain increased as LeRoy picked up the pace; pushing his way through people wearing suits similar in style and fashion to his own, but less bloody.

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