Infinite Waste by Dean F Wilson

Author:Dean F Wilson [Wilson, Dean F]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Dioscuri Press
Published: 2020-01-13T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter 29 – Making Room

Skip didn't make a good prisoner. He kept antagonising the guards, much to El-erae's dismay, though she had a way of talking that made it seem like she'd come to terms with everything, even him.

“Your actions will get us both killed,” she said. She almost seemed fine with that. Her statement was more matter-of-fact than anything else.

“Maybe even a dozen times,” Skip quipped.

He didn't joke so much when the guards opened the cell. He thought this was it. Death number two. It was funny, that. Humans usually only got one. It made Skip wonder if maybe cats chased rats because they had more lives than them.

The guards entered, and Skip involuntarily flinched. He wasn't sure why. He had trained for this. He had taken beating after beating and been tortured to death's door. He was ready for death. He just wasn't sure if he was ready for what was beyond.

But the guards passed him by and seized El-erae. He expected her to scream and fight, but she offered no resistance. Stars, they could have just asked her to escort herself out. She might have been at peace with it, but Skip was at war.

“Hey!” Skip shouted, but one of the guards kicked him back. Normally he would have grabbed that boot, twisted the leg, snapped the knee, and moved on to the next one. But now, after having died once, his reflexes weren't the same. He hoped it just required some time. He hated the idea that maybe part of him, the fighting part, hadn't come back with the rest of him.

They hauled El-erae outside, kicking and screaming, then slammed the gate shut.

El-erae's shouts diminished slowly as she was dragged away. Then the silence kicked in. That was when Skip could hear his own racing thoughts. It was also then when he saw a vast shadowy form, a billowing black smoke, creep down the corridor, passing by his cage. It almost seemed to turn and look at him, and he felt a horror beyond horrors. It continued on, down to where El-erae had been taken.

Skip tried to calm his breath. He'd learned techniques for that too, and they'd largely become second nature—except for now. He found the basics were becoming a struggle. His doctor had warned him about this at his last fitness test before taking position on Gemini. He gave him pills to counteract things. Those pills were in his armour, wherever they had taken that.

Skip tried not to think about the shadow, and tried not to flinch at his own. He suddenly felt like a child again, shaking as his father told him stories about the Umbra. They'll get you if you don't go to sleep, his father warned—as if that would help him slumber.

He listened out for El-erae's distant whimpers. It was silent. Maybe she was dead now. Maybe, after all, they only got one life. In place of her comforting presence and encouraging calm, he let his fears and paranoia build something else.

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