Paolini, Christopher - To Sleep in a Sea of Stars by Paolini Christopher
Author:Paolini, Christopher [Paolini, Christopher]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Tom Doherty Associates
3.
*Kira ⦠Where are you?⦠Kira?*
Kira screamed as she returned to herself.
The humanoid nightmare still had the tentacle wrapped around her arm, but there was more to it than that. Black threads joined the surface of the Soft Blade to the flesh of the nightmare, and she could feel the creatureâs consciousness pressing against her, seeking to blot her out. The nightmareâs skin was eating into her own as it assimilated the Soft Blade. It wasnât a process she could stop by force of will; the xeno didnât recognize the nightmare as an enemy. Rather, it seemed to want to assimilate with the creatureâs broken flesh, to become one again with its lost parts.
If she delayed, Kira knew she would die. Or least be converted into something she abhorred.
She tried to yank her arm away from the humanoid, and they spun end over end until they smacked into the deck. The flesh of the nightmare was still melting into her.
âGive up,â said the monster, mandibles clicking. âYou cannot win. All will be flesssh for the mouth of many. Join usssss and be eaten.â
âNo!â said Kira. She willed the Soft Blade outward, and it responded with a thousand jutting spikes, piercing the nightmare through and through. The creature shrieked and writhed, but it did not die. Then Kira felt the spikes impaling its body dissolve and flow into the nightmare, leaving the Soft Blade thinner, smaller than before.
The tentacle had sunk deep into her arm; only the top of it was visible above the churning surface of the Soft Blade.
No! She refused to die like this. Flesh was expendable. Consciousness wasnât.
Kira formed the suit on her left arm into a blade, andâwith a yell of desperationâshe cut twice.
Once through her right arm, severing it at the elbow.
Once through the nightmare, slicing it in two at the waist.
Blood fountained from the stump of her arm, but only for an instant. Then the Soft Blade closed over the raw end of the wound.
It should have hurt, but whether from adrenaline or the xeno, it didnât.
The two halves of the nightmare flew to opposite ends of the corridor. And still the creature didnât die; the torso half continued to move its arms and head and chitter with its mandibles, while the lower half kicked as if trying to run. Even as she watched, black tendrils emerged from the exposed surfaces of its insides, reaching and searching in an attempt to pull themselves back together.
Kira knew she was outmatched.
She looked for the alcove: there. She kicked herself over to it, grabbed Trigâs cocoon with her one hand, and then willed the Soft Blade to propel them back along the corridor, in the direction theyâd been headed originally.
As they neared the end of the passage, she glanced over her shoulder at the nightmare. The two parts of the creatureâs body were nearly rejoined. Then she saw the torso half lift its remaining tentacle and point the same small device at her as before.
She tried to duck her head behind her arm.
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