The Spires of Turris by Christine Danse

Author:Christine Danse
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: scifi, action, gay, lgbt, military, prison, ptsd, aliens, futuristic, age gap
Publisher: NineStar Press

Chapter Sixteen

A lot of noise accompanied the explosion in my shoulder. Alarms blared and metal groaned and my innards slammed against my ribcage, all of it compressed into one screaming sensation. We were falling. We were rising. We were ripping apart.

Going still.

Listening to the silence.

I sagged against the harness like a dead weight, but was not in fact dead. It took me a few moments to realize this, and a few more to realize we had come more or less to a full stop and the ship had not blown up.

Opening my eyes was a mistake. The image on the view screen showed me the diagonal lines of a crazed white-and-gray abstract painting. I closed my eyes again and just breathed, reacquainting myself with the idea that we had not—were likely not going to—die in this landing. I didn’t know how this was possible. Likely it was beyond my capacity for comprehension at the moment. I was still relearning how to breathe.

“Dr. Wells?”

Chas’ voice came to me from another plane of existence. I marked it with relief and surprise. Deep and solid, his voice, like a hand reaching through to grasp mine.

“Dr. Wells? London?”

His concern—and rising volume—grated against my raw nerves. “I’m alive,” I said.

“Oh thank God.”

Buckles clicked as Chas released himself, and the scrape of metal on metal brought me around to myself. I raised my hands to my own harness and let myself free.

“I’m fine,” I said to Chas, who was sitting forward in his own chair, ready to spring to my rescue should I go toppling.

“Good,” he said, and stood. The entire ship swayed. I gripped the chair arms.

“Don’t. Do that.”

A long quiet followed. Chas stood still, arms and legs spread. Slowly he lowered his arms. “We’re going to have to get out of here.”

I was glad one of us was aware of the obvious and could be decisive about it, because I’d left most of my own wits spread over the ceiling. Or that might have been the remnants of toast with honey. I vaguely wished I hadn’t drunk the coffee, because now my hands trembled finely. I’d never had this reaction to caffeine before.

Chas was looking at me. Waiting for a response, I realized.

Right.

I couldn’t quite bring myself to look at the view screen yet. From the corner of my vision, I made out forms like white pillars, large with closeness. I tallied this up with the gentle sway of the ship. “We’re high up, aren’t we?”

“Yeah.”

I took a long breath. I had the bad feeling in my gut we’d survived a fall from space only to perish in our fall from a spire a few hundred feet up.

Oddly, the thought brought me back to myself.

“Okay then,” I said. “We need our things, and rope. Time to put your hobby to work.”

I stood and braced myself. All was fine for a moment, and then the ship began a slow roll to starboard. Chas and I stared at each other with mirrored expressions of alarm. I

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