Chapter 5
Ican’t believe I just left him there.
My skin crawled, anxiety eating at my nerves.
I tapped my wristport screen. It had been two hours, or suns, as the locals from Tern would say, since I’d abandoned D’alton in the temporary med bay to fend for himself.
His confused copper eyes as I bolted back to level thirty-one with a quick “Reach out to C and she’ll let me know if you need anything,” haunted me.
I felt like a total schmuck as I cranked my torque wrench around the water recycler’s loose plasmasteel coupler. The musty aroma of tree pollen filled the air, and fluffy seeds as big as beach balls landed like clouds on my shoulders.
I had no idea why I was fucking around repairing shit in the Tig biome when I hadn’t spoken to another living being in months.
And a few short floors up, the answer to my loneliness lay injured and in need of a helping hand.
Bright red carrot-shaped things grew among the lava rocks where I knelt, black tufts bursting from their tops.
Rows of navy and oyster colored…squash, maybe, dripped from long vines overhead, brushing my shoulders as I angled between them.
My knuckles jammed against a sharp-edged bolt. “Damn it.” I dropped the torque wrench and cradled my stinging hand. Why the hell was I wasting time I didn’t have keeping this biome going, anyway?
I inhaled a deep breath of air so clean I wanted to bathe in it. That was why. Because I could breathe down here. Free. Easy. I shuddered at how much breathing unmasked outside level thirty-one still unnerved me.
By some miracle, I’d forced myself not to reach for the full oxy tank when I’d wheeled D’alton to level ten.
But no matter how busy I kept myself, nothing stopped my mind from free-falling whenever I remembered the day the spores had released their lethal virus.
And I remembered often. Like, multiple times a day often.
If I hadn’t left D’alton behind the second I did, the oncoming panic attack threatening would’ve made me useless.
Sweat that had nothing to do with the humidity broke out on my brow as I bent to pick up my tool and gave the coupler one final wrench. That oughta do it. “C, repairs to the water recycler are complete.” She already knew, but saying it out loud made the accomplishment more meaningful.
Fresh guilt weighed down my tight shoulders.
Would D’alton be ready to move to a room on level nine yet?
Maybe I could redeem myself. But, fuck, would he want to talk about being rescued again?
The idea did my head in. Hope had turned into a dangerous slipknot tightening around my neck many times since those first alarms had splintered my mind. Best to just get by one day at a time.
“Excellent work, Sterling Peoples. The sprinkler system will now require recalibration to all the biodomes.”
My eyelids shuttered closed as I breathed in more oxygen-rich air.
Exhaustion dimmed my wits, even more so than at the end of a harrowing day of boot camp with Earth’s Special Forces Western Division.
I should have been in bed already, but I still needed to wash a pair of coveralls and rustle up something to eat.
The recalibration could wait until tomorrow.
No matter how dead on my feet I was, sleep wouldn’t come without knowing D’alton was safe.
A long tuber squished under my boot as I gathered my tool belt and shuffled toward the glass door that sealed the biodome shut.
Mouthwatering melon infused the air, and a memory of competing to see who could spit watermelon seeds the farthest—me or my loud-mouthed neighbor—flashed through my mind.
Would the yellow-marbled fruit make me puke my guts out like the last innocent-looking plant I’d tried? I continued on. Not worth the risk.
“Has D’alton finished in the infirmary? Does he need help moving to level nine?” I asked C.
If I hadn’t been so antisocial on the day of sporemageddon, I would’ve been celebrating with most of Thermal Station C’s employees, eating cake.
Instead of commemorating fifty years of research and watching the biodome’s plantbot’s presentation on the virtues of volcanic agriculture, I’d been replacing the air recycler in the engine room—again.
Was I grateful to be alive? Sometimes. Would life have been a hell of a lot easier if the biodome’s plantbot hadn’t met its demise with everyone else in this death trap? Hell yeah.
“D’alton of Clan Lasting is asleep in his new pod.”
Well, isn’t that something? A mixture of pride in him and disappointment in myself carried me back to my pod.
Why hadn’t I made it easier for him? Stripping down to my mesh-tec briefs, I wadded my coveralls up into a ball and promised myself I’d wash something tomorrow.
Maybe I could wash D’alton’s clothes too.
I dumped what remained of the bucket of water over my head and sloshed some sani-foam under my pits. After toweling off with a mostly clean towel, I stuffed myself into the shallow hollow on my thin mattress.
My mind wandered as I played an old vampire movie in the background. The engineer who’d been here before me had had strange and limited tastes.
D’alton had looked like death warmed over when I’d left him hanging. But I guessed he’d figured it out. A smart guy would be a pretty damn handy asset to keep this broken-down heap operational.
I stuffed a pillow over my ears, but it did nothing to muffle C’s sing-song voice.
“Sterling Peoples, it is one sun.” It had taken me a while to adjust to Tern’s days, but separating daylight hours by suns and moonlit hours by moons made total sense now.
Though, it didn’t make getting up at the ass crack of dawn any easier.
My gaze shifted to the external camera above my bed, and I switched it on with my wristport.
Pink sand gusted across the landscape as it panned up from the ground to expose the twisted remains of the top five levels of the research station.
Diamond crystals wrapped around the ruined building’s framework, and my sleep-muddled mind likened the morning’s frost to a wedding venue for the undead.
No more vampire movies before bed.
“…recalibration. Then the refrigerator coil—”
Mashing the heels of my palms into my eyes, I groaned. “Hang on, C, would ya? Give a guy a second to wake the fuck up.”
“Certainly, Sterling. Did you literally mean a second, or is this one of the times you’re being figurative?”
Jesus Christ, it was too early for this.
“I’ll let you know when I’m ready.” Yesterday’s coveralls had weird watermelon-like slime halfway up the calf, and I cringed as I slid them on.
I gathered everything off my floor, swearing when I knocked over my half-full smoothie, then stuffed all my laundry into a mesh bag.
Reeking of kale, I hurried toward level nine.
My stomach rumbled in the hovertube. God, what would I do for something that wasn’t green? Something I could sink my teeth into.
The platform locked into place and the hovertube’s doors slid open, blasting me with hot air. D’alton couldn’t stay here. Sweat beaded on my forehead as I knocked on a few doors and yelled out his name, pausing when I found a communal gathering space.
“C? What room is D’alton in?” Glossy white cabinets lined the curve of one wall, and I hustled to investigate. Maybe they’d have a stash of ration bars. At the third cupboard, I pumped my fist into the air. “Yes! Motherfucking payload.”
For months I’d been imagining the moment something salty, sweet and over-processed would meet my tongue, and this did not disappoint. Saliva pooled in my mouth as the fake beefy goodness melted on my tastebuds. Sign me up for anything I didn’t have to grow for myself that came wrapped in plastic.
“D’alton is occupying pod 09-09, Sterling Peoples. Would you like this rotation’s urgent tasks now?”
Not unless they were ‘stuff my face’ followed by ‘check on D’alton’ and finished with ‘wash my clothes before they start looking like the fungus in the Lornian biodome.’ “Just emergencies. Thanks, C.” Sometimes I was nice to her.
A trolley with a neat stack of bins stood abandoned in one corner, and I popped the tab to unseal the top one.
Air whistled out, adding the scent of spicy meat to the sweltering humidity.
Rows of foil envelopes, the same as the ones I’d just stumbled upon in the cupboard, filled the bin.
I smiled and ripped another package open with my teeth, chewing the hearty mantu strips.
Not bothering to check what treasures lay hidden in the other three bins, I wheeled the trolley toward D’alton’s room. I owed him. With those teeth, I didn’t think smoothies would top his list.
“D’alton.” I banged on his door. “You in there?” Of course he’d be in there.
No sane person was awake at one sun. Though that didn’t mean much when the sun never showed itself through the perpetual windstorm.
Or when you lived thirty-one levels below ground.
Windows weren’t exactly a hot commodity in Thermal Station C.
The jerky stuck in my throat in a hard lump as a minute, then two, went by. “I’m coming in. Cover up them jewels.”
I tested the door’s seal, and it slid open unlocked when I palmed it. Seemed he was the trusting sort. Then, I kicked myself for my negligence, and rushed to his side.
His brow was hot and sweat-slicked under my palm. With his knees curled into his stomach, he looked much smaller. I ran my gaze down his shirtless torso, landing on his sockless feet.
He hadn’t showered. Revive gel that should have been peeled off long ago lay in shriveling sheets along his thigh, and a bandage meant to be wrapping his ribs dragged on the ground below the bed like a shedding mummy. And despite the sweltering heat, his body trembled.
“C, why didn’t you tell me D’alton needed help?” I growled.
“Sterling Peoples, you did not have D’alton’s palm scanned as I requested, therefore I cannot monitor his health.”
I whipped to the corner unit ensuite and raised the corrugated flap door from where it snapped into the floor. Inside the bathroom, I filled the cup attached to the wall above the sink with water and hurried to his side.
“Damn it all to hell.” I ignored C’s snit as I propped D’alton’s head up and brought the cup to his lips.
He jerked in my arms, spilling water over a chin the color of burnished caramel. His eyes flashed open, glazed and unaware. Thick copper bands ringed his swirling honey irises under fluttering lashes.
In a series of lightning-quick moves, his canines descended, and his head twisted toward the frantic pulse of my carotid artery. A piercing pain stabbed my neck, then the iron band of his arm clamped around my shoulders so tight I couldn’t move.
Cool water spilled into my lap, jerking my brain online.
“D’alton! What the fuck?” I dug my heels into the ground, twisting in his hold as his swirling eyes showed zero recognition.
“Get the hell off of me!” His teeth—fangs?
—only plunged deeper. His leg bound my calf, and my heart rate skyrocketed.
I’d always been able to get out of a hold. A human one, at least.
How the hell had my employee orientation not covered the fact that Boola drank blood?
Human blood? I couldn’t even look a Lizzard straight in the eye after finding out their shit was toxic and should be avoided at all costs.
That had been bolded and underlined, so clearly privacy about personal cultural quirks wasn’t an issue.
If I didn’t relax, D’alton was going to rip my neck open, but as much as I tried, I couldn’t stop the frantic drum of my fingertips against his spine.
He smelled ripe this close, and the heat of the air mixed with the metallic tang of blood made my stomach churn.
I counted to seven, breathing in. Seven out.
He would come back to himself. He had to.
Sweat ran off my forehead, collecting on my collarbone. All the Boola I knew were happy jokers. I didn’t remember seeing anyone walking around the research station with neck scars.
Glossy white cabinets with a mirror-smooth finish lined the wall across from the bed. In their reflection, I watched D’alton’s soft suckling at my neck and focused on the heat of his lips against my skin.
With a strength I couldn’t match even at peak fitness, D’alton shifted, arranging my body beneath his so that every part of me was trapped in his blood-fueled grip.
My body grew languid. The first sharp sting of pain turned into a heady need. My breaths grew shallow. My mind drifted to places it shouldn’t have. The drunk look in his eyes. D’alton’s velvet lips wrapped around my throbbing cock.
As D’alton’s suckling eased and his eyes grew clearer, he began a mindless thrust into my stomach.
A fraction of a second later, his fangs disappeared from my neck before he gasped and threw his hand over his mouth.
He shoved me away and huddled into the corner where the bed met the wall, fangs concealed under his pressed lips and hands cupping his groin.
I reversed with such violence, I fell to the polished basalt floor, my hip twinging at the hard landing. Lightheaded but alert, I looked up to find D’alton’s horrified gaze fixed on me.