Chapter 9
Zharina
My two brothers appeared on the bridge at the same time I released a heart wrenching scream. Startled, they looked at me with a panicked expression.
“Rhad, take me back! We have to go back!” I shouted.
“What?! The base is blowing up!” he exclaimed, flabbergasted.
“Gavin died. His soul is trapped over there. I have to bring him back. Please!” I pleaded, grabbing his arm with both hands.
“Fuck!” Rhad hissed.
Despite the fear in his eyes, he slapped his hand over mine, and the world vanished before us, only for us to reappear in the deepest pit of Gharah’s lair.
We never had a chance of avoiding the plasma-infused rock fragment flying in our direction.
We materialized directly in its path. It embedded itself in my brother’s chest. For a split second, I thought it had stabbed him directly in the heart, but it punctured his lung instead.
He doubled over, blood shooting out of his mouth.
“Rhad!” I shouted.
“Catch him! There’s no time!” he replied, his voice wet with blood.
I glanced ahead, and in the nightmarish firework of explosions, flames, and collapsing debris, the most beautiful light beckoned me.
I threw my hand towards it, calling it to me.
It dashed forward, unable to resist my will.
I closed my fist, and the luminescent coil of Gavin’s soul wrapped around it.
“ZHARA!” Rhadames screamed when a violent explosion had the entire floor before us collapsing.
The vacuum of space immediately started sucking everything out.
“GO!” I shouted back.
I couldn’t tell whether he heard me or not as he whisked us away at the same time I spoke that word. We appeared on the bridge only to see people gathering around Vahl with terrified expressions. He had fallen to one knee, clasping his chest, his face constricted with pain.
I realized then that, through the Geminate bond, he had felt Rhad’s wound and everyone else believed he might have perished.
“Zhara! Rhad!” our father exclaimed when he saw us.
He jumped to his feet and caught Rhadames just as he was crumpling to the floor. Only then did I realize that two more plasma shards had embedded themselves in his body and we’re burning him from within.
“No!” I breathed out, kneeling next to him.
“Leave him,” Vahl ordered, his voice strained as he half-crawled to our sibling’s side. “Go tend to your mate in the medbay. We’ll take care of Rhad.”
Without waiting for my response, he gestured for Lenora to approach. She rushed to him and slapped her palms on Rhadames’ leg. The burning rock fragments instantly started coming out of the wounds.
“Give me your pain, my Gem,” Vahl tenderly said to Rhad while slipping an arm behind him and pressing his hand over the puncture wound in his chest.
Guilt burned my guts that I should leave my younger brother in this state, especially considering I was partially responsible for his wounds.
But Gavin was my priority before his soul began to decay.
Although it didn’t fix anything, I was at least grateful that, as a Geminate, Vahleryon was able to take the pain away from Rhad, or at the very least share part of it so that it would lessen his suffering.
But knowing my twin and how protective he was of us, I knew he would take all of it so that Rhad could be as comfortable as possible until he could be fully mended.
As I ran towards the infirmary, a sharp pain on the right side of my pelvis made me realize I’d also been stabbed by a few rock shards.
Without slowing down, I invoked my powers to heal it.
The presence of the foreign object slowed things down.
But as the severed tissues and muscles rebuilt themselves, they pushed the shard out enough for me to be able to yank it out.
The four smaller ones just fell out on their own.
I turned the corner of the hallway just in time to see the broad silhouette of a Braxian entering the infirmary.
Even though all of this had felt like an eternity, Rhad and I had barely been gone more than a few seconds when we teleported back to the ship to rescue my mate’s soul.
Therefore, it was unsurprising that they had still been on their way to bring him to that room.
I burst inside the Infirmary just as the massive male was laying Gavin down on the medical bed.
Skye—another Veredian healer—was already busying herself setting up equipment to put him in stasis as soon as he was revived.
Considering the horrible state he currently was in, we couldn’t leave him on standard life support.
His body wouldn’t be able to survive without first performing a major reconstruction of most of his organs.
We just needed to fix him enough so that his body could receive his soul.
Rushing to Gavin’s side, I nearly knocked the Braxian out of the way so that I could slap my free hand onto my mate’s chest. Tears pricked my eyes as I now got to see the full extent of his injuries both visually and through my powers.
He never should have been able to survive this long…
I knew nothing of the inner workings of the berserker powers.
But I could only assume that they were what allowed him to endure what he did this entire time.
When things settled down a bit, I would have to examine him through my healing lens to see how his body changed and how that protection worked.
Skye swiftly placed a couple of nodes on Gavin so that we could put him into stasis as soon as we were done, then joined her efforts to mine.
She worked on his heart and lungs while I focused on his brain.
The damage was far too extensive to be handled in one session.
It would take many days, maybe even weeks.
As soon as we got into a state where his body was just over the threshold to be a viable host to his soul, I placed my still fisted hand over his heart, and the mesmerizing light of his soul uncoiled and seeped back into his body.
A violent spasm shook him, and he took a loud and raspy breath.
The monitors lit up and a thousand alarms went off screaming at all the critical organ failures and grievous injuries.
Skye slapped her hand on the interface of the medical console, and his body instantly went numb. While all the readings on the monitors remained critical, his status shifted to stable, artificial though that was.
Overwhelmed, my knees nearly buckled with a mix of relief, shock, and distress. I pressed my palms on the side of the bed, hunched over as I battled the tears that wanted to well in my eyes. I had not been prepared for this. Nothing could have prepared me for any of this.
“He’s going to be fine,” my father’s voice suddenly said behind me.
Startled, I turned around to find him standing a couple of meters away.
“When you and Vahl were still just toddlers, your Nana brought me back from a similar state,” Dad continued in a reassuring tone. “You saved his life like he saved yours. You did good, Zhara.”
Lips quivering, I nodded, still struggling not to fall apart.
“Rhad has teleported home to get healed. He will come back shortly to take you home to your Nana. Between the two of you, your mate will be as good as new,” he said with a smile.
I opened my mouth to thank him, but different words spilled out.
“I’m sorry, Dad. I didn’t mean it,” I blurted out before tears poured out of my eyes.
“I know, my darling. I know,” he replied gently as I rushed towards him to throw myself into his arms.
He held me tightly with one arm around my back, his right hand gently caressing my hair as he kissed the crihnin on my forehead.
“I’m sorry, too,” he said softly. “All that matters is that you are all safe now.”
It shamed me to be bawling my eyes out like this. I’d always taken great pride in being strong. But I hadn’t seen him since our ugly fight three days ago. Added to the traumatic experience I just went through, I didn’t know how to handle it.
Embarrassed, I straightened and wiped my tears with the back of my hand in a very unladylike fashion while sniffling.
“Is Sohr okay?” I asked.
His face darkened in a way that spelled trouble. “He’s injured but mending. We’ll talk about all of this later. For now, take care of your mate.”
“I love you, Dad,” I said.
“I love you, too, Sahena,” he said with the same infinite tenderness that shone in his purple eyes.
Although I knew beyond any doubt that he had forgiven my cruel words, I would make sure to remind him that I truly never meant them. He had hurt me, and I lashed out in the ugliest way. I never imagined I had such a dark side to myself. It now featured on top of my list of things to work on.
A discreet knock claimed our attention.
“Come in,” I called out.
Lenora hesitantly poked her head in, then walked in when all seemed well.
“I figured I could help with the melted armor,” she said sheepishly.
“Yes, that would be fantastic,” I replied gratefully.
She smiled and walked with determined steps towards the medical bed.
My father glanced at Gavin, and a troubled expression crossed his features.
I couldn’t say if the extent of his injuries had prompted that reaction or if it was the haunting memory of his own ordeal nearly two decades ago.
During a rescue mission gone wrong, he had burned alive.
Without my Papa—his Geminate—sharing his pain and holding his soul, he would have died.
He kissed my forehead again, caressed my cheek, then left the room.
When I approached the medical bed to resume healing Gavin, Skye stepped in front of me, blocking my path.
“We need to heal you first before you work on your mate,” she said disapprovingly.
“But—”
The argument died on my tongue as she sternly glared at me. It was part of the basic training every healer received. Unless any delay would result in the death or irreversible damage to a patient, we were to heal ourselves first so that we could be optimal when tending to others.