Chapter 45
I changed into my imperium suit, and climbed into the real cockpit of a Shinka for the first time.
The layout was the same as my VR pod, so it all felt familiar as I sank my hands into the control spheres and was strapped in to the seat.
The only part that didn’t feel quite the same, however, was when the helmet lowered onto my head, and I began being violently ripped into the mind of my battle unit.
“What the hell is this?” I heard myself scream as the neural pathways were forced open with all the subtlety of a splitting migraine.
My vitals spiked on the HUD, and I sucked deep breaths through my teeth, forcing myself to control my physical state in hopes that my body would come back to something normal. Something survivable.
This was nothing like VR. What the fuck was happening? Was this what they meant when they said women couldn’t be pilots? Was it too late to eject?
“It hurts, it hurts, it hurts.” I was chanting in time with my deep breathing trying to get a hold on myself, while hoping this was temporary. “Fuck, why does it hurt so bad?”
“Breathe, kid.” Conrad’s voice projected directly through my COMM. “Calm down. This is normal for your first time making the bridge with a real Shinka. If you can hold on until the link is fully secure, it’ll get easier.”
His voice was unexpectedly soothing, with its deep, smooth notes, and I clung to that respite as white hot, searing agony pulsed down my neck and through my chest. My lungs arrested for long enough to fuel my panic, then the pain moved lower and lower, until it was wrenching through my gut.
I started counting in my head, but that didn’t work. Breathing was the only thing I could control, while my body was being torn apart from the inside out.
I bit into my lip with force and intent, until I felt blood dribbling down my chin in my real body, defying the nerve receptors of the machine by demanding my mind acknowledge my own injury.
My heart rate was still in outer space, and I needed to slow it down, but there was so much violence pounding at the door of my brain, that it was an event to focus on anything other than the fucking burning.
Burning, burning, burning.
“How long does it take to download?” I hissed as that agony finished at my toes, then started its way up my body again. “By the fucking stars.”
“Another three minutes, give or take,” he said so casually. I wasn’t going to survive another three minutes at this rate. “Try to focus on something other than the soul rending pain.”
“Easy for you to say.” I gasped like the wind had been punched out of me through my stomach when white hot pain seared my nethers.
My heart rate grabbed another ten beats per minute.
“Are you sure this is normal?” It was everything in my power not to cry.
I had my suspicions that the only reason I wasn’t crying was purely because my brain was too overloaded to add another action to my existence.
With my body temperature now reaching 101, sweat and chills would mask any tears and sobbing that might manifest anyway.
“Feeling like you’re being burned alive and could die at any moment?
Yes, it’s normal.” His tone was so fucking nonchalant that I hated this man before I ever had a chance to like him.
“Try thinking of a time you felt pleasure. Maybe when you last had your favorite dessert or achieved something great.”
“They only feed us nutritionally complete garbage, and my whole life has been a fucking travesty, and I haven’t achieved anything.” I gritted out through my teeth. Apparently I had some pretty dark thoughts when under a crushing fucking anvil.
I should examine that.
“What about sex. You’ve had sex, haven’t you? Most guys just think about the last time they got their dick wet, and that does the trick.” Again, his tone was deadpan while my whole face miraculously managed to light up hotter than it already was.
“No, I have not.” I said that, but the worst part of all was I immediately thought back to the night before with Elio, falling asleep on his chest, running my hands up the scars he hid from everyone else, and holding onto him on the back of his bike, trusting him with my life and safety.
And then, maybe, I also might have wondered what his tongue piercing might feel like if he—
Nooooo, nope. I was not some fan girl with a crush, but also, why did that sooth a smallest bit of the discomfort?
I wasn’t sure which aspect of that was the most offensive, but all of it ranked on some level.
“Huh. Your life really has been a travesty. I don’t recommend dying right now before you’ve experienced a single thing that makes the human condition enjoyable.
” The impressively bored suggestion ripped me out of the thoughts that I wasn’t trying to think, including the fact that the intimate moments Elio and I had together were only because he thought I was a guy, and now he was right back to hating me upon discovering I was a girl.
Elio would never want me that way. I didn’t think he was the type to ever want anyone or anything in that way.
Which was fine, because I didn’t want him to want me that way either. Because fucking hell, is this what my brain does while under duress? I start fantasizing about fucking hot monsters? If this is evolution, then I want a lobotomy.
The pain returned in full force, and dammit, the day having sexual thoughts about Elio was the only way to save my life was a day that I would rather die.
“You’re a fucking pervert.” Was I talking to Conrad? My subconscious? Who could say.
“How have you fooled anyone into thinking you’re a man if the mere suggestion of sex makes you this uncomfortable?” The eye roll was audible through his tone.
“What? How did you—” I cut myself off before I could say another word, but I was already too late. I hadn’t had the mental capacity to argue, and I just completely fucked myself.
“I suspected it, but that confirmed it. You kids really overestimate your cute little modules.” He laughed, and I was mortified.
“But also, your ring finger and your index finger are the exact same length, so it was a fairly safe bet. Next time you’re trying to fool someone into thinking you’re a man, program in a proper male finger ratio. ”
Finger ratio…
Finger ratio?! Are you fucking kidding me right now?
“I guess no amount of technology can fool a man with a fetish,” I gritted through my teeth.
“It’s more like being observant, but I’ve certainly taken enough fingers all the way into my mouth to know the difference, so you’re not wrong.” Conrad didn’t have a filter at all, and I really wished he did. “Maybe when you grow up, you’ll understand.”
“You’re not even that much older than me.” I attempted to change the subject to buy time, but also because ew. How was this man a professional at anything? If I was such a special snowflake of a person, this seemed like an unreasonable way to destroy my potential.
“I’m thirty-eight, so I actually am that much older than you.” He droned on with technicalities. “I do take care of myself though, so I appreciate the compliment. Good genes are good genes.”
“By the stars, I don’t care.” I groaned through my agony.
“If it helps clear my reputation, my wife told me that trick works. I didn’t just make it up like some creep.
Imagine how fun that conversation was for me: while the woman I married thought she was physically dying, she survived by thinking about her ex-boyfriend railing her.
” The hard life of an unimpressive man. I’d cry him a fucking creek later.
“Granted, it happened before she met me, so it wasn’t personal, but it still didn’t make my day better.
I figured if it worked for her, it would work for you. ”
“Wait, so your wife was a pilot?” Everything I said sounded angry under the circumstances, but that was a genuine question. There hadn’t been female pilots since the brain melting incident, and talking to him was the only thing distracting me from even a portion of the pain.
“Sort of. She was the woman who died trying to be one.”
“Oh.” Well, now I felt like a real bitch.
But also, taking advice from someone who literally died from brain melting in a Shinka didn’t seem particularly helpful.
It was an interesting thing to unpack, and I would definitely have questions, but now was not the star-forsaken time to be thinking about Conrad’s forlorn love life.
“So you’re giving me advice based on someone who died doing this? !”
His tone took on something between amusement and dismissiveness. “That’s irrelevant. The technology has changed a lot since then. I’m sure you’ve got this, Vann Callan.” The mocking way he said my name was unnecessary.
“It’s Fianna Callan, if you must know.” I didn’t know what compelled me to give out that information, but there wasn’t much point in hiding it. “Are you going to turn me in, or can you just let me die in peace?”
“You’re a snarky one. I like that.” Conrad chuckled through our line.
“But no, if you can actually sync with this thing, then I won’t turn you in.
If you can’t, you will, in fact, die in peace, so I won’t have to.
It’s win-win for me, because reporting a stray woman in an all-men’s academy would be a lot of paperwork I’m really not interest in doing.
” Laziness was as good a reason as any to keep a secret, I suppose.
It worked out for me anyway, so I wasn’t going to argue.
“Wait, if your late wife was the one who died—was her last name Shinka?” This wasn’t insignificant information. Because I also knew the infamous woman who died from her brain melting invented Shinkas.