Chapter 13 More Questions
More Questions
Jace opened his eyes. He saw blue. Blue everywhere. And then the face of an angel. Blue skin, blue on blue eyes, flowing white hair and a concerned expression on that beautiful, blue face looking down upon him
Am I dead? I’m not in pain and that never happens. So I must be dead. And that is definitely an angel.
There was a giggle. I wonder how Khoth would respond to being called an angel! Knowing his Thaf’ell mind he would immediately think that you were unwell. But you just think him angelically beautiful!
Gehenna?!
Jace rocketed upwards. His mouth opened to say her name as he broke the surface of the liquid. Luckily, he had a mouth-piece over his lips or he would have been drinking that liquid.
Yes! It’s me! And you’re you! And we’re together and alive and everything is glorious! The AI enthused.
“Jace?” Khoth had his arms around Jace’s shoulders as he helped Jace take off the face mask.
Jace took in a grateful breath. Despite it being there to help him breathe underwater, it had been annoying out of the liquid. Once off his face, the mask retracted on it’s own into the pool and disappeared.
“K-Khoth?” Jace asked as the “angel” became the Thaf’ell commander firmly in his head once again.
His mind started to fill back in with the wild time they’d had to get to Gehenna. The pain he’d been in was but a distant memory though. In fact, all pain seemed to be.
“Are you well? Your vitals appear…” Khoth looked over his shoulder towards a holographic screen that showed some kind of readout. Jace recognized the jumping line as his heart beat. “Your vitals are in the green range. But that does not always signify complete health.”
“I feel…” Jace paused and swallowed. His voice sounded a little ragged.
He was thirsty. He knew that much. But how did he feel other than that?
It was what he didn’t feel that was boggling him.
That no pain thing. That sense of wellness.
It was something he’d never actually experienced before and he couldn’t quite quantify it now. “I’m not sure, to be honest.”
“You have undergone an ordeal,” the Thaf’ell commander stated softly and there was a flicker of--what? Guilt? Relief? Combination of both?--in those blue on blue eyes that reminded Jace of the universe.
There were parts of his memory that were a little hazy. Maybe that was what was causing this strange well feeling. He frowned as one of those hazy moments surfaced. “Did I… die?”
“Yes, you were clinically dead for five of your Earth minutes,” Khoth answered.
“Huh. Okay. Well, not dead now so… that’s good?
” Jace flushed as he heard himself make what should have been a statement into a question.
“Wait! I didn’t mean to make that sound like a question!
It’s good not to be dead. Very, very good.
I can’t tell you how good, to be honest. Just… spectacularly good.”
“You are still orienting yourself. It is understandable if you were not able to assess your own well being at this time,” Khoth said without judgment.
Jace remembered something else then too. “You, evidently, made up your mind not to simply take Gehenna and leave me to face my fate. I’m alive so… you saved me.”
“I only did what was…”
“Right?”
“No.”
“It wasn’t right to save me?” Jace lifted his right eyebrow expressively.
Khoth was suddenly not meeting his gaze but was watching the screen where Jace’s vitals were, but then that screen winked out of existence causing Khoth to just stare at the surface of the pool.
Finally, he answered, “The needs of the many should outweigh the needs of the one.”
“But the many are made out of ones,” Jace stated.
Khoth’s head jerked up as if Jace had said something profound, though he knew he hadn’t.
Some could say that since his own life had been the “one” in this case that he could hardly argue on behalf of the individual meaning more than the society without it sounding completely self-serving.
But Khoth didn’t seem to be reacting to that.
There was something in his eyes though. He surprisingly gave a sharp nod.
“Yes, I do not regret my actions, but I fear that they will likely earn me exile,” Khoth stated.
“What? No! That can’t be! That’s not--oh, my God, what is that?!”
Jace had been blinking and looking around them. He caught sight of a squid but made of metal and tubing. The glass skull suddenly lit up and the squid was looking at him.
Jace! Gehenna called to him merrily.
“That is--” Khoth began.
“Gehenna! Holy crap! So I didn’t dream she was a gigantic metal squid!” Jace laughed.
“Indeed not. It was not a form I thought she would inhabit,” Khoth agreed with him.
Oh, this? This isn’t my form! It’s just one of the Osiris’ cleaning bots! Gehenna explained as she disconnected a tube to her glass head.
“You took over a cleaning bot?” Jace said out loud.
“What?” Khoth’s forehead furrowed. “I did not--”
“It’s Gehenna, she… Gehenna, aren’t there any speakers on that thing that you can speak out loud so Khoth can hear?” Jace asked.
He felt Gehenna blush. He couldn’t exactly explain how his mind received a physical action as a mental one but it did.
I could rig something up, but… she hesitated.
But what? He prodded.
But it wouldn’t sound like me!
I’m not really following. You--
I’ve rather gotten used to sounding like I do to you, she hastily explained and her tentacles quivered with anxiety. There was a rustling sound as they brushed against one another. I’d rather wait and talk out loud after I fix something up properly!
Jace found himself smiling fondly at her. I guess I do understand. Though I would have thought for an AI that since you can have any voice you want that it wouldn’t matter what you sound like. Are you attached to the cleaner bot body? Is that going to be what you inhabit from now on?
She raised some of the tentacles and the tips had different tools on them that whizzed and buzzed. I admit that this form is rather useful. But it’s not… cute.
No, not cute. Well, Jace cocked his head, I don’t know. It could be cute. But in an evil sort of way.
She showed him some wicked looking little buzz saws, some pincers and other pointy things he couldn’t imagine what they were for on the tips of other tentacles.
I know, right? But it was all I could get a hold of.
And, thankfully, it doesn’t require that much power to operate. I had to conserve energy.
Jace knew there was a story there, but he wanted her to tell it when others could hear. It suits you for now. We can find you something cute later, right?
Oh, yes! I’m really interested in inhabiting the Storm Spike! For us to go flying together and--
The Storm Spike is definitely real? Like really real? Jace felt his heart beat a little quicker.
Of course! She told him and spun around. Her tentacles flew up rather like a dress. I had a good look at the Osiris’ manifest. I needed to see what material I had to work with.
I can’t wait to see what you inhabit next then, Jace said. Will it be cute? Sleek? Cuddly? Deadly? Or a combination of all of those?
Oh, all of them if I can help it! She paused and then said with a tentative gesture of her tentacles towards him. Uhm, Jace, speaking about inhabiting cute forms… you should check out your own. Khoth was while you were transforming, Gehenna chuckled.
Jace frowned. What was she talking about? Then he noticed he was naked. Where had his clothes gone?! They’d been on him when he went into the liquid! He was sure of it. He then blushed because he realized that yes, he was naked in Khoth’s arms and still sitting in the pool.
He didn’t believe Gehenna’s words about Khoth checking him out.
Khoth was… well, whatever else the Thaf’ell had going for them, big, muscular physiques and strong jaws with attractive features were on the top of that list. He was sort of scrawny and had no muscle tone and--he stopped himself.
He was fine as he was. He was happy with who he was.
Considering his illness that he was alive was… awesome.
But still…
He was naked.
With Khoth.
In Khoth’s arms.
Jace immediately moved to cover himself when he saw the back of his right hand and forearm.
There were electric blue lines running along his veins and arteries.
As he stared, they faded and then disappeared altogether, but he had a sense that the blue, almost indigo color was just hidden, not gone forever.
He blinked. But that wasn’t the weirdest thing about his body.
And that had been weird. No, it was the fact that he had muscular forearms.
He closed his hand into a fist and watched as the muscles flexed and moved beneath his skin. He’d always been attracted to guys with muscular forearms. His had never been anything like this.
Gehenna… What happened to me? Am I this big all over?
He didn’t dare look down at his body. He shifted his legs and they felt different. Bigger. More muscular.
Yes! Gehenna explained. You’ve been optimized! Not only are you a peak physical condition, but the Osiris added a bunch of new things to you. Fast healing. Super strength, well, for a human. Slowed aging. I’m not sure if you age. Uhm, let’s see, there’s so much here--
I mean… I mean… Do I still look like me? Jace asked, even as he was stunned by her words. He lifted his right hand to his face, but quickly dropped it. What if he had tentacles too?
Of course! Gehenna laughed. You still look human on the outside.
On the outside? He gasped.
Well, you’re… uhm, evolved? Yes, that’s probably the term I should use, Gehenna mused. Improved makes it sound like humans aren’t good or something and they clearly are! They must be the best of the Seeded Species, after all the Osiris chose you over anyone else to be the Pilot.
Jace just blinked. This was too much to take him. He felt a little dizzy. But that, he realized, was because he was hungry and thirsty. And overwhelmed.