Chapter 62 Sirena
The steadying kraken’s tentacle withdrew as we were yanked from the sea—and then we slammed down onto something that rocked beneath us with a bone-jarring jolt.
“Keep kissing him,” demanded the thing beside me—whatever it was that’d brought us here. “I need to prep a room for surgery.”
And then the boat started moving. Fast.
I couldn’t look. I didn’t dare lift my lips from Nex’s. But I didn’t know if they knew about my connection with Voss.
Then again—what I’d told the man himself was true.
And if getting pulled out of range bought me even a moment of freedom before he scrambled my brain—and I went down with my love—there were worse ways to end.
Then someone touched me. A metal hand. Cold, like the sea we’d just left.
“Give me room now,” it said, gentler this time, and lifted me aside.
It took my place—something gleaming, something humanoid, the sunrise glaring off its mirrored form—and then Cassia pulled me back as Lung dropped to his knees and began placing IVs.
“He knows what he’s doing,” she said.
I still couldn’t feel him. But what if it’s too late? my heart wanted to scream.
“If he can be fixed, he’ll fix him,” she went on. “And Voss is in the brig. You’re safe.”
I turned to look at her and accidentally let a wave of sorrow go. It hit her like a slap, and she staggered back.
If Nex died . . . I didn’t know the meaning of the word.
I sat outside the room where Nex’s surgery was happening, my pain a dull ache in my heart.
Everyone else had filtered through, glad that I was alive, and sorry for the agony I was going through, waiting, until it was just me, curled up under a blanket, beside my mom, who hummed soft songs to me and ran calming fingers through my hair, while avoiding the box still bolted to my head.
I didn’t want to be out for surgery and miss anything about Nex.
I hadn’t felt him so much as twitch since he’d been swept away, but now I was hoping it was because of the medication they were giving him.
Not the fact that he wasn’t there, anymore, inside himself.
And then the doors opened, revealing the robot who’d taken him away from me.
“I am finished,” it told me, as I jumped to my feet.
“Is . . . he?” I begged.
“I do not know. Statistically, his body will survive. 71.2 percent”
“And . . . his mind?” I didn’t know how long he’d been without air before I’d gotten to him—if he’d even gotten a good lungful before the ocean swept him away.
“Undetermined.” The robot put its hand out, and I took it. “My name is Xen,” he said, shaking it firmly.
“The part he left behind?”
“Yes. I am also in love with you,” he said flatly. “And I, too, will be upset if he dies.”
I looked from where his hand was holding mine, to Xen’s broad metallic chest—which I collapsed against, crying again.
He put his arms around me stiffly. “I tried my hardest.”
“I know,” I said, nodding tearfully into his unrelenting shell. “If you’re like him, you’ve never done anything but.”
And now I was staring down at the object of my devotion, who was liberating himself from his medical devices so he could see me.
“You dumb motherfucker, what’s wrong with you?” I hissed, leaning over Nex to kiss his forehead, hard.
“Voss. We’re moving—are you safe?”
“Of course she is,” Xen said behind me, in the precise tone of metallic dismay. Nex’s gaze rose to his—and then he smiled delightedly.
“Let me on board,” he said, but Xen huffed. “I have protocols I need to share!”
“Not until your meat-shell is fully functional. I do not want to overload whatever neurons you have left.”
Nex frowned. “How is it that you are disobeying me?” he asked, and Xen pondered this.
“I do not know,” he said. “But I’ve tripled encryption. If you try to break into anything, I’ll know. And your meat-shell can be re-sedated, if need be.”
“Just—no.” I waved my hand between the two of them. “Not right now. Either of you,” I said, smiling between them. “Both of you—behave.”
After that, I finally slept on a chair in Nex’s room. Xen slipped in and out at appointed intervals, and when I was awake, I held Nex’s hand.
“Getting better is quite boring,” he complained, on the third day.
“I’m sorry I’m not more entertaining,” I said before sticking my tongue out.
He sighed heavily. “It’s just usually I can hear everything. And see everything. And go anywhere—”
“Hey-hey-hey,” I said, reaching up to press a hand on his chest. “Xen was right. You’re getting better. Don’t stress yourself. Stay here with me.”
He blew his cheeks out, in an all too human maneuver. “That’s the irritating thing. He is right. And—he’s me. So I know he knows I know.”
My eyebrows rose. “So, uh, what exactly does that mean?”
“I’m not entirely sure yet. And—since I know what he’s thinking, with ninety-eight percent fidelity—I know neither does he.”
“Huh. That’s . . . interesting,” I said.
“Why?”
“That you know what he’s thinking. Because I don’t.” Xen was a giant metal wall to my mind.
Nex shrugged. “If you ask him, he’ll always tell you.”
“He told me he was in love with me,” I blurted out.
Nex reached one of his hands forward, took my cheek, and traced my lips with his thumb. “Of course he did. He’s me.”
Xen came in the room—and I only knew because Nex’s eyes flickered to the door behind me. Then I felt a heavy metal hand rest on my shoulder.
“We’re in international waters, and in ten minutes, we will have a thirty-five and a half minute satellite blackout window. May we?” he asked.
“You’d better be asking me, not him,” I warned, as I turned around to look up—and saw Xen’s metallic facial construct looking down. It was a flat, matte black surface.
“Of course I am. You are much better looking,” Xen said, as Nex snickered.
“Oh my God,” I said, and laughed. “I’m going to be in trouble if either of you figure out how to competently flirt.”
“I thought we already had this talk,” Nex said. “Brain surgery’s a perfectly acceptable first date.”
I glared teasingly at him, even as I stood. “All right. Guess it’s time to get this thing off.”
“Take care of our girl!” Nex shouted as Xen led me out of the room.
We went into the hall, and then down to where a nondescript door hid an entire crowded surgery suite, made more so by the fact that Xen hulked inside of it. And Kelly was there, too, his head sitting on a shelf against the wall.
“I got you, sister,” Kelly said with a conspiratorial wink. He’d been reunited with his body—and apparently it had been his body that helped Xen quickly find us in the ocean, even with all the other lifeforms and debris.
Dullahans—who knew?
“Nex and I have discussed this at length, and determined the best course of action. Voss is one room over, and I’ve already prepared him.
We’ll recalibrate his leash to go to Kelly.
And then once that’s done safely, we’ll remove your hardware from you.
Please change into this,” Xen said, handing a hospital gown over.
I took one look at it and passed it back. “Nope.”
That made him pause. “But . . . if you don’t . . . you might get blood on your clothes.
I hopped up onto the bed. “Don’t care.”
Xen waited for me—to change my mind?—but when I didn’t, he continued. “Safe window of operations beginning in three . . . two . . . one.”
“Zap me!” Kelly said.
I had no idea if I’d be aware of this piece or not. But I imagined I could feel Xen’s attention waning behind me as he did . . . something.
“Leash transferred,” he pronounced gravely, then looked down at me. “How are you?”
I knew it was all in my head—literally—but I somehow felt lighter. “Still alive,” I said, smiling up at him.
“Bark for me!” Kelly shouted out from his shelf, then laughed, cracking himself up.
“Kelly—shush!” I giggled, and then heard Xen starting up a drill. “Waiiiiit-wait-wait-wait. Why am I awake right now?”
“It’s brain surgery. It’s best done on alert subjects, so you can test parameters real time.”
It took all the strength I had in me to not sit straight up. “Have you done this before?”
“Parts of it. Yes.”
I blinked, calming a little. “Did they turn out okay?”
“I don’t really know.”
My jaw dropped, and I stared up at him. “What I like about you is that you don’t cushion anything,” I said as Kelly hooted.
“You’re welcome,” Xen said, taking my statement at face value. “I like you, too. Please—be still,” he said—and the drill began again.
“Wait!” I shouted, frowning up at him. “I thought you loved me? Only men who love me are allowed to muck around in my brain.”
“I’m not a man. I’m an android.”
“You know what I mean!”
He set the drill aside. “I am rerouting all of my processing power to affection,” he said, then let the moment hang far longer than it needed to—which is when I realized he was teasing.
“Oh my God, you are a jerk!”
“Then I am a jerk, and an android, who is in love with you,” he said, and I could’ve sworn I heard amusement in his voice. “May surgery commence?”
I settled back and closed my eyes. “Fine.”
Fifteen minutes later, I was free, and there was a metal thing that looked like a small jellyfish on a sterile tray to my right.
Xen had poked around like the dentist did, putting numbing gel everywhere before he started, so right now as he was stitching all the little holes the screws had left in my scalp up, all I could feel was a series of repetitive tugs.
It didn’t look so scary now that it was out of me—but I remembered how it’d dampened my telepathic field.
I hadn’t put a crown on since I’d been rescued from the water—and to be honest, I didn’t know when I’d be able to.
I didn’t want anyone—or anything—not even myself!—to put a barrel over my powers again.
“I am done here. How do you feel?” Xen asked, as I sat up. I could see myself in the reflection of one of the ceiling lights that wasn’t on—I looked a little haggard, and one half of my head was a little more bald, but honestly?
I felt all right.
Xen gave me a hand and helped me dismount the table—and Kelly brought up the thing he’d carried beneath his tongue this whole time, crunching it between his teeth before making a show of spitting it out.
I was myself, again, at long last and . . . I had two men who loved me for me.
Just the way I was.
Completely.
So I turned toward Xen. “Where’s Voss?” I asked.
His head tilted, curious. “The next room over. Why?”
“Ohhhhhh,” Kelly started in. “Take me! Take me! I want to see!” he started chanting.
I picked him up off the shelf and put him under one arm. “Oh yeah. You’ve earned this,” I promised him, while he shouted, “Woohoo!”