Chapter 13
Chapter thirteen
Her quarters spun around her. Wynn stumbled, reached out, and caught her balance on the wall.
They’re gone. They’re gone. They’re gone.
The floor shifted beneath her feet. Sips of air passed her lips, but she couldn’t get a proper lungful. Head bent, she braced her hands on her knees.
It hadn’t really hit her at first. The disappearance of her scars had shocked and angered her, but now the truth settled deep inside her, forcefully shoved there along with the knowledge that she wasn’t fully human.
Both truths battled for dominance while the room spun. Her skin itched, feeling too tight on her body, like she needed to take it off and replace it with another.
That spinning, out-of-control sensation had plagued her through her teenage years, culminating in the loss of herself when her parents had died.
Before Foster’s death, it had been so long since she’d given in to the urge to stop that spinning sensation with self-inflicted pain.
A slice here, a cut there. It helped to calm her thoughts and focus her mind.
She’d always healed the cuts after giving them to herself, removing all evidence of her weakness.
Until her parents died during a Tellusian raid on their long-distance transport.
In their honor, so she wouldn’t forget, she’d marked herself, one line for each of them, and allowed them to scar.
It hadn’t made the spinning sensation disappear altogether, but it had helped.
Every time she’d felt her control slip, she would place her hand over the marks, and the world would calm.
Eventually, she’d stopped needing to cut herself.
Being accepted into the Science Academy had helped with that.
So had landing her dream job at this outpost.
She’d only added the third line a few weeks ago. After Foster died.
Grief flooded her. The removal of her marks felt like Iax had erased the existence of her parents and friend.
The narrow entrance to the washroom called to her. She staggered toward it, the floor beneath her feet listing to the side. Her shoulder slammed into the doorjamb, and she welcomed the pain, needed it to keep the world from spinning.
Her knees buckled, and she collapsed onto the lid of the toilet. Fumbling hands reached for the compartment under the sink. It hissed opened, and she grabbed her kit.
It hit the counter with a bang. She clicked it open and swiped the laser scalpel from its place on the side, then yanked on her sleeve, exposing her forearm.
Shallow breaths filled the small space of the washroom. The sight of those missing lines clenched a tight band around her ribs. Stars dotted her vision. She flicked her thumb over the control, and the laser scalpel hummed softly, the head glowing a bright blue. She brought it closer to her arm.
“You are distressed.” His voice came from right above her.
She yelped and jerked straight, hitting the kit with her elbow.
It slid off the edge of the counter, everything tumbling to the floor in a clatter, including the laser scalpel she held.
The regenerator, the synthetic bandages, the blades, the topical ointment—it all sprayed across the shiny white floor.
Wynn’s heart raced with shame. Caught. Exposed. Raw. She was an ulcer open to the elements, unprotected and festering. Mortification burned through her so hot it felt like her skin blazed red from head to toe.
“Get out!” she screamed, standing.
He didn’t move fast enough, and she pushed two hands against his chest. “Get. Out.” The flexible material shifted beneath her hands; his heart beat beneath her palms.
She shoved him. Hard.
There was no give at first, like she tried to open blast doors with her bare hands, but then he backed up a step, then another. She gave him one last shove, and he continued his retreat, unaided, until he stood in the corridor. Not fully, though, because the door didn’t close.
She spun around, and dove back into the washroom. As soon as the door closed behind her, she locked it.
Ignoring the mess on the floor, she grabbed the laser scalpel. The toilet lid squeaked when she sat on it. She placed her elbow on her knee, forearm up, and flicked her thumb against the scalpel’s control. It hummed, glowing blue.
But she didn’t lower it to her skin because the world had stopped spinning.
She stared at her arm, unsettled. The itchy sensation had receded too. She gasped a breath, heart rate slowing, then flicked off the laser scalpel.
“Your marks.”
Her fingers tightened on the medical tool at the sound of his voice. It echoed from a distance, like he stood where she’d left him.
“They were important to you?” he called.
Another sob escaped her. She hadn’t cried in so long, and it hurt. She hurt everywhere.
“Yes,” she whispered, not loud enough for him to hear, but loud enough to acknowledge the pain. She set the scalpel on the edge of the counter.
“I—” He stopped speaking.
She wiped her eyes on her sleeve and listened.
“I regret that I have distressed you.”
She snorted. “Distressed” didn’t begin to cover the emotions she was feeling right now.
A wet sound bounced off the walls when she snuffed her runny nose. Realizing what a mess she was, she grabbed a towel out of the compartment near the steam shower, and wiped her face. The towel dangled from her fingertips as she stared at the door, trying to make sense of what had happened.
He’d healed her, helped her, but in doing so had fixed everything about her skin.
Not just her scars, but her cuticles too.
Where she sometimes picked at them was now smooth and unblemished.
Her lips too. They were always dry, but when she pressed them together, they squished together with plump moisture.
What else had he done to her with that touch? Were there things he’d healed she couldn’t see?
If only he could fix all her deeper issues as easily.
It was what everyone had been told to fear—the touch of a Calypson.
That just stepping close would change you into one of them.
It was one reason the CORE government left them alone, the fear that any contact, even in battle would change everyone.
That, and Calypsons kept to themselves, hidden from sight in their nebula.
There were whispers that some group somewhere planned a siege of Sector Ten, but it hadn’t happened yet.
That they lived a peaceful, solitary existence protected them from the CORE government.
Her eyes drifted to the door. But that wasn’t exactly true now, was it? Calypsons were supposed to stay in Sector Ten to remain safe from invasion. The CORE had made it an unbreakable ultimatum.
But now one stood in her outpost.
What did that mean for Sector Ten? Why would they risk retaliation to send someone here to collect her? Why did she matter?
Wynn stood and braced her hands against the counter. “Viewer on,” she rasped, and the glossy surface became more reflective, revealing her in high-definition color.
She winced. Red, puffy eyes stared back at her. Her skin was splotchy on her forehead, cheeks, and throat. Her black hair stuck out in all directions.
She leaned forward and examined her irises. There was nothing different about their brown color. She twisted her head one way, then the other. They didn’t glint or do anything unusual at all.
Straightening, she frowned at herself. Iax hadn’t changed her, but he’d done something.
With her shirt sleeve still rolled up, she turned her arm toward the mirror to reveal unblemished skin. She stroked up and down, stiff fingers over warm flesh.
For a second there, when he’d taken her hand, she’d thought something had passed between them, something special.
There’d been this strange energy when he’d touched her skin, like nothing she’d experienced with someone before.
Was it because he was Calypson? Or the healing process? Or was it something else entirely?
“Viewer off,” she whispered, and the detailed image disappeared, replaced by the slightly warped reflection of the black terminal.
Wynn turned around and grabbed the counter, allowing the edge to dig into the backs of her thighs and palms, centering her.
She wasn’t Calypson, no matter what the blood test said. She was born on Lunar Six, a colony on the far side of the moon. Maybe that was why she’d jumped at the chance to work on Earth, despite its lethal conditions.
And I have work to do.
With a tip of her chin, she stared at the closed door, inhaled a deep breath, then unlocked it with a swipe of her hand.
One step into her quarters, and she paused. Iax was where she’d left him, not quite in her quarters, not quite out, the door ajar. He stood still and silent, his brow wrinkled. His fingers twitched at his sides as he scanned her from top to bottom.
Maybe he searched for something, because his gaze lingered on the sleeve of her shirt. She resisted the urge to cover that section of arm with her hand.
She stepped forward.
He didn’t move.
“May I leave?” Her words came out scratchy.
He straightened at her question. A beat later, he retreated a pace, allowing her escape. But he didn’t give her much space, and she felt his body heat as she passed.
Ignoring the lure of another’s warmth, she headed through the hallway and into her lab. The ferocity of the storm hit her again. Unbelievably, it hadn’t abated. How long could this go on?
She crossed to the main terminal, tension spreading across her shoulders as her eyes landed on the towel sitting on the analyzer plate. Before she could think twice, she snatched it up along with the dermal syringe, and crossed to the other side of the lab to the reclamation unit.
Tossing both inside, she hit the destroy and recycle control. She stood there as it hummed and whirred, then when silent. Her chest rose and fell like she’d just completed a strenuous activity, and she didn’t know why.
A sound rustled near the door. She turned to find Iax paused on the threshold. Those eyes. He stared at her in a way that made her entire body pay attention. She didn’t know how to handle it. Swallowing, she tore her gaze away, and returned to the main terminal.
She tapped on the glossy black surface, turning it on, then touched her PALM to activate her ocular implant.
The terminal glowed, but didn’t update, still not connecting with the grid.
The main computer system had collected weather stats from the central hub, and she downloaded those.
Wind speed, moisture collection, acidic content—it all scrolled in front of her and connected with her ocular implant.
Lifting her hand, she rubbed her temple, annoyed by it immediately. No matter how many times she’d brought it up to tech support, they always said both were working perfectly. And drugs never worked to rid her of the mild pain.
A shift in the air behind her, and she knew Iax walked farther into the lab. He stopped at the window on her left, just in her periphery about two meters away.
Tap tap tap went her fingers against the terminal. Her data was all a muddle, a couple of her sensors not reporting, probably because of the storm taking them out. The work helped to settle her mind.
The hub continued to send her data. Miraculously, the fields’ shielding was surviving the storm.
The concentration of acid had diminished some, which was also good.
Were her seeds surviving, or had the wind and rain washed them away?
She wouldn’t know until she could get back out there and scan them by hand.
She processed data until there was nothing left to analyze. Throughout it all, Iax barely moved, just stared at the storm.
Her fingers paused, and she pressed her hands flat on the glossy surface.
A heavy sort of responsibility hung over her because of him.
Her duty to report his presence to the authorities weighed on her, a physical burden across her shoulders.
But she couldn’t warn the research station, or anyone on this planet, until she reconnected with the grid.
Did she even want to? A solid answer refused to form.
On an exhale, she left him there, and returned to the kitchen. The pot of soup had cooled, and she retrieved a stack of containers out of the wall compartment beside the dispensary.
Setting the stack beside the pot, she found a ladle in the drawer and portioned it out one container at a time.
His footsteps stopped in the doorway, but Wynn didn’t look up. He remained there while she finished packing everything up.
She hesitated a moment, then left one container out before taking the rest to the refrigeration unit. Only when they were all placed neatly inside did she turn around and meet his gaze square on, using the wall compartment behind her for support.
His stillness, the glint in his eyes, took her breath.
“That’s for you,” she said with a jerk of her chin toward the container of soup.
He looked between her and the container, then his gaze resettled on her.
She shivered and pushed away from the wall. “You can use Foster’s room again.”
And she left him there, staring at soup.