Chapter Forty-Six

 

I’m back inside the Sunshine, looking at the maps using Tyson’s ship-mounted householo. Looking for Kayla’s about all I have to hold onto right now. That, and finding a way to destroy HGB that won’t leave Earth in smoking ruins.

The ship’s cell is empty. “What happened to your prisoner?”

Tyson shrugs. “I turned him over to te local autorities.”

“That’s nice.” I’m still trying not to break down crying again.

“Bo, I’m sorry.”

“For what?” He’s just about the only one who hasn’t tried to hurt me, this time around.

“For tis.” He grabs me around the waist and lifts me off the floor. He holds me against him with one arm, and I can feel his strong, even breathing as he uses the other hand to open the door to the cell. The cuff of his jacket shifts, and I can see he’s wearing the locket Awn had left in her lockbox like a bracelet around his wrist.

I suck in air as frío dread tickles across my skin.

“Por favor! I can’t go back in there!”

Pero, there’s nothing I can do as the heavy door clanks shut, closing me in. “Oye!”

This is getting ridiculous. Between me and Kayla and Brill, people have been kidnapped more times on Zant than the heroine in the telenovela I was on as a niña was in season two.

“I didn’t hurt you, did I?” Tyson sounds concerned he might not have realized his own strength.

“No, loco boy. Pero, why am I in here?” Though looking at that locket, I already think I know why.

Tyson scratches idly at the back of his hand again. “I didn’t tink you would understand what te Mindhuggers are trying to do here. Tey want to trust you. Tey have shown you mercy, and tey want you to show tem mercy in return.”

My chest goes cold. I should have known all this Mercy is a Gift garbage would backfire. Mindhugger-Tyson lights up the controls and the ship lifts off. I have no idea where he’s taking us.

“What do you mean they’ve shown me mercy?”

Tyson turns, an amused smile stretching his lips. “Can you guess when I got infected?”

Eh? Tyson already knew the Mindhugger existed, so it didn’t even try to hide itself, the way it had with Mertex and Kaliel. It is amazingly adaptable. I think back, try to push the pieces into place. When would Tyson have encountered it? “After Mertex took the Invincible Heart to escape from the car?”

If it had happened during the original fight, Tyson would just have let Mertex go the moment Brill and I headed across that field.

“Exactly. He had a tiny injector hidden in his hand that slipped between two of my scales. And as my hug was unfolding and attaching into my consciousness, the first ting we heard was you saying that Murry should have been saved. So he did tat. For you.”

“No, it – he didn’t. Mertex is dead.”

“Physically, yes. But te Mindhugger looked in Mertex’s consciousness to find out what made him so important to you. It liked what it found tere – wanted a friend – knew Mertex had qualities tat you admired – so it took tat consciousness and absorbed it. Each piece of him is a biological computer. He filed and replicated all Mertex’s memories. He tinks of himself as Murry now.” Tyson taps the side of his cabeza. “He’s what he was before, but at te same time, he’s a shy, nerdy Zantite who keeps me tinking about feedholos I’ve never seen.”

That sounds like Mertex, all right. “And what does he want?”

“He wants to be safe. To not be hunted everywhere he goes, attacked at every turn. He left his planet because tey were trying to exterminate him.”

I can sympathize with that. I can’t see a way to fix it – the thing’s a parasite – pero I can sympathize. “Why is he interested in me?”

“You surprised him, when he was Fizzax Clunssas. He intended for Fizzax to eat Brill Cray, because we thought Brill might have witnessed Jimena Duarte infecting Kaliel Johannsson. But when you volunteered to die, it caught his curiosity. He had intended another mission for Kaliel, who had already left te planet, and wasn’t sure he would make it back in time. He was afraid tat Brill would die, and he wouldn’t get to see why you were so attached to each oter.”

The timing of Kaliel’s return hadn’t been an accident. The Murry worm had been afraid of losing his little experiment. That means us being outside when the bombs went off on Minda’s set hadn’t been an accident either. Only – it was more than an experiment. He’d been captivated by the idea of selfless love. I think about that box, hidden all that time beneath the ocean, of the locket dangling from Tyson’s wrist. “The couple that froze in the cryopods. That was one of Murry’s first experiences, no? Pero, he didn’t understand what it meant to be an individual, so how could he understand amor – except as something he needs but doesn’t know how to get.”

“But he wants to. He’s starting to understand love, and he hurts for you. You and Brill belonged together, like two pieces in Dashtin’s puzzle. And you alone – it’s not right. I heard you talking to the HGB agent, eavesdropped on you eavesdropping. Murry tinks I should track down Frank when we’re done here.”

“No!” I take a deep breath. “Por favor, no. Hurting him won’t change anything. I want Frank to look me in the eye and apologize, that’s all. And then I never want to see him again.”

After I’ve said it, I realize that’s true. It’s like Mamá said. If I hold onto this angerzentment at him, it will destroy me. It won’t bring Brill back. It won’t heal the rift between me and HGB, or between me and Mamá, or between Earth and the galaxy. That moment of weakness when I’d wanted to take IH and confront Frank, and see where the rage took me – that dissolves in my heart into a puddle of shame.

“Brill was both heroic and flawed, and I loved him fiercely, both when he deserved it and when he didn’t. And because I love him, even though he’s gone, I won’t do anything in his memory that he wouldn’t have approved of.”

I don’t have the time or the emotional endurance right now to explain to the mindworm how much this loss is going to hurt. I need to find a way out of this mess, out of this cell, around the lump in my throat that keeps threatening to choke me. When I have control of myself, I ask, “So what happened with Fizzax? Did Murry release the hug on him after he wasn’t useful?”

Tyson bows his head. “Tat was heartbreak snowfall cancelled series. After he consumed te t’eobromine in tose cookies, te part of Murry tat was him died. It was like what happened when Jimena splattered tat chocolate on her arm and mouth, only she didn’t absorb enough to kill the hug – just to make both of them sick.”

“Oye! Poor Jimena.”

Tyson blinks. “You feel sorry for her? Even tough she was planning to kill you at te capital?”

“Que?”

“You and Kayla. It was supposed to look like a murder suicide. After all, she’d been paid to start a war.”

Once I get over the shock enough to draw a full breath, I ask, “Who paid her?”

“Enemies of Zant, tat wanted te Zantites distracted. She didn’t ever tink about who. Just about the money. Murry didn’t tink tat was right. He wants you to be happy.”

“What does Murry want from me now?”

“He needs you to get him Stephen Baker.”

I was following this, right up until then. “As in Kayla’s brother?”