PERSONAL RECORD: DESIGNATION ZETA4542910-9545E
PALLAS STATION
478.2.6.03
We had finished our unpalatable lunches when Nate’s communications link crackled, and a feminine voice sounded over the external speaker. “Osmund’s prepping the shuttle. You and Lars need to head over.”
After Nate’s affirmative answer, the link chimed without a farewell.
Lars braced himself on Kyleigh’s desk and stood. His face tightened, and he exhaled slowly. “Right then. Get this over with. Sooner we’re there, sooner we’re back.”
He was not wrong, even if a few seconds would make little difference.
I reached out and took Nate’s hand. “Nathaniel? Will you keep me informed as your treatment progresses?”
He promised, and then they were gone. The door closed behind them, again leaving me—and the other two—in temporary confinement.
“He’ll be fine,” Kyleigh said. “They all will, especially Alec. They have to be.” She trudged to the stool Lars had vacated and collapsed onto it with a groan. “Stars, but my legs ache.”
My breath caught. Was that a symptom? No one had complained of that before, that I recalled.
“My abs, too.” My concern dissipated, however, when she added, “Who would’ve thought that escaping roaches would use stomach muscles? That was more running than I’m used to.”
“If you were more diligent in your exercise . . .” My words tapered off when Kyleigh glowered at me.
She turned to the medic. “This is a bit awkward, but I don’t know your name.”
The woman on Freddie’s hoverbed spoke to the ceiling. “Yrsa Ramos.”
“You are twenty-four?” I asked.
“Almost twenty-five.” She squinted at me. “How did you know? Did that drone-thing tell you?”
Slightly affronted, all I said was, “No.”
“Well, Recorder-that-isn’t, I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised by a level of borderline omniscience.”
“Yours is a preposterous conclusion, Yrsa Ramos,” I retorted. “The name is simply one of the most popular female names the year I was born.”
“So we’re the same age? Huh. Never thought of Recorders as having birthdays.” The medic’s expression twisted, as if she smelled something sour, but the air filters remained operational. “We’re going to die in the same year, too.”
“You can’t know—” Kyleigh began, but her computer chimed. The stool squeaked when she rotated to the screen and projections. The uneven taps on her antiquated keyboard sped, then slowed, then stopped altogether, and her hands fell to her lap. “Lytwin is dead.”
A lump swelled in my throat. Lorik would never have wanted death as his legacy, yet that was what the roaches had spread.
“Patterson?” Yrsa Ramos asked.
“Williams said he’s holding,” Kyleigh said quietly. “They’ve delayed the shuttle to take him, in case there’s anything Edwards and the researchers can do.”
“That’s it, then.” The medic flopped back onto her pillow, and her hand covered her eyes. “I’m dead, too. Walking dead.”
She was not walking, but I understood. “If I have not succumbed, nor has Kyleigh, we all have a chance.”
She lowered her hand and glared at me. “Don’t be stupid. I’ve seen the numbers. Just because you two haven’t died yet doesn’t negate the fact that once you’re sick, the fatality rate is almost one hundred percent.” The medic’s gaze drifted back to the ceiling. “But sure, I’ll shun reason if you say so.”
Determined to alter the conversation’s course, I attempted to change the subject. “Yrsa Ramos, how do you want to be called?”
“Does it even matter now?”
“Yes.” The word shot from me without forethought, straighter and truer than almost anything I had ever said.
The medic rounded on me. “How can you say that, Recorder? You don’t have a name, not even—”
“Stop!” Kyleigh demanded. “I won’t let you sit there and spout rubbish like that when she’s gone through so much. Stars, she saved your life!”
My heart thundered. The idea someone would recite the events in the hall sliced away any calm. I beat a rhythm on my thigh.
“Did she? I hadn’t noticed,” the medic said through clenched teeth. “It seems to me that we are all trapped in a quarantine room in varying stages of death.”
“They were going to take you. They were dragging you away—” Kyleigh broke off, then took a breath. “And she stopped them.”
“Stopped them?” The medic flopped back onto her pillow again. “Dying here, dying there. What does it matter?”
“Fine,” Kyleigh snapped. “You go ahead and quit. We won’t. We’ll figure it out without you.” Her hazel eyes turned to me. “So what can we do?”
My heart’s uneven rhythm slowed. Kyleigh was correct about quitting, though loss of the equipment hampered our ability to detect nanotechnology. “I need the drone.” I held up the damaged green datapad. “I might require another one.”
“Does it work at all?”
I powered it on, and it flickered unevenly. “It seems to, but the pitting on the surface may impair my ability to communicate properly.”
“I’ll track down another one,” Kyleigh said.
My attention fell on the datasticks again. I set down the datapad and spilled the mismatched datasticks into my hand. Freddie’s and . . . why could I not remember?
It seemed important. Something about tunnels? But why would tunnels matter?
“You know what I don’t get?” the medic asked the grey ceiling. “How did they even know we were there? Spying on the door the whole time isn’t likely.”
Kyleigh glowered. “Julian Ross would’ve known where the equipment was. He worked on nanotech stuff with Dr. Johnson and my dad.”
I flipped the datasticks over and over in my palm, struggling to recall what Ross had told me quarters past on our trip to New Triton, before he had tried to kill me. The words played in my memory in patchy bursts. “He was working with Dr. SahnVeer to combat the mortality rates in the miners in the outer belt. Ross used viral therapies to trigger immune responses to autoimmune disorders, and he and the doctor designed nanotechnology to deliver medication directly to the tumors themselves without damaging surrounding tissue.”
“Not a bad idea,” the medic said.
Kyleigh set her fists on her hips. “No, but he used that mechanism to hide his murder weapon.”
The medic tucked one hand under her nearly bald head. “Maybe it would have been better to work on preventative methods. Better respirators and suits. Still doesn’t tell us how they knew.”
As if in a memory download, I saw Skip and the knife-man in the hall. The knife-man’s respirator gleamed, reflecting the overhead lights as he ducked behind Skip, who had been clad in the mottled grey-and-black of Consortium—
“Oh!” My fingers tightened involuntarily, and the datasticks dug into my palm. “Suits!”
At my exclamation, both women asked simultaneously, “What?”
“That is how they knew,” I said in a rush. “Skip was wearing Lorik’s suit! And that woman, the one who stole your necklace, Kyleigh, she was wearing yours when I found you. Someone must have Freddie’s, too. They must have accessed the communications links to monitor our channels.”
“Stars,” the medic hissed.
“And that means . . .” I tapped my thigh. “How could I have forgotten?”
“Forgotten what?” Kyleigh asked.
Ignoring her, I dropped the datasticks onto my crumpled bedcover and snatched up the damaged datapad. My fingers flew over its pitted surface.
I sank to my bed when its response scrolled across the screen.
>>Continuing temporary access granted, Aberrant Zeta4542910-9545E.
“What is it?” Kyleigh demanded.
I held up one hand for silence, then resumed my query about access to the main channels through the Elder’s suit, but the drone’s answer was garbled. Or was it my question? I retyped the same request. The drone asked for clarification.
With a groan of frustration, I dropped the datapad and pulled my suit from under my bed.
“What do you think you’re doing?” Kyleigh demanded.
“I need the drone.”
The medic pushed herself up on one elbow. “Why?”
“In the hall, it was both monitoring channels and recording their transmissions.”
“Documentation,” Kyleigh said in a hushed voice.
“Blasted Consortium spying machine,” the medic growled.
“They are listening to us, but with the drone, we can now spy on them.” I checked the light over the door. It was still red. The men were not through.
The medic, Yrsa Ramos, pulled herself upright and blinked hard, as if to correct double vision. “Could it be used to triangulate their position so we can find those spacing trogs?”
“It might. I must get to my drone, and I must warn Jackson.”
Yrsa cursed. “And we can’t comm Jackson without them hearing.”
“They can’t know that we know that they know.” Kyleigh blanched. “Stars! Can they access the data about the virus we’ve been transmitting up to Dr. Clarkson and that she sends here?”
“I do not know, but I fear we must warn Thalassa as well.”
“Right,” Kyleigh said as she pulled out her suit.
“Both of you should stay here,” the medic stated. “I’ll go.”
“Don’t be stupid, Yrsa,” Kyleigh said sharply. “You’ve been drugged, dosed with a virus, and dropped onto a concrete floor. If you don’t have a concussion, I don’t know who does.”
The medic tried to stand. She grabbed the railing and lowered herself back onto her bed. “You’re right. What good is training when I can’t use it? You need protection, but I’m seeing double.” She groaned. “Void take it. It isn’t safe. Even if we’ve kept these hallways clear of roaches for the most part, there’re still vents.”
“Yrsa, someone needs to remain here.” I fastened my boots. “If anyone returns, you must explain our theory, should we—”
“Don’t you go saying you won’t make it,” the medic snapped. “Blast. Sending civilians into this disaster isn’t right.” She slumped back onto her bed, her hand over her eyes. “Just make sure someone goes with you once you pass the barricade. And for Founders’ sakes, keep an eye on the ceiling.”
Kyleigh stomped her feet into her boots and turned to me. “What do you think? You’re faster, but I’m steadier. Who goes to the hangar, and who goes to the control room?”
“I shall inform the shuttle. They can take the information to Thalassa.” I slid the datapad into my pocket, hesitated, then added the datasticks and the communications link Nate had given me.
“Can you get the drone before they leave?” the medic asked. “Otherwise we won’t know for sure that’s what they did.”
My jaw tightened. “I must.”
The light over the door turned green. Kyleigh entered the exit code at the panel.
I checked the chronometer over my bed. Sixteen minutes since Nate and Lars had left. Kyleigh and I would spend fifteen waiting in the vestibule. The timeline was too tight.
I paused at the door. “Rest, Yrsa Ramos. Rest and heal.”
“Be safe,” she countered. “And be fast.”
Kyleigh and I entered the vestibule and left the quarantine room behind.