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Earth, Gaia’s Creation Cave
“Are you sure she’ll wake up? It’s been days." The statement bumped gently against Tessa's consciousness. “I don’t understand why she doesn’t regenerate the damaged nanocytes like she did before.”
"Sirius’ machine was designed to prevent replication. It wouldn’t have been effective otherwise. And, rebuilding what the NTU destroyed was complicated. The surviving nanocytes are still forging connections. Such things take time."
Gaia's voice. But who are they talking about? She tried to open her eyes, but her eyelids felt like lead weights. What is wrong with me?
"You created entire species from nothing. Repairing her shouldn't be that hard."
Is that Magnus?
"This was different, in many ways, from making a new creature. I had to be careful not to do more damage. And, getting organic material to mesh with the underlying nanocyte structure – damaged as it was – is a complex exercise."
"Who are we..." Tessa croaked, and trailed off, shocked by the dry, weak sound of her own voice.
"Tessa?"
She sensed movement close to her, and someone touched her hand.
"Magnus? What is..." She forced her eyes partly open. The walls were a soft rose color, warm and comforting. Light filtered in from a source she couldn't locate. A monitor took the place of a window to her left, crossed with fluctuating lines in green and red. It was like a hospital room, but far more luxurious than any she'd ever seen.
She flexed her fingers against silky sheets. She was laying down, covered. What was she doing in bed? "Where are we?"
"You are in my creation cave, Tessa." Gaia's face swam into view next to Magnus. "I've done some remodeling so that you will be more comfortable. How are you feeling?"
Tessa considered the question and tried to bring up her internal screen. Nothing happened. The diagnostic readout was gone. "I think my system is malfunctioning. I feel... odd. And I can't access my internal screen."
Gaia and Magnus looked at each other.
"How much of the reaper fight do you remember?" Magnus asked.
Tessa frowned. "It was... going well, I think. There were more than I expected, but I was handling it. And then..." The shrill scrape of static sounded in her memory and she winced. "A noise, like the air was buzzing and I..." She paused, grasping at fragments, incomplete images like a jigsaw puzzle with half the pieces missing. "Something happened. What?"
Magnus cleared his throat. "You were right about Yolanda. She tampered with the NTU so it would attack you, as well as the reapers. We almost..." He choked, trailing off.
"The damage they caused was extensive." Gaia placed a hand on Tessa's arm. "I had to move quickly to stabilize you and preserve what I could of your body."
Panic pushed in, making her heart pound. Wait. Heart? She looked down at herself and the room spun, forcing her to lie back again. "I need a mirror. I need to see."
"That isn't–" Gaia began.
"You shouldn't–" Magnus said at the same time.
"I. Need. To. See." Tessa forced the words through gritted teeth. If she was permanently maimed, best to face it head on.
"All right," Gaia said quietly. "Stella2, change panel four to reflection mode, won't you?"
"Yes ma'am," the DEVA replied.
Above Tessa, the ceiling shimmered, and a mirrored surface appeared. The woman who looked back at Tessa from its reflective surface was familiar, but not at all what she expected to see. Bronzed brown curls lay in a disordered array around an oval face with keen hazel eyes. Her face was light tan, with full lips and a worried expression.
"You brought me back," she whispered.
Gaia smiled. "You were there all along."
Tessa looked at her, uncertain. "I look like me... I mean... pre-evacuation me. When I was still... human."
Pain crimped Gaia's features. "Oh, Tessa. You have always been human. It was your choice to look..." She glanced at Magnus. "Different."
"I didn't want to pretend. But now..." She turned her attention back to the mirror and lifted a hand to her face. An image flashed through her mind of watching her fingers turn to black dust and she stared at them for a moment. "How much of my nanocyte load did she destroy?"
"You, um... about seventy percent." Magnus swallowed. He hadn't let go of her hand.
"And you replaced that with... What?" she asked.
"I grew organic flesh over the existing frame. We used bone where the underlying substructure had been destroyed," Gaia said. "You now own a body with a larger nanocyte host than most humans possess, but far less than what you had before."
"And what does that mean in practical terms?" Tessa asked.
Gaia sighed. "You will heal faster, be stronger, and live longer than other humans. But you are no longer immortal. As your body is now seventy-four percent organic, it will age as others of your species do, but slower."
"And I can't change how I look anymore." It wasn't a question, but Gaia answered anyway.
"You may be able to make minor changes. Eye color, skin tone, the shape of your nose, higher or lower cheekbones. But that is likely to be painful and take time to recover from. The larger the change, the more difficult it will be."
Letting go of Magnus, Tessa raised her hands to look at them. "So, no more using my hands as blasters?"
The ghost of a smile crossed Gaia's features. "I wouldn't think so. No."
A thought froze Tessa in place. "What about..." She paused, trying to figure out how to ask this question. "All the stuff I learned, my skill sets. What about that?"
Sirius spoke from the viewscreen. "Unlike organic species, the locus of your memory was not in your head. In essence, every nanocyte carried the sum-total of your experience. It may take a while for them to deposit that knowledge within the organic brain you now possess, but all that you were before remains. All that you knew is still within you."
Relief flooded through her. A body was just a body, no matter how much it could do. The possibility that she had lost part of her memory, parts of her past, had been terrifying. A wave of fatigue washed through her, and her eyelids grew heavy again.
"I'm tired," she said.
Immediately, Gaia straightened and touched Magnus on the arm. "We will leave you to rest," she said. "If you need anything, you have only to speak it. Stella2 will be listening."
Magnus leaned close and kissed her. "Welcome back, Tessa. It's going to be OK."
She smiled up at him, though weariness dragged at her, sucking her down into the warm dark. "I know." Her eyes drifted closed. She didn't hear them leave the room.
Earth, The Oracle
It took another month before Tessa could function normally. Walking required a few days to master; other physical activities like running and exercising came easier after that.
Her memory was slower to return, but bit by bit, the fighting styles, medical and linguistic expertise, and all the rest came back.
When she strode into the Oracle six weeks after the reaper battle, she felt as close to her old self as she was ever likely to.
Hearing Gaia's voice coming from the ship's lounge was a surprise.
She walked through the door, a shiver of relief sliding through her as she took in the familiar faces. Val and Alex sat on the couch, while the twins lounged at their feet. Magnus kicked back with his feet on a low table while Tamar and Rakan sprawled in their own chairs. Gaia stood, facing them and away from the door.
“Tessa!” A wide grin lit Magnus' features when he saw her. He patted the couch next to him, putting an arm around her as she sat down.
“Welcome, Tessa,” Gaia said. “We were discussing the HDL situation. I doubt they will ever change their position. We will need to keep an eye on them."
"You could take them out completely," Rakan commented.
"Agreed," Magnus said. "No sense leaving an enemy standing. Hard enough to deal with so-called friends, some days," he said, ending with a bitter twist to his lips.
Settling next to Magnus, Tessa looked around, noting that, aside from him, only the Venture's crew was present. Curiosity tugged at her. "What did you do with Yolanda?"
She couldn't see Magnus allowing a traitor, which is how he obviously viewed the woman, also known as Atah Totepe, to stay on the ship. Val probably felt the same way. But she didn't think Gaia would allow Atah to remain on Earth, either.
The twins frisked over to her. We are so happy to see you, Dr. Tessa. The goddess would not let us visit. They spoke in unison, and the last bit was said with a harsh glance at Gaia.
Amusement lit Gaia's eyes. "I told you, my dears. I am no goddess. And Tessa needed her rest, not your experiments. Remember what we agreed earlier?"
If Syfe could roll their eyes, the twins would have blinded themselves. We remember, they said. But we would not stress Dr. Tessa. Not at all.
"Your definition of stress and ours is likely to be very different," Val said. But she was smiling.
Tessa smiled uncertainly. "Why would I be stressed by their visit?"
Surprise lit every face.
"You can hear them?" Alex asked.
"Of course," Tessa said, her hand going involuntarily to the spot behind her ear where the device they'd given her used to be. Nothing but bare skin met her questing fingers. Why hadn't she thought to check that before?
You have had a lot to deal with, Dr. Tessa. But we are glad you can hear us now without the receiver.
And you can hear me, obviously, whether I want you to or not. A note of wry irritation colored the thought, and the twins hastened to reassure her.
We are not nosy, Dr. Tessa. We will not invade your privacy.
Not that you haven't already, Tessa thought back, but neither Syfe answered. The way their ears twitched, she knew they'd heard, but she appreciated the effort.
The Oracle's lounge was fully populated the day before the two teams were scheduled to leave Earth. Dash perched on a corner of the couch with Tamar and Rakan. Magnus, Tessa, Val, and Alex occupied various chairs around the room while Gaia paced. Hermie's eyes followed her as she moved from the viewport to the galley and back again, concern plain on her usually placid features.
The twins lay at Tessa's feet as the group discussed what to do with the reaper's remains. Gaia was understandably reluctant to inter them on Earth, but there weren't many alternatives.
"We could toss them into the sun," Alex said. "I mean, Sol isn't maybe as hot as that star in the Crab Nebula, but it should do the job."
"It is likely that will be our solution," Gaia said. "I'm not as concerned about the defunct reapers as I am about the one who sent them."
"The HDL is a right pain in the ass," Magnus agreed. "But without consenting to mass murder, I'm not sure what you can do about them."
Shocked repugnance rippled across Gaia's features. "I'm not interested in killing humans."
"Not even those who want you dead?" Dash asked.
"Not even them," Gaia replied tightly.
"So, we continue our education campaign," Tessa said. "Get the message out there that the blood plague and all the rest wasn't Gaia's fault."
"This will not work, I am being sorry to say." Tamar wrinkled her nose.
"Why not?" Rakan asked. "Seems like a reasonable next step to me."
Magnus shook his head. "No, she's right. Conspiracy theorists are married to their core beliefs. And they are more faithful to them than to any spouse. They don't change their minds, no matter how much evidence is presented."
"It's too bad we can't go back and encode the truth into each fleet's database," Val remarked. "Fix the problem before it gets a foothold."
Why don't you? Pan asked.
Val lifted an eyebrow and favored the Syfe with a lopsided smile. "Because time travel isn't an option?" she suggested.
Dora stopped licking the paw she'd been cleaning and sat up. Why isn't it?
Val and Tessa exchanged a look, but it was Gaia who answered. "Time travel is not only dangerous, but impossible, so far as I know. At the least, it is not a skill I possess."
But we do, the twins said in unison and with identical notes of casual satisfaction.
"You do what?" Tessa asked, her mind reeling. Could they really send her back?
The twins turned to stare at her.
We are able to move you through time, Dr. Tessa Graham. We can send you home.
