Hearts and Stones (Celta HeartMate) Page 6

  Honor. The word worked on each and every one of them. A word that bound them together in a community. All of them had gifts that others had feared or scorned or envied, that the gov had condemned.

  When placed in the psi ghettos, they’d banded together, with so much more in common with each other than with people with more normal talents and gifts. They’d combined, and the glue that held them together was trust, and that consisted of honor, honesty. Courage.

  Levona could live with dislike, as long as she respected the people who disliked her.

  Donna Clague stepped forward. “Let’s get this done, the sooner the better. I agree to your terms. For undergoing this process, we will make a place for you and Pizi on board this ship. If a person who has reserved a cryonics tube fails to arrive before the time it takes us to launch, you will be assigned the tube.” Now the younger woman stared at her fellows. “Any further discussion?”

  Her husband added dryly, “Anyone else here want to volunteer?”

  Silence.

  “I’ll take to you the cryonics bay for the procedure,” Donna said. The door opened at the wave of her hand and she left. Levona followed, her mouth dry and her stomach clenching at the thought of all this. Everything had happened so quickly. She wasn’t ready! Though she couldn’t change her mind. This is how she and Pizi would escape Earth. “Should I have fasted?” she asked.

  With a smile over her shoulder, Donna said, “We’ll clean you out.”

  Oh, joy.

  Pizi leapt into Levona’s arms and she cherished the warmth and breathing and aliveness of her friend.

  Every single other person trailed after them.

  Donna continued, “You will also enter a cleansing and disinfecting station, then we will prepare you for the cryonics tube. You’ll lie down, we’ll inject you with the drugs necessary for the process, the upper glass will close over you and additional gas will fill the capsule and preserve you.” The woman sent her a reassuring smile. “Any questions?”

  “I got the layman’s explanation,” Levona stated.

  Nodding, Donna said, “Yes. Everyone who reserved a cryonics tube received an 800-page report of each detail of the procedure, the freezing, the stasis state, and the thawing or awakening.”

  “We got it, and decided whether to read it or not,” Megan Dufort said. “I glanced through it, read a bit here and there.”

  Umar put in, “We know the procedure worked previously, in other situations, as well as on other starships. We received communications from colonists on other planets.”

  “Once or twice,” Hoku said. “Whether we continue to receive such communications no one here knows. The gov hasn’t relayed that information to us. Not even those of us who recently worked for the WorldStates gov.”

  “Once upon a time, we went into space. Once upon a time, we colonized other planets.” Megan sighed.

  And suddenly the walk up and down the corridors, the travel by omnivator to another level, ended. They faced wide doors that opened in front of them, but showed only a vestibule and another set of doors.

  “Sterilization chamber,” Donna explained as she stepped in. Levona did, too, and though a couple of people hesitated, they all crowded together and the doors closed behind them. Pizi sneezed at the tech and psi-tech process that left Levona’s cheap clothes in tatters and her feeling scrubbed clean to her last skin-cell.

  Pizi hopped from Levona’s arms to an examination table.

  I WILL DO THIS TOO! The cat sat straight, tiny head lifted in pride.

  Donna’s expression softened. “Not this time.” She glanced at Levona.

  With fear zooming through her, Levona realized she could truly die. That might help the colonists regulate the cryonics procedure, but she’d be dead. Clearing her throat, she said, “Let me do this first, Pizi. They have, um, specifications for humans, but will have to work up amounts of the drugs and stuff for a cat companion.”

  A heart friend.

  “Yes,” Levona and Donna said in unison.

  But We will go to sleep together in Our tube for the trip, Pizi insisted.

  “I can do that,” Donna said.

  Levona stared at her, more, probed the woman for confidence and veracity. The physician believed she spoke the truth. “Have you had any experience of initiating and finishing the cryonics procedure?” Levona asked as she should have before.

  “I’ve watched the procedure often. I know the chemicals and the timeline,” Donna stated.

  Levona wouldn’t ask if she’d observed in person or participated. Too late now.

  Ignoring everyone else’s gazes on her bruised and scratched, too-thin body, she disrobed and followed each step of the process. Finally, she sat on the edge of the narrow pad comprising the bottom of the tube. “How long will I be … out?”

  “As long as we can test you for, but probably for no less than three days and …” Donna glanced over to the others observing the process …

  “Not longer than a week,” the smooth-talking pilot stated. He trusted Levona with information, at least.

  She knew that the Geek Class would need at least forty-eight hours of full preparation before the ship launched. At least Lugh’s Spear would. She hadn’t figured out, yet, how their time tables interwove with the schedules of Nuada’s Sword that would leave from NJNY and Arianrhod’s Wheel launching from EurAstates.

  She couldn’t hug Pizi now, could only stare at her and emanate the huge emotion, and send telepathically, I love You, Pizi.

  I love You, too, Levona, my heart friend, Pizi said from the firm grasp of Netra Sunaya Hoku.

  She met his dark brown eyes, then switched her gaze to Donna. “You will take care of Pizi for me? You all must realize by now she’s a very special cat, a true animal companion.”

  Everyone loved Pizi, and if they didn’t need Levona to come out of this experiment, she figured they’d keep the cat and kick Levona off the ship.

  “We promise on our honor,” several people said, more than half … six. And since they replied in unison, she understood it to be a common phrase in the community that she would have to learn, and live by.

  Dipping her head, and snuffling back her tears, she said, “Thank you.”

  “Look at me,” Donna lilted.

  Levona did.

  TRANCE!

  And Levona fell … drifted. She saw more than felt the injections. Noticed the hot heat of the hands of a couple of the men who lowered her steadily to the sponge beneath her, straightened her limbs and head. The domed lid of the tube snapped over her and her heart leapt and blood surged in fear — but no. Her mind thought that should be happening, but her blood continued to slow along with the beating of her heart as the air chilled around her.

  Fog clouded her eyes, or the inside of the pod, she didn’t know. She thought she wanted to say something but her thoughts s-l-o-w-e-d and her lips froze like all the rest of her.

  Down. Down. Down into muddy darkness, breaking chill thin-iced water in a ditch and settling on the bottom. Gray stones closed around her, curving over her like an old-time crypt tomb. She felt … more enervated than they’d said, as if she sank into death and not a deep coma-sleep with a tinge of awareness.

  She’d listened to the explanations, but … this … was … not … right. She couldn’t let herself slip away into sleep because she was sure she would not wake again. She’d die, and that might not help anyone.

  She wanted to be of use, she wanted to contribute, not to be a leech, or even taken along out of sufferance.

  Yes, stone blocks bricked around her, pressed on her chest, sat on her head and if she allowed it, would infiltrate her brain and solidify it. Solidify everything. Not the preferred process. Not.

  THINK! she screamed into her own mind. Tried to twitch her fingers, couldn’t. That was correct, what was supposed to happen. Breathing nearly stopped. Correct. One last breath. No! THINK. What was going wrong? THINK!

  Chemical equations danced before her vision, the various stu
ff slipped in to her blood. CHECK BLOOD! FEEL BLOOD! Wrong. Wrong, wrong, wrong. Too much of … too much of something.

  Fight. But stone encased her now, not just the slabs but layered over her body like inflexible armor.

  THINK! Harder and harder to think. So fight! Fight for another breath because to stop would be to die. Emotional hurt to lose Pizi. Pizi would hurt, too. That gave her a spurt of energy.

  Sniff the gas. Gas correct.

  Only a little too much bad stuff in her veins. Or arteries. Or both. Blood.

  If she could have spilt her blood, drained it, she would have.

  Dark redness, blood.

  Spiraling downward, away, away, away from the here and now.

  NO! FIGHT!

  Fight. In her head she sat up. The capsule had disappeared … in the far distance she saw it waiting for her down a stone passage looking like some she — they’d, she and Pizi — had gone through on the way to the city. The way to the ship, to Lugh’s Spear. The name of the ship infused hope that energized.

  She would find her way back in her mind from this place in the stone passages of the city to the capsule far away, one that represented safety and life. Arise from the cryonics tube of Lugh’s Spear.

  Already in her imagination, she did not lie flat, but sat straight, stiff in her stone, but with grit enough to fight. Yes! Hearing her own creaks, she moved one knee. Difficult. Slow. Heavy.

  Taking too long. She could roll … NO! THINK!

  If she rolled off what seemed like a stone dais, she’d hit the stone floor and she would not get up again. The armor encasing her would trap her. For the moment it, and her body, still responded to the control of her mind. As long as she didn’t sleep.

  Stand up, get moving, keep moving. Like all of her life.

  She’d find Pizi again, and … and maybe friends, maybe a lover on the voyage for the rest of her life. She visualized a boat on the sea. It dissipated with the next thought. She imagined the starship moving through the vastness of galaxies. It popped the next second.

  Just. Move.

  Stone scraping stone she slid, creaked, toppled from the dais, caught herself. Tried to bite her lip instinctively. Couldn’t. Crystallized lips, too. Her face was stone. Her eyes couldn’t move, could see through a narrow band, maybe a rock helmet, too.

  Didn’t matter. Fight. Keep moving. March!

  And she did, for an eternity, until she didn’t know who she was or why she moved, only that she could see a sunburst far in front of her and she had to reach it because it would be warm, and purr, and the fur would soak up her tears when she buried her face in it.

  Step, step, step.

  Two arches stood in front of her. Both dark. She paused and would have slumped and fallen but the stone armor kept her upright. Right. The right arch, the correct arch, on the other side of the tunnel. She liked going to the left, less chance of being trapped. Less confinement, to the left.

  Not this time.

  Awake!

  She shuddered in her stone skin. Not her voice, some other voice.

  Heart friend!

  Yes.

  Step, stumble, run!

  Levona opened her eyes and looked through clear glass. She’d awakened from the cold, cold, cold stone. Now felt many stares locked on her again. Time had passed, her body told her that, but she didn’t know how much. Before she’d slid into the frozen stasis they’d said the test would last days or a week. But they’d miscalculated the amount of the damn chemicals injected into her body. That she knew.

  The moment the flexible tube shield slid into the side of the platform, a small thump hit her stomach and a warmth traipsed up her body and nuzzled her under her chin. You is BACK. You came back. I knews You would! You is strong and My heart friend! I will lie here on You and help!

  Yes, soft fur, the smell of Pizi and mountain dust and brown-yellow weeds and … stars to come.

  Tears spurted from Levona’s eyes.

  “Here, then. Here.” A soft, soothing voice that matched the soft cloth that patted her face.

  Her mouth … moved. She could move her mouth. “Almost died.”

  A slight clearing of more than one throat. “Yes. We noted something went wrong almost immediately, but believed stopping the process would kill you.” A different woman’s voice. The first had belonged to the … to Donna … Clague.

  This one, not snippy, came from Ava Quintana.

  One of the men said, “We think the blend of the chemical mixture is off. Not sure why.”

  “Let’s do a complete chem run, blood analysis, and other procedures,” Donna ordered, and whipped a spider-armed medical robot over the bed. It looked more like a torture device than an aid for human health. Levona managed to lift her hand and pet … no, just touch … Pizi, who breathed warm and vibrantly alive, atop her.

  “Yes,” Levona croaked. “I felt … something wrong … one of the chemicals too much, I think, in my blood.”

  Umar Clague came into view behind his lady. “We’ll debrief you and listen to your experience later.” A wintry smile, accompanied by a shake of his head. “After you also survive the awakening process and all the medical tests in the world.”

  She’d have sighed, but even the small weight of Pizi compressed her chest.

  “How long?” That seemed to be the last words she could speak.

  “As long as we possibly could keep you for the test and still have a good idea of the results of the process, and report to the colonists on the other ships and keep to our timeline. This is dawn of the eighth day. We noted that you yet lived, and wanted to carry on with the experiment.”

  Because Levona was expendable.

  “Because we are all depending on the cryonics process to live.” Ava’s voice held a note of steel.

  A pause, another dip of the head from Umar Clague. “We’ll be initiating the forty-eight-hour launch sequence at dawn tomorrow morning.”

  Tongue thick, Levona said, “You didn’t give yourself much leeway to discover what went wrong with me.”

  “No. But we knew something went wrong and continued the procedure and analyzed it as it went along. And you fought to stay alive. We observed that, too. And you lived. You gave us life, too. Most of us, under the same circumstances, would have fought. So, all in all, a good result,” Umar Clague finished.

  The med-bot squeaked as it tried to work around Pizi. She hissed back.

  “I’m sorry, Pizi, but we need to help Levona, help us all. I will be picking You up now,” Hoku said. Levona hadn’t seen him, but then her eyelids had fluttered shut. So exhausted.

  “I fought for a week,” she whispered. Didn’t know if anyone heard her, then slid down a stone-lined hole to the darkness of sleep.

  The rest of the day they pummeled her with tests, and she faded in and out of consciousness. Miserable except for the presence of Pizi. Later that afternoon she sat in the main conference room with the ten leaders, clothed in some soft undies, trousers and shirt, a donation from some unknown person that Megan had delivered to the medical bay. The clothes didn’t quite fit. But Levona’s pack sat propped against her chair legs, and Pizi purred on her lap.

  “I’ll tell everything. I think one of the chemical amounts was too much, at least for me.” She blinked. “I could distinguish the problem. It showed up as one of the chemicals in my blood, not in the gas.”

  “That’s correct,” Donna said. She bit her lip. “I’m sorry that the process didn’t go as smoothly as expected.” She stood, hands on table, and scanned everyone. “But I am convinced we’ve found the problem and remedied it.” With a smile at Levona, she said, “We relayed the fact we had a problem within the first hour to the leadership crew of the other ships and that prodded them to institute their own tests. Off-site for the NJNY crowd, they are still stringing along the local gov that the ship won’t lift for another couple of weeks. And Arianrhod’s Wheel did its own tests in its cryonics bay. All of their multiple samples proceeded perfectly.”

  �
�Multiple,” Levona said.

  “A total of six. Two procedures by NJNY and four by the EurAstates Resistance.”

  “Good. That’s good,” Levona said.

  “We are all very pleased, but, naturally, you went into the capsule first and were the last to be awakened, so we have had the most complete process,” Donna ended and sat.

  Drawing in a breath, Levona said, “I knew one of the chemicals was too high, but I couldn’t say so. I examined — as much as my ability allowed — the gas and other factors and believed only that one chemical in the mixture wasn’t right.” She grimaced. “Then I fought. I lost myself in the fight until you called me back.”

  WE called You back, Pizi licked Levona’s hand.

  Yes, she replied privately to her friend.

  “I wasn’t aware that a week had passed.” Another big breath, she set her chin, then stated calmly, “I’ve fulfilled my part of the bargain.”

  Yes! Pizi leapt onto the table before Levona, defending her. We’ve been Good! I could not smell or touch or lick My friend all that looong time. I did like You peoples asked. I will be Mother of Cats, and My Levona has skills and fight like You need.

  The stares, grimaces, and the expressions in the eyes and on the faces, showed reluctant acceptance.

  Umar Clague inclined his head. “We are honorable folk. We do not make deals and renege on them like the government. You have earned your right to stay on the ship along with Pizi, and have been assigned a room with the crew.”

  Ava stood. “We have researched the files we have on you and your parents and your contributions to the psi-community — or lack of that.” She bent a stern look on Levona who refuse to flinch. “We’ve spoken to other members of the community who know you such as Bartek Coval and Karida Bonfils, who give you good references. We are pleased with your performance so far.”