Tailspin, page 59
“Let Jim sort it. I’ll message him. Just rest. I’ll get dressed quick.”
She never even left the room. Slipped her clothes on under the towel like a pro. No flesh exposed. In less time than I could blink, she was back before me with a straw and a drink.
“I’ve been such a burden.” The cool drink went down so nicely, and I tried to suck up more than was in the bottle.
“No, you haven’t. It’s been hard to see you like this. To see anyone like this.”
“Mal, I’m so sorry,” I said, tears dribbling down my face at the words I’d spoken to her, my best friend. “I said terrible things, I never—”
Malaki had tears instantly in her own eyes, and she tried her best to wipe them away. “You remember them?” I nodded at her. “It wasn’t you,” she whispered. “It really wasn’t you.”
“They were still words I said.”
“Can we forget them?”
“I don’t think I ever can,” I replied, shaking my head. “I had no idea I could be so cruel.”
She wrapped the top half of me into her arms, gently held me. “You’re not the only one that can say terrible things. My father got the brunt of it after the accident and my operation. We both said things I can’t forget, but I love you, he loved me. We can move forwards.”
I buried my head into her shoulder, my breathing steadied with hers and I whispered words I thought I’d never admit to her either. “I love you too, I really do.”
Jim and Alba whirled in a moment later and Malaki backed off. They went over my stats before I was allowed out of the liquid bath.
“As it comes off, let us know how you’re feeling. Got it?”
“Understood,” I replied. Internally, I had to ask. Are you with me?
I’m here. You did good. It took time, but for what we went through, you did better than I thought you ever would.
We did. You were with me every step of the way, encouraging, helping.
Of course.
The watery liquid left my body, and the air tickled me. I shivered. “Towels are warm, don’t worry,” Malaki said, and moved away.
“All vitals are steady,” Jim said to Alba more than me. “TAP is fully online. All nodes are connected, if not live.”
I smiled on the outside and the inside. “We did it?”
“Yes,” Jim said. “You being in here, in this for two weeks, was not what was planned. But you did it.”
“But the cost?”
“Don’t worry about that,” Jim said. “Please don’t worry about that.”
Weight lifted off me and my legs felt light. “Steady,” Malaki said. She stepped toward me, holding the towel up.
I was buck naked, and the muscle I’d gained I’d lost. Back to square one. I sighed.
Back to square one, Apex repeated.
I stepped into the towel, and Malaki wrapped me up in it. It was really warm and soothing. Just like being in her arms was. Like family.
“My heart feels weird, and my legs are unsteady,” I said and looked at Jim.
“Heart is fine. Legs have lost a lot of muscle mass. We couldn’t do much about that over the last few weeks.”
“Rehab?”
“Yes,” Alba said. “We’ll get you going with the right team.”
“I’d like…” I said, watching Malaki smile. “I’d like you to get me to a helo.”
“Justin’s bringing in a SAR 17. He’s landing in thirty minutes,” she said.
Jim went to open his mouth, but Alba stopped him. “You can’t hold him back now.”
“I—” I started to say.
“I’m worried, too,” Jim said dipping his head.
“So am I,” Malaki joined in. “We don’t have time. We have to try it. We need to know. At least you’re here to monitor him, right?”
Jim’s face flushed. “Do you know how late it is? How hard we’ve worked keeping Rise, him, and you both going?”
Malaki’s face paled. “I do, I’m sorry. But we’re doing it.”
“Help him get dressed. I’ll get the med kits ready.” Alba tried to smile at me, but her own face had paled.
“I need this,” I said to her.
“I know,” she said. “I knew you’d want to the moment you were awake.”
“You didn’t bring the helo yourself?”
“I was local,” she admitted. “Job for my father.”
Malaki helped me to a bed at the side of the room where I sat, then she helped me get dressed. My arms moved but wobbled about like gelatin. “It will take some time. They don’t forget. You are using different wavelengths now and have less muscle.”
“I had less muscle as it was,” I moaned.
“Well, you can rebuild. Now…” She grinned. “We’re cooking on gas. You have the X1, X24, X16, and an M-Corp TAP.”
“So you know?”
“Michaels had to get us together to explain a few things. But yes, we know they wanted the underground TAP off the market. They’re basically tracking Shay and those he works for for their own reasons, and you got the TAP we all hoped you would. What you’re worth.” She grinned. “They even gave us our money back, so we’re not broke anymore.”
I let out a sigh. I would have hated owing them that sort of money. Well, any sort of money.
“Did Michaels say anything else?”
She crossed her arms under her chest. “Like what?”
“About why? What he really wants us for?”
Malaki shook her head. “No, but you’re excited right?”
“Yeah.” I smiled, my heart pounding at the thoughts. Enthusiasm filled me, and even though it felt as though everything floated around me, drugs were good. I was truly happy.
The pain. The memory of it pushed to the back of my mind. Just like that.
70
It took me all thirty minutes to get dressed, to get another few drinks in me, and for Alba and Jim to be ready enough for a jaunt out in a helo.
“Where’s he landing?” I asked as both ladies helped me into a wheelchair.
“We have several landing pads,” Jim said. “Had to with our jobs. We’re on call twenty-four hours a day, every day.”
“Damn, that’s harsh,” I said, putting a hand on Alba’s.
“It is,” Alba said. “But if we weren’t, we’d never have been called out to you, or get there to help the many lives we have saved over the years.”
“For that, I’m grateful,” I said, and gave her a squeeze. “I am sorry. For being so much work.”
Alba leaned down and put her cheek to my face. “We really meant everything we’ve said to you, the nights I sat up talking to you about E’toro. You remind me of him. I’d like to think he’d want us to help you, help you as much as we would if it were him.”
When she kissed my cheek and stepped back, I had never missed my mother more. I wanted her to be here by my side.
The soft whump-whump of helo blades echoed in the distance, and my heart soared.
Justin and Silao landed deftly before us. The kicked-up winds and a little dust made me cough.
Justin hopped out and ran over. “It’s good to see you up,” he said. “But fuck me, what a ride this month has been.”
Malaki glared at him, and he just shrugged.
I cringed. He was not happy. Not at all.
Malaki didn’t hesitate in rushing for the pilot seat. Then Silao joined us. He knelt before me, lowered his eyes. “You understand more now, right?”
I nodded.
Silao held his hand out for me, and even though I was shaking, I took it. “The bond that links true family is not of blood, or love, but of pain, sacrifice—”
“And sheer fucking determination,” I finished for him.
He smiled. “There’s no amount of preparation we can do for what comes for us. Just know only those who can take it will survive.”
“I survived,” I replied.
“Yes, you did for now. Now get in that helo and have fun making me look like an idiot.”
I laughed. “I doubt it, but I will try.”
“Damn right.” Silao let go of my hand and moved out of my way.
“Are you coming with us?” I asked Justin.
“No, the medical teams are enough. You’re not going far. We have to get her back to OOF for tomorrow’s flight out to the wall.”
“Still bad out there?”
“Not as bad, no, but they’re keeping some of the smaller helos on standby.” Justin pointed and waved me off. “Malaki’s giving me the evils, go.”
Silao, Alba, and Jim escorted me in closer, then I had to walk.
Those steps unaided were just as difficult as those inside their home, but here they meant so much more.
I opened the door and whistled. This would be the first time I’d sit in a DP’s seat, one where I could connect with it.
“Get your ass in, or we’ll run out of fuel,” Malaki scolded.
“Yes, ma’am.” I struggled in using the pulleys and hefted myself into my seat with a plop. There was still no pain, and I was in the green; that was what Alba and Jim were discussing behind me.
“Ready?” Malaki asked.
“You want me to fly?” I was dripping in sweat and panting like a lunatic.
“No,” she said. “I just meant to take off.”
“Ready.” I ran my hands down my slacks and gently tugged my shirt open at the back.
The cold metal of the seat made me shiver even more. “I need to get hardened and used to the fact I’m going to be semi naked in these things.”
“We can get you a suit,” Malaki said. “Just takes—”
“Money,” I added. “Yeah, buck naked it is…doing a helicopter in a helicopter!”
Malaki almost twitched the cyclic, laughing so hard. Alba and Jim behind us were crying.
“Hey, I gotta lighten the mood somehow.”
“Lower it, more like.” Jim grinned.
This flight, though. It would be burned into my mind forever, just like waking up and walking was.
Silao had been right. There was no amount of training or preparation that got us ready for this.
No number of warnings would put us off; no amount of money would either way.
DPs were either made for this, or they died for this.
Malaki eased the helo into the air, and I listened as she talked through to FC even though we weren’t in their airspace. They—no, her father was all over this.
She didn’t move far, or high. Took a nice hover over Jim and Alba’s home.
“Always looks so lovely from up here,” Alba said.
Those words alone distracted me enough to realize I wasn’t breathing. I sucked in that much-needed breath and concentrated. My X16 took in everything. It truly did look so lovely, all of it. I wondered if I was actually in Aug-World’s interface for a moment.
This is all real, Apex said. This is the real world you’re seeing, no lies.
Malaki put her hand on my arm. “Take your time. We’re all here for you.”
“I don’t know what to do.”
“I got you.” Silao popped his head in between. “You don’t need to see me. Listen to me.”
“Okay,” I said, my voice still shaking almost as much as my body was.
“Vitals are holding,” Alba reported.
“The seats are all the same, the connections perfectly spaced out. There’s no room for error on their side during the operation or the tech side in constructing the seats. They’re perfect. They will align.”
“You’re saying that like—”
“It will feel like they’re not. That there’s a barrier. Almost like opposites, it will feel as if you’re not meant to be pushing, sliding away from each other. That first connection breaks that barrier for good. You’ll never feel that again.”
I let myself slide back and there it was, a barrier. I let myself feel it and wriggle around it. When I pushed, it pushed.
“You feel it, right?” Silao asked.
“Yeah, it’s slippery. Cold. How did you break it?”
“Honestly, I don’t know,” he said. “I’d like to think it was something I did specifically, but I don’t remember. It’s like communicating with the drones. When you start out, there’s resistance, then an understanding. It’s almost as if they give you a chance, prove yourself to them and they’ll accept you.”
“Yeah, makes no sense at all.”
“No kidding,” Malaki said. “How can you communicate with a program?”
“It’s like having a conversation. Like we are now,” Silao said. “I know it sounds weird, but it really isn’t.”
“Sounds weird,” Malaki agreed, but she smiled. “How can I help?”
“Justin couldn’t do anything,” Silao said. “It was totally on me.”
“On me,” I reiterated.
I let their chatter flitter away, and I focused on that barrier. Instead of pushing it, I tried to do what Silao said, to talk to it.
Hey there, I said feeling like an idiot talking to a machine.
Hi, Apex also added and we both laughed.
A chuckle escaped my lips, and I heard Silao laugh with it. “He’ll be fine.”
Silence echoed back to me across the barrier. There was no real sensation now, only layers of cold.
I could break it down into each layer. Micro segments, one on top of another. That was interesting.
From my own body, I noticed threads reaching out. My nodes wanted that connection, tiny filaments of bright light, reaching, twisting, trying to enter the barrier, yet they were still blocked.
I knew mana existed. There were so many around me that had used it, the creatures in the world that had it as much as they did nanites.
That is mana, right? I asked Apex.
Correct, you and the nites. The tech is using mana.
Then I just want it to feel warm for now. It’s cold. I don’t want it to feel cold.
The bright filaments changed from lemon to canary yellow to mustard, then darkened to peach, apricot, and amber.
They’re warming to you, Apex said. Now talk.
I still felt like an idiot. Hey there, I said. Think you can let me in?
I sat back just a little, felt the warmth surround me as the barrier broke with a snap. My nodes, instead of being pushed away, were pulled towards their respective slots. I tried to stop it at first, feeling it wasn’t me in control—it was them.
I couldn’t stop it.
Searing hot pain ripped through every node, every cell as they slotted into place. I heard shouting around me. I couldn’t make out their words, then I could. Malaki’s stern voice came through to me first.
“Flight Control, aborting now. Repeat, we are aborting.”
The helo dropped. I felt it. I saw it from a whole other perspective. The hangar. I wasn’t in the cockpit anymore.
“His heart rate is through the roof,” Jim shouted. “We need to get him out before it gives out.”
HEART RATE - 230 bpm
I noted it really was. I couldn’t see what I was doing, not in the cockpit, but I lifted my arm up, formed words.
At least I thought I did.
“I don’t understand you,” Malaki said. “Silao?”
“He said stop, level the helo off.”
“Stop? Are you kidding me?”
I tried again to talk to her, but nothing.
“Give him a minute, please,” Silao said. “He’s talking in code, their code.”
I heard Alba and Jim in the back, saw their machines red lining. The whole helo around me, everything, from every single angle.
Silao reached over the center, touched my arm. “I know you see me. I’ll translate. Tell them what you need.”
“Time,” I said. “Give me time. I’m almost there.”
He reiterated my words.
They did give me time.
Ten seconds.
Thirty seconds.
“Heart rate decreasing,” Alba said what seemed a lifetime later.
HEART RATE - 180 bpm
I was overwhelmed, and so was Apex. It feels so wrong, but right, he said.
“Each node has its own processing power,” Silao said. “You’ve got a top-of-the-range power tool under your belt. This is no newbie toy. This is the real deal. Use it.”
“How?” I asked him.
“Start at the base of your spine. That’s your core node. That one relates everything up to your X1. Once you’ve got that one working with you, you can spread up and out into each branch. But take it slow—it hurts.”
I already knew it hurt. I didn’t think it could hurt more.
I was wrong.
The more pain came, the more weight settled on my shoulders. “I don’t think I can,” I said. “I’m tired.”
“Just make that one connection,” Silao said. “The rest will come, I promise. Just one. Once you’ve got that, you’ll feel a thousand times better.”
In my mind, I appeared in a green, lush, and very wet swamp. I waded out into the center and realized, no, it was quicksand and it had tight hold of me, it wasn’t letting go. Instead of forcing myself to trudge forward, when I felt like I couldn’t move…
I heard a voice, a familiar one.
“Dad?”
“You can’t force yourself forward if the sand gets you,” he said. “It goes against every bit of instinct you’ll ever have. You’ll want to take steps. You’ll want to walk. Stop. Stop and drop. Throw yourself back at the mercy of nature.”
Emotion choked me. I did remember. I remembered being out in the mud lands and getting stuck. We’d gone there on purpose. He was trying to teach me things could be vastly different to what you thought, and sometimes fighting made it worse. You had to let it go.
Going against your instinct was hard. So hard.
“You can do it,” Dad said as I struggled in that sand, that very real, life-threatening sinking sand. “Let it go.”
With his voice in my mind and his words echoing through everything around me, I let out a breath and with it. I let everything around me stop.
There was no struggle then; nothing held onto me.
I floated.
Everything around me, which was red lining, dropped back through the color system as it cooled.
We were back in the orange, then the yellows.
I opened my eyes, looked directly at Malaki. “I’m in, disconnecting now. Take me back.”
