Revelations, Abominations, and the Sleep Deprived

Sunday, 08 Aug 2523
Durance class Exeter
En route to Regina
0023hrs, ship's time

We'd managed to escape Grasshopper Station with little more injured than our dignity but there were still consequences to our dust-up to contend with. I'd earned a few of my own, not the least of which was a broken rib, and it currently made sleep impossible. I slid out of bed and heard Joshua stir and murmur behind me. I leaned over despite the stab it cost me and smoothed his hair from his face.

"Go back to sleep." I kissed him tenderly and stroked his cheek. "I won't be long."

I'd pulled on a pair of pajama pants before racking out, but had left off wearing a top for comfort. Getting a shirt on so soon after breaking that rib was more pain I was willing to withstand, but if I was leaving my quarters, I'd have to cover up. I compromised by slipping on my bathrobe. It did the job and didn't require raising my arms above my head. Thus modestly attired, I left my quarters with only a vague sense of direction, too distracted by the throb of my injury to focus. The smart table in the conference room beckoned. We might still be in Cortex range of the station. I could scan the news and see if anyone had been sent out after us.

With that in mind, I started off for it and light caught my eye to port. Med bay. Arden's pulling a late one. My steps turned his way of their own volition and thirty paces later, I was leaning on the doorjamb to medical. Arden was moving around in his fancy dinner duds, a white silk shirt and green brocade vest, now a bit worse for wear from the jail break. I rapped my knuckles on the door to let him know I was there.

"Hey," I said softly. "What are you doing still up?"

---

Arden looked up, smiled wearily at Rina, "Just tidying up a bit." Then noticing her attire - very unRina-like. "Is something wrong Rina?"

---

"Nothing, really," I shrugged and winced when my rib protested. Knowing he'd notice, I amended, "Well, nothing I haven't dealt with before. Just restless, I guess. I thought I'd try to catch the news but saw the light on."

God it was lame, but it was the truth.

---

Concern lights Arden's eyes. "Come on in and sit in the examining table. Let me check out what scratches and bruises you have. I'll give you an analgesic if you need." Arden pats the padded table.

---

"Sure," I said, stepping up to the table. I hoisted myself up and grit my teeth against the internal stab. Nothing for it, really. "Mostly bruises and scrapes, but I think I've broken a rib."

I let my robe fall around my waist so he could see for himself the livid bruise that spread over my right flank. A distant part of my head squawked that I was nude beneath, but I barely noticed. I had more important things on my mind.

"I have got to learn to dodge better."

---

Arden grunts as he looks over the collection of scrapes, scratches, abd bruises that were his friend Rina. "Actually you should take all together better care of yourself. Start with not getting in such situations to begin with." Arden turns away and gathers some bandages to wrap around Rina's abdomen. "Actually, it's been months since you've been shot. That's an improvement."

---

"Well, I've been kinda busy lately." I breathed a laugh, it being the only sort I could make without wincing. "If you like, I could try to pencil it in."

---

"No need on my account," Arden says smiling. "Now lift up your arms as much as you can. I'll be gentle as I can, I need to wrap the ribs until they heal."

---

"'Kay ...Dierma!" I bit my tongue on the rest and managed to lace my fingers behind my neck. "I hope this is good enough. I don't think I can go any farther."

Wuss, snarked my inner critic. Shut up, you. Just taking his advice. I held still so Arden could wrap my ribs. Oh, yeah? You've lost your edge, gotten all gooey and soft. How else could a ten-year-old girl get the drop on you? Admit it, you're whipped.

Shut the fuck up.

I ground my teeth and wondered how many pounds per inch pressure it would take to crack a molar.

Try it and see. Maybe your teeth have gotten soft too. Just like your head.

---

Arden carefully wrapped the bandage around her. Once it was secured with a butterfly clip, Arden tightened the tension on the bandage and wrapped it around her.

"Okay," Arden said, "That does it. You'll probably need to take some NSAID when you feel pain. How does it feel?"

---

"Could use some now, actually," I admitted and steadfastly turned a deaf ear on my inner critic. "I could use the sleep."

I eyed the med locker and scowled at it.

"About the meds, I'm sorry."

---

"I have a sleep aid if you need one," Arden points out.

---

"I don't think I'll need it, not if I can take the edge off with something weaker. Not to be ungrateful, but I don't want to have to fight against the drugs if I have to respond to a GQ." I nodded at the med locker. "How much did she take? I saw her filch three of the little bottles but she could have taken more after I was out."

---

"Who take?" Arden turns and looks at Rina. "Okay, start at the beginning..."

---

"Didn't Joshua tell ...," I broke off with a sigh. I gingerly pulled my robe to rights and tied it shut. "Joshua and I were making our way back to Exeter when he got hit with a mental whammy and went down puking. He was a mess, Arden, in a lot of pain and nearly unconscious from it. Actually, about a minute or so into it, he did black out. That's when I noticed we were being followed. A girl about 9, maybe 10 years old. Had a street kid look to her. I asked her to help me out, she showed us a different way around to the ship, and we got Joshua on the table." I patted the cushion I sat on. "That's when it started going sideways."

I told him how she'd convinced me to open the med locker and once she'd gotten inside, halfway held Joshua hostage while we argued what meds to give him.

"Specifically, she said that since she was a Reader, she would know what to give him. And while I did recognize what she picked out for him and might have figured it out on my own, saving time was more important at that moment. No, what pissed me off was her stealing from us while she did it. That and the fact that she refused to get out of there when I asked." I sighed and was glad to note it didn't hurt as much. The wrap was doing its job. "So I did the inevitable: I got in there to haul her out. And that's when she ... I dunno. Kicked me or something. Solar plexus, I think. I hit the wall and that was all she wrote."

I crossed my arms, testing the wrap and finding it solid. It was hard to do but I managed. "She could have taken anything after I was out. So ... How much did she take?"

---

"Not too much," Arden says looking at the medicine. "At least, no more than I think Joshua is worth. If that was her price, fine.

"A reader though? Isn't she kind of young? No training.... And she was better than Joshua? That seems fishy."

---

Relieved that the theft was a non-issue—outside of my own personal misgivings—I tackled the last half of his statement.

"I know it does, but I'm pretty sure she was telling the truth. She ....," I paused, gathering my thoughts on it. "She knew things. You remember how it made Joshua ill to be near Readers like Volker, during the trial on Highgate? Or how those Creepy Guys at the Kremlin made him feel? Joshua told me about them later. It was like getting jackhammered in the gut. That's how wrong they were. He could sense it coming off them the way we'd feel heat from a fire. It was there, a physically felt presence. And when I was getting Joshua to Exeter, he hit a wave of it coming from ... somewhere ahead of us on the station. Mische said it was coming off the freighter, that they were transporting more of the Creepies aboard. And that, Arden, was all the evidence I needed that she was a Reader. Because Joshua was moaning and puking his guts out and I've never seen him that ill except when he was in mental range of ... of shit like that. There was no way that girl could have known that, unless she was a Reader, too. How else would she know what was wrong with him without knowing him?"

I sighed, frustrated.

"You know, it would be so much easier if you could just Read it from me yourself. I can't tell you exactly how I made the pieces fit, but they fit and they made sense, and I ran with it. That's what convinced me to let her help us. Otherwise I would have thanked her and sent her on her way."

---

"It's not that she was a Reader, Rina, it's that she was so much better at it than Joshua.

"You see my point? Joshua had training, he was made to use his mind, taught how to build on his gift. How is it that a street waif does it much better?"

Arden returns to picking up meds as he talks.

--

"Why do you think that just because she's a street kid now, that she never got training back when? Do you remember what we learned on St. Albans? That the Academy that trained Joshua was no longer in operation but most of the people involved with it—as well as some of the students—went off on their own, formed something called Aegis? Who's to say she wasn't one of them? And as the next generation model, why shouldn't she be better?"

It didn't take a big leap of imagination to think of how Mische had gotten away from Aegis if she were of a mind.

"What I want to know is what she was doing on that station?"

---

Arden shrugs, "The more we look at it, the more questions I have." Arden continues to put the spilled med supplies away. "Who is she? Where did she come from? Who is she working for? Is she running from something? Just more questions.

"I would be curious on how she got to the station," Arden finishes.

---

"So would I. I wonder if Joshua got any more information out of her." I silently kicked myself for not asking him. I was just too glad to have him back in one piece, to have the crew back in one piece, to ask after side details. It was only now, when the immediate danger was over, that the what-ifs and the what-nows would needle me. And as befitting the nature of such questions, I knew that I would never get the answers I wanted. At best I might get a hint or two. "But we may never know. That just sucks, Arden."

---

"Seems like we don't have a choice in the matter, lots of things suck. But I prefer to think of things we can't change as blocks. Otherwise I would go crazy trying to change things I can't." Arden smiles, "Knowing more about the mysterious urchin is definitely a block right now.

"In the future we need to keep our metaphorical ears open for more information. Maybe we can do something about it then."

---

"Roger that," I agreed with a nod. "And I will keep my feelers out. The Academy had too much potential and the fact that it survives as Aegis hasn't gotten past me. Maybe we can cover more ground if we both keep an eye out together?" It was on the tip of my tongue to ask him to inquire amongst his medical contacts, but there was no knowing if he'd tip our hand doing so. Instead I stuck to a safer topic. "I know you spend a lot of time channel surfing."

---

Arden looks stunned. "Wait. Start over. Aegis is Academy? And what's Aegis?"

---

"Do you remember what the Operative said when she held us prisoner on St. Albans? The Academy was disbanded but some of the old group struck out on their own and formed Aegis. Part of what was going on at the St. Albans facility was involved with that." I did the math in my head and sighed. "It's been a while, though. Over a year. No telling how much survived the bombardment, or how many got away to regroup later on. And apparently, the Feds have decided on a different avenue of augmentation, if Joshua's sensitivity to the Lacy's cargo is any indication."

---

"And assuming that Aegis is the one creating the abomination," Arden points out. "Another one of those things to remember and keep our eyes open for."

---

"Absolutna." I slid off the table as gently as I could to spare my ribs and said once I got my feet on the deck. "It's a mess, Arden. I don't know where this is going but it's not impossible that we're heading toward a war involving augmenteds against augmenteds on both sides--because sooner or later, the Feds won't allow the corporate faction to have their own augmented army. And before that happens, both factions will throw their augmenteds at us. How the hell do you fight that kind of war?"

---

"I don't think that the Independents have abominations, which I think is a better name than augmented," Arden says. "They have to have a weakness, something the Alliance uses to control them. Might be sonic, might be programming, which would involve some sort on network."

Arden pauses then speaks slowly, "Weren't there some sort of close range network in a helmet? I'm not misremembering am I? Could it have been a prototype for the control over the abominations."

---

I stood there in my bathrobe and tried to think it through.

Pax and Miranda ...the Academy that altered Joshua and River and Volker ... the Chempliant that ruined Mike ... Valerie and the Blue Sun hunters at her Osiris clinic ... Queenie on Muir ... Kappa, the Operative, and their captives on St. Albans ... Raven and the Blue Sun hunters on Beaumonde ... the Elect in the Core ... the advent of intelligent Reavers and Mike's weird call ... the unseen cargo on Lacy and their effect on Joshua's mental and physical state ... Mische and her abilities, hidden behind the facade of a ten year old girl ...

It was a trail of breadcrumbs that stretched out behind me for years but try as I might, I couldn't anticipate when or where the next breadcrumb in the trail would fall. My fingers itched for pen and paper, for a way to lay it out on something I could take in with a glance. I could better discern a pattern then, and from the pattern a trajectory, a direction, a gorram clue.

Later. Now's not the time, standing here barefoot in med bay with Arden. Still...

"Yeah. And Mike had that weird ... howl ... he used on the Reavers. And Blue Sun already has a pretty good handle on sonics. We've all bled to prove it. And we know Blue Sun's been experimenting with programming for years. Maybe we should compare notes? Yours and mine?"

---

"I haven't been keeping notes, and as smart as i am, my memory sometimes plays tricks on me. And then there is real, or imagined, influence of Valerie.

"But I am willing to give it a go if you want."

---

"It's late. I should get back before Joshua comes looking for me." I said. "But let's do this when we've both had a chance to sleep on it. Tackle it when our minds are fresher. Deal?" I stuck out my hand, wincing as my rib protested. We shook on it and I made a mental note to ask about Valerie later. The conversation had gotten too surreal as it was to introduce yet another mind-bender into it.

---

"Maybe even with everyone else. Something like that is good with more brains than just two," Arden says.

Then Arden smirks, "Go. Have fun. Don't do anything I wouldn't do."

---

"Sure thing," I said and managed not to roll my eyes. Even after a month and a half, the crew still poked fun at the newlyweds. As if Joshua and I hadn't already been sharing the same bunk for nearly three years. Let them have their fun, girl. There's damned little else to laugh about. "I'll roust him out of a sound sleep and tell him he's gotta. Doctor's orders."

I winked at him as I drifted out the door.

"I'll try not to hurt him too much ...."

---

Arden's voice follows her out, "Don't you get hurt either...."

---

Been there, done that, I didn't say. I let my laugh serve as an answer and went aft to seek my bed and the man waiting for me there.

HOW TO SPEAK RUSSIAN

Absolutna = абсолютно = ahb-soh-loot-nah = absolutely Sound clip
Dierma! = дерьмо = dyeer-mah, dyeer-moh = crap! Sound clip

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