Michael Siemsen - Exigency

John sucked in a deep breath and held it, gathered himself, and rolled onto his back as he let the air blast from his lungs. Acid seemed to spray at his wounds from the inside. The agony was worst on his torso and thigh, where the sensation of tearing flesh made him freeze in a full body grimace. He forced himself to sip tiny breaths as he waited for the pain scale to drop from 10 to 9… even just 9.5.

It took a long time. So long that the possibility occurred to him that it may never go back down. That he’d be stuck there like an overturned turtle, a dose of relief clenched in the fist at his side, unable to bring it to his mouth. But it did go down… 9.9, 9.75, 9.5, 8.5, all quite quickly once the peak had released its grip. The opportunity presented, he didn’t hesitate to fling the pill to the back of his throat. He swallowed, stuck his water tube in, and then slurped enough liquid to dissolve the capsule. T-minus twenty minutes until relief.

He once again lifted his head enough to see past his chest to the EV outside. His fone pegged it at 10.06 meters. He labored through raising his legs, planting both boots on the gritty floor, and used his left arm as a third lever to turn his body around. Pivoting on his back, he rotated, powering through without stopping, until the top of his head pointed out the cave.

Dust and gravel rolled beneath his back with a deep scritching sound as he slid, little by little, across the surface. Pushing his legs downward hurt worse than sideways. His right thigh screamed at him to stop, to at least take a break as re-formed and half-healed muscle fibers pulled and tore, delicate embryonic flesh detaching at the edges, leaking fluid.

Back up to 9.5, his body surrendered before his mind agreed. Stinging tears streamed from the corners of his eyes, into and around his ears.

He breathed and waited.

They say suicide is a coward’s escape. Partially true in this instance. He wished to be free from agony, to head off the unavoidably miserable existence ahead, the despair of a driven personality reduced to irrelevance. On the other hand, there was the freeing of Minerva, both physically and mentally, the preservation of her supplies, increased chances of survival. Still, there was a catch to all this.

He resumed sliding. Outside now. Three more meters. Thin clouds overhead. Two meters. One. The front of the EV moved slowly into view like a massive white sister planet eclipsing the violet sky. Zero.

Now for sitting up. Fortunately, the new pill was kicking in, overlapping with the meds already in his system. It would still hurt like hell, but at the very least his murky brain would care less. He wedged his fingers into a hull crevice, pulled with his abs while pushing with his better leg, and folded himself upward 90.

A moment later, the hatch glided up over the roof, revealing the medkit on the floor, just inside. With a guilty sense of triumph, he grasped the handle and set the kit in the dirt at his side.

What if Minerva had considered the possibility of him attempting to self-medicate and overdosing—accidentally or otherwise? What if she’d hid the meds somewhere else? These thoughts clumsied his fingers as he groped at the latches.

Open.

All meds present and accounted for. It wouldn’t be long now. He sighed relief, but it was short-lived. There was still that catch.

Assuming Ish had met with a less-than-pleasant fate, if John died, Minerva would be all alone, with only herself to support. This fact had fallen into the “pros” column of suicide contemplation, as his absence bolstered her ability to travel, eliminated the need to feed, house, and nurse a burdensome companion. However, absent those very liabilities, she could easily lose the will to survive. She might carry on for a time, try to make it to the coast on the slim chance that, despite the lack of any communication, others had actually survived evac and may come for her. That hope would dwindle away as weeks elapsed. Maybe she’d one day get on the skimmer, point it out to sea, toward Threck Country, knowing full well it wouldn’t make an eighth of the journey on a full charge. Or more likely, she’d intentionally set off her HSPD. Let it run its full course. A self-produced overdose.

She needed a reason to live. She needed hope.

Minnie purred as cool water streamed down her forehead, beading and sheeting over her face. A light breeze chilled it further. Her hand oozed lazily from her neck to her chest.

No one else knows this feeling.

Not another human in the world…

Another human…

Aether…

…gone.

John.

She opened her eyes. The throbbing in her chest began to ache, sharp and stabby, or maybe it’d hurt all along. She was hot—so hot. A tiny glimmer of clarity. Fingers grappled at her suit collar. The suit needed to be opened. She could cool down in the wind. But heat was only a symptom, not the real problem.

She closed her eyes once more, pulled her feet in, spread her knees wide, and rested her palms on them. Slow breaths. Prime numbers and… black holes. Primes and black holes, go.

2, NGC 1277, 3, Guthrie 13.09, 5, Cygnus X-1, 7…

After a few minutes, her pulse responded, slowing. Continuing meditation, she felt it safe to pull up biostats to monitor herself. Heart rate: 177. O 2level: 86%. Tyramine, dopamine, ABG, pH, SR, friction, metab: all gradually stabilizing. She ceased meditation at 1039, Messier 77 . She’d won. Her mind was stronger than the evil hormones and electrochemical demons.

Ah, but this perception in itself was an instrument of the trap. The fallacy of mental strength and personal responsibility. To succumb was no more a sign of weakness than when an unrelenting cancer finally overpowered a body. Especially since this allegedly strong brain was one of the many organs working against her. Doctors had tried to drill that point into her head, while others wished to literally drill into her head. In a world where few uncured or unmanaged afflictions remained, a medical field wherein DNA transplants had long since taken the fun out of the profession, Minnie had been a captivating specimen for otherwise thumb-twiddling researchers desperate for a problem to solve.

“What if we make her all new thyroid, pituitary, and adrenal glands? Hell, throw in kidneys, thymus, pineal, and pancreas while we’re at it. Or maybe we should fill her brain with bots, rewire the offending synapses, neurons, and axons.” Her father wouldn’t have any of it. Once Minnie’s shrink had honed in on the right meds, Dad yanked her out of every study. He wouldn’t risk detriment to her brain—identified before birth as an extremely rare H-class, hypothesized to be the type possessed by all of history’s famed polymaths.

“If the world ever collapses to a point where people can’t get meds,” he’d told her with a pinch of her chin, “we’ve probably got bigger worries than your attacks.”

Bigger worries indeed.

Hovering at 30m, with doubly tall ridges on either flank, the echoes of a thousand raving Hynka bounced to and fro with surreal stereo effects. It sounded as though they’d grown wings: two nightmarish swarms closing in.

Minnie grasped a handhold over her head and pulled herself up. Still dizzy, fingers and toes prickly, butt numb, headache from hell sinking its dagger fingers through her skull. Nausea—instantaneous—plopped down into her stomach like she’d swallowed a 10-kilo bucket of rocks and vomit.

“Well, that was nice,” she said. “You still there?”

No responses from imaginary friends.

She took in her surroundings, didn’t remember entering this wide canyon. Below the skimmers, what looked to be the entire local Hynka population had ripped apart the jungle floor, creating a wide clearing. In the middle of the horde she spotted a semi-pyramid of struggling beasts, like ants, or the universe’s most terrifying cheerleading team. They’d reached four standing bodies high but couldn’t seem to pull off a fifth. It’d take quite a bit of practice before they hit the eight or nine required to reach her, but she applauded their effort as the skimmers once more accelerated through the canyon. Glancing back to be sure they were still dedicated to their pursuit, Minnie could see she’d triggered a new bloodbath. They had a serious problem with frustration.