Page 3 of Fated in A Time of War
“No no no no no—don’t you do this,” I whisper, dropping beside him, pulling medsprays from my hip. My hands are shaking. I drop one. “You hold the fuck on.”
I jab a medspray into his neck, dump another into the gaping cavity where his side used to be. Foam spreads, useless. Blood pours faster. His hand—still armored, fingers twitching—grabs my wrist. Not hard. Just enough to tell me he's still here. Barely.
“Lakk, come on,” I whisper, then louder, “LAKKA! Stay with me!”
His eyes flutter open. One is bloodshot and unfocused. The other stares directly at me. He doesn’t smile. He’s not dumbenough to think he’s going to make it. But he sees me. Really sees me.
“Shut up,” I say quickly. “Don’t waste breath. Save it.”
I slam another spray into his throat. Nothing. I rip open a compression pack, slap it onto what’s left of his side. The auto-seal hisses, tries to glue a dying man back together. Doesn’t work.
“Krall…” he croaks.
“No! No. Shut up. You don’t get to say anything. Not yet.”
He tries to laugh—it comes out a bubbling rasp. Blood leaks from the corner of his mouth.
I press on his chest, start CPR even though I know it’s too early. Too soon to give up. Too soon to accept the finality in that look he just gave me.
“I swear to all twelve gods, if you die on me I’m gonna drag your carcass back to Barrakus and prop you up at the parade grounds! You hear me?!Breathe!”
I slam my palms into his chest. Over and over. I feel ribs crack. Feel the useless flutter of a heart that doesn’t want to beat. I scream his name so loud my throat tears, then slap his cheek hard enough to leave a red mark through his scales.
He jerks.
Then stills.
Completely.
Just… stillness.
“No,” I whisper.
I sit there, pressing both hands on his chest, trying again, again, again.
“Come back, dammit. You were the good one. Thesmartone. You always did the right thing. You—you kept your gear squared, you actuallyreadthe protocols. You were the one Mom cried over when you left.Not me!She said I’d die in a gutter. I told her you’d watch my six! And now I—” My voice breaks.
I lean over him, forehead touching his. Blood smears between us. I don’t care.
“Lakk,” I say quietly. “I was just joking about the rations. About the liquor store. I didn’t mean it. You were right. This wasn’t a nothing op. You were right, and I was wrong, and now you’re?—”
My voice fails. My hands fall to his sides. I stay like that for what feels like hours. Long enough for the mech to stomp away. Long enough for the ash to stop falling. Long enough for the fire to die.
The street goes quiet. Just the distant hum of the mech’s engines as it moves to some other sector. Looking for more to kill.
I finally sit up. My whole body is shaking, like I’ve been electrocuted. My hands are sticky with blood and medfoam. My armor’s cracked across one thigh. I can’t feel my left foot. Doesn’t matter.
I close Lakka’s eyes.
That’s all I can do now.
The world doesn’t end with a scream. Not really. It ends with silence. With an empty street and one broken promise after another.
And me, sitting in the ruin, trying to remember how to breathe.
I stay kneeling long after Lakka’s gone cold. Blood pools beneath my knees, sticky and warm, soaking through the cracked seal of my armor. The copper stink of it is thick in my mouth, my nostrils. I can taste my brother on my tongue. Feel him caked into the grooves of my gauntlets. Every breath hurts, every heartbeat feels like it ought to carry a scream with it—but none comes.
I don’t cry.
