Page 66 of Taken to Voraxia
Svera reaches out for my hands and holds them. “It’s going to be okay. I promise. Just…tell me about this thing!” She flails out, grabbing for stuff that’s strewn across my desk — well, what was once a vanity type thing that I dismantled into a flat tabletop now piled high with wires and jars of powders and secure canisters with stone lids and half-finished projects — mostly duds but a few live ones as well that I should probably find a home for…
“That’s nothing. Just some melted metal that was supposed to be for…” I stop, realizing what I’m about to say and grin. “It’s supposed to be for these.”
I reach past a bit of folded metal and pull out three devices, each no bigger than a fingernail — a nail, not a claw. I hand Svera one and take another. “Guess what this is?”
“How can I?” She handles the clunky metal, turning it over and trying to find a way to open the applicator. Inside, she’d see that it was filled with copper-lined Droherion. Much different than the particle ion I used last time I built one out of dejected plastic parts and scrap metal.
“Here. Let me show you.” I reach for Svera’s hair covering and she eyes my hand warily as I stroke one of the kinky curls that’s escaped by her ear. Singling out just one hair, I rip it quickly.
“Ow! Hey!”
I bring the hair follicle to the opening and thread it through the microscopic hole I planted there. The device whirs to life, emitting a low tick before sucking the hair the rest of the way in. I press down on the base and the device clicks again. A harsh buzzing fills the air as the charge kicks and the holo generator begins to creep over my skin.
The sensation is strange — only in that it isn’t. I don’t feel anything at all, and nothing for me changes, even as Svera’s face does. She gasps. “Oh my stars! Miari, you made another one!”
“I made another three.” I laugh. “I wanted to get it right. And I wanted to make it so that you don’t have to hold the button pressed in the entire time you want to use the generator. The ones I made have motion sensors installed so they get a better graph of the body, but they only need to get a graph of the body once, right at the beginning.” I toss Svera the device in my hand and she fumbles to catch it, drops it on the floor twice, and then finally stands — she’s never had great hand-eye coordination.
It makes me smile as she examines the device and then retreats to look at me from afar. She watches me warily. Or rather — watchesherself —warily. I do a turn for her and then shake my booty. “Like what you see?”
“Oh stop that. I just…it works without holding it?”
“Yes. The user can be apart from the device up to twenty paces, more or less. And I should say human paces — not Voraxian ones.”
Svera smiles as she inspects the device up close. “Wow. I’m impressed. I’d say it’s official.”
“What is?”
“That you are a genius.”
I roll my eyes. “Not at all. You should see what some of these others come up with in Tri'Herion’s lab. It’s incredible. They are so much more advanced than we are…”
I hear her small feet pad over the dirt floor. It’s slightly mossy in here. I love the way it squishes under my toes. “You are, Miari. Don’t ever think otherwise.”
Her hand lands on my shoulder and it’s so light and soft compared to Xoran’s. I look into her face and her wide, brown eyes are so much like my own and yet…not. Her eyelids blink up and down, like the other humans’. Like me, but only half.
“You are a genius,” she repeats. “You always have been. Raku is so lucky to have you and don’t you ever forget it.”
I smile. “And I’m lucky to have you. You’re saving my skin as advisor. Raku and I were discussing and after your trial, if you’re up for it, I’d like for it to be a permanent post. One with a title and everything.”
Svera’s grin spreads, her white teeth peeking through pink lips. “I’m not sure if I’m ready to live here permanently…”
“You could be posted to the human colony most of the time if you like. It’s really whatever you want. Just don’t make me do this alone. You know everything. You’re the diplomat. I’m just the…tinkerer.”
“Genius,” she finishes at the same time I do.
We smile at one another and I’m just about to open my mouth to ask her more questions about life on Qath when I hear the muffled sound of shouting just outside the door.
Svera freezes and takes a tentative step towards me. We lock hands, surely silly looking —twoSverasholding one another amidst the mess of my tinkering space — as we wait for the sounds to die out.
But they don’t. They get louder. And soon the voices are mixed in with the ominous scrape of metal on metal and then the horrifying bang of bullets exploding and ricocheting off of holoshields, blasting through werro wood…
“My stars, what is that?” Svera jumps at the sound of an ion round hitting a shield wall. One that doesn’t penetrate.
Relief hits me. “It’s okay. They’re firing ion rounds at our fighters, but our fighters are equipped with Droherion shields. They are more than enough to stop the rounds. They’ll be okay…”
“At our fighters? I know that Krisxox stationed many xcleranx out there, but this sounds like a full out war! Rhorkanterannu is just one man — one male. He can’t warrant this level of…”
BOOM.
