Beyond (21 page)

"Test their blood to see if it has struck them yet, or how far advanced it is." Salvan ordered Raja.

"But I thought the suit lights up." Aimee aimed her question to Zak. His hard expression softened slightly when he looked at her.

"If your suit lights up, it's already too late."

Free from the grip of the sentries, she wrapped her arms around herself and jumped when Raja touched her shoulder.

"You are hurt?" The young woman looked concerned.

Aimee reached for the torn fabric. "No. It feels fine. You have enough on your hands to worry about."

Raja's smile was weary.

"Come," she said. "We'll take a look at your blood."

Raja started to usher her away, but Aimee looked frantically over her shoulder. "
Zak?"

Tall and enduring, Zak’s wistful gaze told her that she had to go. She felt like crying again. She didn't want to leave him. There was a connection between them now that she did not want to sever. What if she never saw him again?

"Go, Aimee," he whispered. "It's going to be okay."

His eyes contradicted the declaration.

She held on to that glance even as Raja drew her away. She held it until a stream of patients and doctors filed between them and all she could see was Zak's dark hair above the melee.

And finally, she could not see him at all. She turned and noticed the knot of tension nestled between Raja's eyebrows.

"How bad is it?" Aimee asked in a confidential whisper.

The undertone was unnecessary with all the chaos around them. Several JOHs blocked the aisles, as patients shouted out denials. Some clawed at their suits, tearing at the condemning patch of light across their abdomens.

Raja worriedly reached for Aimee's hand, holding a silver instrument similar to a thimble over the tip of Aimee's pointer finger. After a weighted pause, Raja's frown dissolved and her shoulders slumped.

"You are clean." The woman's fawn-colored hair fell forward as she dipped in close to speak. "You are the first clean report today," she confided. "Maybe this infection will take a turn."

Aimee grabbed Raja’s hands. They were cold.

"Raja.
What about you?"

There was panic in the blue eyes, and then Raja’s glance dropped down to her suit. Aimee felt Raja’s fingers tremble.

"How long?"
Aimee asked with hushed urgency.

"It won't be long now before the color registers," Raja explained. "I have to keep working. The
number of scientists are
—" she scanned the vaulted room, "dwindling."

Fear of sounding callous was tossed aside by desperation. "I don't understand. How can you work on people? Won't you...infect them?"

"Once the infection is airborne, that surpasses human contact. You either succumb to the disease, or you are immune. But when it strikes with this severity like it did to our planet...there is no immunity."

Aimee felt her palms grow moist. "But you said I was clean."

Raja nodded, defeated. "I hope you stay that way, Aimee. I really do. But you need to be prepared. It's just a matter of time for all of us."

Aimee snapped her hand back. "No!"

"Raja?"
An older man with graying blonde hair and dour lines around his mouth interrupted from the aisle. With dismay, Aimee noticed that his stomach was lit up as red as a traffic light. "We need you in the lab.”

Raja cast a plaintive look at Aimee, but Aimee just nodded. “Go ahead.”

“I’ll be right back. Please—” she hesitated, looking over her shoulder. “Please, Aimee. You have to stay here. Please be here when I return.”

“Raja, you have to go.”

A well of emotion flooded Aimee and she reached forward to hug the woman who had to be only a few years older than her.
Much too young to die.

At first Raja tensed. Then she wrapped her arms around Aimee and whispered, “It’s going to be okay.”

But it wasn’t. Aimee needed to know the statistics. She needed to know exactly how bad it was going to be. She grabbed the closest JOH, and this time the blue crystal face that illuminated under her touch did not look so jovial.

“Hello Aimeeee.”

“Hi, JOH.”

“You sound sad, Aimee.”

“So do you,” she countered.

JOH’s black mouth flattened.

“JOH.”
She leaned forward to exclude the patients in the surrounding beds. “Tell me honestly. How bad is it?”

His dark eyes skewed sideward and back again.
“Very bad.
There is a vault filling with casualties. They are trying to keep that process out of the public view so as not to cause any more panic than already exists.”

“How long does someone have if their blood tested positive?”

“In your calculation of time…two, maybe three weeks.”

Aimee’s heart lurched.

“How long do they have if their suit has lit up?”

JOH looked straight at her and answered, “Two or three days.”

Aimee clutched her fist to her chest.
Oh, Raja
.

“JOH, they said Vodu—”

The black orbs bulged and then poured back into place. “Not long. He is in a separate chamber being attended to by our top scientists.”

Depression was boring its way into her soul. “They said I have not tested positive. Do I stand a chance?”

JOH remained quiet.

“JOH?”

“I am not capable of lying, Aimee.”

Oh no.
“Tell me.”

Another long pause and then he answered, subdued. “Even though you are from a different planet, your genetic makeup is the same as the Anthumians, making you just as susceptible as them.” Again, he hesitated. “And Aimee, even if you were not to succumb…would you want to be the only living creature left on this ship?”

A moan wrenched from deep in her throat. She shoved the JOH out of the way and charged into the aisle. A young aid grabbed a hold of her arm and urged her back onto her bed, but she yanked free from him and raced up the lane. She was aware of curious glances, but more so, the sad, desperate gawks. She ran past them, thinking that if she was fast enough, she would never make eye contact with them.

Outside the Bio Ward, Aimee collapsed against the wall. Posted alongside the entrance were a group of warriors, looking suspiciously like guards. One caught sight of her and moved to confront her, but Aimee grabbed a JOH and swung it before her face, pretending to engage in ardent conversation. In actuality, she refused to tap the screen. She refused to hear any more of JOH’s condemnation.

Aimee turned and stalked down the hall with her shoulders drawn back, attempting a look of composure. The guards were too busy to pay her much heed, or too distraught to care.

She had no idea of her destination. This was not her home. She was a stranger in a world that was dying. There was no place to run to for solace.
Nowhere to hide from this insidious fate.

Drawing in a deep breath, she stared at the walls of the corridor, willing herself to read them. Recognizing one symbol that might offer peace, she followed it with resolve.

The door slid shut behind her.

Silence.

The blissful hush of solitude.
A quiet born from night—a night that surrounded her.

Aimee gazed up at the atrium, into a world of glittering orbs and interstellar clouds. It was a new world, and yet it was comforting and familiar. In this forest, the trees might be foreign and the animal-life unique, but this was the closest connection she had to home.

She moved quietly down an alley, hearing the soft cadence of her boots against marble. She was positive this was the lane she was looking for, but both sides of the path were flanked by trees she did not recognize.

There.

It stood alone, eclipsed by the black desolation of outer space.
A single palm tree.

Aimee stepped up close, her eyes climbing the coarse trunk until she reached the apex, an amalgamation of balmy leaves. A coconut clung beneath the soft arc of a palm frond. She smiled, remembering the taste of coconut.

“I knew you would be here.”

The husky voice did not alarm her. He belonged in this forest as much as she.
Two strangers from different worlds.

She didn’t turn around, nor did she flinch when she heard him directly behind her.

“This isn’t something we can hide from, Aimee.”

She was tired.
So drained.

“I know that, Zak. But—” Defeated, she confessed, “I’m scared.”

“I know you are.” His tone was sober.

Aimee caught a reflection of them in the glass behind the palm tree. Zak was so tall. The top of her head came just below his chin. She could see him studying their reflection as well. Their eyes locked in the glass.

“Zak, how much time has passed back on my planet?”

His head tipped back as he calculated.

“Probably about three rotations now.”

“Three years,” she said, staring at her face in the glass.

Auburn hair dipped below her shoulders, lustrous under the
ambient light. Her face was cast in a blue glow—and yes, there was a maturity to it now. That maturity came from experience and not necessarily time. Her eyes collided with Zak’s again.

“I’m twenty years-old,” she murmured, but added with more vigor, “and now they’re telling me that I’m going to die. I don’t want to die, Zak.”

Zak stepped into the path of her reflection. He stood before her. Even in the filtered glow from the atrium, his eyes smoldered. They bore into her, making her feel vulnerable and desirable all in one glance.

“You aren’t going to die, Aimee.”

She shook her head, angry with the tears that began to well. “You can’t make that promise.”

He reached for her arms as his head dipped close to hers. So close that if she just tipped her neck back, she could—

“I won’t let you die.” His vow was hoarse.

“Why?” she pleaded.

Zak’s mouth crossed that empty space to claim hers. It was a soft kiss, but his grip on her arms confirmed that husky promise. Gentle passes of his lips made her legs grow weak. She leaned into him, returning those kisses, feeling a tear slip from the corner of her closed eyes. He parted from her, but the warm flesh of his forehead still nestled against hers.

“That’s why,” he whispered.

Aimee wanted to respond, but his mouth proved too tempting. She could feel his lips so near to hers and she yearned for that heated connection. With the end of her world close at hand, liberation that she had never possessed before manifested itself. She reached up and cupped his cheeks in her palms, pulling him closer so that she could kiss him again. Until this moment she
hadn't
really considered her age, but every bit of woman in her poured into this kiss. She shivered when his lips brushed across hers and returned for a deeper caress. Her hands slipped up into his hair, reveling in the coarse texture.

Zak’s arms folded around her, pulling her tight into his embrace. She felt his heart pounding and it exhilarated her to know that she was the reason for the hastened beat. The friction of his lips against hers turned her body into liquid and she was afraid she might pour out of his arms.

“Aimee,” he whispered against her lips. “I’m not going to lose you.”

She whimpered and reached to kiss him again, but he held his mouth just out of reach.

“I threw myself into the role of the warrior,” he spoke, “and I was damn good at it…but at what cost? I never even considered a woman in my life before.” His hand lifted to touch her face. “And then this stranger shows up.
This beautiful stranger who stows away on my ship.
A girl who attacks men twice her size because she was
afraid for me
.
A woman who has survived near death with me.”
His eyes smoldered. “I want you. I want you in my life.”

Aimee dusted her fingers against his jaw, where a muscle pumped beneath her touch. He was so beautiful with his chiseled chin and high cheekbones.
Exotic and handsome.
She drew back to take in more of him…and screamed.

“Zak!”

“What?” He jerked back. His eyes flashed and his body tensed. He was alert, seeking out a foe. “What did you hear?”

She whimpered and clamped her hand over her mouth.

“Aimee, what’s wrong?” Zak reached for her.

She held her hand up between them and pointed. Zak’s glance followed her finger.

“No.” He stumbled back.

His hand dropped to his chest and his palm flattened over the red glow beneath it. The red pulsed through his fingers and Aimee’s eyes locked onto that radiance.

“Oh, Zak, no,” she cried. She broke from her stupor and reached for him, shaking him out of frustration and pain. “No. This can’t happen. I want you too. This can’t be happening.”