Chapter 10
Blood, Thicker
Songbird drifted almost silently in the black sea of the night sky. Having flown for several hours the beaten sun had long sunk beyond the horizon and left the group even more secluded and alone. A cold, thick darkness had them in a state of almost relaxing isolation. It was the first time they'd had a moment to pause. But with what they had been through and what they had lost, the moment slowly stretched into what felt like a lifetime of solidarity. Most slept. Peace propped up against the cool wall of Songbird, his eyes tightly closed and his head softly waved and bobbed with the gentle throb of the ship. Hollow too, nearby in a corner with a large bag propped up underneath to support his height. A few feet away and sprawled across several piled up bits and pieces Rage turned in his sleep restlessly. Both bad dreams and a lack of comfort kept him at a state of unease as he jostled and murmured to no one. The ship swung side to side as if cradling them, offering a mechanical safety only granted whilst hurtling through the shadow of night. It was no real safety, but it was safer than staying still.
Pocket sat in her turret that hung underneath the ship. The panels in front bathed it in a soft blue light that spun and danced like a river across her soft features. Shadows cut around the many decorations emblazoned upon her clothes making them almost seem alive. Her eyes locked on her own. The reflection in the windowed case the only thing visible amongst the black background outside, as they whistled through the dark night sky. With the top sealed the only intrusion came from occasional mutterings and sounds that leaked through the headset from the cockpit, dangled over a screen. Here though, she was alone to think. To stare.
A similar faint glow illuminated Evanz. Against a wall in the engine room and from below, the panel on his arm washed him in a much dimmer light that highlighted an age he otherwise never showed. Thin lines and drawn eyes the sign of a man who had pushed himself too far, too fast and too hard. Time and stress proving no one is safe from the decay it inflicts. The glow was dim. Almost stuttering as the metallic limb lay across his body like a dead weight. It looked less like a part of him and more like a tool. A burden.
The lines along his face grew as the arm lifted up, if only briefly. The exertion apparent as his breath laboured. The screen flickered again as he paused and let it fall limp by his side. A clunk as it connected with the metallic floor. He grimaced again. His other hand drifted across, soft fingers ran up the cold metal surface. Starting from their mirrored silver and black counterparts, frictionlessly he slid them along pipes and framework. After all this time he thought he could still remember what it felt like, what it felt to feel. To be whole. But like a dip in ice cold water the metal only woke him up from the warmth of that dream to the stark reality he now lived in. As he traced coils up past his elbow and to his shoulder. A cold, almost lifeless collection of parts to replace his that he had lost made those memories become even hazier. The lines on his face grew again as his eyes flickered.
His hand stopped when metal met flesh, a seemingly smooth line where his body joined his invention. It ran underneath his armpit and over the shoulder with an almost medieval shoulder pad to support the weight of the arm. Completely smooth minus a small clip hidden in the armpit, where his fingers had come to a halt. He hesitated, teeth clenched further emphasising the gauntness of his face. A few more laboured breaths to ease nerves before his fingers had pinched the small clip and began to pull it outwards. It followed, slowly. A black ribbon that inched out from under his arm where man met machine. Like a pull-cord on a parachute or a tapeworm that has lived far beyond what it should. It unwrapped from muscle and bone slowly. Slight spasms and unnatural tensing. A small flap on the metal casing of the arm eased its way open as more slid out from the flesh inside. His teeth still clenched, breath still slow. Almost a year of having to perform this had left him much more attuned to it but he could never truly shake the feeling of how unnatural it was. Not completely painless either but, that took a backseat for now.
As the hatch opened thin lines of a dark blue liquid began to seep out. They drifted down his torso forming small rivers that marked and mapped his thin stature and defined ribs before hitting the floor. Few at first, but as it opened further they became more frequent forming a small pool alongside him. A metallic click came from inside the arm as the ribbon reached the end, the hatch as open as it would get. The extrusion, now almost 8 inches had stopped unravelling and his fingers let it drop as it swung underneath his armpit and snaked its way alongside his body. As he leant over to pick up a small bowl to his side, his robotic appendage barely glowing, slumped by his side. The slight flickers licked his face like a candle made of a deep blue, cold and gaunt.
His muscle twitched as he brought the bowl across his body, torso jerking to the side slightly and a wince painted across his face, almost hissing in the otherwise deathly quiet. The bowl landed with a slight thud against the metal though the small pool of blue liquid licked the base. Teeth still clenched, he took a few breaths and reasserted himself. Irritated more he had reacted at all than dropped the bowl.
With a slow and laboured motion he raised the robotic appendage into the air as if saluting. A mix of pain and effort muttered under his breath. The blue liquid began to pour out now as the almost dead weight became parallel, then angled further above him. It pooled out like syrup. Murky and dark as his face contorted at the uncomfort of ejecting this mechanical cast off from his body. As more poured, his arm seemed to lighten and the effort of holding it up passed from his face. The panel perked up too, more illuminated as the brighter glow washed out the lines, marks and shadows giving him a sense of rejuvenation. After about half a minute it eased up, the amount thinning but the colour remaining thick and dismal until nothing more than a few drops fell along his body rather than poured into the bowl. About an inch worth of this fluid now pooled in the bowl.
His body was pale. The flesh around the shoulder almost completely white with a blue discolouring running underneath. His face and physique carried a similarly pale scheme but it was highlighted closest around where his shoulder and the arm connected. As he brought it back down alongside him he pushed the open hatch closed. It clicked again, filling the room and the cord began to slowly suck itself back into the divide. His fingers, now much more attentive and mobile clenched one after the other as he re-tested the purged arm. It stopped reeling in, just as a familiar voice echoed from a panel on the wall.
"There is more than last time" Juke stated cooly, choosing not to project and letting the scientist sit alone. "You're paler this time, so that's more of yours too" he added, as Evanz propped himself up slightly further from the bowl. "If my calculations are correct-"
"They are." Evanz interrupted, his voice missing its usual child-like exuberance. Juke paused as the atmosphere thickened with the abrupt and raspy response. The only sound the metal, clanking and warping against itself.
"So do something about it" Juke muttered, as Evanz ran his hand through his matted hair and looked to the floor. "Like what?"
"Take the arm off" He ordered, all sense of his usual sarcastic rapport gone from the otherwise blunt statement.
"You know I can't"
"You can, it's just tech-"
"Not that." Evanz whispered, dejected, as he propped against the wall bringing his robotic appendage in front of his face and staring intently at the fingers as they flicked and turned. "I'm not going to be useless, or a burden, they need me" He added, as his hand clenched into a fist.
"They need you to not die either" Juke added.
Evanz paused. As he glanced down at the mix of blood and liquid he had just siphoned out. The castaway from an otherwise alien power-source tearing his fragile humanity apart from inside. He knew his creation was correct. He knew because it had every square inch of his own intelligence which screamed from the back of his mind that he was killing himself. Slowly. But the one thing he had that the AI never could was his mortality; his humanity. A resolve that kept him from admitting he faced his death in equal parts because he knew he couldn't die yet and wasn't ready for it.
But this conversation was a well worn path between the two. More akin to a personal struggle than anything. The genius scientist could argue back and forth with the manifestation of his own thoughts, his own fears, his own brain. He could give himself reason not to give in. But as the crystal, the arm, drew more and more his arguments faltered. The AI though lacking humanity knew every thought running through the scientist's mind. He knew he could say nothing more.
Evanz's voice had fallen soft, "I will stop. Soon, I promise. But I can't yet because if I give up then it's over." His gaze locked on the floor as the pulse of the engines and throb of the metal filled the silence. Small spots of blue had stained his fingers, they left slight marks in his matted hair. Slowly, and with swathes of effort he rose to his feet using the wall to crutch his currently siphoned strength.
"After this, this is the last thing and after this i'll have time. We all will" He added, as he grabbed his jacket and picked up the container before he slid it into a backpack. One last deep breath before he walked with a bit more gusto back out into the ship, toward the others.
The AI kept silent and watched. A million thoughts rushed through his processor, a swathe of blinding information and intelligence. Tactical recommendation, medicine, treatment. But above all that he knew his creator's stubbornness all too well, and unfortunately, his mortality.