Seven: Feeling No Pain

Silver rain and a flutter of wings. Pain that threatened to topple him from a great height. Neon/halogen haze of the city by night and a man's face, terrified... I was cold and wet and dying. I don't think I'm dead. I'm warm and dry...

There were voices nearby. Two men, one whose voice was soft, slightly nasal...the other sounded like two granite blocks striking together. Do I know them? Either of them? "Why isn't he waking up, Kaz?" growled the granite voice.

"You might want to practice saying 'she'," suggested the other voice.

I don't understand... Where am I? Are these Tyrell's people? Tyrell is dead by my hand. He said there was no way to correct the replication failure. I'm not in pain any more, I feel strong. How can this be?

"The EEG reads like she's awake," said the softer voice. What is he talking about? She? Pris! But she's--she's dead, isn't she? Do I really remember that? Did I paint myself with her blood and shed tears for her, or was that a nightmare I had in the rain...?

"Roy? Can you hear me?" The granite voice was close, close enough to be taken out--but not without more information. Is this a Tyrell facility? Roy sniffed surreptitiously. The smells were antiseptic, medicinal...with a whiff of onions and underlaid faintly by mustiness. No. Not Tyrell. Someplace improvised.... Improvised? That seemed as if it should mean something. "Come on, Roy. Snap out of it. We got you fixed up."

That wasn't possible, was it? A moment of focusing on the flesh that contained the spirit, and one of the cryptic comments suddenly made sense. Something was missing. How can my penis be missing? What have they done to me--and why?

'Yup, she's awake," said the softer voice, sounding pleased. "Hello, Roy. My name is Kazminsky. Your friend Riddick hired me to try to regenerate your systemic failure. It's looking pretty good." Tyrell said that was impossible. Either he lied, at the cost of his life, or this man Kazminsky is a genius. I'm going to live? Even if he's only bought me a few more years, that is still an incredible gift...

"Don't worry about the gender reversal," continued Kazminsky, and Roy concentrated intently. "It's a way to get you off Earth incognito, and it's completely reversable."

"Why isn't he waking up?" the second voice demanded. "I though you said that shit you gave him would fix the memory in his hippopotamus."

Memory? Hippopotamus--? "Hippocampus," Roy said involuntarily. Well, that did it. No point in trying to eavesdrop now.

Squinting at the bright lights ringing the surface on which Roy lay showed two men. One wore a lab coat--Kazminsky?--and barely came up to the chin of the other man. The second man was shirtless and impressively well-muscled. Definitely not Tyrell personnel. Their precious dress code would never permit such a thing. He looked as if he belonged to the granite voice. Mr. Riddick, I presume?

"There you are," said the granite-voiced man--he was the larger of the two, and Roy felt obscurely pleased at having guessed correctly.

"Where am I?"

"We're still in L.A. We didn't have time to move you. I 'jacked your body from the morgue before they could do an autopsy and brought you here to Kaz." Riddick glanced over at the smaller man, who smiled. "It's been almost two weeks. It took a while to get everything stable." An aside to Kaz "You want to explain that part?"

Kazminsky explained the various drugs he'd applied to counter one failing organ or another, with a mild emphasis on the unholy cost of the rejuv drugs that had been used unstintingly. Meant to make me feel grateful to them, hence obligated. That is an error on their part.

As Roy struggled to sit up, feeling weiredly disembodied, Kazminsky activated the table support, which obligingly raised the replicant to a sitting position. Beyond the area where the three of them were clustered, other tables could be seen.

"Where are the others?" Roy asked urgently. "Pris and --" And? Pris and --? Faces, I remember faces--but not their names. This was frightening, tragic...

Riddick's expression was somber. "Six of us came down on the shuttle. I was the pilot. You told me to set up this place as a last resort, in case you couldn't get help from Tyrell."

"The others?" Roy whispered. The sense of dread was sickening.

"You told me Merle got killed trying to get into Tyrell." We tried to infiltrate their perimeter. Laser flash, and Merle's screams... Roy's heart raced at the memory. "We were leaving messages for each other at a bar called Toujours. You said Zhora and Leon got taken out by blade runners. Pris hooked up with somebody who was going to get you in to see Tyrell himself."

More memory flashes: a young-old man, mechanical toys, chasing another man through a labyrinth of broken rooms... "You asked me to meet you at the Bradbury Building. When I got there, the place was surrounded by emergency vehicles. They carried out Pris, and a while later, they brought you out. I 'jacked a porta-freeze and bribed a morgue attendant into releasing your body to me. And here we are."

Zhora...Leon...now names matched the faces Roy remembered. In a way, that made it hurt more. "You were the pilot..." Roy murmured, and a flicker of the flight came through, the shuddering atmospheric reentry and the big man's face illuminated satanically by the red glow of the viewscreen. "You're one of us."

"Jesus Christ," said Riddick, sounding impatient. "We've already had this conversation once. I'm not a replicant. Kaz, I thought you fixed his memory."

"I told you the short-term looked scatty," Kazminsky replied, defensive. "You were willing to settle for alive, now you want miracles? Hello, she's alive, awake and coherent, I'd say break out the champagne, but that's probably not a good idea until she's worked her way up to solid food."

Being continually referred to as "she" was disconcerting enough that Roy almost didn't notice the edge to Kazminsky's tone. There was an undertone of hurt, and the replicant surmised its cause. "I thank you for my life," Roy said with sincerity. "Tyrell himself told me that it was impossible for my life to be renewed, so I can only conclude that you have performed a miracle. You have my deepest gratitude."

Kazminsky shook the hand Roy extended. "You're welcome, but there's the guy you should be thanking." He nodded at Riddick.

Roy gave the big man a searching look. "Why have you done this for me?"

"We hooked up on Stromberg and I said I'd pilot you guys down because your situation was seriously fucked up. I don't give a damn if you're a replicant or not--a life sentence when you didn't do anything criminal? That's bullshit."

"Thank you." Roy tried to find more words, but they weren't there. Something, anything to fill the awkward silence as they all stared at one another... "Am I really female?"

"According to a gene-scan, yes." That was Kazminsky; brisk and clinical. "The skeletal structure won't finish adapting for nearly a year, but you've had a fertility inhibitor so that shouldn't be a problem."

"I could bear children?" The thought was intriguing.

"It's been done. It's not advisable until the pelvic reconfiguration has stabliziled. The implant I gave you is good for one standard year. If you wait longer than that to reverse the procedure, be absolutely sure that whoever does the reversal does a pregnancy scan first. Even if you're 99 certain. Otherwise, there can be some really ugly, fatal complications. Trust me on this one."

Roy was disoriented. Nothing seemed to fit. Rounded breasts surmounted the trim pectorals, felt heavy and tender. The pubic hair was as white-blonde as it had always been, but there was a cleft below it instead of a penis. There was no pain, but it seemed defenseless, somehow. Even looking at the hand which had had a nail driven through it was unreal; the wound had healed to a whitish splotch of scar-tissue, and the hand was no longer clawed with tremors. Its nails had grown out, giving it an unfamilar elegance.

"Everything is normal, Roy," Kaz reassured.

"He should know," Riddick added gruffly. "That's his specialty."

What a curious thing to specialize in. Roy wasn't sure what to make of Kazminsky. It was all very unsettling; these two strangers, grief for the dead, a second chance at life in what amounted to a new body...which felt strange. Uncomfortable. Shaky-cold, nerves stretched taut and an insistant pressure. "I need to use the toilet."

Riddick paced outside the metal cubical. Roy could hear his boots scuffing on the tiles. A lighter step advanced into the room, and Kazminsky said, "I'm going to start packing up. You don't need me any more." An undertone to his voice was brusque; Roy wondered why.

"You can't go yet."

"Why not? Medically--" Riddick's answer was short--all Roy heard was a low growl before Kazminsky replied: "That's what you wanted." This time his tone was amused.

"Kaz--dammit!"

Roy slide the bolt as quietly as it allowed, and eased opened the door to find Kazminsky embracing Riddick in a sculpture of mouths pressed together and hands grasping. By the looks of it, a naked woman is neither required nor desired...

Returning to the solitude of the cubical, Roy studied the woman in the mirror intently. I can't imagine that this will impede my abilities as a soldier. In fact, it may give me an edge. So many people underestimate a woman's ruthlessness. Of course, none of them ever knew Zhora. Roy smiled. Perhaps they've done me a second favor, in addition to saving my life.

When the hungry noises outside the stall gave way to quiet conversation, Roy exited ostentatiously. This time, Riddick and Kazminsky were holding one another, but without the urgent kissing and groping they'd displayed earlier. Now Roy understood the mixed signals Kaz had been giving off...he viewed Roy as a rival. How interesting. They both are. Pris said sex could be unpleasant, but if it is my choice--? Perhaps when I've had more opportunity to become accustomed to this body...

"Where are we going to go from here?" Roy asked, and was quietly amused by the numerous meanings the question had.