Cyborg Nation (25 page)

Bronte put her hand over his. “Leave it. I’m dying anyway,” she said, feeling oddly calm about it and yet as certain of it as she had ever been about anything in her life. Her suit was already soaked in blood. She was fairly certain the metal had severed major blood vessels if not an artery.

He caught her chin in a hard grip. “You will not die,” he said through clenched teeth. “On the count of three, Bronte.”

Too tired to argue with him, she sucked in her breath, trying to brace herself. He snatched it out on two, snatching her breath with it and, blessedly, consciousness. Unfortunately, she was only unconscious for a handful of seconds. She came to as he pulled her from the seat, groaning at the pain that cut through her with each step he took. Dizziness swept through her and a sense of falling. Her back settled on a hard surface.

When she opened her eyes she saw that all three men were bent over her, their expressions grim as they tore her uniform off of her. “’s alright,” she murmured. “Doesn’t hurt much … least I got contracted first,” she added, trying to infuse a little humor into the situation. “Do not talk,” Gideon said harshly. “Save your strength.”

What strength, she thought tiredly? It was an effort even to breathe. She discovered that was partly because Gabriel was leaning against her, pressing her belly so tightly it felt as if he was going to shove her stomach through her back.

“We need to get the bleeding stopped.”

Gideon glanced up at Jerico. “Find whatever you can in the wreckage.” His hand was shaking as he brushed it along her cheek. “This is going to hurt like hell, Bronte.”

She opened her eyes and discovered he had one of the laser pistols in his hand.

Gabriel caught his wrist even as he lifted it and tried to steady the sight. “This is too clumsy.”

Gideon jerked his head up to stare at Gabriel. “She will bleed to death if I do not stop the bleeding. This will cauterize the wound.”

Reluctantly, Gabriel released his grip.

Gideon rubbed an arm across his face and for the first time Bronte noticed his hair was matted with blood. He focused on her stomach. She saw the barrel of the pistol waver. Abruptly, he tossed it aside. Glancing around, he snatched up a jagged piece of metal. Bronte sucked in her breath as he slashed it across his arm. Blood spurted from the artery he’d severed. “Gideon!”

Ignoring her cry, he leaned over her, squeezing the arm he had sliced so hard the muscles in his arm stood out, shook as his blood flowed over her. “The nanos,” he said harshly, glancing at Gabriel.

Nodding, Gabriel glanced around until he found another jagged piece of metal and sliced his own open.

They were going to die, too, Bronte thought, so distressed she felt tears well in her eyes, gather at the corners and then run down into her hair.

“I have found the med case,” Jerico said, racing up to them. He stopped abruptly when he saw what they were doing. Dropping the case he’d brought, he moved around to her legs. It was the last thing Bronte remembered clearly. Darkness descended over her. It lifted and fell, not like a curtain so much as waves as if she was sleeping and surfacing near consciousness and then drifting down again.

Burning pain brought her more fully awake for a handful of minutes, just long enough to be thoroughly disoriented by the hands pulling at her, rocking her. Something soft tightened across the burning pain in her stomach and then they left her in peace for a few moments.

“Now—while she is unconscious.”

Dread filled her when she heard Gideon’s words but she didn’t have time to brace for what she knew was coming—more pain. She screamed as they pulled on her leg, trying to tear off. Why wouldn’t they just leave her alone? she thought wearily when she could think at all again.

Thankfully, either they stopped torturing her or she lost any sense of pain. She sighed tiredly and drifted off again. She woke freezing, her teeth chattering so badly she couldn’t seem to make them stop. It was dark—or she was blind—she discovered when she opened her eyes. Slowly, her eyes focused and she saw stars winking above her.

Closing her eyes again, she searched for the pain and discovered that she hurt all over, that it was impossible to localize the pain, but it was duller, not the sharp, cutting pain that had taken her breath before. A shadow had fallen over her when she opened her eyes again. She stared hard, trying to pierce the darkness.

“Drink.” It was Jerico’s voice. His hand settled beneath her head, lifted it. She opened her mouth when she felt the edge of a glass, or something cylindrical. Icy water cascaded into her mouth. She gulped and then choked and the water overflowed, running down her chin and then her neck.

The coughing brought the pain up to a new level and she struggled to suppress the cough and the shivers that added to her misery.

“She is cold.”

Two more shadows moved close. She heard a faint rustle as they crouched beside her. “What happened?” she asked through chattering teeth.

A hand settled on her forehead and then stroked her face lightly. “The nanos stopped the bleeding, but we could not give you many. They are designed to speed to the area most damaged and close off the artery as quickly as possible to prevent death by blood loss. Since you do not have many, it will take a while for them to repair the damage from the crash.” He paused. “Jerico, keep watch. We will keep her warm for now.”

Bronte hadn’t realized she’d been covered until Gabriel and Gideon lifted the cover on either side of her, allowing a frigid breeze to blow across her bare skin. Then they settled the cover again and pressed lightly against her on either side. Their skin was nearly as chilled as hers at first, but after a few moments she began to feel them grow warm. Grateful for even a small amount of warmth, Bronte tried to roll closer and gasped as the movement sent a jolt of pain through her stomach and another through her leg.

“Be still. You will only cause yourself more pain.”

“I know,” she gasped. “I’m still cold.”

A hand moved over her shaking shoulder. “I will lift you. Just relax and do not try to help,” Gideon said quietly.

It was impossible to lay completely passive, but the moment she tensed her stomach muscles the pain intensified until she
couldn’t
help. Gabriel shifted closer behind her as Gideon helped her onto her side. When he’d positioned her against Gabriel, he moved closer, sandwiching her between them. A sigh of relief drifted from her lips as she felt their warmth envelop her until she ceased to tremble and finally drifted to sleep again.

Light woke her again. She lay trying to block it for a while, but her mind threw off the mists of sleep and began sifting through flashes of memory. This time she didn’t feel pain until she tried to stretch. The movement didn’t just create pain inside of her, though, it surfaced the memory of laying between Gideon and Gabriel.

She saw what was left of the ship when she finally opened her eyes but it took her many minutes to figure out that that was what she was looking at. Most of both sides were missing. A large section of what had been the port hull was curled back. Wires and strips of metal and tubing hung down from what had been the ceiling. It wasn’t until she spotted the chairs that she realized she was looking at the front end of the craft, or at least what was left of it. A portion of the floor of the mid-section was still attached.

The nose of the craft was flattened, crushed back against what had been the control console until she had to wonder how Gabriel and Gideon had managed to walk away from it.

The moment that thought clicked in her mind, though, a flood of images followed. She’d been in no state to note their condition, not consciously. Unconsciously, her mind had collected the images. They hadn’t walked away without a scratch. Both of them had been torn and bloody, limping, moving stiffly in pain.

And they’d still come to find her before they’d even tried to do anything about their own wounds. Twisting her head to search for them, she saw Jerico and Gabriel carefully sorting through the wreckage. There was no sign of Gideon and panic gripped her.

Chapter Sixteen

“Gideon!”

Both Jerico and Gabriel whirled at her call. Dropping the items they’d found, they hurried toward her. Gabriel reached her first. “You must not call out!” he said, his voice harsh, urgent as he dropped to his knees beside her.

Bronte’s heart fluttered uncomfortably in her chest. “Why?”

Jerico and Gabriel exchanged a look. “The trogs will have seen the crash. They will be searching for us.”

Whatever, or whoever, the trogs were, Bronte had a feeling she didn’t want them to find her if they made Jerico and Gabriel uneasy. “Where’s Gideon?”

“He followed the path the craft tore through the jungle to search for our weapons.”

Bronte frowned, battling the growing, nameless fear. “He went off alone? Without a weapon?”

She could tell by the look on their faces that they didn’t understand her alarm. “He took the laser pistol,” Jerico supplied finally.

She tried to sit up. Gabriel caught her shoulders to push her down again but it wasn’t necessary. The moment she tried, fiery pain seared through her. She went limp, trying to catch her breath.

“You must not move yet,” Gabriel said gruffly. “The wounds have only begun to close. You will open them again.”

“What happened?”

“We crashed.”

Bronte closed her eyes. She’d forgotten what it was like to get any information out of them, especially when they were
trying
to keep her in the dark, and she suspected they were.

“Are you hungry?”

She wasn’t, but she nodded when Jerico asked anyway, knowing she should eat something. She wasn’t just injured, she was so weak it took an effort to do anything at all. She knew she’d lost a lot of blood and she hadn’t taken in food or water in a very long time.

“We can not build a fire,” Jerico said apologetically when he returned a few minutes later. “So there is no way to heat or cook food.”

Because of the trogs—who were probably out looking for them—and they couldn’t leave because they were afraid to move her. They didn’t have to tell her that. She would’ve known even if she hadn’t been a doctor and well aware of just how bad her injuries were.

She should be dead, she realized abruptly, not just weak and in pain. She’d been impaled by a flying piece of the disintegrating craft, pinned to her seat by it, and there was no doubt the internal damage would have to have been extensive when something that big had gone all the way through her.

She
would
be dead except that Gideon and Jerico and Gabriel had risked their own lives to give her nanos, slashed their arms to force the microscopic bots to the surface and milked them from their bodies and into hers. As vague and mixed up as her memories were because of the shock, she recalled enough to know that they’d been injured badly enough to be in serious need of their nanos themselves quite aside from their own blood lost from injuries that had made sacrificing more to help her life threatening for them.

She could see they’d finally gotten around to tending their own wounds after they’d done what they could for her, but she could also see that both Jerico and Gabriel were showing signs of a good deal of trauma. Aside from the numerous blood soaked bandages they were sporting, their coloring wasn’t even close to their usual healthy glow. Both of them looked nearly as pale and washed out as she felt and she knew Gideon was in no better shape.

Instead of taking the food and water Jerico held out, she lifted a hand to explore the place along her mid-section where she’d seen the metal sticking out of her. It was bandaged but even the light pressure of her hand made it hurt deep inside of her. Vaguely, she recalled being jostled until she’d felt like screaming, or crying because she’d been too weak by then to scream, and realized they’d been bandaging her wounds.

And her leg.

She lifted her head to look down at herself but discovered she was covered with the blanket. She knew, though, that her leg was broken, as well. They’d realigned the bone and braced her leg with something.

She looked up at Jerico and Gabriel, feeling a mixture of gratitude and something else that was difficult to pin down. They’d saved her life—and Gideon. He was the one who’d thought to try to give her their nanos—because he hadn’t been able to bring himself to try to use the laser to close the wound.

Finally, offering them a smile since she couldn’t speak for the knot of emotion closing her throat, she took the food Jerico was offering. It was some sort of bread. Gabriel lifted her head and propped something soft beneath it and she pulled off a small piece and chewed it carefully. It wasn’t easy trying to eat flat on her back, but then she wasn’t that hungry anyway.

“We will stay close. If you have need of anything, keep your voice low. We will hear you and come.” Setting the cup he’d brought with him within her reach, Jerico rose and left her. After flicking a gaze over her assessingly, Gabriel straightened and followed him and the two of them returned to sifting through the wreckage.

She watched them while she struggled to swallow as much of the food and water as she could, trying to piece everything together in her mind.

Something had hit the craft, something pretty big to have damaged it as badly as it had, a meteor undoubtedly, though she wondered how it had gotten so close before the proximity alarm had sounded. The system wouldn’t have warned them at all if had been malfunctioning, she didn’t suppose, but there most have been something wrong with the detection range. Either that or something had caused the meteor to abruptly change course.

They hadn’t gotten the chance to get out a call for help because the collision had destroyed communications.

That explained why they were still here. The command center had to know, though, that the ship had been damaged. Surely they would be looking? Surely they would’ve been able to track the descent at least part of the way and have some idea of their general location?

Unless they thought the ship had been destroyed?

She dismissed the fear that caused her. Gideon, Jerico, and Gabriel would take care of her. Despite their rowdiness in general, it hadn’t escaped her that the moment there was a threat, they’d instantly responded with cool headed military precision and they’d managed to get the craft on the ground without killing everyone on board. As little as she knew about piloting a craft, she knew that had been a hell of a feat in and of itself. They’d had almost no control over it, had had to improvise the usage of what they had left in ways it had never been intended.