Page 50 of Storm of Stars
That did it.
I inhaled sharp and hard, then guided the needle beneath her skin. A tiny bloom of red in the tubing let me know it was working.
“I got it,” I whispered, heart hammering.
“Open the valve,” Lark said, adjusting the line. The blood began its slow crawl down the tube and into her.
Time lost all shape. Each second stretched, twisted. I could only watch and wait.
Then, Bex stirred. Her eyelids fluttered. Her fingers twitched. And relief flooded through me. My muscles relaxed and I didn’t even realize how tight I had been holding my body.
“Ezra?” she rasped, her voice more breath than sound.
“He’s okay,” Briar said quickly, tears springing into her eyes as she cradled Bex’s hand. “Thanks to you.”
“You passed out, love,” I murmured, brushing a clean cloth across her sweaty forehead, then pressing a kiss to her warming lips. “Don’t do that again.”
A weak, tired smile curved her lips. “I’ll try to schedule my collapses better.”
Behind me, Devrin looked up from where he was finishing Ezra’s last wrap. “His burns are treated. He won’t be dancing anytime soon, but he’s alive.”
Briar squeezed Bex’s hand. “Both of them are.”
“Let me take care of that leg,” I said, reaching for the ointments and salves lined up on the tray beside us. Because Praxis hoards their supplies, and gatekeeps their doctors and their medicine, they’ve been able to develop some truly miraculous stuff. Stuff that could change lives. Maybe even save them, if they cared to share. I uncapped one of the jars, the smell sharp and sterile, and carefully dabbed a bit of the shimmering cream along Bex’s torn skin.
It was like watching frost melt off glass, slow but unmistakable. The angry red of the wound softened almost immediately. By the time I wrapped the bandage around her leg, she was out of danger. At least for now.
Only then did I let myself stumble back, collapsing onto the nearest cot like a puppet with cut strings. My hands shook. My vision blurred at the edges. Exhaustion burrowed into my bones, thick and aching. I sat forward, elbows on my knees, burying my face in my hands. The quiet was overwhelming, just the soft beep of machinery and the low, steady breaths of the living. Which, no thanks to Praxis, was all of us.
“Thank you,” Bex said, her voice faint but steady. She looked at me first, then over to Briar. “All of you.” Her eyes continued to Lark, and then—after a beat—to Devrin.
Devrin met her gaze. There was something in his face then, something fast and fractured. Guilt, maybe. Good. He should feel it. He’d nearly killed her.
“It’s the least I could do,” he murmured, voice clipped. He looked away.
Bex sank back into the cot, exhaling a long, tired breath.
“So… is that it?” Lark asked. His voice barely reached above a whisper, directed more at the still air than anyone in particular.
I scanned the room. Six of us, all that was left from the original twenty Challengers. Two more gone just this morning. The medical trials were always separate, and typically more mental than physical. Although today, I guess, was a healthy mix of the two. Supplies. Then personnel. But this… this one felt like a full stop. Like we’d done both in one vicious fell swoop.
“I don’t know,” I admitted. It was the only answer that felt honest.
Lark drifted toward the supply table. His fingers lingered over the items there until they closed around a mask, filter-lined, made for prolonged wear. He turned it over in his hands like it was something sacred.
“Your people… they’ve been suffering, haven’t they?” Bex asked. Her voice had gentled, softened like cloth soaked in light. She was looking directly at Lark now.
He blinked, surprised by the question. Then nodded.
“Our air’s been poisoned for years,” he said, lifting the mask slightly as if to explain it. “We wear these to breathe. Long exposure without one... it breaks you down. Lungs. Brain. Even the skin, sometimes.” His voice cracked at the edges. “We’ve lost a lot of people.”
“I’m so sorry,” Bex said, and she meant it. You could see it in her eyes, the way they shimmered, not from pain, but from empathy.
“It’s not fair,” Lark muttered, almost too low to hear.
We all stilled.
“It’s not fair,” he repeated, louder this time. His voice splintered, and then the dam broke. The tears came hard, sudden and silent at first. Then sobs wracked his frame as he dropped the mask and buried his face in his hands.
