Defy the Worlds (Defy the Stars #2)(71)

“Doubt it,” Riko rasps.

“Shhh. Save your strength.” Noemi looks around for something, anything that might help, and Abel hands her a cool, damp washrag someone must have prepared. It’s not much, but it’s better than nothing, so she lays it across Riko’s forehead. Riko’s skin is so hot it nearly burns.

“Tell me one thing,” Riko whispers. Every word costs her. Every movement. Yet she manages to clasp Noemi’s wrist. “You people—on Genesis—you believe in gods, don’t you?”

“We believe—” Noemi catches herself before launching into a detailed explanation of the many various faiths on Genesis. “Well, we believe.”

“Before—I thought I’d see people living free—thought I’d know then it was all worth it.” The doubts Riko never hinted at before now haunt her eyes. “But I’m not going to see that. I’ll never really know.”

Noemi opens her mouth to protest that Riko will be okay, but Abel gives her a look that silences her words. Whatever treatment is out there, they’re not going to retrieve it in time.

Riko continues, “What if I was wrong the whole while? What if there’s no place for us to go? Was it all for nothing?”

Abel says, “You acted on your beliefs, intending to help others. That has worth.” He and Noemi share a glance. She knows he doesn’t agree with Remedy’s terrorist actions any more than she does. But there’s no point in punishing this woman on her deathbed.

Noemi remembers Captain Baz’s words to her, more meaningful than ever before. “I think it matters what we fight for. What we choose to die for.”

Riko hears in those words whatever she needed to hear. She very nearly smiles. “Yeah?”

“Yeah.” Noemi brushes a few strands of sweaty hair off Riko’s forehead, then takes her hand.

Riko’s grip tightens around hers at first, but slowly, gradually goes slack. Her breathing slows down. Suddenly the image of Esther’s final moments fills Noemi’s mind, tightening her throat. This is what death looks like.

The doctors always say hearing is the last sense to go. She leans close to Riko’s ear. “It’s all right. We’re here with you. It’s okay.” Which is utterly meaningless, but it’s all she can come up with.

Somehow she must have said the right thing again, because Riko relaxes, exhales in a long, unmistakable rattle, and—

“She’s dead,” Noemi whispers as she turns to Abel. “Isn’t she?”

“The line between life and death is somewhat arbitrary.” Only Abel could say this and sound compassionate. “Riko’s heart and lungs have ceased to function, but while her brain no longer supports consciousness, it continues sending signals. In its last moments, her body was flooded with endorphins, with every possible emergency boost of strength or will. Her brain will be processing these as pure euphoria, producing the visions reported by so many brought back from clinical death.”

“That’s what Earth thinks.” She wipes at her eyes. “On Genesis we see it differently.”

Apparently Abel knows better than to argue the existence of heaven with her here and now. “It’s interesting to conjecture.”

Although Noemi believes in the afterlife, she isn’t sure exactly what kind of reckoning awaits on the other side. She only knows Riko kneels before it now. A power greater than Noemi will decide whether punishment or mercy is called for. So it’s okay to mourn what could’ve been.

If Earth had opened Haven to everyone, Noemi thinks, there wouldn’t be such a thing as Remedy. Maybe Riko would’ve been a settler here, working hard to set up the first cities of a brand-new world.

So many lives could’ve been so much better if Earth had only taken responsibility.

The comms—recently restored by Abel—crackle with sound. Gillian Shearer’s voice comes through: “If our calculations are correct, by now the members of Remedy have learned exactly why this world belongs to us, and not to them. You can’t live in this environment—not without the medical treatment we control.”

Noemi and Abel look at each other. We were right, she thinks.

Gillian says, “We’re willing to trade that medical treatment. You’ll get as much as you need. You simply have to pay for it first.”

Noemi instantly realizes what comes next. Dread hollows her out, and her breath catches in her throat.

With satisfaction, Gillian concludes, “Bring us the mech named Abel, alive.”





24



ABEL’S BLASTER IS BACK IN HIS HAND BEFORE GILLIAN Shearer has finished saying his name. He reaches for Noemi—but she’s already on her feet, her own weapon at the ready. She looks down at the body of Riko Watanabe, and for a moment he thinks Noemi won’t be able to abandon her. Humans behave strangely around the dead.

Instead Noemi says only a single word: “Go.”

He runs for the far door, which leads into a badly damaged corridor. With one leap he’s in the door frame, able to pull Noemi with him. Behind them he hears somebody hoarsely shout, “He’s getting away!”

Are Fouda’s soldiers already after him? Irrelevant. If they aren’t, they will be, and he and Noemi have to run without looking back.

They take off through the long, dark corridor, debris crunching under their feet. Even the emergency lighting took damage here, meaning the small orange beacons are far apart. They dash through an area that must have briefly caught fire; the once-delicate murals on the walls have been charred black. Each breath smells of ash. Through the darkness he can barely make out Noemi, sometimes glimpsing only the glitter of her jumpsuit. With her limited vision, she must be running nearly blind.