Aetherbound - E.K. Johnston Page 0,68

working as hard as the rest of them, and he was still exhausted.

“The mages who didn’t die went into comas,” Pendt said. “And most of them never woke up. But the ones who were tended to medically did. If treatment was started immediately, their chances increased.”

“There’s no point in faking your death if we have to treat you immediately,” Fisher argued. “They’ll notice.”

“Let me think,” Pendt said. She stared at Ned. “There was no body at Ned’s funeral, but if there had been, what would we have done with it?”

“I would have been embalmed,” Ned said. “And then they would have laid me out in the colonnade for a week or so, so that anyone who wanted to pay respects, could. Embalming is a sign of respect. If they froze me, for example, I could be recycled. But about all you can do with an embalmed body is bounce it off the Well when the funeral’s done and send it into space forever.”

“That’s a little bit gruesome,” Pendt said.

“What does your family do?” Ned countered.

“You don’t want to know,” Pendt told him.

“None of this solves the problem of you being DEAD!” Fisher roared suddenly. “Why am I the only person who is bothered by that?”

“We’re all bothered, Fisher,” Pendt said. “I show it by getting very calculating and your brother shows it with inappropriate humour.”

Fisher laughed darkly.

“All right,” Pendt said. “I expend a lot of calories on the æther. You hook me up to embalming fluid immediately. We can alter the formula so that it’s more of a restorative than a preservative but keep it very low grade. My family comes to view my body, and you tell them that the embalming is for station tradition. Dr. Morunt confirms my death. The Harland leaves. You bring me back. Ned and I are both legally dead and start over.”

“I hate it,” Fisher said.

“I know,” Pendt said.

“What about the foetus?” Ned asked.

“I’m not sure,” Pendt said. “There’s a lot of risk in this plan, for both of us.”

“You are our priority, with Ned here,” Fisher said. Ned agreed. “We will focus on saving you.”

“All right,” Pendt said. “What do you think I should use the æther for?”

“What?” Fisher said.

“Well, if I’m going to do a lot of magic, it might as well be on something useful,” Pendt said. “I’m not just going to turn all the grain in hydroponics purple. It’ll have to be something huge.”

The three of them sat in the lounge, raking through their dreams for anything they could think of that might be big enough.

“You could change Fisher.” Ned sounded hesitant, like he was voicing something he knew wasn’t quite right, but that someone had to say. “You could give him the chromosome he needs to run the station by himself.”

Fisher didn’t say anything.

“You know it’s never made a difference to me, in terms of who you are,” Ned said. “But . . . would it make you happy?”

“I don’t know,” Fisher said.

“He is happy,” Pendt said. She blinked several times, and her eyes flashed. “He is already happy. He knows who he is, and he has made a place for himself. It’s not fair to ask him to change.”

“We asked you to change,” Fisher said. “You said yourself, you didn’t want to be a mother yet, and yet you made yourself one for us.”

“For the station,” Pendt said. “The station needed me.”

“And it doesn’t need Fisher?” Ned said.

“It has Fisher,” Pendt said.

“Why is this upsetting you so much?” Fisher asked. “You’re allowed to take risks and make sacrifices, but I’m not?”

“Because you shouldn’t have to change!” Pendt said. “You’re perfect the way you are. The universe has pushed me around my entire life, always playing the card that makes me trust its cold calculus and choose against my feelings, but I won’t. Not this far. I will not change the person I love because some long-dead despot thought that one chromosome was easier to control than another.”

If words could have lit the æther on fire, she’d have been burning.

“You . . . love me?” said Fisher.

“I—” Pendt’s voice failed her.

“You two are adorable.” Ned clapped his hands. “I’m so glad I died and brought you together.”

“Shut up,” said Fisher.

“The fact remains,” Pendt said, “I won’t change you, or anyone else for that matter, to make you into a key to fit a lock that was forced upon us. I’d rather change—”

Her eyes widened.

“Fisher,” she said, the galaxy open to her every bidding. “Where is the gene-lock?”

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