Page 40 of Mazorium Buys a Human

What we needed was to draw a crowd. If Mazorium’s rattling wasn’t doing it, we needed something massive to bring attention to this area.

The sensor digging into my hip gave me an idea!

My arms were starting to shake from holding Nadia up. Sliding toward the entrance a little, I brought her down to my waist with one arm. My shoulders stopped screaming at me, and I took a breath as I judged the sensors.

On the stations I’d worked on, they’d mount the sensors behind big metal cages to keep them from being touched, but that wasn’t fancy enough for these Talins. They had to bury them in a crevice.

Pressing my shoulders against one side, I lifted a foot and kicked at one of the sensors with as much force as I could manage.

Nothing happened. Damn it!

I kicked a few more times and still nothing. All these years of thinking these things were delicate evaporated.

“What the fuck?” I muttered, kicking them a few more times for good measure. By now my foot was hurting, and my left arm was shaking from Nadia’s weight. I shifted her so she was resting against my shoulder. Her cries filled my ears, making me feel even more helpless.

That’s when I noticed her everclean suit had changed color. That meant the nanos couldn’t break down and store any more of her waste. She needed a new suit and was at least partially upset because the suit couldn’t clean her like usual.

If I couldn’t upset the sensors with my kicking, maybe Nadia could do it for me!

It wasn’t easy, but I laid her on the floor at my feet. Movement was so limited I only had one hand to tug the suit free. She screamed in protest.

“I’m sorry,” I told her over and over again, tears of frustration rolling down my cheeks. “I know the floor is cold. I know you don’t like the way I’m handling you. I’m sorry, but it’ll be over soon. I promise.”

That wasn’t a lie. We would either have help or be captured.

I got the suit off at the same time Mazorium’s rattling suddenly cut off. The silence felt unnatural and foreboding.

Fearing the worst, I turned the suit inside out, ignoring the noxious odors my sweet child managed to produce. Pressing the dirty suit to the sensors, I rubbed it all over.

“Please work,” I begged. “Please work. Please work!”

The first indication I was successful was a flash of light and a beep from the base of one of the sensors, then the entire place was flooded with red light and blaring alarms.

“Biological contamination,” a calm voice said. “Please leave this area at a safe but quick pace.”

“What’s going on?” one of the Talins said. I could barely hear him over the shrieking alarms and the voice telling us to evacuate. The other one spoke, but I only made out the last part of what he said.

“...no amount of wealth is worth suffering a long, painful death from some kind of fuel leak.”

Then I heard rapid footsteps.

I wiggled out of my safe spot, shuffling Nadia with me. I nearly fell over backward when I popped free. Grabbing Nadia up, I held her naked body against my chest, ignoring her wails.

Mazorium was a little further down the hall, leaning heavily against a wall. He was bleeding excessively from a wound on his face, and there were cracks on the plating on his chest. His breathing was ragged, and he was blinking rapidly, as if having a hard time focusing.

I rushed up to him. “Maz?”

His eyes focused on me, and he went completely still for a second. Then he exploded into motion. He snatched me up and sprinted off. The walls flew by as he ran.

We left the alarms behind and entered a populated area. Everyone was moving rapidly, probably because they’d beenwarned of the alarm. Standard procedure on almost all stations was to have everyone shelter in the closest safe place until the emergency was assessed. No one gave Mazorium a second look as he rushed toward the docks. Most of the traffic was heading the other way, probably going to the living quarters. The rest were moving along with us to get to their ships.

Mazorium flowed through the crowd; his ability to judge where the gaps would appear was uncanny. He didn’t slow down when we got the umbilical to the ship. Thundering up the passage, he continued running until we were inside the ship. Then he pressed the emergency protocol button next to the door.

The moment it slammed shut behind him, he sank to his knees and set me on my feet. I turned to face him, expecting him to express concern for the still screaming Nadia.

His gaze held mine.

“You’re safe,” he whispered. His eyes rolled back, and he slumped to the floor.