Micro

Chapter 45

Rourke’s Redoubt 1 November, 1:00 a.m.

Karen and Rick were curled up inside the magnet, waiting out the night.

“We’re the last ones,” Karen said.

Rick smiled thinly. “I didn’t figure we’d end up together, Karen.”

“What did you figure?”

“Well, I thought you’d survive. Not me,” he said.

“How are you feeling?” she asked him.

“Perfect.” That was a lie. His face had become streaked with bruises, and his joints ached.

As Karen studied Rick’s bruises, it made her wonder what she looked like. I probably look like I’ve been mugged, she thought. “You need to get into the generator, Rick.”

He glanced at her face in the firelight. “You, too.”

“Listen, Rick—” How to tell him about what she’d decided? Just be blunt. “I’m not going back.”

“What?”

“I’m going to be okay, I think.”

“What?”

“I’m not flying to Nanigen. I’m going to take my chances here.”

They were sitting shoulder to shoulder, wrapped in blankets and looking into the dying embers of the fire. She could feel his body going tense; and he turned and stared at her. “What are you talking about, Karen?”

“I don’t have anything to go back to, Rick. I was so unhappy in Cambridge. I didn’t even realize it. But here—I’m happier than I’ve ever been in my life. It’s dangerous, but it’s a new world. It’s waiting to be explored.”

Rick felt a kind of sickness take hold in his chest, and he couldn’t tell if it was the bends or his feelings…“What the—? Are you in love with Ben or something?”

She laughed. “Ben? Are you kidding? I don’t love anybody. Here, I don’t have to love anybody. I can be alone and free. I can study nature…give names to things that don’t have names—”

“For Christ’s sake, Karen.”

After a pause, she said, “Can you get back to Nanigen by yourself? Ben would probably fly with you.”

“You can’t do this.”

The fire popped and crackled. Rick felt a disappointment grip his insides, like a fist closing. He tried to ignore the feeling. He looked over at her, saw the firelight shining on her raven hair, but couldn’t keep his eyes off the shadow of a bruise on her neck. That bruise worried him. Had he done that to her? When he’d grabbed her around the neck? He couldn’t bear the thought that he’d hurt her…“Karen,” he said.

“Yeah?”

“Please don’t stay. You could die here.”

She took his hand and squeezed it. And let it go.

“Don’t do it,” Rick went on.

“I’ll take my chances.”

“That’s not good enough for me.”

She glared at him. “It’s my decision.”

“But I am involved.”

“Like how?”

“By the fact that I love you.”

He heard her take a breath. She turned away and her hair fell over her eyes, so that he couldn’t read her expression. “Rick—”

“I can’t help it, Karen. Somewhere along the way, I fell in love with you. I don’t know how it happened, but it happened. When you got swallowed by the bird, I thought you were dead, Karen. At that moment I would have thrown my life away to save you. And I hadn’t even known I loved you. And then, when I got you back and you weren’t breathing—it scared me so much—I couldn’t bear to lose you—”

“Rick, please—not now—”

“Well, why did you save me?”

“Because I had to,” she answered in a tight voice.

“Because you love me,” he went on.

“Look, get off this—”

He thought he had gone too far. Probably she didn’t love him, didn’t even like him. Maybe he should just shut up. But he couldn’t. “I’ll stay with you. We’ll have the bends together. We’ll get through it. Just like we got through everything else.”

“Rick, I’m not somebody to stay with. I’m basically—alone.”

He folded his arms around her, feeling her body trembling. He pulled her hair aside and found her cheekbone with his fingertips, and turned her head gently toward him. “You’re not alone.” He brought her mouth to his, and kissed her, and she didn’t try to stop it. And then she was kissing him deeply, wrapping her arms around him. That was when he noticed how much it hurt to kiss her. Every part of his body hurt with a deep, unfocused pain, an ache in the joints and bones that seemed to be spreading everywhere, like a spilled liquid. Was he bleeding internally? She winced suddenly, and it made him wonder if she hurt the same way he did. “Are you okay?”

She pushed him off without answering. “Don’t stay.”

“Why? Give me a reason.”

“I don’t love you. I can’t love anybody.”

“Karen—”

Their talk got no further, because the ceiling lights went out, plunging the room into gloom except for the glowing fire pit. Almost immediately a weird odor began to filter through the tunnels. The room smelled like a gas station. The smell grew stronger.

Ben Rourke came running. “Gasoline!” he shouted. “Get out!”