Oh ye gods. She almost facepalmed and definitely groaned softly.
“Cyn,” Willow began sternly, “I may have almost had you executed. You may be a dangerous loose cannon, at times, however, you are also the reason we are here. None of us can forget that. You will sit still and listen.”
“Not really. Big Daddy is why we are here, the research vehicle?—”
“You will sit stilland listen.”
Her eyebrows shot up. Rutger chuckled, and Vargr snorted, obviously delighted by her being chastised. She tamped down her normal ornery response and swallowed. “Yes ma’am. I will shut up now.”
“Good.” Willow sent her an almost straight-lipped smile that barely reached her eyes. “I was truthful. You are the only one who has escaped from the Top, or who has killed a Ghoul Lord, and the only one who has ever shown any ability to manipulatethe Lure. Little Mo followed you for a reason, and wewillget to Big Daddy and find out the whys to all of this, as well as hopefully find out a lot more about the nanite experiment we were subjected to. However, now…”
Well, that was what she’d been telling herself all this time. Just, she guessed she’d had her own doubts. Still did.
Willow slapped her thighs. “Keep going, Vincent.”
“I talked to several people after Willow asked me this. I’m no doctor either, but when someone’s body can heal anything…” He stared straight at Cyn. “I get itchy when I hear they’ve gone lame and blind for no reason and then healed. Blind for no visible reason? When a biotechie feels nothing wrong inside you, to me it says that maybe whatever is injuring you is invisible to her, maybe it’s hurting you over and over, and then you’rehealingthat damage. Yes?”
Her mouth fell slightly open. “Keep going.” Her mind was trying to dig up possibilities.
“Vargr and Rutger said the headaches began after you killed the Ghoul Lord. One of those who guarded you back then said you had what seemed to be many wounds, tiny ones, for a short time after they arrested you that day.”
She felt a chill run down her, the blood leaving her face, as she realized where this was heading.
“I think maybe you have bits of Ghoul Lord inside you, and that is why Willow cannot see them. She can’t test this on anyone else. It’s just a theory.”
A terrible, horribledarktheory. Yeah, one of those.
“Okay.” She reached out to either side, and both her males held a hand. Then she took that deep breath she needed before trying to think up answers to what he’d said. There was nothing sensible, though. How did you pull something from her that no one could feel or see? Was he right?
“If it’s unfeelable… and we know of no drugs to use…” She frowned. Why didn’t her nanites kill it off?
“Wait. Before you go off worrying, Maura has an idea also. Maura?” Willow turned to her.
“Hi, Cyn.”
“Hi. You look good, girl.” Calling her girl was kinda silly, but she did look good. She smiled wryly. Maura was probably healthier than she was.
Her white hair had been neatly cropped since they’d last spoken. She and Locke had been off doing the dirty far more than necessary, but that was all fine and fun. It wasn’t that she’d neglected her human, as if she could own Maura, but she did feel wrong for not seeking her out.
“So, do you think I have GL in me?”Tentacles in me. Ugh. The fuckers.She’d kill it with fire if she had to. “Do you have a solution?”
“I think you do have something from it inside you, yes. It’s the one solution that makes sense. I’m sorry, Cyn.” She clasped her hands together before her and rested her chin on them. “A solution though? I don’t have an exact one. A precise one. I have worked on nanites a lot in the past, and I’m not sure it is they that cure you. Rather it’s more likely whatever DNA you were given is boosting your immune system. That genetic material however isnotinside your head anymore, according to Willow. Or very little of it is. That makes me go ah-hah.”
“A goodah-hah?”
“Sort of.”
Both her guys tensed, and Vargr sat forward. “Go on.”
Maura straightened. “Ifwe can get the nanites and the genetic material they carry into your head area, they might augment your healing there. Assuming the symptoms and nanite scarcity mean the GL has migrated there. Your blindness,according to Vincent, makes it sound as if you suffered from some brain or optic nerve damage?”
“Yes.” He agreed. “The limping and the headaches could also be purely from neurological damage. It ties together.”
Tentacles were in her head.Fuuuuck.“So you can do this? Inject more of them up here?” She freed her hand from Rutger and tapped her head.
“No.” Maura twisted her mouth. “Not here, anyway, but get me to Big Daddy, and maybe we can grow some new nanites from your blood. Maybe we can inject them into your CNS. Or, and this is a bigger maybe, I might be able to get some chemical indicators that Willow can detect to stick to the GL material that hasprobablymigrated to your brain? And then she might be able to destroy it.”
“Lots of ifs and maybes.”
