Chapter 2
It was time for her medication.
Gemma hated this time of day. Just when the fog was beginning to burn away, they forced it back around her with those horrible yellow pills. They wanted to muffle things, make them into misty shadows.
The world around her was already a blur. It was too much, all the time, every detail assaulting her senses. It wasn’t possible to take it all in, to interpret it, catalogue it, respond to it, interact with it. She had to concentrate with all her might to get even three words out in a row. It was an even chance whether those three words would have anything to do with each other.
She considered dashing down the hall, finding a place to hide. Maybe the infirmary. Or the supply closet. But it was just prolonging the inevitable. Every square inch of RPS was monitored, wired for image and sound, and there was nowhere to hide. She’d already tried them all. After fifteen years, every option had been exhausted.
Gemma instead stared out the window, feeling her brain start to awaken. Beyond the sanitarium, the red dust blew through the remains of the town that had once been there centuries ago. RPS was situated within one of the ancient domes which had cracked open ages ago when they’d finally figured out how to successfully oxygenate the atmosphere.
Despite the atmospheric change, most colonists had left the red planet and its dust behind. There were more exciting prospects in the seven galaxies. All that was left were the dregs. Like the crazies at RPS. No one wanted them. There were no more exciting prospects for her kind. Just the haze of medication and red dust.
A hand touched her shoulder and she flinched. “Simmons is looking for you.” Charlie jerked her chin behind her at the female orderly headed in their direction.
Everything inside her told her to rebel. There was something inside her, some way to pierce the barrier between her and the rest of reality, and if she could just think clearly for a moment, maybe the world would start to make sense. But she’d never be able to do that with these damn yellow pills messing up her system. Covering her in fog.
Her current dose was wearing off, meaning reality was rushing in at her on all sides. She could smell dinner down in the mess. Roast artificial beef. She could count the ceiling tiles while zooming in on a single pore in her friend’s pretty face. A thousand sounds assaulted her ears.
Too much, too fast.
Then Simmons was there, tipping the little cup of pills into her mouth and following it with a splash of water. Gemma sputtered, then swallowed. The new formula took effect in near seconds. The fog rolled back in to embrace her, covering the window and the ruins beyond it. Covering her friend’s pretty face. Muting the smells and sounds and sights. Slowing things down.
Gemma embraced the fog for another day, accepting that the battle was lost, half-grateful for the pill’s effect. The world all at once was too much stimulation. Small doses were better. Numbly, she felt someone take her hand. The smoothness of the palm let her know it was Charlie. The smell of dinner gradually increased, and Gemma assumed they’d found the mess hall.
The next hour was spent slowly consuming a host of artificial protein-rich food approximations. After that, it was time for digital recreation, several hours in front of the holo-screen for three-dimensional fun.
Gemma tried to ignore as much of the holo-projections as she could. Information overload could cripple her for hours, even days. She generally kept her back turned to the screen and her front angled toward the window. She tried to concentrate on categorizing the weather patterns on display as she had every other day she’d lived here.
Fifteen years of dust. Sometimes blowing in the wind. Sometimes rising subtly in the frigid air. Lots of time unmoving, just sitting on the bones of a world long since passed. If her brain were equipped to think in metaphors, she might have been sad. Instead, she justwaited.
Tonight, something penetrated the haze enough for her to risk swinging her attention back to the holo-screen. A news program was discussing a transportation checkpoint set up along one of the main corridors into Sol. Apparently, the interstellar police had reason to believe that armed suspects were loose in the area, and these checkpoints were being established at all known entry and exit corridors in the system.
The news didn’t interest Gemma. What did was the voice of the man being interviewed. The reporter had been asking passing ships for their views on the checkpoint, and this man had provided his. “I find it very interesting that the interstellar police are establishing these checkpoints to catch armed and dangerous criminals. In fact, if I weren’t a law-abiding citizen, I might wonder who they were really targeting and whether these checkpoints will become just another permanent means of control for an increasingly authoritarian conspiracy involving the police and certain interested parties outside the system.”
He was the most beautiful thing she’d ever seen. Dark brown hair that fell in waves to his shoulders. Sharp cheekbones, full lips, and a straight nose finished off his features. But it was his piercing green eyes that affected her most. When she looked into those eyes, the world seemed to slow down, to open up, to allow her room to breathe. Gemma was instantly hooked on the sensation.
He smiled, and her heart pounded like it would beat its way out of her chest. “Of course, since Iama law-abiding citizen with nothing but the utmost respect for our public service institutions, I have complied fully with the requirements set forth by these fine officers and suggest that all other ships do as well.”
She could detect the subtext of his words and silently rejoiced, being thrilled not only to understand the words but their underlying meaning. All too soon, the camera cut to another figure and the beautiful male was gone.
The world crashed in around Gemma again, details of the holo-projections burning her brain in their endless frenzy. She was forced to turn away in defeat, so hopeless that she contemplated truly giving up for the first time in all her years of living. To have a light suddenly shine in, clearing away all the clouds for a few perfect seconds, and then to have that light disappear was more than she could handle.
Sliding from her chair, Gemma wandered down the hall and into her room. Under her desk, she’d created a hiding place to keep out as much sensory input as possible, with a blanket covering it to block out the world. She crawled under there now, her face pressed to the cold floor, her tears collecting in pools beneath her.
Who was that man? He’d been Territhian, like her. Just another random human, bouncing around the universe like particles inside an atom. But her particles had been crying out for a bond between them, one that would reverse years of torment in mere seconds. It was the voice she’d been waiting for, the awakening her body had been crying out for. And it was there and gone in a matter of moments.
The awareness inside her was still clamoring at her, another stimulus beating at her overcrowded brain. She tried to focus on her breathing, tried to calm herself, but the onslaught continued. In desperation, Gemma turned her mind to the memory of the male, to the sound of his voice, and managed to push away the chaos for long enough to catch her breath.
She replayed his appearance over and over until she fell into an exhausted sleep.
