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That’s when I saw the leader—a man with a big beard that hid most of his face—move to put a big tree between himself and Kantus.
But the tree wasn’t between me and him, and I had an open line of fire. I shot him.
The pirate melted onto the tree. Part of me wish he’d suffered more, because death by plasma was like being suddenly teleported into the middle of a sun. I doubt he’d felt a thing.
Bullets ripped through Kantus, and he fell. I rushed forward, partially out of a sense of camaraderie and debt to the Khetar who had protected my mate, but mostly because, tactically, we needed to finish these fuckers off before Kantus’s injuries caught up with him.
I spewed plasma everywhere, barely aware of the subtle vibration telling me the power cell was nearly depleted.
Kantus’s gun rattled off more shots too, and I got hit one more time—this time on my arm—before we finally killed every last piece of rapist human scum.
When my adrenaline finally died down, I was ducking down over Kantus’ yellow body, which was full of holes. His orange body limped up behind me.
I pressed my hand onto the biggest wound and held the palm there to stop him from bleeding out. Even though I was pushing on the yellow body, his orange one winced and grunted in pain.
“Where is she?” I asked.
“Both women fled,” he said through the orange body. “They’re safe. I think I held out long enough. They just have made good distance.”
“Good,” I grunted. “Thanks. I think this body is going to bleed out. It barely has a pulse. Where’s the other one?”
He shook both heads, though the dying body’s shake was barely perceptible now. It was mostly just a twitch.
“Sorry, mate,” I said, pressing even harder on the wound, “I don’t think I can—”
Kantus grabbed the plasma rifle into his orange hands—which were red with blood—then adjusted a setting.
“It’s almost spent,” I said.
“I don’t need much power for this,” he said, “on three, let go of the wound.”
I almost argued, but then I realized what this crazy bastard was about to do. I doubted it would work, but I’d leave it up to him.
“One, two,three,”
I pulled my hands off and jumped back. Kantus fired the plasma rifle—at the lowest setting—right into the wound, melting the fucking wound shut. In the same instant, he dropped the rifle, and even his orange body twitched and convulsed in pain, doubling over next to the yellow one.
I grabbed the yellow hand and squeezed. Both pairs of eyes looked at me wildly, full of confusion and desperation. I squeezed harder. “You’ve got this. Hold your shit together. Keep the blood in you. Fucktoy is waiting for you.”
“Fuck…toy…” he grunted. “I fucking love her. Not just fucking her,” he said, “buther…I’ve lived in more than one body, Scion, and the self—the mind—exists beyond all bodies. I love that part of her above all else, it’s the purest…”
He was talking through the orange body, which was bleeding and shot up full of holes too, but it was still way better off than the yellow one. The big wound was now a burned and charred mass on his torso, and each breath he took sounded like a leaky airlock on a human ship. The body wasn’t bleeding out anymore, but the shock and all the other damage might still kill off the body. Or maybe it had already lost too much blood?
“Look,” I said, “I’ve gotta go find Eve. Midwife is with her too, so I’ll get them both. You stay here. Try to keep yourselves alive.”
“I’ll…go…” he grunted.
I shook my head, pointing at his dying body. “You can’t.”
He gritted his teeth, then stood on his orange body’s legs. “Thisbody can go.”
“Thisone cannot,” I said, looking down at the yellow body.
I put on a hand on his orange shoulder and squeezed. “Rest. I found a bunker with supplies. I’ll go find the women, then we can load your injured body onto the sled.”
He shook his head. “I can feel it. It’s not going to make it. I thought when we stopped the bleeding it might be enough, but…”
“You’ll abandon the body?” I asked. “Won’t that hurt to go so far from it?”
“I won’t abandon it,” he said, “but I can’t do this myself, Scion,” he said, and he handed the plasma rifle to me.
I clenched my jaw, but reminded myself that there would be no pain. It would be like teleporting his body right into a sun. I remember Eve telling me once that we all came from the inside of exploding stars, so in some way I’d be sending Kantus’ body right back where it came from.
