One of the lines from this song by Three Days Grace seemed uniquely appropriate (“burning on the inside”). All kinda of fun metaphors to play with there, but it applies so well in the literal to Ji.
Three Days Grace is another favored band of mine.
…So if anyone hears a woman cursing internet companies, computers, and technology in general, do not be alarmed.
I’ll post the next segment of The Echo Chambers as soon as I figure out how to get it there without having to retype it and how to either fix the problem on this computer or find one that doesn’t hate me.
The first song I’ve heard from this band, The Drawing Room. Now I have to hunt down more of their stuff ’cause I really like it…
Dan was already plugging him in and booting up the diagnostic program. Not fast enough, Ji thought as Cale rolled to his side and retched, reaching blindly for the trashcan Ji had placed there.
He shifted to stand beside Dan. “Take care of the nausea first,” he murmured in the redundantly named American English. He spoke conversationally, as if commenting and observing instead of directing in case, by some miracle, Cale could notice details in his current state. Even as he spoke, Cale moaned and retched again, sweat beading on his face and spreading in damp patches across his back. “That’s the worst. Turn off the gag reflex, the abdominal spasms.”
“I remember,” Dan murmured back, though he sounded frustrated as he stared at the flashing codes and images that finally lit the screen. And maybe he did, but he was slow at it, hesitating and halting as he tapped in commands, clicked and dragged images. When he spoke again, it was more to himself than to Ji. “I didn’t think I’d ever have to do this again.”
“SD-401 through 33,” Ji said. “Ease it off. Don’t just drop the levels. Then the pain receptors. QRL, that whole group. Slowly. Stop about halfway and ease his optical receptors down about twenty percent. Drop non-vital involuntary muscle function completely. Then go back and turn off pain receptors completely. He’ll need a few minutes before—”
“Would you shut the fuck up?” Cale said in Prism. He dropped the trashcan as Dan worked through the process, wincing when it clattered to the floor. He rolled onto his back, his legs jerking, his arms twitching even as he flung the right one over his eyes and grimaced.
Ji pointed at the screen when Dan hesitated, showing him the muscle groups to turn off, the cluster of images that monitored and controlled Cale’s heart, lungs, and brain activity pulsing only inches away. When Dan clicked and began to turn the proper group down, Ji lifted a hand and spread his fingers, bouncing his palm as if patting the air to tell Dan to slow down.
Within moments, Cale’s body relaxed into the unsettling stillness reminiscent of the dead. Silence settled as Dan and JI both waited. “Son of a bitch,” Cale said, his arms still over his eyes and his voice cracking. “Haven’t you found my profile yet? Put me the fuck out already.”
Ji’d forgotten about the profiles. He’d been instructing Dan based on his own experience at the other end of the process, when he was the one in agony on the transfer bed. He turned to the console and brought up Cale’s personalized transfer protocol. After a quick scan, he discovered that Cale suffered from severe and persistent transfer sickness. He didn’t wait to instruct Dan, but simply made the adjustments.
Dan turned to Ji as Cale’s body went completely limp, his head listing to the left, his breath leaving in a long, slow sigh. “What’d you do?”
“Knocked him out.” Ji returned some his muscle function, just enough to let them work through some of the lactic lock without disturbing his sleep. “He’ll be out for at least twelve hours. We’ll have to wake him up, check on him again. But from what his profile says, we’ll have to keep him like this for at least 24 hours. Average is 38, longest recorded is over 80.”
Dan glanced at the screen and grimaced. “I’d forgotten about these.”
“So did I. The process I know is my own. Never considered anyone else’s.”
“Symptoms can last that long?” Dan asked, still reading.
“Apparently. Mine never last more than a few hours, but Cale—” He shook his head, wondering whose transfer symptoms were more atypical: his or Cale’s.
“No wonder he wanted to be put out,” Dan said, glancing back at the villein prone on the narrow bed. “You know him?”
“I do.”
He paused, took a moment to close Cale’s profile and pull up the bio monitor. “Is he trouble?”
“Yes,” Ji said, weary. “He is.”
Their hushed conversation fell into silence and then a shadow passed beneath the fitting room door. Ji. He made no sound when he moved, a realization that Lyssa found disconcerting.
She sat, waiting until she heard Clare go by, and then counted to thirty before she stood, eased the latch open. The clothes Ji had settled on still lay piled on the bench between the men’s and women’s dressing rooms. She hefted it into her arms and left, heading for a checkout.
Clare came up behind her as she was passing men’s shoes. “There you are! I’ve been looking all over for you.”
“I was putting some things back.” She let Clare take half the load. “Where’s Ji?”
“Oh, I told him that I wanted to go look at shoes after, and apparently that was the straw that broke him.” Her laugh would have sounded a little forced even if Lyssa hadn’t expected the lie. “He called for a rescue.”
“He just left you to pay for all this? That’s rather inconsiderate.”
“I offered,” Clare said as they reached the counter. She dropped her load and smiled at the painfully thin woman behind the counter. “Hi, how are you?”
“I’d have thought you’d jump at the chance to harass him some more.”
“I didn’t have the heart. Poor boy looked stricken.”
“Those, too?” the sales clerk asked, gesturing at the clothes in Lyssa’s arms.
“Oh, yeah. Sorry.” She added to the mix, and both she and Clare watched the clerk sort and scan.
“Twenty-nine thirty-eight,” the clerk finally announced, “and fifty-two cents.”
“Whoo,” Lyssa said in a low whistle.
Clare handed the clerk her credit card.
“You’re paying for it?”
“Ji’ll pay me back.” Claire fiddled with the clasp of her wallet, opening and closing it with soft clicks.
“Didn’t you just meet him?”
Click—click—click. “He’s family,” she said with another laugh. “If you can’t trust family, who can you trust?” She signed the slip, and they each grabbed a couple bags.
“When are you going to tell me what’s really going on?” Lyssa asked as they walked toward the exit.
“What are you talking about? Nothing’s going on.”
“Uh-huh.”
Clare propped the door open to let Lyssa pass into the cool September sunshine. “Paranoid,” she said, her tone teasing.
“You didn’t stop to look at shoes.”
“What? Why would I—” she stopped short and looked at Lyssa from the corners of her eyes. “I told you, he looked stricken. But he still has to try them on. I’ll just wait a couple days and haul him back here.”
Lyssa realized that Clare wasn’t going to budge—at least not today. But that only made her more determined. With some poking around, she might not be able to discover the truth, but she could at least uncover a couple of the lies. She’d always wanted to play Nancy Drew. For now, though, she turned her attention to the sea of asphalt and metal. “Where did we park?”
The light in the Echo Chamber didn’t have a dimmer. Ji tamped down on his frustration and helped Dan dig out an old floor lamp from a storage closet in the hallway. They’d no sooner plugged it in beside the transfer and turned it on when Dan’s alarm sang the two long notes that signified an immediate arrival. Ji crossed the room in three strides and flicked the switch to turn off the overhead light just as the small rush of displaced air stirred the room.
Ji turned and bit back an oath.
Cale.
