She dug the nails of her right hand into her left forearm and inhaled sharply, nostrils flaring. No one but Alan seemed to notice; he gave her a worried glance and his arm tightened around her waist.
Kira shook herself in an attempt to dislodge her thoughts and, looking around at them all, said, “So who’s going to fill me in?”
Mendoza grunted. “Give us your report first, and then we’ll bring you up to speed.”
It took Kira a moment to realize that the team hadn’t come just to greet her. There was an anxious look to them, and as she studied their faces, she saw the same signs of stress as on Alan. Whatever they had been dealing with for the past four weeks, it hadn’t been easy.
“Uh, is this going to be on the record, boss?” she asked.
Mendoza’s face remained hard and fixed, unreadable. “On the record, Navárez, and it won’t just be the company seeing it, either.”
Shit. She swallowed, still tasting the hibernation fluids on the back of her tongue. “Could we do this in an hour or two? I’m pretty out of it.”
“No can do, Navárez.” He hesitated, and then added, “It’s better talking to us rather than…”
“Someone else,” said Ivanova.
“Exactly.”
Kira’s confusion deepened. Her worry too. She glanced at Alan, and he nodded and gave her a comforting squeeze. Okay. If he thought this was the right thing to do, then she’d trust him.
She took a breath. “The last thing I remember is heading out to check on the organic material the drone tagged before crashing. Neghar Esfahani was piloting. We landed on island number—”
It didn’t take Kira long to summarize what had followed, ending with her fall into the strange rock formation and the room deep within. She did her best to describe the room, but at that point, her memory became so disjointed as to be unusable. (Had the lines on the pedestal really been glowing, or was that an artifact of her imagination?)
“And that’s all you saw?” said Mendoza.
Kira scratched at her arm. “It’s all I remember. I think I tried to stand up and then…” She shook her head. “Everything after that is blank.”
The expedition boss scowled and stuffed his hands in his overall pockets.
Alan kissed her on the temple. “I’m sorry you had to go through that.”
“Did you touch anything?” Mendoza said.
Kira thought. “Just where I fell.”
“Are you sure? When Neghar pulled you out, there were marks in the dust on and around the pillar in the center of the room.”
“As I said, the last thing I remember is trying to stand up.” She cocked her head. “Why don’t you check the recording from my suit?”
Mendoza surprised her by grimacing. “The fall damaged your suit’s sensors. The telemetry is useless. Your implants weren’t much help either. They stopped recording forty-three seconds after you entered the room. Fizel says that’s not uncommon with traumatic head injuries.”
“Were my implants damaged?” Kira asked, suddenly concerned. Her overlays seemed normal.
“Your implants,” said Fizel, “are in perfect working order.” His lip curled. “More than can be said for the rest of you.”
She stiffened, unwilling to let him see how frightened that made her. “Just how badly was I hurt?”
Alan started to answer, but the doctor overrode him. “Hairline fractures in two ribs, chipped cartilage in your right elbow, along with a strained tendon. Fractured ankle, ruptured Achilles, multiple bruises and lacerations, and a moderate to severe concussion accompanied by cerebral swelling.” Fizel ticked off each injury on his fingers as he spoke. “I repaired most of the damage; the rest will heal in a few weeks. In the meantime, you may experience some soreness.”
At that, Kira nearly laughed. Sometimes humor was the only rational response.
“I was really worried about you,” Alan said.
“We all were,” said Marie-Élise.
“Yeah,” said Kira, tightening her hold on Alan. She could only imagine what it had been like for him, waiting for her these past weeks. “So, Neghar, you managed to haul me out of that hole?”
The woman wobbled her hand in front of her. “Eh. So-so. It took some doing.”
“But you got me out.”
“Sure did, honey.”
“Next chance I get, I’m buying you a whole case of cinnamon rolls.”
Mendoza snared Fizel’s exam stool and sat. He rested his hands on his knees, arms straight. “What she’s not telling you is—You know what? Tell her, go ahead and tell her.”
Neghar rubbed her arms. “Shit. Well, you were unconscious, so I had to strap us together so I could keep you from getting your head ripped off or something when Geiger winched you out. There wasn’t much room in the tunnel you fell through, and, well—”
“She tore her skinsuit,” said Jenan.
Neghar extended a hand toward him. “That. Full—” A cough interrupted her, and she doubled over for a moment, hacking. Her lungs sounded wet, as if she had bronchitis. “Guh. Full pressure breach. Was a bitch to patch with one hand while hanging from a harness.”
“Which meant,” said Mendoza, “that Neghar had to be quarantined along with you. We ran every test in the book, including some that aren’t. They all came up negative, but you were still unresponsive—”
“Which was scary as fuck,” said Alan.
“—and since we didn’t know what we were dealing with, I decided it was better to put both of you into cryo until we got a handle on the situation.”
Kira winced. “Sorry about that.”
“Don’t worry about it,” said Neghar.
Fizel thumped himself on the chest. “What of poor me? You forget about me. Cryo is easy. I had to stay in quarantine for almost a month after working on you, Navárez. A month.”
“And I appreciate your help,” said Kira. “Thank you.” She meant it too. A month in quarantine would wear on anyone.
“Bah. You shouldn’t have been poking your bony nose where it didn’t belong. You—”
“Enough,” said Mendoza in a mild tone, and the doctor subsided, but not without flicking his index and middle fingers toward her in a way that Kira had learned was a rude gesture. A very rude gesture.
She took another sip of water to fortify herself. “So. Why did you wait so long to thaw us out?” Her gaze shifted back to Neghar. “Or did they wake you up sooner?”
Neghar coughed again. “Two days ago.”
Around the room, Kira noticed faces tightening, and the mood growing tense, uncomfortable. “What is it?” she asked.
Before Mendoza could answer, the roar of a firing rocket—louder than any of their shuttles—sounded outside and the walls of the compound shuddered as if from a minor earthquake.
Kira flinched, but none of the others seemed surprised. “What was that?” On her overlays, she checked the feed from the cameras outside. All she could see were billows of smoke expanding from the landing pad some distance from the buildings.
The roar quickly receded as whatever vessel was taking off vanished into the upper atmosphere.