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A headache was blossoming just behind his eyes, but John was too exhausted to get up and take something. It’d either go away while he slept or turn into a full-blown migraine, and he was more than willing to take the gamble for some sleep right now. Keeping his eyes open while he scrubbed off the grime of Old Town’s streets in the shower had been fighting a losing battle. Not the first losing battle of the day, his aching side reminded him when he shifted on the lumpy bedspread. But this Killjoying thing wasn’t so bad. They had Joy in their pockets. They weren’t running from their pasts anymore. And he wasn’t sure when it happened, but the Quad was becoming a place that felt like… not quite home. The start of one, maybe. All John knew was that here, with Dutch, it felt like more of a home than Telen had ever been.
“Ship. Lights out, please?”
Darkness fell, and the A.I. replied, “Good night, John.”
John smiled to himself. Gaining the A.I.’s trust had been almost as rewarding as gaining Dutch’s.
He woke an indeterminate amount of time later, heart thumping in rhythm with the dagger in his brain. His mind was fuzzy, fritzing out like a faulty comm connection, and it took him several moments to shake off the disorientation. A half-forgotten dream lurked in his memory, and John lay in the dark, trying to recall it, knowing he’d probably regret his next move. The pounding headache had already intensified in the short time he’d been up. “Lights,” he said, squeezing his eyes shut. Unwelcome brightness bled through despite the precautionary measures. “Dimmer!” The ship complied, and he cautiously opened his eyes, then rolled over to check on his PDD, groaning as every muscle group and joint in his body protested.
“What the hell?” Yesterday’s altercation was rough, but he wasn’t that out of shape. He hadn’t gotten drunk, although it felt like it. And his throat hurt. He was sick. Or… Oh, no. Not poison again… The disturbing possibility was quickly dismissed as ridiculous. Probably.
“Is something wrong?” The ship’s cool tone seemed lower than usual, but it was probably his imagination. “Should I inform Yalena?”
“No, it’s—”
His comm buzzed, derailing his spiraling train of thought and illuminating the elusive memory. It wasn’t a dream, it was the comm going off. “Johnny Jaqobis, this isn’t a gods-damned pleasure cruise,” Dutch snapped. John sat up and fumbled for something to wear. Chilled air bit at his skin as the covers fell away. White spots danced across his vision and a high-pitched ringing drowned out whatever Dutch said next, forcing him to slump forward and wait for it to clear. Once it had, he pulled on the clothes and sloppily laced his boots. “On the way,” he told Dutch, then muted his comm and headed for the washroom.
The shock of cool water on his face didn’t refresh him, just made the vertigo more intense. The round analgesic tablets that he kept stocked for hangovers more than anything else stuck and scraped on their way down his sore throat. When he lurched towards the door, it slid open silently. John murmured his thanks, but the ship either didn’t hear or didn’t deign to reply.
Above, the fluorescent lights pulsed and swirled and the pumping rush of blood roared in his ears. With every passing minute, he felt like getting out of bed at all might have been a bad idea. A really bad idea, he thought, as a wave of dizziness and warmth and static swept over him. He could hear Dutch’s voice again, and he tried to answer the blurry form in front of him, but the corridor warped alarmingly under his feet. His legs gave out just as the darkness swallowed him whole.
He found himself staring up into those sickeningly bright lights when he woke, with Dutch repeating his name like a mantra. “Turn those off,” he pleaded. The lights dimmed automatically.
“You’re too hot,” Dutch said, cool fingers brushing across his forehead. He wasn’t. It was freezing here. “Why did the ship have to be the one to tell me something was wrong?” Her voice was suspended underwater, and it took him a while to parse the words. He couldn’t remember ever feeling this awful because of a simple illness. What if it really was poison? He wanted to ask Dutch, but she was busy propping him up and helping him to his feet, and the dizziness was so intense it was all he could do to stay that way. She led him to his cot, and he collapsed into it gratefully.
“We can take a week off,” he heard her say. Still caught in a swirling vortex, he squeezed his eyes shut in the hope it would end soon. “Get some rest.”
He dreamed. Most of it was nonsensical, flashes of memory and fantasy, sensations of falling, floating, running but always too slow to catch up. And then the next thing he heard was his mother sobbing. The filthy floor under his feet was blurry as he stared at it, absorbed in the irregular texture of the gray concrete. His father wasn’t angry for once, cold and unmoved. D’avin was gone, and he wasn’t coming back. The memory of his mother with her matted hair bunched up into her fists as she cried morphed into Dutch, regret shining in her eyes. “It’s been fun, Johnny.”
“Dutch, don’t leave,” John called, but she backed out of the low doorway without listening. “Wait!”
The door slammed shut with a squeal of abused hinges behind her, and she was gone. The house dissolved around him, browns and grays pulled into a black hole with him.
He coughed, and the taste of blood tainted his saliva. Panic seized John’s lungs, further stoking the attack. He wondered how long he had left to live. He wondered if Dutch was okay. If the other assassin was back and he’d been stupid enough to get himself poisoned again, it was better that she left. Something cold and wet pressed against him. He tried to shrink away from it, but he was so damn dizzy and wrung out that an effort to do anything but wheeze for breath was futile. A comforting voice above, uncharacteristically soft but unmistakably Dutch, brought him pause. She was supposed to leave…
When he surfaced once more, it was to a blurry shape holding a cup to his lips. Eventually, it coalesced into Dutch with an impatient expression on her face. Hazily, John remembered assassins and poison and pain.
“You found the antidote?” Even to his own ears, the words sounded slurred.
“Sure. Now drink.”
He swallowed obediently, fighting back an urge to gag on the bitter liquid. The dose was a lot bigger than he recalled it being last time, and halfway through he had to stop, spluttering his way through a coughing fit. Half seemed to satisfy Dutch, because she took the cup away and leaned him back into the pillows. He closed his eyes, though it did nothing to combat the spinning, and left them that way as the world drifted away again.
“Feeling better?”
John groaned. He felt significantly more lucid, at least. “Maybe.” Trying to sort through his disjointed memories of the past day (days?) was proving difficult. “Was I—There wasn’t—”
Dutch took pity on him. “You caught a bug. One that rivaled hallcyon poisoning, apparently.”
He winced, feeling his face heat. “So that,” he gestured towards the side, but the cup was gone now.
“Something for the fever.” Dutch smirked. “At least I know how to get you to take your medicine.”
“Convince me I’ll die if I don’t?”
“Hey, you did all the convincing for me,” Dutch said in a joking tone. Her next words weren’t, though, and when he looked up, her green eyes were shining with sincerity. “You know we’re in this together now, Johnny? I made a promise, and I’m not going anywhere just yet.”
His chest felt tight, suddenly. All he could think to say was, “Right. The twoyear.”
Her expression told him she understood what it meant to him, anyway. She understood him, and he understood her, no matter what she’d say about that.
The moment lasted until Dutch doubled over, stifling a sneeze. “You better not have spread your plague to me, Johnny,” she threatened.