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I'm not drinking enough. I know, I should drink more because I'm not getting as much fluids as I need, as I would get from food, from the Taumoeba. However, as we're getting closer and closer to Erid, I also need to ration my water. Between the maximum capacity of the water tanks aboard the Hail Mary and the small amount that's still lost through my sweat and evaporation during the recycling, I just can't make any allowances.
Now, though, my back hurts. At first I thought it was from sitting too long, not getting as much exercise as I used to a couple of weeks ago, just as I find myself without the energy to workout as much as I should in the first place. The last two times Rocky slept, I let the nanny-bot check me out. Things didn't look amazing both times, but they didn't look too terrible either. Still, with how little Rocky sleeps compared to me, I can't say I've had check-ups at reasonable intervals, when I've only had medical care by sneaking off somewhere.
Here's the thing, I told Rocky about all that would likely happen to me as we approached Erid, and my food supply ran out. With the help of his photographic memory, we had worked out how I would divide up my rations to last and ideally long amount of time. We made plans for how we'd handle the effects of malnutrition on my body and how he needn't worry if I started sleeping even more than he already complained about.
But how could I miss the thing with the water? Stupid, stupid Ryland! Does it even matter what I wrote about all those years ago!? Humans... humans really need liquid water! And I just haven't been having enough. I've been thinking about and chewing on the numbers and worrying. The headache and the brain fog, I thought, were from being bent over the lab table and all but counting every drop of water I have. Meanwhile, I was so in the numbers that I didn't drink more than 2 glasses of water a day, for days.
I'm left on the rack. I'm stressed out of my mind and that doesn't help matters at all. Then, earlier I suddenly felt so dizzy that I just sat down on the floor halfway between the lab and the dormitory. I got myself up again, of course, but Rocky 'saw' me as he sees everything, even with walls between us. It's become a comfort, admittedly, but right now I don't appreciate it. So, I had no choice but to let myself get looked over again by the computer.
I need to lie down. As I sit on my bunk I let myself fall sideways. I'm exhausted and all the same all my muscles are tense and won't let me relax as I'm lying there.
I let the nanny-bot take my blood. My white blood cells are out of whack, and there's too much nitrogen waste in my blood. I put my hand against my own forehead, but I'm not relieved. The opposite, really. I can't tell if I'm too warm or not, but as I put my arm back down I notice I'm shivering. Everything points to an infection.
Stress-induced, stupidity-induced, whatever.
"You are sick, question?" No point making Rocky decipher the numbers on the screen himself. He's already been sitting in his tunnel, waiting with me, for an hour at this point. "Yeah."
Worry, that was plainly already there while we waited, moves into his voice. "You have not enough water." The thing he once light-heartedly made fun of me for has become a real issue. I need water so much, that parts of my body get really, really bad without it.
I rub my side and try to take a deep breath to get through this bout of throbbing, aching pain I've had for more than half a day now. When it doesn't get better, now along with everything else, I know it's not muscular. Meanwhile the actual muscle aches themselves are from my fever.
"I need to take medicine." "Medicine is more water, question?" "No, but just water can't fix this, anyway." Rocky grumbles at the treatment plan I make without consulting the computer.
The robot opens a similar compartment to where the painkillers used to be, back when I had to take some, so thankfully I don't have to go about taking my own ship apart just to find a few more pills. I come up empty, though, on pills that is. I guess, even years into my ex-suicide mission, I still need to be reminded that the ship was meant to take care of me and my crew while we were in comas—why bother loading too much of something to be taken by mouth onto the ship, when it's going to be easier for the bot. I can't appreciate that idea, however. I grit my teeth at my find of several vials of antibiotics. I'd much rather take pills. I guess it's a blessing in disguise, though. While I can't believe that I didn't take this into account before, putting the medicine in a drip means I'll be getting fluids, too. And I can pop some bags of saline and dilute them with my current supply of drinking water, I'll have a little bit more.
The euphoria I feel at my genius is still only brief. The kidney infection is back to lay me out as soon as it gets a foot in the door, in the form of me settling into my bunk again. Finally, I'm back where I left off, shivering. Nanny-bot tucks me under a blanket, but my arm left outside of it, with the IV rests on top of Rocky's ball that he pushed under it.
"You sleep," he hums. "Can't," I say, as I'm currently flip-flopping between feeling too hot and too cold. My jaw feels all tight when I try to talk. I'm exhausted but even so, "I'm too wound up. Stressed." I explain very curtly. God, the human nervous system is so maladaptive.
"You better after sleep." "You mean less stupid." "Less stressed," he promises.
Okay... I'll close my eyes for a bit, knowing he will watch me for a while.
When I wake up again in the red-low-lighted dormitory, I don't really feel any better, though. The robot arm tucked my other hand in too and I have no idea where Rocky is. What I do know, immediately, is that my back hurts, all the way from my neck down to my hips. I slept wrong, if I say I've slept at all. And my shirt sticks to my body. I'm sweating, wasting all that water. Rocky lied, I'm not less stressed.
I push up on my hands, which the computer arms points out is not absolutely desired in my current condition. My side hurts and the surge of that makes my stomach roll—
—No! I can't lose any more water. I curl up, in on myself again and clasp a hand over my mouth for good measure.
Rocky heard either me or the computer and comes into the dormitory through his tunnel. "Be calm!" I groan. Like I'm not trying to be. "Rocky, my water..." "You smart. Figure out water situation later. Lot of time."
"B-But," I blubber. "Impatient. You bad," he chides, tapping the Xenonite hard. Ah, he knows to use that word for me often at this point. That actually nudges me out of my stupor, though, and seizing the opportunity, Rocky doesn't say anything else for a time and I also just breathe. I try to let it take me through the pain, until whatever the nanny-bot decided to inject into my IV helps with it. Nothing that's going to make me too dumb, I hope, but that it will also help with my fever, while I suspect that isn't from the infection only.
"Can you do math for me?" I turn back to my friend after several long, long minutes, feeling weary. "Yes. Is no problem," he says, like he just waited for me to ask. My shoulders relax.