Dedicated to _Esli_ for their kind words and votes.
∞ ∞ ∞
Day 00008 Mission Nilex
At first, all Ayla heard was the whisper, repeating over and over again.
"... breath of Wind... Be still and hear... Here is no danger..."
The words came closer, and this time, she found herself repeating them until she and the words became one. "Listen..."
Awareness filled her as she opened her eyes to find herself staring at a ceiling she didn't recognize. She looked around. She was in a bed. Lina sat fast asleep in a chair to her right. And on the other side, Nura also slept.
That was odd—both of them sleeping when they should be keeping vigil? Is this real? she asked herself as she sat up.
«Yes, Ayla,» a familiar voice spoke in her mind. «It is real, in a fashion. This is a dream of where you actually are. I wanted you to have time to adjust before regaining consciousness.»
Memories flooded her mind, memories of a world, dead, of walking through a graveyard of a dead world. Images of a white-and-blue porcelain urn shining in the light of a suit's headlamps, a gloved hand holding seven acorns, the skeletons of a family. It all came rushing back, the flood of horror and despair, anguish and heartbreak overwhelming her.
She didn't want to feel any of it. It couldn't have happened—she didn't want it to have happened. Yet she had to ask, «Was any of it real?»
«The correct question to ask is, 'Was any of it true?' You already know the answer to that, Ayla.»
She did. As she resigned herself to the fact, she remembered something else. «I saw you... I spoke to you. You were trying to help me.»
«Yes, we did speak, and I truly do wish to help you.»
«Is this help why I can hear you in my mind?»
«Yes. We're sisters now, Ayla.»
Sisters. Ayla had lived all her life with her sisters of the Nilex family, and she had the deepest connection with the two beside her, apart from their Gift and training. But this was different. Canaisis' voice was clearly modulated inside her head.
«Is this how you and the Captain talk?» she asked.
«Yes, you have medical nanos that were created outside of this Universe, the same as he has. We're linked together now. We did this to save your life.»
Ayla looked down at her hands, trying to see the difference inside of herself. «What do these nanos mean for me? I mean, what can I expect?»
«With the Captain, he was in prime condition from the medical nanos he was given before launch. All I had to do was map his sub-atomic makeup and design nanos to maintain that matrix. In your case, I've never seen your Gift work normally, so I had to design parameters that would allow you to endure your Gift in its hyperactive mode. It was an interesting challenge, and I took some liberties while doing it. But this isn't what you want to know.
«In short, the very atoms that make up your body's cells have been stabilized. Normal life functions will occur naturally—you'll need food for energy, eliminate waste, shed dead skin cells, even grow hair. But your matrix as a whole is maintained at a very slow rate of decay. Genetic degradation and mutation will not be allowed to occur. Injury and cellular damage will be repaired to maintain the current matrix that the nanos are set for. In fact, where your immune system can't maintain the matrix standard, they will step in. You've been given a level of health far above Human—and a very long life. That is the price of this health.»
BINABASA MO ANG
CANAISIS ∞ Chronicle One ∞ 2: A Captain's Journey
Science FictionBook 2 of CANAISIS ∞ The Last Living Ship trilogy (Chronicles of Canaisis 1) Can a ship, born to sail the ocean of stars to ensure Humankind's survival, save her Captain from the void within his own heart? ∞ ∞ ∞ As Canaisis agrees to carry a religio...
