She tastes rot between her teeth.
It settles deep into the crevices of her molars as her fingers curl around the lip of the arm rest, pushing herself up, groggy and slightly irascible. The taste of decay, of ruin, is enough to wake her up from her state of half-consciousness. Darkness beats its way into her eyes; recycled, stale air filling the smallest crevices of her lungs. A quick glance to her sides, then to the flickering instrument cluster. The soft analog-amber numbers glow back; nothing showing on the primary radar screen.
A pause. Another.
She could possibly convince herself she's imagining it. Exhaustion weighs hot and heavy behind her eyes, bloodshot and dry. She's been in this place for far too long this time around by no fault other than her own stubbornness. If any of her mental faculties were in order, she'd probably phone to Base, ask for an escort back. Yet...
She cannot ignore the lick of saccharine against her tongue, a taste she has digested many times before. A mumbled expletive, then the humiliated reach for the comms phone. It dials once, twice, three times before the signal steadies and connects.
"Acheilus to Command Alpha." Nothing. "Acheilus to Command Alpha, please acknowledge."
"Received, Lieutenant, over." A crackled low-pitch voice comes to life, human and warm, so different from the chilled depths she's been in for...
Well, she doesn't really know how long, at this point.
"Requesting corruption sweep in the fourth quadrant. Approximately one-hundred klicks from the Thoosa Trench," Rolling out her neck, she messes with the switches on her detection instrument. "Rad detection isn't picking up anything." A quick shrug, as if Command could see it. "Could be nothing, just want to make sure."
"Roger." The line goes dead momentarily as an override connection is made with her ship. Flickering lights that shift from amber to crimson in milliseconds of a blink, an alarm of warning, then back to silence. Huh. From the receiver, dizzy and distorted until it solidifies into reality comes: "This is Command Alpha to Acheilus. No rad detected in the area. You're being ordered to come home, over."
Come home?
Her jaw sets, clenches her teeth so hard she can feel the grinding of her molars in her shoulders. Fuck no. "Put Admiral Thetis on." A beat passes with no response. "Now. I wasn't asking."
A quick shuffle of movement, the blaring of a dial tone before a familiar voice comes through. " Lieutenant Reeves this is Admiral Thetis, over."
"Whose idea was it to order me home?" She asks, knowing full well who gave the order, not bothering to hide her fury in these bruise-colored depths. Here, behind the metaled walls of Acheilus, there is the dream of being safe, there is the hope of being warm again. Order her home? She already is.
"Lorelei." An irritated puff of air through the receiver and Lorelei imagines Thetis sitting at a desk in her office, brows drawn, fingers against her forehead like she has a migraine - something Lorelei only really had the power to give her. The sigh of a steadying breath,"Lieutenant Reeves, it was mine." Clearly. "You've been gone too long. There's no evidence of corruption in the fourth quadrant and you are needed elsewhere."
Lorelei scoffs. "No corruption my ass. My teeth are practically tingling with it. It's soaked into the systems here." As if to confirm herself, she licks greasy rust off her lip. Tangy with hints of palladium oranges and reds. The color of the end. She's breathing the stuff in, even now. "Acheilus may not have picked up on it, but any living creature here would have."
YOU ARE READING
From This Mouth That Bleeds
Science Fiction"Humanity took to the stars and left us for dead." Lorelei knows the end. Has seen it flicker along the edges of her home, catch fire to everything she's ever known. Has felt it gnaw its way into her bones, watching as the last safety ship glinted...
