Purity (Pure and Tainted) (6 page)

Chapter Five

Boone woke up before his alarm went off with the idea that he was
in the middle of something important. At first he couldn’t remember what it was.
Then he looked down at K, her slender asexual body curled against his and her
sleek head pillowed on his bicep. She was a Paladin and he had gone to the
trouble of luring her aboard the ship and capturing her because…
Because of Shayla.

The moment he thought his little sister’s name the memory came
rushing back like a dog with sharp teeth just waiting to be called.

The transport officer had come to Boone’s lab in downtown Titus,
his face grim.
“I’m sorry but the Star’s
Hope has been taken by pirates. Your sister was aboard, wasn’t she? We think
she and the rest of the passengers have been sold to the Purists for their
pshalite mines on Midas. I’m very sorry for your loss.”
Boone still
remembered the look in the man’s eyes when he gave the news—it was as though
Shayla was already dead.

Sorrow and remorse filled him.
All my
fault, I shouldn’t have let her go. But she wanted a trip off planet
so badly and she worked so hard in school. It only seemed fair. She begged me
to go with her but I said no, my research was too important, at a critical
stage. If only I had gone, I might have been able to do something. Might have
been able to protect her, to escape with her…

The guilt was crippling and for a moment he wished he could crush
the emotion and just be cold and calculating like the girl in his arms. But the
best he could do was
push
it away and shove his fear
for Shayla to the back of his mind. If he let himself dwell on the way he had
failed her he would go insane.

Boone sighed. He had to keep working toward the ultimate goal of
bringing his little sister back home in one piece, both emotionally and physically.
I’m coming, Shayla,
he vowed silently
as he did every morning.
I swear I’ll get
to you out of there or die trying.

He looked at K again, trying to concentrate on something
else—anything other than his worry. In repose her delicate features looked relaxed
and at peace, unlike the stern expression she always seemed to wear while she
was awake. She was quite tall for a little, though her height seemed strange
considering her underdeveloped body. “
Like
a little girl who somehow grew to massive proportions”,
Loki had said and
Boone tended to agree although not with the massive part. Despite her lean
adult-sized frame without an ounce of fat on it, K looked like she had never
even gone through puberty. Her chest was completely flat and her hips were
narrow and boyish.

Boone was actually glad for his prisoner’s asexual appearance. If
she hadn’t looked like a little girl he might have embarrassed himself last
night when he held her close. But everything about her seemed to scream,
Don’t
touch.
It made it much easier to be
lying next to a naked woman, especially considering it had been eighteen solar
months since his last relationship.

K stirred against him, making a soft, kittenish sound in her sleep.
Her skin was pale, contrasting vividly with her hair which was long and black
and braided into a thick cable at the back of her head. Wisps of it were
escaping to frame her face and neck with tiny, delicate curls. Boone resisted
the sudden urge to stroke them away from her cheek, knowing his touch wasn’t
wanted. Besides, this girl was the enemy—a trained killer, not a tame kitten,
no matter how harmless and peaceful she looked while she was asleep.
You’d do best to remember that,
he told
himself firmly.
She wants you dead, as
dead as Krill and Chall.

The memory of the two dead crewmembers, both of whom had flown
with himself and Loki before on different research missions, was sobering. Boone
still felt guilty for asking them to help but he’d had no other choice. The
government of Colossus had a strict no-contact policy with the Purists. Even
during the Pan Wars they had refused to get involved, a grave mistake in
Boone’s opinion.

Now that Pan was subjugated, the Purists seemed to be turning
their attention toward Eros. Who was to say that Colossus wouldn’t be next? There
was no reasoning with insanity, no arguing with fanaticism. But his home world
continued blithely on, trusting in their superior physical size and strength to
keep them safe. Though as Loki often pointed out, “Nobody can see how big your
dick is from the outside of your spaceship so you better fly right.”
Whatever that meant.

Enough
interstellar politics.
Time for
breakfast.
And since it was his turn to cook, he’d better get going. Gently, Boone
dislodged the sleeping girl from his arm and sat up. K sighed and snuggled into
the warm spot he’d left in the covers, looking even more innocent and harmless.

He wanted a quick shower but he hesitated to leave her. Suppose
she was faking? She was a
soldier,
shouldn’t she be
instantly alert to any change in her environment? Then again, maybe she was
getting the first good night’s sleep she’d had since she put on that damn suit.
Her body probably needed the rest after the constant barrage of drugs,
hormones, and emotion-dampers it had been pumping into her continuously for
years.

Boone remembered the neat rows of white needle tracks that ran up
the inside of both her forearms. He’d seen them when he’d first cut the black
webbing off her and hadn’t understood their origin until he’d almost stabbed
himself with one of the suit’s hollow spikes. The thing had dripped its witch’s
brew of chemicals like venom, obviously still trying to inject even when its
victim was gone.

A shiver of disgust went over him as he pictured the thick whitish
droplets oozing from the pitch black mesh. K seemed to think she had a
symbiotic relationship with the suit she craved so badly but to Boone the damn
thing was nothing but a parasite.

He looked down at K again, her face smooth and peaceful in sleep.
She’d put the suit on when she was nine cycles old and though it was difficult
to place her age, Boone put her somewhere in her mid twenties now. How had she
lived so long in that thing? It was amazing she wasn’t in severe withdrawal
right now. The very fact that she wasn’t worried him. Made him wonder if a bad
reaction was coming somewhere down the line. He had a feeling that it was going
to take quite awhile for all the meds to be flushed out of her system and that
K would be dealing the side effects of her forced addiction for some time to come.

Deciding to let her sleep, Boone headed toward the small fresher
at the far end of his quarters. Even if she woke up before he was done there
wasn’t much K could do. The door was voice-locked to him and he’d been careful
about removing anything that could be used as a weapon. The suit was hidden in
a stasis tube at the far end of the ship where she would never find it. He
would get her up when he was done and let her take a quick rinse herself. In
the meantime, he had to hurry before the rest of the crew got up and started
bitching about breakfast being late.

* * * * *

“Rise and shine, darlin’.
It’s our turn for kitchen duty and
we’ve got a hungry crew to feed.”

The strange words held no meaning for her but they penetrated K’s
consciousness anyway.
Where am I?
She
opened one eye groggily, peering at the unfamiliar surroundings. Why hadn’t her
skinsuit woken her? Usually the sharp pain of needles digging into her arms was
her wake-up call, followed by an instant jolt of adrenaline. It was strange to
be awake and yet not feel instantly alert, to be caught in the foggy half-dream
state she found herself in.

“K? You up?” That voice again…
Boone!

Everything came back in a rush. K sat bolt upright, immediately on
the defensive but he was just standing there, towering over her in that annoying
way of his.
Why does he have to be so
tall?
she
thought, scrambling to her feet. Back
home on Athena she was one of the tallest people she knew and her height gave
her a distinct advantage, especially when it came to commanding troops. But she
got no advantage with Boone—the top of her head barely came up to the giant’s
shoulder, making her feel short for the first time in her life.

“What do you want?” she demanded, putting her hands on her hips
and wishing for the hundredth time that she had her suit. Boone was dressed in
the same tight black flight pants she’d seen him in earlier and a dark blue
shirt with short sleeves that clung to the flat planes of his chest and left
his impressive arms bare. Not that K noticed things like that.

“For you to get up.
Do you want a shower? You have
time for a quick one if you hurry.”

“A shower?”
K had a sudden memory of her
childhood—the time she mostly thought of as
before-the-suit
.
The shower room…the sound of frightened
crying echoing off the metal walls… cold and wet and scary…
“No,” she said
looking up at Boone. “I do
not
want a
shower.
Absolutely
not
.”

He looked a little startled at her vehement refusal but then just
shrugged. “All right then, you don’t have to if you don’t want to. But we do
have to get you some clothes. We can’t have you, uh, running around like
that
.” He cleared his throat. “So here.”

K took the garment he handed her which was white with thin gray
stripes running down it. “What’s this?”

“It’s one of my dress shirts. Mom is the only other female on
board and there’s no way you’ll fit into her clothes—you’re too tall. You and
Loki are about the same size but he’s not going to be giving you anything but
hard looks for the foreseeable future. So this is it.” He nodded at the
garment. “I thought you might be able to wear it as kind of a dress.”

“A dress?”
So many words in his vocabulary
seemed to have no meaning for her. Life on Colossus must be very different from
what she was used to on Athena.

“Yeah, uh…how do I explain this? Oh, hell. Just put it on and I’ll
show you.”

K struggled with the unfamiliar fabric which hung limply from her
hands and bunched awkwardly when she tried to pull it over her head, unlike her
suit which had flowed as smoothly as water to cover her of its own volition.

“Here, wait.” Boone stopped her. “It’ll be easier if you unbutton
it first.” Then, obviously seeing the confused look on K’s face he took the
shirt back from her. “I guess you don’t have any buttons on your suit, do you?
And since that’s all you ever wear, how would you know what the hell I’m
talking about?
These
are buttons.” He
slipped the flat metal disks that ran down the front of the shirt out of their
tiny holes and then held it open for K. Then, he buttoned it back up again,
going slowly so she could see what he was doing.

It was exceedingly simple, K saw, though also incredibly slow and
inefficient. Why bother with clothing you had to struggle into when you could
have something that would cover and protect you with no effort on your part? Purity,
but she missed her suit!

When she had the shirt-dress on and buttoned up, the uneven hem
fell to the tops of her thighs and the sleeves were too long. Boone rolled them
up for her so that her hands were free and then stood back with his arms crossed
over his chest frowning.

“Well, it’s a hell of a lot too big for you. I’d give you
something to belt it with if I didn’t think you’d try to hang yourself with
it.”

K raised an eyebrow at him. “And if I give you my word not to
attempt to purge myself?”

“Now why would you do that?” Boone looked skeptical. “You were all
gung-ho to go into the light last night. What changed your mind?”

She lifted her chin. “I have decided I do not wish to die without
my suit. I have a much better chance of killing you once I regain it. After
that I can purge myself and know that the one who contaminated me is dead.”

Boone surprised her by laughing. “Blood-thirsty little thing,
aren’t you?”

K gave him a cold stare. “I am not making an idle threat. You
will
die by my hand.”

He sobered at once. “You’re hard core, aren’t you darlin’?”

“If by that you mean dedicated to my purpose, then yes.”

Boone sighed. “All right, if that’s the way you want to play it. But
I’m telling you, even if you could find the damn thing—and I promise you
won’t—but even if you did, it’s too damaged for you to wear right now.”

“Because you
cut
it.”
It still made K feel like he’d cut off a piece off her body.

“I
had
to,” Boone said
patiently. “I’m not going over this with you again. But here’s the deal—I can
tell you’re an honorable person, that your word means a lot to you and you
won’t break it.”

“That’s true.” K nodded.

“Okay, so if you give me your word that you won’t try to harm me,
yourself, or anybody else until you get your suit back, you get to come out and
play with the rest of us.
If,
however,
you keep reciting from the homicidal handbook, I’m going to feel the need to
keep you tied up in here like a
real
prisoner.
So what’s it gonna be, darlin’?”