Galactic Gambit

Chapter 28

There was a crashing sound coming from the platform that had brought us down, and then the fast-moving glimmer that led us here was coming down the hall.

"Prismatrix, is he sedated?" Sirah asked the spinning crystal entity. It flashed once, brightly sending off refracted rainbow light. "Okay, good. Now we just have to bring him in. Neo, Asa and Reiyna set off down the hall. When they reached the platform, Pax was lying in a disheveled heap on the ground. He looked so much worse than the last time she saw him. Black veins ran through every inch of his skin, and he had cuts and scrapes smeared with dried blood along his body. She assumed it was from all the thrashing he had been doing while trapped in his room, but seeing him like that dashed her hopes for saving him.

Asa and Reiyna grabbed him by his arms and feet and began carrying him back down the hall. Pax's head lolled to the side as they rounded the corner. When they entered the room, Dr. Husion cautiously backed away as Sirah rolled out a flat metal table with straps hanging off the sides. "Put him here," she said as she stopped it in the center of the room. Dr. Husion didn't dare approach until Pax was securely strapped down.

"Can he fix him?" Neo asked as she stared at Pax with worry.

"Nothing is guaranteed, but he's going to try." Sirah walked back toward Dr. Husion, speaking lowly once again. Neo turned her attention to Reiyna.

Leaning close to Neo's ear, Reiyna whispered, "They're talking about some kind of vaccine." Neo nodded, as she stood anxiously waiting for something to happen. She felt Asa's comforting presence as he stood beside her with his hand on her lower back. Turning to him, she leaned into his side as he wrapped his arm around her. Dr. Husion walked out of the room toward another door in the back with quick steps. When he entered again, his hands were fisted in his hair, and his expression was frantic.

Neo pulled away from Asa, walking over as she asked, "What's wrong? What's going on?"

Dr. Husion rambled as Neo was only able to make out select words. "Not here—no time." Sirah rushed over to him, leaning in as he mumbled in her ear. She sighed as she walked back to Neo.

"He says he doesn't have the vaccine, and he can't make more because he doesn't have any samples of the Necroverme here to use to for it." Her face looked solemn, as if this was the end of it and there was no saving him.

"No, there must be something we can do. I can go and find some—I'll go back to Cenus—" Neo said as she tried to rationalize a way to help him.

"There's not enough time, the virus is already spreading too far, see—" Sirah interjected before she walked toward Pax, turning his head to the side and pulling his shirt down to reveal how far the black veins had spread.

"What about the safe?" Reiyna asked, her face drawn with worry.

Both Sirah and Dr. Husion's attention fell on Reiyna as Sirah asked, "What safe?"

"Back at the lab where we found you, we were there to steal a safe," Neo began to explain, turning to Dr. Husion she said, "I didn't know at the time it was yours, we only did it because we had to."

Dr. Husion's eyes widened as he turned to Sirah and nodded. "Thats what he needs, but you better hurry.

"I'll go, I'm fastest," Reiyna offered already starting down the hall. The clock was ticking, and Neo was worried there wasn't much time left. Pax's body tensed under the restrains and he began thrashing against them, but his eyes were still closed.

"He's seizing," Sirah shouted as she ran across the room to a medical cabinet and withdrew a syringe and several small bottles of liquid. She hurried back over, plunging the syringe into one of the bottles and injected it into the vein in his arm. "This will hold him over, but we're running out of time. You better hope she gets back soo—"