The Syn-En Solution (13 page)

Nell dried her damp palms on the emergency blanket wrapped around her body. The moisture left tracks along the silver fabric. If he was correct, she was more than a century and a half old. Just how big of a freak did that make her? Nails digging into the coffin-sized box she’d been stored in, she sighed. “I’m not sure how I’ve come to live this long. I mean, I haven’t actually looked in a mirror but I don’t feel old and decrepit. In fact, I feel better than I have in a long time.”

She flexed her arm muscles and squeezed her shoulder blades together. That pesky ache in her back was gone as was the throb in her elbow from a childhood broken arm. Of course, it might just be because gravity didn’t pull on her bones. Nudging aside his hand, she tugged the edge of her makeshift sarong higher up her chest. Even her breasts seemed perkier. Definitely the zero gravity.

The admiral’s attention shifted to the cleavage under his palm. “What was the last birthday you remember?”

“My fortieth.” Her mother and father had stood in line for three hours to get one of the food boxes. Aside from their usual fare of boiled beans and canned corn, her sister had made mock apple crumble using saltine crackers and dusty cinnamon sticks. Nell’s mouth watered from the memory and tears swam in her eyes. What had happened to her family?

His eyes narrowed as he peered at her. “If I had to guess your age, I would estimate you to be in your early thirties.”

“I age well.”

He grunted. “Remarkably well considering your hormone levels are on par with a citizen at her most fertile.”

Nell swallowed hard as embarrassment lit her cheeks. While she knew he’d noticed that she had the hots for him, she had hoped he wouldn’t mention it, especially given his own reaction. “Can’t you look me up in some database? I’ll even give you my social security number, my mother’s maiden name and…”

He shook his head. “Records that old would have been erased during the solar storms of the twenty twenties.”

Nell blew the hair floating in her face out of her eyes, before gathering the escaped locks and tucking them under the knot at the back of her neck. “Solar storms, huh? Is there anything that remains of my world? 2012.”

Except her.

He didn’t answer the question. “What else do you remember?”

Her parents. Her nieces and nephews, brothers and sisters, her cat, eating pasta for months at a time, standing in line for hours just to pick three lemons from a tree. None of those things would help prove her story. She needed something time specific.

“Everyone was sick. Services were breaking down. Water was available in our area every third day. We couldn’t use the electricity because it cost so much, so we had a charcoal grill in our backyard. Martial law had just been declared and there was a tank parked on our corner. We tried planting a garden in the front yard but people stole the plants, so we moved it to the back and my brothers-in-law and I had to stand guard over them. Hunger was rampant, jobs were practically nonexistent, especially at my age.”

“What year?”

“2012.” A montage of food riots, looting and dwindling medical services played inside Nell’s head. Humanity disappeared in the imperative to survive. Desperate times turned people into brutal savages. Lost in the memories, Nell shivered. The stasis chamber cut into her lower back yet again.

Still keeping his hand on her chest, the admiral backed up a step.

Nell set her hand over his. Despite the contact, her thoughts returned to a previous time. The disinterest she felt viewing the news as events dramatically altered lives, but left hers relatively untouched. “Climate change caused never-ending rains in the Midwest, snowstorms in the deserts and dustbowls in the Northeast. Crops molded in the fields, forests burned, cacti exploded and California was falling into the ocean one mudslide at a time.”

“You were there?” The admiral’s words pulled her back to this metal slaughterhouse.

“With the Federal Emergency Management Agency, for a time. I’d been lucky to keep my job until January. The boss’s aging trophy wife didn’t see me as competition, you see. Most people didn’t actually see me at all…” She waved away the thought. No use feeling sorry for herself. She survived. How many others had not? “Well that’s not important.”

He cocked his head. “You worked for this Save Our World Foundation?”

“No. This was before that.” Nell shook her head. “I lost my job to a stupid automated receptionist and because I had a little retirement account I only qualified for a hundred and twenty dollars a week in benefits.”

The words were ash on her tongue. From over a grand to barely more than a hundred in the space of a week. Not enough to feed the nine people in her immediate family. Her stomach rumbled in support of her rising anger. The adults had sacrificed their meager boiled beans for the growing children.

“You lost your job to a
computer
?” The admiral’s hand formed a fist.

Briefly, Nell wondered at his reaction then she remembered the encyclopedia entry that had sounded in her head. The Syn-En were made up of sophisticated computers. Not that you’d know by looking at him, but still… She cupped his fist, stroked the rough skin of his fingers. It wasn’t his fault. It was greed, pure and simple. “Not so much a computer, more like a guard who couldn’t be bribed, bargained with, feel sorry for some poor smuck trying to sell something or make her boss feel guilty for not paying his bills.”

His fingers slowly uncurled and slipped between hers. “You didn’t do your job.”

Nell yanked her hand away from his. The nerve of him, insulting her like that. She poked him in the chest. “I did my job. I just felt sorry for most of those salesmen. They were only trying to put food on the table and I never took bribes. I was damn good at my job.”

He quirked an eyebrow and captured her wrist. Firmly, but gently, he set her palm on his shoulder.

Clenching her teeth, Nell glared at him. What did he know? He hadn’t been there, hadn’t lived through the nightmare. “Okay, I hated taking the calls from vendors. I mean, we had the money to pay our bills but the boss wanted to squeeze that last penny of interest out of his money before paying his bills. It wasn’t right. People needed that money to pay their workers.”

He nodded once. “How did you end up on my ship, working for the Save Our World Foundation?”

Nell shrugged as her stomach cramped in fear. God only knew. Too bad He wasn’t here to answer the admiral’s questions. Or hers. So how had she gotten here? The answer must lie in that box. Still, she’d tell him what she remembered, and maybe that would be enough for him. “After twelve months of unemployment, I used up the last of my savings and had racked up quite a bit of credit card debt.”

“And you could not repay those debts.” The admiral rubbed his jaw.

As if that explained anything. Nell snorted. Besides, most charges had been medical bills and medicines for her sister and niece. “I wasn’t the only one. So many people were filing bankruptcy that Congress was ready to pass an amendment forcing people into indentured servitude until they paid off their debts. Crazy as it sounds, most people supported it since the company they’d be bonded to would have to feed, house and clothe them. Sixty-five percent unemployment can make the most ridiculous thing look good.”

“So you were indentured to the Save Our World Foundation?”

“No!” Nell straightened her back as much as being wedged between him and the sarcophagus would allow. “I was ready to meet with a
lawyer
to get the bankruptcy paperwork going when I got a job
interview
with Save Our World.”

“The Syn-En were not created until 2025. How could the Save Our World Foundation know about them thirteen years prior to their formation, let alone send you to save us?”

And that was the million dollar question.

“I don’t know.” Although her presence here indicated the foundation knew. If the wreckage in the cargo bay and the empty space visible through the gashes in the wall were any indication, the Syn-En definitely needed saving.

“So you lied when you said you’d come to save us?”

Nell glanced at his hand still resting against her chest, keeping her from floating away like an free helium balloon, and decided to keep her thoughts to herself. If he really could detect lies just by touching her, he might punish her for them as well. “I signed up to save Earth, her people. Europe’s growing season had been disrupted because of the mini ice age; Mt. Etna blew, lowering the temperatures even more. Russia was expanding once again into Eastern Europe to gain ports that weren’t frozen, and my brother was stuck in the middle of it. He’d been called up with NATO forces to defend Poland.”

He looked at her as if she spoke a foreign language. Heck maybe she did. A hundred and twenty odd years was a long time to be missing. “These are subsidiaries of Save Our World?”

Shaking her head, Nell pressed on, praying something she said would ring a bell and prevent him from torturing her. “Save Our World was looking for volunteers to help. While most of my skills were administrative, I had helped FEMA during the California real estate shake up, so I knew there’d be lots of paper pushing and record keeping. I got a job interview.”

He cocked his head to the left, set his free hand on her shoulder. “Then what happened?”

“I told them about my brother, my experience and my desire to be sent to the European Front. Of course, they knew that if we couldn’t supply proof of life, the government would stop paying my brother’s salary and well, my parents, sister and five other family members relied on that income.” Shame roiled through her. Hearing her words, he might think she cared more for money than her own flesh and blood. Dammit, dead soldier and POW families got benefits, but missing soldiers were treated as deserters and those they left behind received nothing. Nothing! “I needed to get to Europe to find proof that my brother was still alive. Save Our World could get me into the disaster areas, put me in contact with the military.”

“Did you?”

No. Nell bit the inside of her mouth to keep from crying out. God, what must her parents think of her? “I got called back for a second interview and then…”

She shrugged and flashed her palms at him.

“And then?” His fingers slipped around her neck.

“That’s it. I remember the waiting room. I had a tickle in the back of my throat and thought I might be coming down with the flu so I had drunk a lot of peppermint tea and was about to ask to use the rest room when I was called. The next thing I knew, I opened my eyes and there was this guy looming over me squeezing my…” She gestured down to where his hand was. “Then that crazy woman with her needles and you.”

His gray eyes narrowed a fraction. “You want me to believe you’re from over a century ago come forward in time to save us?”

“I don’t expect you to believe it.” Nell gulped as hysteria threatened to bubble out of her. She set her hand over his, knowing she wouldn’t be able to stop him if he decided to strangle her but determined to try anyway. “Honestly, I’m having a hard time thinking of this as anything other than a dream.”

“Do you have proof?”

She snorted. “Where exactly would I put it?”

Soft as a caress, his gaze skimmed down and then up her body. “There are places.”

Nell squeezed her legs together. “There better not be!”

His lips twitched. “Shang’hai found a data recorder on your life pod.”

Feeling cold air against her teeth, Nell clicked her mouth shut. He deliberately let her think he planned a body cavity search. Should she take it as proof of a sense of humor or sadistic streak? She forced the thoughts aside. “Shang’hai? You’re talking about the pink haired woman who left with the box, right?”

“Yes.”

“Well good. Then I hope we both get answers about how I got here.”

He tapped her jugular, matching the beat of her heart. “Yet, even if a human could be put in suspended animation for over a hundred years, it would not explain how you know about the wireless array.”

Nell blinked as unease traveled down her spine. Nor did it explain why her mother/conscious sometimes sounded like an encyclopedia entry. But according to Sci-Fi shows, space parasites could. Somehow she doubted the Admiral would be any more receptive to the idea than her mother/conscience. “No. I guess it wouldn’t.”

“So you see you’ve left me with no choice but to try another tactic to get at the truth.”

“I’ve told you the truth!” Nell clutched his hand, trying to drag it away from her throat.

“But you know more than you remember.” He leaned in close again until his lips brushed the shell of her ear. “And I’ve been trained at releasing those suppressed memories.” Rearing back, he shook off her grasp and raised his free hand. The fingertips flipped open to reveal the winking blades concealed inside the digits.

“Please.” She blinked in disbelief at the emerging scalpels, then fear seized her. Nell planted both hands against his shoulders and shoved. Still trapped. “Don’t do this.”

“Admiral.” Entering the cargo bay, Shang’hai stepped through the debris and stood next to Nell.

Bei glanced at his chief engineer, surprised and annoyed at her interruption. Shifting to hide his erection, he tamped down his desires. He didn’t like the effect she had on his control, yet he seemed powerless to stop it. How had the woman gotten to him so quickly? “You have a report.”

Shang’hai looked at Nell and a bundle of her concern hit him through the wireless array. “Shields will be restored to half power in thirty minutes. Hull repairs will require three days, otherwise shearing will be an issue when we engage the fusion engines. Thrusters will be online in two hours.”

“That could have been sent on the WA.” Watching his engineer, Bei set the surgical knives against Nell’s neck. The human had been afraid, then excited. He had felt both as keenly as if they were his own.

“I don’t think this could.” Shang’hai lifted the skin of her forearm, revealing the narrow compartment between her metal ulna and radius bones.

Nell leaned to the left to get a closer look, fascination written on her face.

Shang’hai extracted a rolled up LCD and smoothed it open on the side of Nell’s life pod. Images and data streamed down the white background. “According to the log, the human has been in suspended animation for over a hundred and twenty years.”