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“I—I’m not—” Sazahk’s breath rattled in his lungs. His scar burned under Garin’s palm. The operating room lights flashed in his eyes. He couldn’t move. “Get off.”
“Fucking hell, that’s hot,” Garin shouted over the thunderous cacophony of the geyser as a sudden jet of water hit his shoulder, soaking through his shirt. He wrenched Sazahk farther away and Sazahk’s muscles snapped into action on instinct.
“Get off!” The words finally ripped from his throat loud enough to be heard, and he tore himself free of Garin’s grip.
“Sazahk, what the hell?” Garin let him go but lost his balance and lurched forward.
Reality slammed back into Sazahk and time slowed as Garin’s boot hit the brittle geyserite.
His leg punched through the ground, and his body pitched after it.
Words froze in horror in Sazahk’s throat as he reached helplessly.
The shelf they stood on collapsed out from under Garin’s weight, dropping him onto a slope slick with a thick yellow microbial mat. He slid fast through the mat, dropping toward a steaming cerulean-blue pool, and Sazahk’s stomach dropped with him.
Hot. Hot. Hot. That thing was hot. That thing was dangerous. A hot spring like that could sear the flesh off a man’s bones.
Garin twisted and yelled as he slid away, grabbing for anything but catching nothing.
Sazahk’s heart stopped when Garin crashed into the pool, disappearing in a splash of impossibly beautiful water.
“Garin!” Sazahk scrambled after him, moving as fast as possible while avoiding Garin’s fate. If he could get to him fast enough, if he could pull him out, if they had enough bandages, if they had enough ointment, if Sazahk could get him back to the research compound?—
Garin burst up through the water’s surface, panting and spluttering.
“Garin!”
“I’m okay.” Garin whipped the liquid out of his eyes and took a few shaky breaths, treading water. “I’m okay. It’s not that hot.”
Sazahk ran to the edge of the pool and held his hand over the rippling surface. When it didn’t hurt, he plunged it in. Warm. Uncomfortably warm, but just warm. Sazahk dropped his chin to his heaving chest, his pounding heart slowing. “Thank the goddess.”
Garin swam to the edge, dragging his pack behind him. “That was not fun.”
“That could have been a lot worse than not fun. You have no idea how lucky you are.” Sazahk grabbed the straps of Garin’s pack and pulled it out of the water, finding it ripped open and a lot lighter than it should have been. “Geothermal springs like this can reach temperatures of hundreds of degrees, and that’s not even considering the chemical compositions. It could have literally dissolved you.”
“Yeah, I fucking know that, Sazahk.” Garin hauled himself out of the pool and flopped onto his back.
Sazahk dropped Garin’s waterlogged bag onto a dry bit of ground, then tore open his own pack and dug around for test kits.
“What are you doing?” Garin jerked away when Sazahk swiped the cotton end of a swap down his cheek.
“Making sure you’re not dissolving slowly.” Sazahk stuck the swab in a tube and squeezed in a testing solution.
“I’m not dissolving.” Garin sat up and pushed a hand through his hair, flinging a few droplets free.
Sazahk swirled the swab around and watched the solution change color. “No, you’re not.”
The hot spring had a neutral pH level. Sazahk released the last of his tension and took a few deep breaths as the geyser above them that had started it all gurgled and spluttered. A neutral pH and a temperature like a warm bath. Sazahk sat down hard on the ground next to Garin. Talk about a bullet dodged.
They sat beside each other as the geyser quieted down and the pool’s surface returned to perfect placidity. Sazahk’s breath evened out until it was quiet enough again for Sazahk to hear Garin’s steady breaths at his side.
“So.” Garin turned to Sazahk and raised his eyebrows. “You gonna let me choose our path now?”
Chapter Four
After a full day of charting a careful path through dangerous terrain and biting his tongue every time Sazahk reached for a death trap masquerading as a hot spring, Garin readily lead them to a small hill devoid of the telltale white silica that denoted danger as soon as evening fell.
He hadn’t been so afraid to put one foot in front of the other since crossing that minefield on Tava eight years ago. His life had flashed before his eyes as he’d slid down that hill toward the pool. He’d had plenty of near-death experiences before, given his occupations, but there’d always been something he could do.
