Page 12 of Life-Debt

“If only it had been a one-man system,” Delta murmured.

If only. “I suspect the ship will be overhauled to have such a system in the future. And, perhaps they will finally crack a system allowing the stasis process to be completed by the person in the chamber. That would be complicated, though.”

“Because of the sedation.”

I nodded. “I am concerned you were given a higher dose of sedative than typically prescribed, but I will monitor you for the next twelve hours.”

“Without equipment?”

“Without equipment. It’s better to observe you directly. Now, let’s try to get you moving around. I can’t promise more than a standard jumper, but I have clothing you can wear. I always keep a range of apparel in case of live recoveries. Once you are through the full process, I will open my communication system to your home world.”

Delta’s eyes widened, “You have a long-distance comm?”

I grinned. “Would you like to see my system?”

“I’d love to. I’ve always been interested in the drives and shiftgem setups, but I never qualified to become a mechanic.”

Pft. In space, qualifications made no difference. Knowledge won the battles and wars against the void. “Well, that will make the next ten days pleasant enough for you. On my ship, you need no qualifications to learn beyond respect for my equipment and a willingness to be taught. So next time, when disaster strikes, you might be the difference between life and death.”

“How long do you think it will take to repair my ship?”

“I’ve already repaired your ship. Once I had the stones from the cargo bay and fitted them, it didn’t take long. It was more of a matter of knowing how to do the work without breaking the system. Some of the equipment needed actual repairs, but it was mostly a shiftgem issue.”

“The crystals all shattered at once, with a great, thundering roar that reverberated through the ship,” Delta said, his expression distant and his eyes unfocused. “And none of us knew if we could just take out the old gems and put new ones in, and we didn’t know how to find the right gems for the job.”

“You couldn’t just take out the old gems and put in new ones. You had to match size and type—or understand which types could stand in. It won’t change the past, but perhaps what you learn will change the future.”

It wasn’t much, but it was all I could offer the man who faced the grief of having been the one left behind to survive.

FOUR

“The next stage is unpleasant.”

Delta needed my help to walk, and I admired how he handled going from fit and healthy to reliant on some strange woman with ears and a tail to reach our destination, which was my spare cabin he’d use for the duration of his stay. He heaved a sigh at the realization he needed my help to wipe his skin clean of the stasis residue, most of which he’d sweated out during the twitching phase of revival.

I took care of most of the work, and I chuckled and turned around so he could address the more delicate matters on his own, making use of one of the several solution-soaked cloths I’d provided for the task. Once he’d cleaned to his satisfaction, I assisted with the dressing process, dressing him in one of my spare jumpers. While not ideal, it fit, it would keep him warm, and he could change into something better later.

“The next stage is unpleasant,” I informed him once he was dressed and able to stand on his own.

“I wish I had paid more attention to the revival process for stasis,” Delta admitted in a rueful tone. “It’s worse than I imagined. How can this possibly become more unpleasant?”

“You have to stand and walk around for at least an hour before trying to eat. While your bodily fluids are thawed now, you need to move around. Once you’ve moved around, I’ll try you on something bland to see if you’re ready to eat. Depending on your symptoms, I may have to hook you to an IV, but that’s uncommon. To provide a distraction, I’ll teach you how good shiftgem systems work. Would you like to learn about the life support system, the engine, or one of the other systems first?”

“Can we start with the revival system? I’ve never seen one, and I mistakenly failed to pay attention to the classes before departure.”

In his situation, with a three-man system and low odds of being the one to go in, I couldn’t blame him. “We absolutely can. Most are only given a short briefing on what to expect if revived from stasis, so I doubt your education was all that expansive. I didn’t check to see if your ship had a revival unit. Mine does, but I don’t have a stasis chamber. That will likely be my next acquisition, assuming I can get the funding required. The revival unit was expensive enough.”

Until he could walk without swaying, which would take another few hours, I would keep a firm grip on his arm. While I could deactivate gravity with the link implants, I preferred to keep my ship’s secrets close to my chest and nestled up my sleeve in case of a true emergency. We made it back to where I’d revived him, which wasn’t much more than a utility closet filled with medical supplies. The revival unit itself counted as tiny but fierce, with the clear shiftgem crystal having cost a whopping quarter of a million tokens.

Its status as a gift was the only reason I had it.

I set the unit on the table, and as I checked the device over after every use anyway, I decided to begin his education with a top-level shiftgem. “This is an upper-level revival unit, meant for portable usage. Most larger ships and ports have full-body cells, similar to what is on your ship. However, those have certain downsides. While cheaper to install, they don’t allow the operators to take a hands-on approach with their patients. When I revived you, I had full access to your body in case of emergency.”

“That seems important.”

“It’s part of why I have a perfect record of reviving stasis patients in space. At this stage, if you were to prematurely expire on me, it would not be due to revival itself; some underlying health condition would be the primary culprit. If you have an underlying health condition, now would be the time to tell me.”

“I have allergies to certain insects on my home world, but that’s it.”