Page 12 of Music of the Ocean

It was both far away and impossibly close, pressing at the boundary of his thoughts, a presence so vast and so ancient it made him feel microscopic.

Saxby hung in the water, breathing easily, as if the water itself had seeped into his cells and replaced them. A current twisted through the blackness, a lazy spiral that brushed against him and sent a shudder of recognition through his dream self.

It was a touch but not physical. More of a probing. His memories were skimmed, his feelings examined like curiosities. His life, his name, every secret, all an open book to the thing in the water.

It drew closer, circling, and the currents tightened, pulling Saxby gently, inexorably, deeper and deeper toward its presence.

There was no fear. Well, not exactly. What flooded Saxby was more like awe or the overwhelming understanding of just how insignificant he was in the grand scope of things.

Whatever was out there was alien, yes, but not hostile. Curious, maybe. Hungry, definitely. To the thing in the water, Saxby was not prey or a rival or an invader. He was something else.

And then, it spoke with a sense of purpose so mind-boggling it eclipsed all else. It was a claim, a truth, an identity stamped on Saxby’s dreaming mind so hard he jolted in his sleep.

Mine.

SAXBY WOKE on his side with his cheek pressed to the cool mesh of his bed’s pillow. His tongue was as dry as the desert, and his lips stuck together. He swallowed, or tried to, and his throat seized up.

Jerking into a sitting position, he grabbed the glass on his bedstand. He gulped the salty water, which triggered coughing, because of course it did. Gods, he couldn’t catch his breath. It kind of felt like he was suffocating.

He was close to panicking by the time he finally got the cough under control. Opening his hand, he grimaced. What the hell was that frothy pink-tinted phlegm? And gross.

Swinging his legs over the side of the bed, he stood, and a wave of dizziness swept over him. Fuck, it was bad enough he saw little blinking lights. The urge to cough was a tickle in throat, just waiting to happen, too.

Actually worried he was about to pass out, he sat back down and stuck his head between his knees. Gods above, it felt like he had a shuttle sitting on his chest. And it hurt.

He stayed there for several minutes until he finally got his body under control. This time when he stood, he took his time. Once he saw he wasn’t going to end up in a heap on the floor, he slowly trudged toward the bathroom.

Wait.

How the hell had he gotten into his bedroom? He’d fallen asleep on the couch. He remembered leaning his head back and thinking he’d just close his eyes for a moment.

He glanced back at the bed, where the sheets were twisted into a tight rope and the blanket lay half-slumped on the floor. Not only had he taken himself to bed, but he’d also fixed himself one of his special slushy things to drink. And none of which he had memory of.

And he had dreamed of water again, but this time there had been something in it with him.

Shit, the medband probably recorded all that. Oh well, he wasn’t receiving emergency comms from Vance, so apparently, he hadn’t triggered an alarm. But he was supposed to record the dream.

And whatever he coughed up was definitely something new, as was the tightness and pain in his chest.

Instead, he stared at the blinking digital clock.

06:28

His forty-eight hours were up, and he had two hours before his next shift. He’d also apparently slept through the first alarm, which was weird, because he normally set it to the highest decibel allowed by shipboard regs.

Sighing, he activated the shower and did a mental checklist of symptoms. The headache was back, a grinder at the base of his skull. His arms ached, fingers tingling. No fever, though. He checked the medband just to be sure.

The cough worried him. He pressed two fingers to his throat, feeling for a lump, and found nothing except the familiar hollow.

Running his fingers up the side of his neck was a different story, though. He did flinch, because wow, the skin was certainly tender. Weren’t there lymph nodes or something there? Okay, was that another new symptom? Or was it just from him coughing so much suddenly?

Saxby drank the rest of his water, then showered, hoping that would clear his head. But the steam seemed to make it worse, so he cut the water to a cooler temperature, finished up, and then hopped out.

He dabbed at his face with a towel, dreading the moment he’d have to look at himself in the mirror, but he did, eventually. What he saw was fine. No swelling, no rash, no bloodshot eyes.

If anything, he looked healthier than usual. His skin was a little less sallow than it had been, his hair a little shinier brown, his jawline a little sharper. He smiled, just to see if his face hurt.

Final analysis was that it did, indeed, hurt.