Rising Tide (8 page)

That he did it to try to save himself is one of the few things that makes sense with him. He's spent a large part of his life trying to stay alive. It's a skill that he's honed to a sharp point.

It's just that that skill, and really most of his past life, is at odds with what I'm trying to do. In the beginning of our association, I had to convince him to carry my blood samples on his ship. He fought and he bucked. Because he was risking his survival.

And yet in the end he came around. Or at least I thought he had. But it's really only been a few weeks ago since he left me the last time.

Where Ben and I differ . . . well, I don't have time to go into all of it, but I see the risk as being worth it for something greater. The risk of dealing with infected blood, or transporting a live Feral, is palatable if it brings us closer to a cure.

I thought he had come around to that way of thinking, especially when he sacrificed the
Cherub
to save Tamoanchan. Hell, he almost sacrificed his life to do it.

I thought something had changed.

I know he didn't plan to put me in danger—Ben wouldn't do that—but he has this tendency to leave chaos in his wake. Ben's impulsive. He makes decisions without always thinking them through. It's one of the things that infuriates me about him.

Okay, Miranda. Be honest. It's also one of the things that I like about him.

I take longer to make up my mind. Many times when he acts, I'll be making lists, weighing the positives and negatives of actions and positions, calculating percentages. It's the kind of thinking that I need to maintain in science.

The truth is that we are often better together, when we can balance one another. Which makes it exceedingly frustrating when he goes off on his own.

Damn it, Ben.

I often think that he likes to play the hero. Dashing off to risk his life, thinking that he's protecting me when all he's doing is preventing me from doing any good. And the good I can do . . .

The data I took from Gastown is still in my pocket. Every moment that passes, I itch to get it back, compare it to our data, share it with Sergei and the others and see where that takes us.

I think it might take us a few steps closer to a cure.

I hope to everything that's good, that I'll get a chance to use it.

I didn't really know what to think about the idea of Malik threatening my life. Since I got here, to the
Phoenix
, he'd been nothing but nice to me. Respectful, even. I know that he has a severe problem with Ben, but he'd always treated me well.

And yet here he was, threatening to send me down with the ship.

I knew I needed to confront him about it and get a sense of what exactly he intended. With Ben gone, and the possibility of him failing, I needed a plan to get myself free of this situation. I wasn't going to let the Gastown data go to waste. It would not go down with me.

Luckily for me, we have our dinners.

I didn't get a chance to fill Ben in on anything, but I wonder if he would have been surprised to know that Malik had been inviting me to dinner on a regular basis since shortly after picking us up out of the water. During the day, I would work on whatever medical issues needed attending—setting broken bones or irrigating wounds or just bandaging people—and in the evenings Malik and I would dine together.

It seemed perfectly natural to me, of course. I was the one who convinced Malik to save Ben. I was the one working him. At first we talked about what had happened with the
Cherub
. Then, my skills as a doctor. But after that . . . we just started talking.

After seeing Ben, and discovering my new status as a prisoner, I expected that to change. And yet, mere hours after Ben left, Malik himself appeared at the door to my cabin.

“Is it time to go below?” I asked. I stood against the wall of the cabin, my arms crossed. Still mad at Ben. Still mad at the situation. That fucker.

“No,” he said. “I came to invite you to dinner.”

“Do you normally dine with prisoners?” I asked.

“I prefer the term ‘honored guest.'”

“Maybe we can settle on ‘hostage,'” I said.

He smiled. “Will you come to dinner tonight?”

I thought about it. I thought I should say no, but I needed to figure a way out of this. And I needed more data. Also, his food is spectacular. It's always hard to turn down good food.

I nodded.

“Wonderful.” He turned to go.

I stopped him before he left. “Why do you hate Ben?”

He waved a hand in the air. “I'd rather not get into those details at the moment. Maybe another time.”

“At dinner?”

He smiled at me. “Perhaps.”

I am forced to admit that Malik's dinner arrangements were always impressive.

Like always, I was escorted to a private room where he was waiting for me. Just the two of us, a small, intimate table, and lit oil lamps around the room.

“I think you forgot the food,” I said.

He smiled. “It's being prepared,” he said. “Please, have a seat.” I sat and soon could smell the aroma of the fish and vegetables that were cooking in the nearby galley. My stomach spasmed in anticipation. Malik ate better than anyone I had ever met. That was one of the reasons I kept accepting his invitations.

Then Malik opened a bottle of wine. I've always preferred the stronger spirits, but when I tasted it, I had to admit it was good—smooth, silky, and yet still having an almost fruity flavor.

The conversation turned to me. My background. I started giving him my scientific background before realizing he was asking about something different—ethnicity.

“Why do you want to know?” I asked.

He shrugged. “It doesn't matter, of course. Why would it? It's just that you defy easy categorization.”

I chose to take it as a compliment. Some people still cling to the importance of ethnicities, but most people couldn't give a damn. What does it matter if your ancestors were English if there was no England anymore? The concern mostly came from zealots and fanatics. I wouldn't have even answered if I didn't think it was an intellectual question. Malik seemed the kind of person who would know aspects of history and nationality. I decided to answer.

“I'm a mix,” I said. “If I were an airship, I'd be a junker. A little of this, something of that. The way I was told, I've got some Indian, Brazilian, Irish, and French.”

“That's a lot for the Sick,” he said.

“You've obviously never been on a science commune,” I said. “There's a certain comfort in the fact that everyone understands disease transmission. Romantic attachments are loose and fluid. And you?”

“My mother's people were Muslims,” he said. “She was raised in the faith. She used to pray to the east several times a day.”

“But you weren't raised that way?”

“Things were . . . more difficult when I was a child. Partly because of me. I think it became less important.” He sipped his wine. “Or rather survival became more important.” He looked down at his glass, rotated it between his fingers. I thought I saw a dark cloud come over his face for just a moment. Then he covered it with a smile, looking up at me.

“How did you lose her?” I asked. I was being manipulative, pushing on the sensitivity he had just shown, but I needed to gain some ground with him.

His face grew tight. He drank a long sip of his wine, then he finally met my eyes. “I don't like to talk about it,” he said. “Suffice it to say that she sacrificed herself to save me. I was old enough to start looking out for myself. But only barely.”

“That must have been hard,” I said, holding his gaze.

He smiled. “It forced me to learn quickly. I learned how to make friends, how to convince people to help me.” The smile vanished. “And I learned . . . other things.”

“My parents both died when I was young,” I said, scrambling to cover the gap that seemed to be opening up between us. “I only remember fragments of them. My father, his brown hands bent around a microscope. My mother, taking me up in a balloon, a smile on her face.”

“That must have been difficult,” Malik said. “Having them both taken from you at a young age.”

I nodded. “It was. But I had Sergei.”

“Sergei?” he asked.

I smiled. “He was a friend of my parents. A student of my father's. He took me in when they died.” I felt warmth in my chest, thinking about Sergei. I miss him so much. I hope he's okay. “Sergei took care of me.”

Malik raised his glass. “To Sergei.”

What could I do but raise mine? “To Sergei.” I felt tears collect in my eyes, but I pushed them away. I wasn't going to show weakness in front of Malik.

But I missed Sergei and last I knew, Gastown ships were headed for Tamoanchan, the island where he was. Where I'd left him. When we blew up the
Cherub
, we took out those ships, but what if there were more?

“Are you okay?” Malik had asked.

“Yes,” I said, sipping at my wine. “I was just thinking of . . . old times.”

Malik narrowed his eyes and stared at me. “What?” I asked.

“I know you told me about you and Benjamin. That you hired him to protect you, but . . . why him?”

Ah
, I thought.
Here it is. Whatever was between them had sparked this question.
I smiled at him. “I'll tell you. But in return you have to tell me why you hate him.”

He regarded me for a long moment. “Are you sure you really want to know?”

“Yes,” I said, without hesitation.

He nodded. “Okay, then.”

So I told him about how I had been researching Ferals, taking blood samples to study Maenad back with Sergei and the others. I told him how on one of those excursions, in Old Monterey, I had been abandoned by the ship captain I'd hired to take me. I told him how Ben had found me and saved me from Ferals.

“He seemed to know what he was doing, so I hired him,” I said. “I think at first the lure of food and fuel was enough to keep him interested.”

“And now?” Malik asked.

For some reason, when he asked that, I thought about the kiss. As Ben prepared to throw us out of the
Cherub
, as we wondered if we were about to plummet to our deaths, he grabbed me and kissed me. I kissed him back. It was a good kiss. Probably an 8 or a 9 out of 10.

It was a very good kiss.

“I think Ben's changed,” I said. “He believes in more than himself.”

Malik smirked. “I don't believe that someone like Benjamin can change.”

“Everything changes,” I say. “It's a fundamental fact of nature.”

Malik tilted his head in agreement. “And yet the bacterium changes in but a few moments. The stone, the mountain . . . a lifetime. I think Benjamin is of the latter kind.”

It was a good point. I had to give him that. “What did he do to you?” I asked.

And so he told me.

I still wish I hadn't asked.