Endosymbiosis

40. Necrosis

Even weakened, Deinos got up and landed a blow against the pione, taking him to the ground and pinning him so I had a chance to break free. But Deinos couldn't hold out for long. I took another sphere out of my pocket, pressed its button and stuffed it into the pione's uniform, who rose in a burst of power too strong for Deinos and lunged at me. Before he got his stinger into my neck I managed to dodge, putting him between me and the edge of the roof, and kicked him into the fall below. The dust cloud exploded around him and he disappeared inside it, drowning in his new loyalty to the metriona.

Deinos let out a pained grunt and I immediately went back to his fallen body, intoxicated by that reddish glow that pulsed just under the skin, so deadly he wouldn't survive much longer if nothing was done. I needed to save him... And I knew Donecea would know how.

I balanced the tons of his body precariously on my shoulders and dragged us down the stairs to the snowy ground at the edge of the camp. I went to one of the trucks for the wounded soldiers that was about to leave for the iatric tents and dumped Deinos with the others. But I wouldn't let him go alone, so I jumped into the moving vehicle before it left me behind. I wanted to make sure that Deinos would get in hands that would help him.

• • • ֍ • • •

I dragged Deinos as quickly as possible to Donecea's tent and tossed him onto one of the makeshift beds on the floor, now that all the stretchers were occupied. She ran around with precision and confidence, sticking needles in those who screamed in pain and applying bandages to the bleeding of others, trying to spare the lives of those who gave them for this cause. There was not a shadow of fear on her face, even as some of the soldiers almost slipped over the precipice of death, because she wouldn't let them fall. And even though so many would leave at the end of this battle, with her there I felt that, inevitably, everything would end well.

When Donecea realized I was there and saw the red pulse in one of Deinos's arms, she ran towards us.

"He was poisoned by one of the piones! Do you have any antidote?!"

In silence, Donecea tore the sleeve of his poisoned arm, releasing that toxic sheen that flooded the veins beneath the already rotting skin. I could practically see the venom migrating through every one of his cells, eating away at everything in its path and approaching some vital part... I could see him dying. And there was nothing I could do but hold him to the bed while he roared in pain and squirmed violently.

"There is no serum for the pione's poison." Donecea revealed. "We have to amputate his arm before the poison spreads."

We?!

I opened my mouth to stammer something incoherent, but she had already dove into the boxes in the corner of the tent and returned with the tools to rip Deinos's arm off – one of them a gigantic silver saw. Donecea put a kind of helmet over her face, and as Deinos tried to pull away, she stuck a needle in his chest.

Slowly his body began to weaken, his eyes rolling and confused murmurs escaping his mouth, perhaps in a plea for us not to do what we were about to... But I knew that if we didn't hear Donecea, he would die.

I wanted to say that everything would be okay, but I knew all Deinos would hear would be the fear in my words, so I just kept silent. And I firmly held the limb that was about to be removed.

"You have so many arms you won't even miss this one..." Donecea, on the other hand, managed to whisper, infinitely more confident than me.

Her voice had such a protective softness that even I calmed down a little... But then she pressed a button on that saw and all that disappeared below the machine's shrill screams. The cold determination on Donecea's face was so surreal I wondered if she'd ever done worse things, every move precise, calculated and armed with an efficiency I swore could save entire worlds.

When she moved the saw towards Deinos' skin, I just held the member tighter and also my breath.

Dark blood splashed everywhere, painting my helmet and Donecea's with a gooey black liquid that dripped onto the floor. The sound of meat being cut pierced my ears and the smell of bone stirred pain in my core. At some point my vision began to darken and my legs started to give out, about to send me spiraling into the depths of unconsciousness. I was going to collapse right there... But then Dorecea whispered:

"Look at me." Reluctantly, I tore my eyes away from the puddle of Deinos's remains and stared at the woman in front of me. "That's just the ugly face of mercy, Arkadi... But it's still the only salvation."

Then, in what seemed like the blink of an eye, Deinos's poisoned arm had been severed and Donecea was already stopping the bleeding with a long tape over the espinero's sleeping body.

Donecea smiled, half comforting, half teasing, and, before turning to leave, she whispered to me:

"See? Didn't even hurt."