Well now. Maybe I feel just a little bit better about this suicide mission. Because these are clearly Xyla’s exoskeletons.
“Dicker,” I say. “Can humans use these suits?”
“Yes, but you’ll need to use an envirosuit as well. The next room over has Jimmy’s armor. You need to use one of his envirosuits underneath Xyla’s exoskeleton.”
“Awesome. I’m on it.”
I float into Jimmy’s room and grab a suit. It takes me a while to pull that thing on in zero gravity, but eventually all the sticky tabs and clamps are fastened, except for my helmet, and I float back into Xyla’s room to choose my weapon.
I smile as I take in her exoskeletons. Five to choose from. They range from lightly armored to the last one on the end that looks like it could take a direct cannon hit and keep walking.
I choose that one and float over to it, positioning my body inside the open body cage. It’s got to be three meters tall. When I position my feet onto the pegs alongside the legs, the clamps automatically latch onto my boots and hold me snugly in place.
Then a series of things start happening in quick succession. Flexisteel armor wraps around my lower and upper legs, torso, and ribcage. When I wrap my fingers around the hand pegs, the same flexible armor wraps around my lower and upper arms, chest, and neck until I’m fully protected by the flexisteel.
I realize I’ve been holding my breath and let out a long exhale, then move my hand to pick up my helmet, testing out the dexterity.
I pick the helmet up with two cyborg fingers and a few seconds later I’m clamping it down over my face. The display inside the suit lights up and commands start scrolling down my faceplate.
“Oh, fuck yeah,” I say.
“Don’t get cocky,” Dicker says, apparently plugged into my skeletal system. “This won’t turn you into Xyla. Only make you feel like her. And that flexisteel can take a big hit, but not too many in a row. So keep that in mind.”
“Is there a weapons system?” I ask.
“What do you think?”
I tap my fingers on the hand plate and feel several buttons.
“Do not,” Dicker says, “deploy a weapon in my hull, Delphi. I will kill you if you shoot holes in me.”
“Got it.” I smile. “I won’t. But which button does what?”
“The first one on each hand is your standard plasma rifle. The second is a laser pistol. Both of those are mounted on your arm. The third button is a flash grenade and the fourth is a shrapnel grenade. Both of those deploy from the shoulders. Don’t mix them up.”
“Got it,” I say. “Third button is shrapnel, fourth is flash.”
“You’re funny,” Dicker says.
“I feel like a super monster.”
“You look like one too. But you’re really just Delphi in a fucking flexisteel suit. This thing will help you—it’ll defuse any plasma bursts and stunner streams—but it won’t save you from a barrage of exploding pellets.”
“Got it,” I say with the appropriate amount of reverence. But secretly I’m kinda exited to take this thing out for a spin and go hunting for the Loathsome Bitch. I’m gonna make her pay for what she’s put Tycho and me through.
I have a plan of sorts. It’s not entirely original, but who cares. It’s one that just might work.
And turns out Dicker has her own secret plan as well.
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE – JIMMY
The first thing I see when I wake up is a single xenon light hanging from the ceiling.
I’m on my back again. And for a moment I figure I’m still in the same cell. The one on Queenie.
But my senses start coming back to me and the tunnel vision sensation fades to reveal reality.
Not still in the cell on Queenie.
Not even on Queenie, because the faint white-noise hum of her engines is missing. In their place is a low moaning leaking through a vent down near the floor and the sound of a heavy door clanging closed outside somewhere.
I turn my head to find a bedroll on the floor—though I’m not lying on it—and a bucket in the corner, functionality obvious.
I close my eyes, still very tired from whatever that green gas was, and think about something better than this cell.
I think about Delphi and the look on her face back in the Mighty Minions meadow. I think about the trip we took to that planet with all the animals. Virtual or not, it was spectacular. I think about the stars and then, without warning, I think about my mother.
It’s been a long time since I could remember her face, so I don’t picture that now. Just some amorphous figure in white, smiling down at me. I see her eyes for a moment. And maybe it’s just my imagination filling in the emptiness, or maybe this is a true memory, I don’t know. But I see them. They’re dark blue. A little bit muddy and gray. She has light hair and fair skin and I think maybe this is a dream or just imagination… because she looks like an angel from a storybook I used to read when I was a small child back on Wayward Station. A real book made of stiff cardboard with bright pictures and few words.