Healing Her Patient

But as her memories of her past life came back, the memories she had made on Soluu Four began to fade. For instance, she vaguely remembered being passionately in love with her coworker. But no—that couldn’t be right, could it?

She shot a glance at Bravik, who was still intent on piloting the ship. He looked different than he had when they had started this mission, didn’t he? He used to have streaks of silver in his black hair and beard, but they were gone now. And he had been extremely rude—Danni was certain she remembered that. So how in the world had she convinced herself she was madly in love with him?

“Well, there she is—the Mother Ship,” he murmured, breaking her train of thought. “Back home again I guess, little girl.”

Danni frowned.

“What did you just call me? I thought I asked you to refer to me by my title—Dr. Adams.”

Bravik shot her a stricken look.

“It’s that quick? You already forgot what happened between us on Soluu Four?”

Danni frowned. Now that he mentioned it, the last two weeks seemed strangely blurry.

“I think I remember we agreed to pretend to be married,” she said slowly. “To make the H’rakens happy. And I remember something about a…a pink rock or crystal? It glowed and it was really big.” She shook her head. “Sorry—it’s so strange but I feel like I’m waking up from a dream and I barely remember what I was dreaming. Is it like that for you?”

Bravik looked away.

“Not quite, little girl,” he murmured.

Danni glared at him.

“I asked you not to call me that derogatory nickname!” she exclaimed.

“You told me I could, back on Soluu Four, because the H’rakens all had nicknames for each other and we were pretending to be Joined,” he shot back. “Don’t you remember anything?”

Danni shook her head.

“No…not really.” Just a moment before she’d had a few blurry memories. But now she couldn’t remember any of their mission to Soluu Four. What had happened to them? Why had she lost her memory of the past two weeks? Had she bumped her head and gotten some kind of selective amnesia? “I don’t remember much at all,” she admitted to Bravik. “I certainly hope I took good notes!”

“If you did, they won’t be any help to you—you left them all back on Soluu Four,” he told her. “Along with everything else we brought with us.”

“What? But why in the world would we do that?” Danni demanded. “I can’t imagine leaving without my research notes! How am I going to write a paper on H’raken society if I can’t remember anything I saw and I don’t have my notes to refer to? We have to go back for them!”

“Afraid that’s impossible.” Bravik shook his head. “We can never go back again—it’s too damn dangerous.”

“Dangerous? How?” Danni had a vague, blurry flash of a white thing with long teeth attacking her but it seemed like a nightmare she’d woken up from a long time ago. “Why is it dangerous?” she asked again as this flash of memory faded too.

“Because the two of us were getting younger and younger and losing our memories of the Mother Ship and our real lives,” Bravik growled. “Look at yourself, Danielle—go on, take a look.”

Danni frowned. She knew that he certainly looked younger, but she hadn’t applied that idea to herself. Hesitantly, she pulled down the passenger-side viewer and had a look at her face.

“Oh my God!” she exclaimed, frowning at what she saw. “What happened to me? I haven’t looked like this since I was seventeen or eighteen years old!”

“Neither one of us have,” Bravik said, scowling. “If we’d stayed on Soluu Four, we would have gone on getting younger until we ceased to exist. That’s why it’s too damn dangerous to go back for your notes—which you stopped keeping after the first few nights, by the way.”

“What? But why would I stop keeping notes?” Danni shook her head, completely perplexed. “That’s not like me at all. I always take copious notes!”

“Well, not this time,” Bravik growled. “This time you were…distracted.”

“Distracted? Distracted by what?” Danni shook her head.

“Oh, I don’t know—maybe the Mother Stone and the way it made us feel and act?” He shot her a deeply unhappy look. “Any of this ringing a bell?”

He seemed to be upset about something, though Danni couldn’t guess what it was. Maybe it was something that had happened between them back on Soluu Four? She strained her memory, but she couldn’t seem to remember what would have made him so upset. She had a vague idea he hadn’t wanted to pretend they were married—or Joined as the Kindred called it. Was that why he was being so snippy with her? Or was he just being an asshole, as usual?

“I’m sorry,” she said stiffly. “I don’t quite understand why, but the whole trip just seems to be a blur to me. Which is really too bad because I have no idea how I’m going to write a paper about a mission I can’t remember and apparently didn’t document.” She shook her head. “It’s just so unlike me.”