Chapter 60

Tamara left him while Carly stayed behind to monitor him. There seemed to be a standing order that a healer was to be with him at all times. The teenager was reading a book and was not interested in talking so Daniel returned to converting the plant. It was boring work, but almost half of the west side of the building had been processed and anyone looking at it now would see vibrant green amongst the purple leaves.

Once more, his alarm went off.

Daniel opened his eyes and a short time later Ivey was staring down at him.

“Good, you’re back.” She declared in a business like tone.

Are you fixed?

Ivey glanced at the flower board. “About eighty percent if I’m being honest, but I heard what happened when I was gone, so I figured I should do this straight away even if I take twice as long.”

No tombstone jokes?

Her face appeared directly over the top of him. There was not a hint of amusement in her eyes. “Exactly. They’re juvenile. Now, before we get started have there been any changes.”

Daniel checked his mind quickly, projecting into his internals and tracing the stress components against his core.

No. Everything is identical.

“And you want me to remove glass outside your core?”

Yes.

She placed her hands lightly over his heart, and energy swept out of her. His chest thrummed for about ten seconds and then she leant backward, looking wane. Daniel recognised mana exhaustion when he saw her.

Thank you.

He heard her sitting down. “I should be able to do another run in about fifteen minutes.”

Curiously he checked her effort his consciousness dipping into his chest and then assessing his core and the glass that was within it. It took him a moment to hunt down the changes. There was a piece missing, which was no larger than a grain of rice. Daniel did the maths quickly and then internally frowned. Very little material had been removed. It would take at least another ten iterations for her to fully separate the glass through his body from the bit embedded in his core.

Is this really going to take three hours?

“No, I’ll get better at it. I’m hoping less than two and then we can pull the glass out.”

How?

Ivey chuckled. “We’re discussing it.” She hesitated. “All the suggestions are shit to be honest.”

What options?

“Open heart surgery going in via the severed ribs on the left side of your back. Or my preference is that you do it yourself.”

Open heart surgery on myself?

“I’m thinking more you grow roots through you to encase the glass and then pull it out with your plant skills while healers keep you alive. We don’t know what’s going to happen.”

You guys don’t know?

“I wouldn’t say it like that.” Ivey sounded tired. “We know that when we pull out the glass, it’s going to do a shit load of damage. We also know that Cindy with a twenty person body bank can probably heal you through all the damage the surgery is going to do.”

Probably?

“Magic works funny. Especially for parts fully removed from the body. For example, if your heart is torn out, then you’re in trouble no matter how much healing you’re getting. If someone cuts the heart in half, then it can be healed a hundred times in the row, which is far more mass generation if you think about it. You’re fine anyway, but if the heart leaves your body, then there is potentially nothing that can be done.” She sighed. “That’s where your problem comes in. I’m worried about heart muscle sticking to the glass. There is so much scar tissue growing over the glass that it’s going to be difficult to extract. Your body is doing the right thing, but it’ll make it really hard for human surgeons, which is where your automated plant approach could shine.”

It sounds difficult.

“We’ll work it out.” Ivey sounded doubtful.

And there are just the two options?

“Yes, unless you can think of a third.”

We don’t do it.

She laughed. “Anyone else suggesting that would be stupid. You doing it.” She paused. “It’s possible, but would you be happy with a life where you are in a cocoon and live through your plant?”

Not really.

“That’s what I figured.” she massaged her brow, shoulders slumped. “I don’t know to be honest. There’s a school of thought that we should do nothing apart from keeping you alive. Having you control that plant is a pretty significant defence.”

So is me running around throwing lightning.

Ivey shook her head when she read that. “If you ignore you and look at the common good, there’s a scientific model where if you have less than twenty percent chance of dying, we are duty bound to try to save you immediately.”

What?

Why would express it like that?

She pinched the bridge of nose. “It doesn’t matter.” She smiled tightly. “It doesn’t matter. There are opinions out there that we don’t listen to because they don’t have humanity. What’s important to me is what you want?”

I don’t want to be stuck in a cocoon for the rest of my life.

“Then that how we approach the problem.”

A non surgeon operates on me?

“Yes.”

I use plant growth to operate on myself?

“Yes.”

None of those options sounded great to Daniel.

You burn out all the glass for over a month.

Ivey read that thought. “That’s a better suggestion than being in a cocoon for life, but are you happy to stay where you are for a few months? Because I won’t get through it before then. We can definitely do it. Put you on a drip, tubes in the right spots and then lock you down so tight you can’t move.”

That would not be fun for him, but it would keep him alive.

Am I needed to fight sooner.

“That’s not a concern.” Ivey told him immediately.

It sort of is.

“If we retreat up the tower I think we’ll be able to survive anything that comes for us.”

Daniel’s mind rushed through the details. Waiting would be emotionally painful, but safer than trying to operate. Could he do it? Maybe. A couple of months bed ridden was not that bad when his mind could spread through the plant mass that had been left by that plant monster. There would always be stuff to do and his writing board was already automated so he could talk to people as he did so.

It could definitely work. A thought occurred to him.

What about the other survivors?

Ivey looked confused. “What about them?”

If both Luke and I are out of action.

“Don’t worry about them.” Ivey said immediately.

Will there be hunting parties?

“Of course. We have parties out saving people right now.”

Would me being there help?

“Daniel, you’re our best fighter, so of course you being out there will help.”

Would me being there save lives?

Ivey shrugged and didn’t answer the question.

How would you test the option where I operate on myself?

“It would be hard,” Ivey admitted. “You basically want to stop the heart and operate in that window. That gives you about sixty seconds to grab the entire glass shard, making the vine surface smooth on the outside and cutting away all the scar tissue clinging to it and we pull the shard out and Cindy hits you with healing to fix up that damage.”

Sixty seconds without the heart beating?

“It won’t kill you of course, but if you can reduce the time that will be better.”

Have you thought about this?

Ivey nodded. “Yes, I’ve seen how quickly you grow things.”

Can we experiment?

“We can.” Ivey hesitated. “But fair warning it’s cruel.”

How?

“What’s your thoughts on animal experimentation?”

Daniel hesitated. As a general rule, he was against it.

“I mean, if it will help save your life would you do it?” She was suddenly leaning over him. “Let’s connect.” She glanced at the flower board.

Okay.

Then her hands linked with his and he was sharing her thoughts once more. The gravity of his situation was absolutely clear in her mind, and surgery was not a guaranteed success. She was also worried about waiting, not because of the psychological impacts, but because a period of weeks would reduce the vigilance of the healer assigned to watch him. The wound was incapable of healing and was always a danger. Two weeks was enough time for something unexpected to happen that would cause the wound to open up. With non-attentive minders, it meant he might be dead before help reached him.

Despite her concerns, she wanted him to make his own informed decisions, but Ivey was absolutely adamant in her mind that him operating on himself was superior to relying on others. Unless a survivor had an unexpected background, then there was no one around who had any experience in a surgical environment. It would be safer and likely to be a better outcome if he did it himself. Surprisingly, her interface agreed with that. It was a surprise because the two of them seemed to be dramatically opposed on everything else. As a last resort, Ivey would even support Blood Drinker and Priscilla directing the surgery.

The reason plants were better because Ivey was worried if humans tugged on the glass shard it might shatter into pieces and make the situation worse potentially beyond what magical healing could tie over but if he effectively encased the glass, there was no risk of that happening.

She pulled her hands away. “I know you don’t want to, but that’s my professional opinion.”

Wait or operate on myself.

“Yes,” she agreed, reading his message. “But you know what I think.”

And if I operate and survive and then go on patrols, that will help keep people alive?

“Maybe.” She shrugged, but it was not convincing. She clearly agreed that he would be valuable. “But we’ve collected a lot of the nearby survivors. We’re up to two hundred of us.”

That many?

“We’ve freed everyone from the smaller structures for about a block. None of the really big building yet, but they’ll come.”

The kids.

“Why am I not surprised that you are asking about that when your life is on the line? We’ve found the building and the hive. We’re going to take everyone this evening to attack it. Whether you’re healed, we’re going.”

Why wait?

“It was worth taking a risk and waiting. Your lightning is not a party trick. It could very well be the difference between disaster and success.”

I don’t believe it.

“How can you not?” He could almost hear the stress cracking her. “I don’t think you understand what you bring to the table. Dave and a couple of the other mutated humans in a melee fight are worth multiple human fighters. In a straight battle, how many Dave’s could you take on?”

Three at once

“Three Dave’s you would crush.” Ivey said immediately. “By dint of attrition and teamwork, ten Dave’s might wear you down and beat you one time out of five. But even when they win only a few would survive the fight. Do you understand the power you bring?”

Yes.

“That’s in Melee offensively. My estimate you’re worth half our melee fighters. Your lighting based on what I hear from the huntsman is worth maybe twenty Tamara’s. You’re half our god damn army and that’s before we even talk about the one shot rockets or the sapient seeds.”

Okay.

“If it helps increase the chance of you surviving, you need to experiment with animals. The plan is to embed glass in them, move them around, and heal them until the glass is as trapped inside them as your version. Then you pull it out with as little blood, guts and flesh as possible and then the healers flash heal the creature.”

This idea sounds crazy.

“It’s incredible that you’re alive. We need to take advantage of that. It’s almost unbelievable that you survived.” She winked at him.

What?

“I wasn’t there, so I can’t comment but Alex getting the right spell at exactly the right time. Cindy and the other healers being able to react as quickly as they could. There is a chain of coincidences and luck that makes no sense.”

Her eyes went unfocused and then she laughed quietly at a private joke. “Then again, I don’t know what I’m talking about. You were lucky.”

Is there a luck stat?

She put a hand on his forehead. “No.”

He felt her create a connection. There was nothing concrete in her mind, but the idea of a structure was presented to him. A massive effort from a collective of aliens had created the framework that had stopped them all from turning into ferals, but there was a deeper layer. Most of the interfaces were just computer programs but one out of five, one out of ten… Ivey scattered thoughts couldn’t tell him how many because she didn’t know, but a proportion of them were sapient and they were probably the reason he was alive.

All of them cheating in concert to get a result that would otherwise be impossible. Them being sapient was a secret one that had to be protected or else… Ivey did not understand what the consequences were for the secret being released, but it was material.

That was why she didn’t want to talk about luck. It wasn’t luck it was instead a secret she wanted to keep.

Random chance, then.

She laughed and nodded. “Exactly that. Have you decided whether you will experiment?”

I will.

“Do you know where we can do it?”

Daniel thought for only a moment. If they were bringing him animals, then he didn’t want to force them to drag them upstairs.

Lobby. Green patch in the building.

I’ll get it ready.

Ivey nodded. “That’s sensible.”

I can secure the animals in vines and then operate.

She got up and went outside and had a hushed conversation. Then she returned. “All the healers but myself and Cindy are going down there. I think half the healers will revolt when they find out what we’re going to make them do. We’ll operate outside and then place the animal on the plant. Then you’ll need to do your thing.” Ivey ordered. “The healers will start healing the moment you’ve extracted the glass. Can you signal when you’re ready?”

I’ll create a yellow flower over each of them and have it bloom once I’ve pulled the shaft.

“We need a signal for the start of the process.”

When I’m ready, there’ll be a purple flower.

“And we’ll pick it when the healers are ready. That will work,” she muttered to herself. “We can do this. If the trader was here, we might not need to do this crap.”

Why?

She read the word and then glanced at the door. “The trader might have something that could heal you directly. If you’re asking why, one has not appeared yet.” Ivey shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe we need more people. That’s what I’m hoping. If the lizard is stopping one from arriving, then we’re going to be in real trouble. We need a trader to sell all the skins and miscellaneous junk we are gathering and buy skills to make a difference.”

Memory Stones?

“Those or pathway books,” Ivey chuckled sadly. “But not shit ones like we got in the chest.”

I thought they were good?

“For a starving man some rat meat is a feast, but it is not comparable to a roast boar. Which after you’re fixed, then you can try.” She patted his hand and grinned. “It was scrumptious. Now my mana is recharged, so let’s do some more work.”

He felt his chest humming as her energy went to work. Then his mind went downstairs to start preparing an area for their experiments. He was conflicted about the animal cruelty part but if it let him get on his feet and out fighting where he could make a difference it was worth it.