Cataclysmic Evolution - 9. Chapter 9

Chapter Nine

When they first met, Barron couldn’t have imagined he’d laugh and shove Revi unless he was knocking him down or taunting him. Becoming friends? Never.

But he’d spent every waking moment of the last few days with Revi, and they got along pretty well, actually. Revi’s accent always got heavier whenever Barron was driving him nuts, and he poked and prodded in return to try and set Barron off.

His dad, Lt. Colonel Ass, popped up far too regularly. He hovered over them. Revi acted just like Barron had before he lost his parents. Well, most of the time.

“So he’s the reason for the hair and stuff?” Barron gestured over his shoulder with one thumb. Revi’s dad was stomping away after he bossed them around some more. Barron replied with the word ‘whatever’ whenever he could.

The man really hated that word, so Barron loved it.

“No. I like how I look.” Revi paused. “Okay, I do like how much it bugs him that I refuse to cut my hair.” They laughed. Revi slammed another box on the table in front of them. “Screws this time.”

Barron cursed. He couldn’t feel the differences in the screw with gloves on, but the threads chewed up the tips of his fingers when he sorted them. Vegging on his bunk didn’t seem so bad anymore.

They sorted through that box, and three more after lunch. Barron shoved his glasses off his nose. He was sweating, and the nose pieces were irritating him. They usually got a break, but they were pushing hard. This was the last day before they dropped in-system of their new home world.

“Why don’t you take those off?”

“My eyes…” Barron shrugged.

“They don’t bug me.”

Taking off his glasses showed off his eyes, which always started people whispering. Like he couldn’t hear them say his name. He didn’t care what they were whispering about—saying he got what he deserved, or fawning over him for saving a little girl at the cost of his sight, and nearly his life. Barron hated it. Working together in the holds, Revi didn’t have anyone to whisper to about Barron’s eyes, though.

He was just Barron.

Ex-bully, not-quite-reformed jerk when he wanted to be… the guy who snapped at his friends and got surly when people tried to help him. He wasn’t good for anything but the most menial of tasks. Separating out different sized screws was getting fucking old. Revi seemed to be the only one who—

“Shit!”

“What?”

“Something in that fucking box just cut the shit out of my hand.”

“You’re bleeding!” Revi grabbed his wrist.

“Yeah, kinda what I just said.” Barron fought the urge to yank it back. His palm burned. He tried to keep it still, but his fingers twitched. “Is there something in my hand?” he said through his gritted teeth. He didn’t want to touch it, but it felt like there was something in there.

“Uh-huh.” Revi’s hand shook.

Barron hissed. “That fucking hurts. Stop moving.”

“I’m not trying to. There’s a-a piece of metal through your hand. Like all the way.”

Okay. Revi was good at a lot of things. Clearly, he was not good with medical emergencies. Blood was pooling in Barron’s palm. He could feel it dripping down the side and hitting the floor.

“Is there a cloth or something around?”

“Uh…”

“Revi. Find me something to wrap around my hand. I don’t care what it is.”

Barron cradled his hand when Revi let go. “Here. We can use my shirt.” He helped wrap it around Barron’s hand.

“Medical.” Barron panted. The thing in his hand felt like a heated spike. He couldn’t seem to make his fingers stop twitching, and every heartbeat felt like a giant fist squeezing his hand. “Now.”

“Right. Right! Let’s go.”

Barron waited. Revi started to walk away. “Revi?”

“What? Why aren’t you coming?”

“I don’t know if I’m up to counting steps.”

“Oh, shit. Yeah. Sorry.” He hurried back and touched Barron’s good arm, still cradling his palm, now swathed in Revi’s shirt. “Um, how do you…?”

“Just hold on to my elbow and help guide me.” Revi helped Barron to his feet and led him away from their work table area.

“You can talk to me.” Barron focused on walking. When he’d gotten burned getting Marya out of the light, it’d been over fast. Even driving some jagged piece of metal through his hand didn’t begin to approach that pain, but damn, it hurt.

“About what?”

“I don’t know, Revi, just anything. Fuck!” Did he have to think of everything?

“Um, have you heard about Paradise?”

Barron grunted. “Stupid fucking name for a planet. Could it be more cliché?”

Revi slid closer to him. “Door.”

Bare skin. Revi’s side was pressed against Barron’s arm. He was shirtless.

Touching him.

If only it wasn’t because Barron was a cripple who needed help walking because he’d just stabbed the shit out of himself.

“…it’s like some sorta lover’s landscape or something.”

“Huh?”

Revi pulled him to a stop. “Are you going into shock? There’s a lot of blood on that shirt.”

“What? No. Just, keep going. I was thinking.”

He snorted. “Only you would be thinking at a time like this. I was saying Paradise is some sorta tropical wonderland. Near Earth standards for just about everything. It’s perfect for us.”

Barron had striven for perfection every single day of his life. “There’s no such thing as perfect.”

Revi shrugged, his arm bumping Barron’s shoulder and jostling his right arm. Barron hissed.

“Sorry. Let’s take the no-grav.” The tube in the center of the ship, where it didn’t rotate and had no gravity. It was a quick way to travel between levels.

Revi stepped in front of him. “Let me do all the work, okay?”

When Barron nodded, Revi stepped behind him. He held onto one arm and slid his other one around Barron’s waist. “God, you’re big.”

“Thick, not big.” Big made it sound like he was fat.

“You just have to argue with me, don’t you?”

Since he’d stopped fighting his attraction to Revi, the feelings that had flared up the first time he saw his wavy hair and casual, arrogant walk as he strolled through the school, were back—stronger than ever. He didn’t have to worry about his dad. There was no one to disapprove if Barron didn’t date a strong, conservative man who liked sports and plotting to take over the world one business at a time.

But even if he’d admitted Revi was exactly his type to himself, he had no idea how to even begin to approach Revi. He liked to think they were friends.

Maybe when he got his eyes fixed.

The drop into freefall in the no-grav lift startled him. “Whoa.”

“It’s okay. I can see the entrance to the medical level. I’ve got you.” Revi squeezed him in his arms. No one had hugged Barron close like that, full body, since he was little. In the weightless environment of the no-grav, the only thing he could feel, beyond the sensation of air brushing past his face, was Revi’s body against his.

Barron liked it.

Too much.

“We’re here.” Barron let Revi reel them in with the level’s tow line. Mass and momentum still mattered.

The medical wing was quiet—even quieter than the levels holding the materials for the new habitats where Revi and Barron had worked.

“Can I help you?”

“He got hurt.”

“I can see that. You’re kinda accident prone, aren’t you, Barron?”

“Nolu?”

“Yeah. Guess you just had to come back and see us, didn’t you?”

“Well, I can’t have you forgetting about me. Out of sight, out of mind, right?”

Nolu chuckled. “Somehow I doubt you’re easily forgotten.”

Was the medic flirting with him? While Barron was standing there with a chunk of metal in his hand, and Revi, shirtless, next to him?

“Only crippled blind guy on board, huh?”

Revi dug his elbow into Barron’s ribs. “You’re more than that. You’re the crippled, blind smartass on board.”

“Ow. Shit, Revi. Really? Don’t I hurt enough with this thing in my hand?”

“Sorry,” Revi muttered. He rubbed Barron’s side. “There. All better.”

Barron swallowed. Hard.

Nolu chuckled. “All right. Let’s take a look?”

The examining bench the medic made Barron sit on was hard. He could hear squeaking and something rattling. “Rest your arm up here.” He guided Barron to slide his arm across a table in front of him. It shifted under his arm, and he froze.

“Ahh.” Sweat beaded up on Barron’s forehead.

“Let me get you something for that.” Cold metal clicked over his right wrist, and Barron lost feeling in his hand completely. He sighed and slumped in relief from the absence of pain. “There, that should be better.”

“It is.”

“Okay. Time to take a peek.” Barron couldn’t feel him doing anything. It was oddly surreal, having a body part unfeeling, like it was gone and his wrist ended in mid-air. “Nice bandage you made here.”

“We were working. It was cleaner than everything else.” Revi was right beside Barron.

“Swift thinking.”

“Actually”—Barron could hear Revi shuffle his feet against the textured floor—“Barron told me to get something to wrap up his hand with. I just stripped.”

Barron squeezed his eyes shut. Without anything to distract him, with the pain gone and no way to see Revi in person, all Barron could see in his mind were Revi’s sharp hips jutting above his low cut jeans as he lounged against the fence. That small strip of flesh had teased Barron into losing control.

He’d pretended to trip Revi that day getting off the bus because Barron didn’t like feminine guys. Really, he’d had to get him away before he gave into the urge to curl his hands around Revi’s hips, slotting his thumbs right into those two dimples on his back, just above his ass, and sliding the tips of his fingers into the front of Revi’s tight pants.

Shit, shit, shit. His pants weren’t nearly loose enough to hide an erection. Barron tried to imagine what Nolu and Revi were looking at—his hand splayed out on the table with a shard of metal jabbing through the palm, blood oozing around it.

That helped some.

Nolu made a sound. “Looks like you did a number on yourself. I need to get Aya. She can determine if you’ve damaged the tendons running through your hand. Just wait here.” Nolu walked away.

It was silent for a few minutes. “I’m sorry,” Revi said.

“What?”

“I’m sorry. I should’ve checked that box.”

Barron snorted. “You didn’t stick it in there on purpose or anything, so why would it be your fault?”

“Still—”

“No. You help me around and stuff. You don’t have to babysit me. Besides, I’ll be able to see soon. So don’t worry about it.”

“Oh.” Revi sounded off. “Okay. I get it. I’m just helping you around. Guide-dog-r-us, that’s me, courtesy of my dad.”

Damn it. Barron always said the wrong thing. “That’s not what I meant.”

Before he could explain, the doctor came in.

“What’s this I hear about you damaging yourself again?” Dr. Samuels asked. “Who were you saving this time?”

“No one. Just doing my part—the crap I can do.”

“He reached into a box of screws he was sorting and jabbed this piece of metal through his palm,” Revi explained.

“That’s a lot of damage for reaching into a box.” She sounded suspicious.

“I was angry.”

“Maybe you shouldn’t be sorting things out of boxes you can’t see when you’re angry.”

Barron snorted, then laughed. “Yeah. That’s one way to look at it. Of course, if I could actually look in the boxes, I never would’ve done it.”

She sighed. “I’d hoped you’d regain some vision naturally. Unfortunately the damage was more severe than we originally thought. Once the new settlement is functioning, I want to try some new procedures.”

“Procedures? I thought you could fix me.” Barron’s heart pounded. He couldn’t live like this forever. He couldn’t be blind.

“Hey, calm down. I’m sure I can help you. Take some breaths. Your hand is bleeding worse because your heart is racing.” Dr. Aya covered the hand Barron could still feel. “Just take some deep breaths.”

“I want to see.” It was stronger than want. “I need to see.” Barron wasn’t going to lose his cool again, as much as he wanted to shout and rage at the doctor. At the whole unfair crapstorm that had become his life. The only thing that got him through each day was knowing that it was one day closer to the day he’d be normal again.

The room was silent for a moment. “I know. I promise, I will do my best.” The doctor cleared her throat. “Okay, let’s get you patched up. Nolu, why don’t you get this other young man something to put on, seeing as he apparently gave up his shirt as a bandage.”

“Sure. Why don’t you come with me? We have some scrub tops in the locker room.”

“You going to be okay?” Revi touched the back of his shoulder.

“I’m fine.” He wasn’t going to freak out.

“All right. I’ll be right back.”

A door opened and then shut. Barron was alone with Dr. Samuels. “I wanted to talk to you for a minute.”

“Why?” Barron asked suspiciously. What other news did she have for him that could be so bad she’d need to send the others away?

“Your young man.”

“He’s not mine. His dad is making him help me as a punishment because we were acting stupid.”

She scoffed. “He didn’t hover beside you with his hands clenched together because he’s forced to be here. When someone is hurt, the people who care for them hurt too. Don’t shut him out. I think he needs you, just as much as you need him.”

“He what?” Barron blinked.

“He cares about you. The way you are now. You can’t see it, but I can. I just thought you should know. You don’t have to see for it to be true,” she said gently.

“Maybe I do.” He couldn’t even sort parts without screwing it up. What use would he be, even on a new planet?

The door slid open, and Barron stopped before Revi could overhear him saying something he didn’t want him to know. Yet.

“So, this is a pretty bad puncture, but I’ve pulled out the metal and stimulated all your tendons. Your hand function seems to be fine, but this will hurt while the tissue regenerates. I can’t do full treatments for something that isn’t life-threatening, so you’ll have to heal the old-fashioned way. I can numb it for a few days, but that means no more working.”

“But we’ll be in-system tomorrow. There will be a lot of work to do when we land on the planet,” Barron protested.

“Tough. You can distract some of the kids with stories or something. You don’t need to be doing manual labor.” Dr. Samuels slid the band off his wrist, and Barron grunted. The pain was different, but it was still there. “I’ll numb you up in a second. First, I need you to wiggle each finger. Tell me if the pain is more severe with any one digit.”

Barron clenched his other hand into a fist in his lap, but he did what she asked. The pain stayed strong, throbbing like his heart rested in the palm of his hand, but it didn’t get worse.

“Good, good.” He heard a spray and then his hand went numb again, all through the palm, but he could still move it.

“I want you to keep the hand still, so I’m going to splint it. I don’t want to seal the wound because that metal was pretty dirty. I’ve cleaned it, but if you develop an infection, I don’t want to have to dissolve the faux tissue.” She muttered under her breath, “Damn barbaric conditions.”

She just finished wrapping his hand when an alarm went off. “That’s the light-speed alert. We must be close to Paradise.”

“We need to get back.” Revi touched Barron’s elbow. “We missed another meal.”

“Good thing I’ve got snacks stashed.”

Revi laughed. “Of course you do.”

“You two go on now,” Nolu said. “I’ll clean up here, Aya.”

“Thank you for fixing my hand,” Barron said.

“You’re welcome. We’ll see you soon.” Dr. Samuels patted his shoulder. “Think about what I said.”

“All right.” Barron slid off the table.

He certainly had a lot to think about.