The Mantis Synchronicity - Book Five - 28. Chapter 28 - On the Brink

Olona was struggling to breathe. The pain in her chest was excruciating, and she could not move. Lahari and S’Kay needed to help her up from the concrete, and Olona was not able to stand on her own.

“Take me… inside,” she managed to get out, and she nodded back toward her shop, the First Organic Mechanic of Teshon City.

The three women left Abernathy’s corpse in the gutter, and they entered.

“I need…” Olona attempted, but she could not get her words out. She pointed at her toolbox. Lahari helped her into one of her exam chairs, and S’Kay brought over the box. Olona fumbled with the latch, and S’Kay released it for her.

“Is there a painkiller somewhere I can get for you?” Lahari offered.

Olona shook her head as she pulled several tools out of the box and laid them beside her on the table. “Help… me…” she whispered. She gripped a small device and held it flat on the table, and she nodded at Lahari. She switched hands with Olona, who began adding pieces of organowire to the device, and she coated them with a sticky substance. Olona waved for Lahari to move her hand, but then Olona faltered as a brutal wave of pain washed over her.

“What do we need to do with it?” S’Kay asked.

Olona raised one hand, and it quavered in the air.

S’Kay interlaced her feathered fingers with Olona’s. “What do you need?”

“Power…” Olona managed to whisper.

“Where is it?” Lahari asked. “Where’s the power?”

Olona turned and stared at a cabinet and Lahari rushed to it, flinging open the doors. “What am I…” she started to say, but she saw exactly what Olona needed. She grabbed a device in front of her with the words POWER SUPPLY printed on it in bold letters.

A moment later, it was beside the component Olona was building. She pulled a small cable from it, attached the end to what she had assembled, and pushed the power supply’s button. Nothing happened. She pushed the button again. Her eyes were tearing from the horrible pain, and her head was starting to spin. Olona pushed the button again, but her hand dropped, and she fell into unconsciousness.

“No,” Lahari whispered.

S’Kay looked at her. “What was she trying to do with this thing?”

“I don’t know, I think charge it up.”

S’Kay looked closer. “It’s not plugged in all the way.” She pushed the cable in more firmly and pressed the button.

The little device blinked with a single light.

“Was that it?” S’Kay asked. “Didn’t Olona teach some guy a bunch of this stuff?”

“Oh yes! She’s been training Kosephaji!”

S’Kay focused on Olona. “Should we try and install this thing, or get him to help?”

“I’ll go get him,” Lahari offered. “He and the two guys who came to Teshon City with Ogomo don’t live far from here. I bet Kosephaji will know exactly what to do!” She ran out of the shop and down the few blocks to where the trio of young men had made a home for themselves. When she reached it, she banged on the door.

Kosephaji opened it.

“Olona needs you, now!”

Kosephaji was startled by Lahari’s very unique appearance, even though he had met her when the Shifton Youth Outreach Center opened. “What do you mean?”

“I’ll explain on the way! Let’s go!” Lahari grabbed Kosephaji’s hand and dragged him out of the house. As they ran, she told him, “Olona’s been shot by one of her own weapons. She started building some sort of organic mechanic thing for her wound, but she’s all messed up, and she couldn’t finish it before passing out. You need to complete it and install it.”

Kosephaji was nervous. “But I’m not very good. What if I screw it up?”

“Look,” Lahari replied, “it’s either you, who knows at least a little about this stuff,” and she brought her palm to her scaly blue chest, “or us, who know nothing. Olona needs you.”

The two of them ran up to the front of the shop, and they entered.

To their alarm, Olona was convulsing.

“I think she’s having a seizure!” S’Kay cried.

“Help her, Kosephaji!” Lahari implored.

“But I don’t…” Kosephaji stopped himself midsentence and rushed to Olona’s side. “We need to put something into her mouth that she can bite on.” He yanked off his belt, folded it, and stuck it between her teeth. Then he saw the device she had been working on. “That’s not complete.” Kosephaji immediately flipped it over and added more of the organowire to the underside. He also coated it with the sticky substance, and he pressed the power supply’s button.

The device blinked once again.

“There we go,” Kosephaji said. He detached a small component of the machine and placed it against Olona’s wound. The device entered the hole in her chest, sealing the opening in her flesh. “That’ll help her heal,” Kosephaji stated. “Olona already has organic machines in both of her lungs, and I think they kept her breathing despite her injury. She needs to rest.” He turned to Lahari and S’Kay. “What happened to her?”

“Should we move her to her bed?” Lahari asked.

“Wait, does the seat lean back?” S’Kay suggested, examining the elaborate chair. “Yeah, it does,” she added.

They carefully reclined Olona into a better resting position and headed out into the street in front of her shop. The three of them were very relieved.

“Good job,” Lahari said to Kosephaji.

“Yeah,” S’Kay added, “thank you.”

Kosephaji blushed and smiled sheepishly. “I’m glad I was able to help.” He glanced at the door to Olona’s shop. “Should one of us stay with her?”

“Oh, I’m not leaving her side,” Lahari stated. “You two don’t have to stick around, but I’m staying.”

S’Kay let out a laugh and wrapped her arms around Lahari, pressing her feathered cheek against Lahari’s scaly and spiny one. “You have such a big heart. I’ll stay with you also.”

“We could take turns,” Kosephaji offered. “I actually can’t stay right now. I left food in the oven, but I could come back and stay overnight here at the shop in case Olona wakes up.”

Lahari smiled. “Sounds good, and I’ll come back in the morning to relieve you.” She then had another thought and pulled away from S’Kay’s embrace. “Maybe my dad can help! S’Kay, do you mind staying here while I run home and see if my dad has anything that might speed Olona’s healing?”

S’Kay nodded. “Go!”

“Sorry, I need to go too,” Kosephaji added, and he and Lahari rushed off in different directions, as S’Kay headed back inside the shop to watch over Olona.

Lahari was home in less than fifteen minutes, and she barged in, hollering, “Dad, where are you?!”

His voice came from the kitchen. “We’re back here!”

She rushed in and found her father and Theolan looking very embarrassed. She eyed them but said, “Olona got shot, and Kosephaji managed to help her with an organic machine, but I wanted to see if you could help too.” She scrutinized them. “And what were you two doing?”

Her father stepped away from his husband and linked arms with his daughter. “Oh, your dads were just sharing a little moment of intimacy, but take me to Olona.” He grabbed his traveling medical bag as they walked out the door. “Bye, love!” he called back to Theolan.

Lahari and her father raced through Shifton, and when they arrived at Olona’s shop, Lahari pulled open the front door. S’Kay greeted them quietly. Olona was still unconscious.

“I’ll give her a dose of sleep draught and an immune-booster,” the mystic informed the two women. “Hopefully they’ll help her stay asleep through the night.” He mixed a tiny amount of several liquids together and set them aside. He also ground three dried leaves to powder that he sprinkled into the liquid. When it was sufficiently incorporated into the concoction, it became a runny paste. The mystic opened Olona’s mouth and used a small spoon to spread the mixture on the inside of her cheek. “She’ll absorb most of this through the blood vessels in her mouth. She doesn’t even need to swallow it.”

Lahari, S’Kay, and the mystic headed back out front again, and Lahari hugged her father. “Thanks for helping, dad.”

“Of course!” he replied. “I’m so sorry Olona was hurt.” He cringed at the two women and said, “Should I ask? How did it happen?”

Lahari pointed along the street at the alleyway where Abernathy’s corpse was sprawled in the gutter. “Olona killed the Demifae who murdered those three Shifts in the Spritehood. He got her before she took him out. He’s dead and she’s healing, and that’s what’s important.”✪