Page 52 of The Last Aquarius
The replay of his life finished with his last days spent with Ishar. He would have whimpered if he had a voice when he was only allowed to relive their last night once. He wouldn’t mind it playing over and over again for all of eternity.
Upon the moment of his death—frozen on Mars, not exactly how he’d imagined—the burning sensation faded and he descended into pure darkness. Eternal quiet. A nothingness that would have grated if he had any feelings left.
The silence ended with a gurgling, followed by a sensation of floating, as if he were weightless. Bubbles tickled across his flesh, only he didn’t have body. Right?
Wrong.
Sensation returned slowly with pins and needles jabbing every single nerve. His feet—Wait, I have feet?—planted on something solid, and as his auditory sense returned, he heard the suction of fluid being evacuated.
A whoosh led to air rushing against his damp skin, and he shivered. He also quivered, his legs trembling with the effort of keeping him upright.
“Wake up,” a female voice said. “Open those eyes and show me you’re in there and that I didn’t work my ass off for nothing.”
Strange… That sounded like Ishtar. But Ishtar was dead, like him. Had his soul found her?
Tap.Tap.
The slap against his cheek certainly felt real. He opened his eyes and blinked. Blame the bright light. Could Heaven tone it down?
“There you are,” she crooned. “The next few moments will be disorienting as your mind and body adjust to one another.”
Adjust to what? The blur in front of his face began to clear and filled with?—
“Ishtar.” The word whispered past lips that felt as if they belonged to someone else.
“Yes, it’s me.” She offered him a bright smile. “And what’s your name?”
He opened his mouth to say Aquarius, only to pause. That wasn’t right. His last act before dying had been to relinquish his Zodiac Warrior status. His old name didn’t seem correct either, so he settled on the one he liked most. “I’m Reece.”
“Excellent. Can you take a step forward for me? Let’s get you out of the tank so I can wrap you in a towel.”
A towel would be nice, as his body still shivered. Definitely not an avatar anymore. He’d not felt temperature since his first death.
His legs obeyed, even as they felt detached. One foot up and forward then down. Definitely his. The floor, while warm, pressed solidly against the sole.
“Good. Hold still while I cover you up.” She meant it quite literally. A soft length of fabric draped around his shoulders, and she pulled it tight around his body. Heat radiated from it, relaxing his tremors. She used a smaller towel to reach up and scrub at his hair.
“How am I not dead?” he asked. “How are you not dead? What’s happening? I saw the Kukakk kill you. Twice.”
“Yeah, which was unfortunate. Good thing I had a spare clone.”
“Wait, you had more than one?”
“Tanks fail. Sometimes the clone itself is defective. I’ve got several tanks scattered throughout the citadel as a just-in-case.”
“That would have been good to know,” his wry reply.
“Would you have acted less stupidly if you had?”
“Probably not.” His mouth quirked.
As he began to become more aware, Reece glanced around and saw the glass cylinder he’d stepped out of. “You put me in a tank. Is that why I’m not dead?” Because he distinctly remembered freezing on the citadel rooftop.
”Oh, you died. Idiot. What were you thinking going outside without a suit?”
“I had a helmet.” A lame retort.
“Which protected your head, but the rest of you…” She sighed. “By the time I reached you, your ass was more solid than the hunks of steak I kept in my freezer.”
