He smiled at the thought of Kylee. She might only be closing on fourteen, but he had come to dote on her. On her best friend, Kip Briggs, too, though he was a different kind of a fish. Quiet, ever watchful, and where Kylee was eternally wary of strangers, Kip avoided them like they were plague.

“You have a smile on your lips.” Talina’s voice surprised him.

Dek twisted, seeing where she lay off to his right, her back to a chabacho log. The brown blanket she had pulled up to her chin matched the log. Made her blend into the background. He could see the long outline of her military-grade rifle where it lay covered on her lap.

“Thinking of Kylee and Kip.” He shifted, gasped at the spike of pain that sent fire up his leg. “Shit on a shoe, I’m getting really tired of this.”

Talina stood, unwrapped the blanket from around her. “It’s light enough we can go. I changed out the power pack last night, so my aircar has a full charge. How about I get you back to hospital and let Raya get a good look at that leg?”

“What about my airplane? It will be faster.”

“You think I’m going to let you fly? You can’t even stand up.”

“How do you know? I haven’t tried. I can—”

“I only had a few gotcha spines in my arm, and I was almost out of my head. Another time I had ’em stuck deep in my hip and thigh. Hurt so bad I dug the spines out with my knife. Still got the scars to prove it. You remember what they did to Muldare? That was just a brush, barely penetrated her skin. We pulled them immediately. Yours, my friend, were driven deep. Maybe a hundred spines, all leaking poison into your muscles and blood.” She gestured for him to proceed. “But go ahead, macho. Get up and walk over to your airplane. Don’t let me stop you.”

Dek growled, threw the blanket off, and felt pain-sweat pop from his skin. Just that small shift had him biting off a whimper.

I can do this. It’s just pain. Pain can be endured. It’s only nerves. Shut it off. One, two, three . . .

He sat up, swallowed a scream, and actually got halfway to his feet before the blast of agony flattened him. On the ground, he lay gasping and sucking for breath. Tears leaked from his eyes. It hurt so much the world spun. His gut convulsed, and he threw up. Or tried to. All he got was concentrated bile that burned in the back of his throat.

“Shoot me,” he whispered.

In the pain-haze that washed over him, he felt something pushed into his mouth.

Heard, “Swallow that.”