Bastion 2 - Chapter 16

We ate the meal in silence, something I was becoming less accustomed to since attending Bastion. Eun-bi glared daggers at me every few bites and Daegon shifted uncomfortably beside me when she did. All the food was delicious, but despite my hunger, I couldn’t eat much. Hana’s words on the train platform echoed in my mind. What if I didn’t what?

I set my chopsticks on the sujeo, a small block to rest the utensils. We hadn’t had them before, but my income from the Rabid Rabbit was providing all sorts of things we hadn’t been able to afford. Eun-bi’s nice dress and shoes, clothes that fit for the twins instead of my hand-me-downs, and even small things like sujeo.

“You’re not going to have more?” my mother asked when she noticed I was done.

I shook my head, feeling my stomach twist.

“Why not? Are you sick?” Suyi asked, her eyes wide.

“No. I’m fine. The food is great,” I said with a kind smile.

The meal resumed for everyone, and I turned inward to cycled ma for the coming work. The questions replayed in my head over and over as I squeezed every bit of munje I could from the energy I had left. I’d be able to mobilize the meal I just ate in an hour, so I had to resort to pulling energy from my surroundings when I had exhausted my reserves.

It was difficult, but not as hard as I remembered before Bastion. Perhaps exercising my cycling had increased my skill in areas I hadn’t expected. I closed my eyes and focused on the angry heat rising of Eun-bi. I visualized her warmth as the white and pink of her new hanbok. Then I saw my mother; her heat output was weak. I left it be and moved on to my other siblings.

I breathed deeply, taking in the heat from the steam of the food and the tea, smelling the energy from the flowers across the room, and the garden out back. The different colors twisted through the air and flowed into my body with my breath. I pulled it down to the bands of my core, then locked the ma block over the crystal. I moved the zo block from the second band over top of it to create the munje required for analyzing my mother’s core and her body at the same time.

“Is it getting cold in here?” Daegon asked.

I ruffled his hair as I said, “Sorry, little brother. I was using your heat to make munje for mother’s evaluation.”

His teeth chattered gently. “That’s okay, she needs it more than me.”

With a little energy, I locked the zo and en blocks over the crystal and created a muscle warming munje. I rubbed my hands against his arms vigorously and transferred the munje into him. Within seconds, his tense pose melted, and his chattering stopped. He grinned up at me. I’d have to be more careful about how much heat energy I took from others in the future.

“It’s getting late,” mother said as she looked to the light on the wall. Do-hwan had painted an interesting geometric mural that was for telling the time depending on the season. We had clocks, of course, but they required ma munje to operate, and mother needed to be able to tell the time, even if no one was home.

We cleaned up the table and stored the leftovers. Mother made me a bento to take back to Bastion since I’d surely be hungry once I got back, and it would be well past dinner. When everything was settled, we moved back to the family room. Mae materialized on the table in a flare of blue light and bowed to my mother. It was unnecessary, but I felt it earned her points in the respect column for my mother.

Mae’s voice came through the speaker on my chest as she said, “I know this will be painful, and I’m sorry to ask, but I need you to try to use your core.”

My mother scowled. “How will that help?”

Mae paced back and forth as she explained. “The disease is attacking your munje, and your core is made up of that munje. If you try to use it, just moving it or cycling a single breath of energy, I’m hoping it will reveal the movement of the disease inside your body to me. From there, I can isolate the offenders and analyze them in more detail.”

“You hope?” my mother asked with an air of annoyance. “You want me to advance my disease so you can test a theory?”

“She’s trying to help,” Eun-bi said with confidence.

Mother pursed her lips as her gaze moved from Eun-bi—the only other child she would allow in the room for her analysis—to me. She heaved a sigh, then said in a resigned tone, “Fine. Are you ready?”

“Jiyong, do I have permission to use the ma-zo munje you created?” Mae asked as her projection looked up to me.

I nodded approval and felt my reservoir open to let out a small but steady flow. The stored munje traveled up to my chest, then down to my hands, and finally a bit into the secondary device. She was creating a data link between them.

Mae stepped closer to my mother and said, “Jiyong, place one hand on her collar bone, left side, then another on her right hand.”

I did as she ordered and felt the munje travel through the hand that gripped hers. A second later, I felt the same munje flow back into my right hand on her collar bone.

‘Any risk my munje might pull her disease back into me?’I asked internally, as not to frighten my mother or Eun-bi.

Mae replied only in my head. “The risk is near zero. I believe the disease is a parasitic nanite infestation that has attuned to her mental signal. If it enters your body through the munje flow, it will die out without anything to attach itself to, much like the junkie’s munje died out in you before I could get a good reading.”

‘Good enough for me,’ I thought back. The whole conversation took a second in my head, but it was long enough for my mother to notice.

“Something wrong?” she asked, worry in her tone.

“No. We’re set. Please try to activate your core,” Mae said as her display disappeared from the table.

My mother nodded with fear etched into the lines in her face. She swallowed hard and closed her eyes as she began the breathing to cycle energy. After a few breaths, the munje flowing back into my arm returned colder than before, tingling against my palm. Her posture stiffened and her hand tightened on mine while her other balled the fabric of her dress.

Mother inhaled sharply and bared her teeth when Mae finally announced, “That’s enough.”

Mother exhaled hard and fell forward into my grasp. My heart hammered and my head raced with thoughts of concern. What if she’d done too much? I helped mother to lean back into the cushion behind her, and she opened her eyes.

She looked up at me and mumbled weakly, “That wasn’t so bad. Not as bad as before your father helped me, at least.”

“I’ll need a few minutes to comb through the data before I can provide a summary,” Mae said through the speaker.

Eun-bi came in with a pot of fresh tea and we helped mother to take tiny drinks until her strength returned. After what felt like far too long, Mae reappeared on the table in front of us in a flourish of blue and purple light.

“My assumption was correct. The disease is a malicious nanite infestation that has created its own reproduction hub attached to your reservoir. The work your husband Hiroto did coated your core in a nanite repulsion field, which is the only thing stopping the infestation from overtaking your core. I’m surprised the field has lasted this long. With Jiyong’s help, I think I can reinforce it and repair the areas that have failed, but this is not a solution. It is only staving off the inevitable.”

Mae’s words hung in the air with a chill.

When no one spoke, she went on. “I have collected a considerable amount of information on the disease and I will be analyzing it in greater detail over the coming weeks. For now, I think the best move would be to reinforce the shield around your core, and have you avoid situations where your core might activate on its own. Keep the house warm, wear thick clothes outside if you must go, try not to allow yourself to be put under any undo stress or anxiety—just pretend you’re on vacation.”

Mae’s voice came through strong in my head. “There’s something else we need to discuss on the way back to school.” I avoided nodding, but gave her a mental affirmative.

Mother sipped her tea with eyes closed. She breathed deeply, never taking the cup away from her lips, as if she were enjoying the smell of jasmine and citron rather than mulling over her eventual—and painful—demise.

“I understand,” Mother said as she set the cup down, empty.

“What would you like us to do?” Mae asked out loud.

Mother’s lips turned up in a grim smile that didn’t touch her eyes, then she sighed and said, “Nothing.”

“You can’t be serious,” I protested. “We can reinforce the shield around your core and buy you time, maybe even years—

She held up a hand to stop me. “This is my choice.”

Eun-bi scowled as she asked, “But why? They can help you!”

Mother took a deep breath. “It’s my decision, and it’s final. You can keep working on your data analysis and I’ll keep doing what I’m doing.”

I gritted my teeth. Another choice with no logical explanation behind it. Why was my mother this way? Heat twisted with sour tightness in my chest and I stood to keep my spiteful reply inside. I grabbed the bento my mother prepared and the cleaned Bastion pants from the chair by the door.

“You’re leaving?” Eun-bi asked as she rushed after me.

I nodded, my cheeks flushed with anger as I said, “There’s nothing more we can do. We’ll send word when we know how to fix it.”

I looked to my mother who carefully avoided my gaze. I didn’t want to tell her I loved her. I didn’t like her right now. How could she be so selfish? This was not just about her life. It was about my siblings growing up with at least one parent who cared for them, too.

“I love you, mother,” I willed the words from my mouth.

She looked to the back door, turning her face even farther away from me. “I love you, too,” she whispered. I heard anger in her whisper and knew what she was thinking: I was trying to take away her autonomy. Maybe I was, but why was her decision so stupid!

“Travel save, brother,” Eun-bi said as she wrapped her arms around my shoulders.

I hugged her with all my strength and whispered, “I love you, too, and all the others. Don’t forget what we’re fighting for.”