Waking up from something similar to death is entirely unlike waking up from a nice nap. Instead of feeling rested and comfortable, I feel intensely cold and sore in every single one of my muscles. My memory is fuzzy, but I do not recall a single thing after breaking the false tooth. My death must have been convincing enough.

My fingers tingle with a thousand tiny pricks of pain like they have fallen asleep and are only now waking as I return to the land of the living. Being not quite dead is not quite fun, actually. I take a deep breath and even my lungs ache. I don’t know how the drug faked my death, but it was definitely enough to fool me.

My hair is wet.

I open my eyes and find myself face to face with the bright blue eyes of a Troo with brown feathers so dark she almost appears completely black. A bright green plastic suit covers every inch of this Troo except her face, and even that is behind a clear plastic shield.

“What the-” she stutters and flails backward away from me. Equally uncoordinated, I knock various tools off of my chest as I sit up. They clatter and fall to the metal table loudly. The sounds hurt my ears, and the bright light burns my eyes.

I sit on the metal table and just focus on breathing for a moment while the Troo flutters around me looking at various medical devices. There are sensors tugging at my skin and I shiver at the cold water that drips from my hair. I’m completely naked.

Not paying attention to the medical Troo, I assess the situation carefully. The aches and pains are all mild enough that I do not think that I have been damaged by anything but my own medical choices. There is no new damage and no additional scratches or cuts on any part of me that I can see or feel. I have been cleaned, and the medic was monitoring my corpse instead of immediately conducting an autopsy. It is luck or providence or both that has kept me from being killed for real. The room has cloth walls, like the inside of a tent.

“May I have my clothing?”

It’s the only thing I can think to ask, and shivering in the chill it is the only thing I care to have.

The medic stops her tittering and points, mute, at a folded stack of belongings on a counter near the thick curtain that makes up a door. Two drones sit in perfect stillness between the two of us and I recognize them as similar to the ones Tromeo operated in the beautiful field where we were married.

On unstable feet, I stumble from the table to the counter. I’d feel some amount of embarrassment over my nudity if I weren’t still reeling from the false death experience. I pick up the garment from the top of the neatly folded pile of clothing and find my cardigan.

It has been shredded. The buttons dangle from damaged threads and long tears through the knit fabric run down either side. There are large rents where Trooaris’s claws tore through it completely. I can’t wear this anymore.

Not that I think I’d want to. That memory of being attacked is visceral enough with the sour taste still in my mouth. I do not want nor need to have evidence of it on me when I find my husband again. He doesn’t need that mental image.

The blouse I was wearing under the cardigan is only in moderately better shape. It has small holes, but the woven fabric did not unravel when torn. Sweat stains from crossing the lake mark both sides. I do not want to wear it either. I fold it and place it back on the counter before putting my underwear on. None of that, at least, has any damage. Nor does my skirt, though the hem is stained from the dirty lake water.

I open the suitcase to find something else to wear and the first thing on top of it is the handgun. The magazine is still missing two rounds, which I will allow myself to feel something about when I am not here anymore. When we’ve escaped and have our freedom I’ll have time to feel.

I finish dressing and carefully, quietly, secretly load the handgun without taking it out of the suitcase. My hand lingers on it when I turn to face the Troo medic.

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“I have to report this,” she says, slowly removing her hood.

“You don’t.” I shake my head. My allies did not recover my corpse in time. I am still under enemy control and the ruse that I have been murdered by the royalty has failed.

“What am I supposed to say, the corpse ran away on its own?” Her posture straightens, and she stands a little taller than me at her full height. “You need to stay and at least let me check and make sure you are not suffering side effects. I don’t know what you took.”

I shake my head.

“The mission failed. It’s time for me to escape by any means necessary.”

She gives me a nasty glare, and then, entirely through her hight advantage, spots the gun in my suitcase. A deep sigh flows out of her and her shoulders droop.

The medic blinks slowly and then rolls her eyes. She reaches down, picks up a dented bedpan and hands it to me.

“Top of the head please. The orbital ridges are fragile and I can’t do that surgery on myself.”

I blink away the confusion for a moment and accept the offered blunt instrument.

“Oh no. The human has a weapon,” her deadpan delivery is instructive enough.

I hit her lightly with the bedpan. She fakes a swoon well enough to deserve some kind of movie award if those were still a thing. With her lying on the ground, I shrug and pick up the pistol before leaving the room.

The hallways are narrow, and with all the walls made of hanging white fabric, it is very hard to tell which way is out. I don’t know where I’m going but I need to be going out of here.

I’m lost, disoriented, and confused. I try to follow my training and turn each corner as though slicing a pie with the muzzle of my gun, but each new corner brings me to a new empty corridor. I try to look in every curtained doorway, but they are all dark empty rooms.

When finally I find a room with the lights on I enter with conviction just to have a change of pace from the infinitely white curtained hallways.

An assortment of blue feathers lies scattered across the floor like depressing confetti. I look for their source and find the crumpled sheets over the still form of a bright blue Troo. His claws twist in exaggerated agony around his face. A large black patch and many bandages cover one eye, and the other is only partly shut.

His mouth is open, as if frozen in a scream that I know I would have heard if it had been voiced. These fabric walls can not possibly cover any loud noise. His tongue hangs limp from between his stiff jaws. An ominous green glow fills his entire mouth.

If I didn’t know better I would think that he had been poisoned with some irradiated substance. But neither humans nor Troo have resorted to nuclear arms exchanges and I do not believe that they have the resources to do so.

I place a hesitant hand on his arm and find it lifeless and limp.

It takes me longer than I wish to admit to finally have my brain catch up with my observations. This isn’t just any blue Troo. This is my blue Troo. And there I am. This is my Tromeo.

I rest my head on his chest to listen for a heartbeat. There is none. Not a breath stirs the feathers there, which lie limp against his flesh instead of flattening themselves again when disturbed. I hold him close to me and breathe in the scent of antiseptics and the soft downy dust of him.

The gun I hold sits silent at his feet.

A tiny vial rolls away from his hand when I move him. Poison, I see, has been his timeless end. I read the label and am entirely unfamiliar with what this substance is. The residue in the glass bottle glows a foreboding green. I thought I recognized most of the toxins we use against the Troo. But I have never heard of this one, and I am sure I would remember a poison that glows.

I do not know if it is also toxic to humans, but I hope that it is. But my beloved has drunk all that was in the little glass vial and left no friendly drop to help me after. Furious, I throw the glass away and it breaks on the hard floor to leave glowing residue to soak into the white tarp floor covering.

I kiss his face, tasting the sharp flavor of the glowing poison on his mouth. It tastes terrible. But it does not do anything to me. His skin still feels strangely cool.

Everything I wanted and all of my plans have been smashed as thoroughly as the little poison vial. There is nothing left for me to hope for. I am in the hands of my enemies, the claws of that monster Trooaris, and they are already going to be angry with me. There is no way out except to fight my way through.

I contemplate how few rounds are in the handgun when there are already two missing.

It’s not enough. I cannot fight my way out. I don’t even know my way out. I am lost, alone, and trapped here.

I can’t let Trooaris touch me again.

I pick up the gun.

“Forgive me,” I whisper, gently caressing Tromeo’s lifeless face.

I tuck the muzzle of the gun under my chin, swallow hard against its cold steel, and pull the trigger.