Deathstalker 08 - Deathstalker Coda

hunched look. Her body bulged in the wrong places, to contain everything that had been put into it. Long raised edges of scar tissue trailed paths all over her body, like the map of a new route into Hell. She moved jerkily, without grace, and often her hands broke things without meaning to. Sometimes she broke them deliberately, out of rage and frustration. Her hair had grown out gray from the stress, and her face was gaunt and tired. Her eyes had the golden gleam of the Hadenman, and when she spoke her voice was a harsh painful buzz. She didn’t look away from the mirror reflection when Finn entered, but when she spoke it was for him.
    “I was beautiful for such a short time. I wish I’d enjoyed it more. Still, at least now the outside finally matches the inside.”
    “You’ve been brooding again, haven’t you?” said Finn. “What have I told you about that? You have nothing to blame yourself for. Besides, beauty is in the eye of the be-holder.”
    Anne tried something like a smile. “It takes one monster to appreciate another. There’s something new in me now, isn’t there?”
    “Yes,” said Finn. “It’s a variant on the old Deathstalker Boost. It will make you stronger, faster, and hopefully a little more stable.”
    Anne turned with awkward suddenness to face him. “Yes. I can feel it, like lightning in my veins. I feel . . . strong. I could probably knock down that stupid door of yours now, if I wanted. But where would I go? I don’t sleep anymore, you know. I don’t need to. Just as well, really. I had bad dreams.”
    “You’re alive,” said Finn. “I promised you I wouldn’t let you die.”
    “My Boost is actually an improvement on what the original was supposed to be,” said Dr. Happy, tottering in circles around Anne, and running his stiff fingers over the tech eruptions in her body. “My Boost is a continual thing, never stopping. You will never lose the benefits it gives you. My dear, you are practically superhuman. Of course, my Boost does have a regrettable tendency to burn up the host body, hence the new flush to the skin, but the various tech implants should balance that out.”
    “How long will she last?” said Finn.
    Dr. Happy shrugged jerkily. “How long have any of us got? She’ll certainly outlast me. And you too, if your ghost is to be believed.”
    “Why have you done all this?” said Anne, staring at Finn with her golden Hadenman eyes. “Why is it so important to you that I live?”
    “To prove that even monsters aren’t monsters all of the time,” said Finn.
    “I miss James,” said Anne. “I want James. Make me another.”
    Finn frowned. “I think the people would know he was a clone this time.”
    “Not for them. Make another James for me.”
    “I’ll see what I can do,” Finn lied. He was wise enough to know that Anne needed a reason to go on living, but still selfish enough to want that reason to be him. A part of him was quietly sad that she couldn’t see the lengths he’d gone to, just for her.
    “I’m tired,” said Anne. “Tired of the pain, of the changes. Of not being human.”
    “The Boost will change that,” said Finn. “And there are still many useful things you can do with your life. Perhaps I should let Douglas know what’s happened to you. He might like to come and visit.”
    “Yes,” said Anne. “I’d like to see Douglas again. One last time.”

CHAPTER THREE

    IN THE GLORY DAYS OF EMPIRE
    O wen Deathstalker went dancing back through time, star systems whirling dizzyingly past like shimmering sands beneath his speeding feet. The galaxy spun around him, its many tiny lights blinking on and off like warning signs. Stars and comets formed an endless rainbow path back into the past. He could feel Hazel d’Ark’s presence, always tantalizingly just ahead of him. He could feel other presences too, moving around him in the time stream. Some traveled into the past beside him, while others headed the other way, into the future. Some felt human, while others very definitely didn’t. Owen could have reached out to them, but didn’t. Perhaps because he wasn’t sure they would approve of what he was going to do. And so he danced on into the past, alone but quietly determined, following the trail that Hazel had left behind her.
    Sometimes it seemed to him that there were other directions than the one he was following of simple past and future; other directions, other possibilities that he could follow. He wondered if these were