Grown Men

itched. The digital queen chirped inside his head. C’mon. He ran a hand over his own face.
    Alone .
    Ox’s blood leaked around the tooth, puddling on the bed, their bed, the dark ooze creeping wider. A shudder ran across his muscles.
    Think.
    Runt’s mouth filled with aluminum spit and he swallowed the urge to vomit. Think. The answer hovered in his peripheral vision. The smell of chopped mango leaves.
    The retirement package!
    The kill-kit ! Welded into the walls. The sonic blade. Runt’s mind raced.
    Drugs. Knife.
    Ox flinched when Runt stood up suddenly. Red dripped fresh and hot to the floor.
    “Stay!”
    Ox’s eyes widened, swimming in agony, and he took a sharp breath. He shook his head and held out a pleading hand, as if Runt was abandoning him. His mouth moved as if trying to make words.
    “No, buddy, I mean—” Runt held up a finger and started to leave. He turned back to say, “Wait right here. And I’m coming back to fix you.”
    Out the habitat door, past the palms, Runt sprinted up the low slope. Up on the terraces, he could see the soft bee-moths out in the fields working the night shift. He almost tore the door off the shed getting at the submachete and cracked something getting out of there, but he felt nothing. The blood roaring in his ears amounting to one word:
    Hive. And then: Knife.
    In three strides, Runt faced the hollow hive wall and cocked the whirring blade. Not pausing to think, he sliced the panel in a wide, blistering cut that exposed the kill-kit. Before it could fall, he dropped the smoking submachete in the sand, scooped up the murder box and ran back down to the habitat.
    Don’t leave me. Don’t leave me.
    As soon as he barged across the threshold, the quiet sounded like thunder. “I’m back. I’m here! We’re okay, huh?”
    Ox nodded once, his face pale and slick. He closed his eyes a moment, as if he hadn’t blinked since Runt left, as if some part of him had expected Runt to just leave him to suffer. Leave him to die. Ox’s breathing had gotten more shallow, but still no signs of toxicity.
    Runt’s heart squeezed into a tight, determined fist behind his breastbone.
    Chance brought him here, and chance’ll keep him safe.
    He set the weapon case on the bed and popped it open. It didn’t matter to him now if Ox saw it or not.
    “Ox . . . Ox? Can you hear me?” Runt’s hands shook as he attempted to roll the oversized body into a fetal curl on the bed. “I’m going to knock you out for a second. And then I’m gonna get that thing out of you.”
    Ox rolled. The bleeding under the bandage had continued, a dark pad of sluggish blood gathered there under the synthetic skin, seeping a little where the tooth pierced it.
    Using one of the trank darts, Runt stung Ox before any silent questions got asked. The giant sighed, his eyes rolled back, and his pulse slowed instantly, not comatose but definitely sub-sentient. Tension washed out of his sinews. The bulldog creases of his face softened into trusting slumber.
    Finally.
    Runt took a real breath. For once, for this, he tried to be as methodical as Ox: listing the steps he would take. Extracting this tooth would be like fishing out a broken lock pick when he was a kid sleeping in alleys.
    Easy-squeezy.
    Slow, smart, steady was the way to get in and out easiest. When it mattered. For a second, Runt remembered squatting with other punks teaching him the ropes so he could jack enough food to survive. The rattle of the wire, the snick of the bolt’s release.
    Make the hole a fraction wider, then fish it loose.
    Runt cracked his knuckles and exhaled fully, forcing his heart rate to calm so his stubby fingers wouldn’t shake more than they were already. A droplet of sweat fell from his eyebrow and onto Ox’s feverish, stained skin.
    Take what you need.
    Runt took a breath and held it. His pulse pounded so hard his vision began to throb, blurring just barely with every pound of his heart as it pushed his sap where he needed it.
    Using calipers to grip the hard tooth, he picked up the sonic knife and got his face as close to the wound as he could. He squeezed the bone handle, and a shivering scalpel flickered from the hilt: vibrations sharp enough to slice a hair.
    Just a nick. Just this once.
    As soon as it tapped the synthetic skin, the flat disk of blood under the bandage slid scarlet down his side and hip, soaking the bed. More blood than seemed safe. Runt exhaled and took another breath.
    Please, please —
    With