There needed to be more disturbing peril. I mean, it’s a science fiction horror novel, right? Kind of implied.
The bag thankfully stayed resolutely still by the time Nur straightened up, looked at the readouts, and pulled the filter off of his face. I winced, both because the sound was horrible, and because Nur had just bet his life on his ability to find and neutralize lethal levels of deathheart.
Then I relaxed, because Nur didn’t fall down, or even start frothing. “You can take that thing off now,” he said. “I’ve checked the area. We got it all. Wasn’t much, actually.”
If you’ve ever worn a filter, you don’t need me to tell you too much about what it’s like to yank a bunch of wiggling goo out of your nose and throat. And if you haven’t, you don’t want me to tell you. It’s infinitely ickier than it sounds, but at least it doesn’t hurt. After I had stuffed the last twitching tendril back into its carrying case, I said, “Was it all in the food, then? Because it smelled like a lot?”
“Yeah, that’s why you’re still alive,” Nur replied. “I found a few crystals on that guy’s gloves. They’re inert, but there’s definitely deathheart inside them. He must have gotten it into your food, because that bowl had enough deathheart in it to kill you in seconds. I don’t know what would make the crystals dissolve, but a couple of them broke apart early after getting mixed with your lunch.”
I looked at the bowl in question — or, rather at the portable plasma furnace it had been vaporized in. Sometimes regular fire just ain’t cleansing enough. “So if they hadn’t, I’d have died later. Which means that if nobody found my body in time, you’d never know the cause of death for sure. That sounds like one hell of an poison.”
“Sure,” Nur shrugged. “If you’re willing to spend ten million bucks a dose. That guy really wanted you dead, Pam.”