by S. L. Viehl
He was lucky to be alive. I noted the tough, sinewy body and the shaggy mane of dirty hair. His relaxed features retained harsh, brutal lines of experience. A hunter. One of the many who had been coming after me.
“Has he regained consciousness?”
“No.” Ktarka indicated the locking restraints that held the mercenary pinned to the berth. “When he does, Captain Pnor wishes to interrogate him. Do you know him?”
Jorenians assumed everyone in a species was either related or acquainted with each other, as they were. “No, I don’t.” I picked up his chart and made a note to be informed when he regained consciousness. I wanted to know just how many more ships the League had sent after me. “He looks mean.” I looked at the Jorenian’s weary face and touched her shoulder. “So why are you here?”
“My co-workers and I volunteered to assist with the injured,” Ktarka said. “Adaola asked me to monitor this one. The nurses are very busy, and no one wishes . . .” She made a diplomatic gesture.
Nobody wanted to help those responsible for the deaths of five Torins. I could understand that. I wondered why no one had done the same to me, since I was one of the responsible parties.
A nurse passed by the isolation room. Her angry gaze bounced from the unconscious man’s face to mine. I decided to call her in to relieve Ktarka, but before I could speak, the woman abruptly turned away.
Well, that answered my question, and hurt, more than I cared to admit. “I have to get out of here before the boss chases me out, Ktarka. Thanks for your help.”
From my quarters, I signaled the temporary command level and inquired after the condition of the ship. It wasn’t good. Displacer fire had rendered the upper three levels of the ship unfit for use. Level one was nearly completely destroyed. Half the gyrlifts were nonoperational. We were all going to be walking a lot for the next few days.
In return, I reported the death toll, complete casualty numbers, and details on the patients in serious condition. Every name created new weight on top of the five already crushing my heart. By the time I was done, I knew what I had to do.
“May I to speak to the Captain?” I asked the duty officer, and was told he was unavailable. “Please ask him to signal me as soon as possible.” I recalled the injured Terran. “What are you planning to do about this mercenary we’ve got over in Medical?” The Jorenian only smiled and flexed his hands. “Never mind. I don’t want to know.”
Jenner jumped up and snuggled next to me as I curled up on my sleeping platform’s soft pillows. His cool nose nuzzled my hand. I stroked him absently.
“Hey, pal. You hungry? I’ll be . . .”
I fell asleep instead. My dreams were immediate and ugly. Filled with faceless demons pursuing me wherever I ran, finding me wherever I hid. Their hands snatched at me, tearing my tunic, pulling at my hair. Rough, frightening voices called my name, laughed at me. I ran until I tripped and fell. Then they crowded all around me, their sharp teeth glittering.
“No escape, lab meat.” One of the hideous things leaned close. “You’ll never get away. Now get up. Get up—”
“Get up.”
I opened my eyes. A Terran stared back at me over the edge of a surgical mask. The rim of a pulse rifle barrel sat on the bridge of my nose.
“Get up now.” It was the mercenary Ktarka had been monitoring. Somehow he had gotten into full surgical gear and walked out of Medical. “Slow and easy.”
I moved carefully, sliding off my sleeping platform to stand up. I was only wearing an undershirt and briefs. He pulled off the head gear and mask while he took a long look.
“Well, well, well. You’re going to earn me a tidy little bounty, Dr. Grey Veil.”
There was probably no chance of me taking him off-guard, as I had Squilyp. That rifle he held trained on me never twitched an inch. My display was too far away to reach and signal for help. If I tried to use voice commands, I suspected he’d knock me out.
My shoulders sagged. I could go quietly, I thought, and be done with this.
“Very nice.” He moved closer, reached out and grabbed my breast. I concealed my revulsion with indifference. “Pity I don’t have time now. Maybe when we get back to my ship.”
No. I wasn’t going quietly. Not with this animal. “Don’t get your hopes up.”
Brutal fingers squeezed until the pain made me inhale sharply. “That’s right, Doctor. I’m in charge. Remember that.” He let his hand fall away. “Get some clothes on.”
I pulled on the first garments that came to hand. Jenner was nowhere in sight. Had he done something to my cat? I couldn’t ask. If Jenner was hiding, he was safe.
“Where are we going?” I asked.
“Shut up and get over here.”
I tugged on my footgear and approached him slowly. When I got within a foot, he grabbed my braid and used it to pull me up against him. The pulse rifle pressed against the back of my head. There was Jorenian blood on him; I could smell it. Who had he hurt or killed to get out of Medical?
Ktarka.
“Maybe I do have enough time,” he said, and ground his hips against mine. “The old man doesn’t care what shape you’re in. Only that he gets you back on Terra.”
It took every ounce of strength to remain motionless as he jammed his mouth over mine. His thick tongue squirming against my clenched teeth made me want to vomit. He groped my breasts with bruising greed. I kept still and didn’t fight him. He raised his head at last, plainly disappointed.
“Have to work on you,” he said. “You’ve been with these blue-skinned freaks too long.” One calloused hand forced my thighs apart, and he rubbed his fingers back and forth in a grotesque caress. “Forget how it feels to have one of your own kind between your legs?”
Honesty is the best policy. “I’d rather mate with a Hsktskt.”
He backhanded me across the face with his fist, then grabbed the front of my tunic to keep me upright. Blood began to trickle down my chin. My teeth must have cut into my lip when my head snapped back.
I met his gaze, then deliberately spat bloody saliva at his feet. “Two Hsktskts.”
“Come on, you stupid bitch.” He shoved me in front of him. “We’re leaving.” I walked through the door panel and turned to enter the gyrlift, but he yanked me back. That was when I saw Ktarka, huddled against the corridor wall. Blood and lacerations masked her features. Before I could go to her, the barrel of his rifle jammed into my side. “No.” The Terran yanked the educator to her feet. “She can still walk.”
He must have used her as a hostage. “They’ll kill you,” I said.
“Not if it means the two of you die first.”
As we moved down the empty corridor, my heart pounded in my ears. I could only hope no one would cross our path. The crew would react to the threat, and he in turn would shoot them where they stood. Come to think of it, why was the corridor so deserted? With half the gyrlifts down, we should have been wading through Jorenians.
“How did you get loose?” I asked him.
“I had some help,” the mercenary said, then chuckled.
Who would have helped him? The saboteur? I tried once more to turn back to Ktarka, but his weapon prodded me again. “Did you have to beat her?”
“I should have killed her, but I was in a hurry.”
He was a dead man. “What’s your name?”
“Did I forget to introduce myself?” He chortled again.
“Call me Leo.”
“Leo, listen to me. You don’t have a prayer of getting a launch off this ship.”
“I got on it, didn’t I?”
“Let me go. I’ll negotiate for you.”
“Shut up.”
We reached level eighteen. Still no sign of the crew. Leo was openly suspicious as he shoved me through the launch bay entrance. Inside, there were a dozen empty vessels, but not another soul.
“Where are they hiding? In the launches? Behind the cargo bins?” He swung around, eyes frantic, reacting to the echo of his own voice.
<
br /> “If you leave Ktarka behind, they’ll let you go,” I lied. After the Jorenians found out he’d attacked one of their own, they’d jaunt across the universe to get their claws on him.
“Get in that one.” He pointed to the launch nearest the huge pressure-lock doors, and followed me, dragging a semiconscious Ktarka with him. We were almost to the boarding ramp when Duncan Reever stepped out from behind the thrusters. His empty hands were held open to show he carried no weapon.
“Mercenary.”
Leo targeted Reever at once. “Tell the rest of them to come out!” he said. Sweat trickled down the sides of his face as he shoved me forward with a hard hand. “Get in the launch!”
I looked past Reever and saw a figure behind one of the launches. Another shadow appeared between the launch and the hull. I quickly averted my eyes.
“There is no one else here,” Reever said. “I will escort you from the ship.”
“I don’t need you!” Leo shouted. “Just her!”
“Who will pilot the launch?” Reever asked.
“She will!”
“I don’t know how to fly one of these things,” I said at once. “And Ktarka is in no shape to do it.”
“If you take the helm, she’ll try to incapacitate you,” Reever said. “Leave the injured woman behind. Take me with you. I’ll serve as pilot.”
“Get in the launch with them.” He thrust the now-sagging body of the educator at Reever. “No tricks.” He aimed the rifle at my head. “Or I blow her brains into space.”
I reached out to Reever with my mind. Silently, he completed the connection.
Are you crazy? I demanded. Get out of here!
Remember the Dervling? Reever moved to stand next to me.
You’re going to get us all killed, you idiot. I let down the barriers that kept Reever from complete access. Felt him draw on the strength of our combined minds. Saw the false image he projected directly into the mercenary’s thoughts.
Leo’s eyes widened. Reever’s mental projection made him think the three of us had disappeared into thin air. He hurried right past us and climbed into the vessel.
“Where are you?” With a roar of fury, the mercenary jumped out of the empty launch.
Reever thrust Ktarka’s limp body into my arms. What he did then I could never describe with words. It wasn’t like anything Xonea had ever taught me, either. It was better. Faster. Scarier. He whirled in some kind of supple, inhuman roll. His hands moved faster than my eye could follow. There was a brief flicker of light, and Leo’s rifle was in Duncan’s hands. The mercenary collapsed, writhing in pain.
Two Jorenians appeared a moment later. Hado, his arm still in a sling, his face contorted with rage. Beside him was Adaola, trying to hold him back.
“Stay away, both of you.” I carefully eased the educator down and made a quick examination. She’d been beaten badly, but she’d live. I went to the mercenary, then glanced up at Reever. “Where did you hit him?”
Reever kept the weapon in his hands trained on the fallen man’s head. “I didn’t.”
I pressed my fingers to Leo’s straining throat and put one palm over his heart. His blood pressure was dropping fast. Pulse rate fluttered erratically.
“Get a medical team down here.” I pushed the Terran into a prone position. His abdomen was so rigid that my palm couldn’t compress it. “Relax, I’m not going to—”
Leo’s eyes bulged. He let out a long, agonized scream. I watched in disbelief as his abdomen swelled out several inches in as many seconds. His breath caught in a horrible gurgle. His chest fell under my palm and didn’t rise again.
“By the Mother of All Houses, I mark this mercenary as my ClanKill,” Hado said, and started toward us. My eyes widened as I saw him rip the sling from his injured arm. The navigator’s claws sprang from his fingertips.
I couldn’t let Hado gut the man. What had Xonea said about this? I protected the mercenary with my body, and faced the enraged Jorenian.
“No, Navigator Torin. I shield this one.”
Deep confusion replaced the murderous mask. “Why, Healer?”
“We’ll chat about it later. Reever, put down that rifle and get over here.”
I showed him how to lock his hands and do the compressions. Then I covered Leo’s mouth with mine.
We continued cardiopulmonary resuscitation. It didn’t help. By the time the team arrived, the mercenary was dead.
Reever helped me to my feet after I finished checking Ktarka. She had cracked ribs, severe facial contusions, and almost certainly a bad concussion. Hado was disappointed when I wouldn’t allow him to make the mercenary into something he called ClanSign.
“What’s he talking about?” I asked the nurse as we transferred the educator onto a gurney.
“It is what is done with the body after ClanKill,” Adaola replied, her voice low and cold. “Ritually displayed, as a warning to those who would likewise threaten the HouseClan.”
“Right. Well, you’re going to have to wait, Hado. I need the body for an autopsy.” I picked up the discarded sling and rewrapped the navigator’s arm. “After I’m done, you can do whatever you like with him.”
Hado regarded the dead man with seething pleasure. “My thanks, Healer.”
I went down to Medical with Ktarka’s gurney while Reever arranged to have the mercenary’s body removed. Once I had her stabilized and resting as comfortably as could be expected, I left Adaola to monitor her and reported to Command. Reever caught up with me in the corridor along the way.
“You are making your report to the Captain?”
“I’m not sure what to tell Pnor,” I said, not counting what I’d planned to propose about ending the League’s pursuit. “Reever, are you positive you didn’t hit him?”
“I merely disarmed him.”
Right. That was like saying I was good with knives.
Pnor remained unavailable, so I reported the incident to the S.O., who recorded my statement in a hurry. When that was done, Ndo said something about the engines and disappeared. Reever had vanished sometime during my interview.
I’d forgotten to thank him, I realized. Again. I’d have to signal him later; I had to get to Medical and get some answers.
Because the mercenary wasn’t Jorenian, Tonetka could perform the autopsy immediately. I assisted.
“Internal organs are even now beginning to liquefy.” My boss stripped off her gloves and passed her hands under the sterilizer. “It is the same as it was with Roelm.”
I insisted on running full pathogenic scans, which came up negative across the board. As they had with Roelm. It didn’t make sense. I’d been there, watched him go down. Nothing had touched him, except Reever, and he couldn’t have inflicted this kind of damage. If Hado wanted to use the body, he’d better work fast.
Then it occurred to me that whatever killed Leo may have been administered prior to his attempted abduction. “Who was the last nurse to make a chart notation?” I asked.
Tonetka checked. “Adaola. She took his vitals a few minutes before he escaped.”
She had also been the last person to touch Roelm before he died. That was an unhappy coincidence. “Did anyone see anything suspicious?”
“Not to my knowledge.” The Senior Healer studied the lab results. “Hematology shows no trace of toxin. I cannot think of a compound that could do this kind of damage, and yet not show on our scans.”
I’d learned my lesson about physical evidence on K-2 from a pathogen that mimicked the tissue it inhabited in order to escape detection. “Perhaps it resembles digestive acid.”
“The enzyme levels would be escalated.”
“True.” I thought about it for a moment. “Maybe it isn’t something the men were injected with.”
Tonetka raised her head. “What else could it be? Any external force would leave massive epidermal damage.”
“Let me check something.” I went over to access the database. She finished cleaning up and joined me at the console.
>
“You are comparing tissue scans from Roelm and the mercenary. Why?”
“There has to be a common denominator.”
“It will take time to determine it. One is Jorenian, the other human. Even the blood chemistries are completely different.” She reached past me and switched off the terminal. “That is quite enough, Healer. Go and rest. It has been an eventful day for you.”
That it had.
I went back to my quarters, and spent a half hour under my cleanser. It didn’t remove the memory of Leo’s touch, or the beating Ktarka had suffered on my behalf, but it kept me busy. Once I was dressed, I signaled Reever.
He seemed surprised by my relay. “Yes, Doctor?”
“I’m sorry, Reever. I forgot to thank you for what you did today.” I pushed my damp hair off my brow. “I’m very glad you showed up when you did.”
“I was happy to be of assistance.” He seemed to be more interested in watching my fingers as I fastened my tunic.
I should tell him what I’d decided to do, I thought. Yet the words didn’t come out that way. “Where did you learn to do that thing you did to disable the mercenary?”
His gaze rose to meet mine. “You don’t want to know.”
Before I could reply, Reever terminated the signal.
Hado did something with Leo’s body; I didn’t try to find out the particulars. I’d overheard a conversation between two nurses about various methods of ClanSign, and that was enough for me. I kept busy attending to the crew members injured in the attack.
Leo’s brutality had one positive effect. The crew’s animosity toward me disappeared, and they began treating me like one of the family again. The change was a relief, but it didn’t make me forget about my decision. When the Captain returned my signal, I politely made my request. With equal courtesy he refused to grant it.
“I cannot allow you to do this, Healer. Not until matters currently under investigation are resolved.”
I pressed him for a commitment. “And when they are resolved? What about then?”
Pnor reluctantly nodded.
