Fever [Sunsinger Chronicles Book 5]

by Michelle Levigne

  “Gil.” She grinned and wiped her eyes. “I'd be honored."

  In moments the conversation shifted to learning about the twins’ training and how they had managed to be assigned to the same ship together. Devon made the common error of assuming Lin was Bain's mother, and Dr. Anyon jumped in to explain the distant kinship and how the two had found each other and joined forces on Lenga.

  How they all managed to avoid talking about the war and the Mashrami and the plagues, Bain couldn't quite decide. It was nice to spend an evening with old and new friends and not talk at least once about the war. Dena brought out a game she had learned as a child, played with stones on lines marked in the dust. She substituted tiny thermal-dots from her medical supplies, and marked lines with strips of paper on the tablecloth. Bain never could figure out the object of the game beyond getting his stones from one side of the grid to the other without being landed on and taken by the other players. The fact that he couldn't keep track of his pieces made it harder. He didn't care, though. It was fun to laugh and scheme and try to form temporary alliances with the other players.

  By the end of the evening, they were comfortable with each other. They could talk. Bain thought that had been the purpose; to get over the strangeness and uncomfortable politeness so Dena and Devon and Dr. Anyon could travel on Sunsinger. They might be living together in close quarters for months, until the plagues were brought under control.

  * * * *

  Sunsinger launched early the next morning, before the first tentative rays of sunrise peeked through the mists. Bain opened the hatch from the bridge and unrolled the ladder so Dr. Anyon and the twins could climb straight in, instead of going through the decontamination airlocks at either end of the cargo hold. He was still yawning, combing his hair with his fingers and trying to see with only one eye open as he climbed down the ladder to meet them. Bain was dressed, but his soft ship-shoes weren't buckled and his pants kept slipping down his hips because he forgot his belt.

  The three medics carried duffel bags over their shoulders and Devon dragged a wheeled cart holding boxes and crates and four precious, padded bags full of diagnostic equipment that couldn't be left in the converted cargo hold. Bain looked at everything that had to be loaded up that ladder into the bridge, and he silently groaned. Lin was at the port master's office, taking care of some last-minute work, along with posting letters to friends, like Branda and Chryssa.

  He consoled himself that because of the darkness of the early morning hour, no one could really see his face.

  Lin returned to the ship before they had finished. Captain Gil followed a few minutes later. He clutched the last box under his arm and climbed up the ladder to the bridge.

  Dena had been assigned to the cubicle next to Lin. Devon and Dr. Anyon would share a cubicle. When the hold was full of sick, the three medics would take duty shifts of two on-duty and one off at all times, so the crowded sleeping arrangements didn't really matter. The fifth cubicle on the bridge became the equipment storage area and makeshift laboratory. Dr. Anyon would spend what little free time he had in there, studying plague samples inside their isolation cases, trying to stay ahead of the mutations.

  Most Rangers would patrol between the planets hit with the plague bombs, trying to backtrack their flight path and predict where the next ones would land. Their job, even more important than the medical personnel trying to cure the ill, was to keep the plague bombs from entering the atmosphere of any planet.

  It took far less time than Bain thought, to settle everyone in their cubicles and strap down the equipment and gear and be ready for launch.

  Captain Gil made formal farewells with Dr. Anyon and Devon. The two men then headed down into the transformed hold to the stasis chairs that had been installed for the medical team. Dena and Gil crawled back down the ladder and said their good-byes outside. Bain didn't miss the slightly teary look in her eyes. Curiosity fought with good manners and the certain knowledge their good-bye would be full of romantic sentiment. Bain kept himself busy checking the control panel while Lin was down in the hold, checking the connections for the stasis chairs one last time. He didn't hear a thing either one said.

  “All set,” Dena said, as she climbed back through the hatch onto the bridge. She fussed with her uniform, straightening jacket and shirt and pants.

  “You're sure?” Bain paused with his hand on the control to shut the hatch.

  “Please. If it doesn't shut soon, he'll probably climb back up and change his mind.” She smiled and rubbed at her eyes. A glint of moisture on her hand gave away the tears she had been fighting not to shed.

  “Why didn't Captain Gil keep you on the Cutlass?” he asked. “Wouldn't it be safer?"

  “Maybe. I wouldn't let him pamper me.” Dena shrugged and headed across the bridge for the access tube to the hold. “Is everybody else set to go?"

  “Lin's probably waiting for you to come down and strap in, then we can launch.” He pressed the switch to close the hatch and watched the door swing shut.

  “Good."

  “Why would he be pampering you if you stayed on his ship?” Bain hoped he wasn't rude, asking questions like that.

  “All the other medics are taking risks. We don't really have any assurance the new vaccines will work, or the plagues won't mutate beyond our abilities to counteract them. He has a lot of confidence in Sunsinger and you and Captain Lin, if he'll let me travel with you."

  “Oh.” He turned to watch her. She paused in the doorway, wearing a little smile.

  “It's not easy, having so much responsibility for people. Wanting to protect people but knowing you can't.” Dena shook her head. A few strands of hair came loose from her clips. “We both hope that if we have children, they all take after me and go into the Medic Corps, and not Command Corps."

  “But we need people like Captain Gil."

  “We need healers more. It's easy to fight; it's harder to put the pieces back together after the battle is over."

  Bain nodded that he understood. He turned back to the control panel and studied the flashing lights.

  Healers were needed more than warriors. He could understand that. Healers and scientists and explorers and builders. People to sneak in and rescue those who were in trouble, and find out what was wrong. People to fix things instead of people who only knew how to fight. Defenders, rather than warriors.

  “Someday, we'll have people like that,” Bain whispered. A green light flashed, signaling all three stasis chairs were functioning. He pressed the series of switches that would take the ship's engines from warm idle to active status.

  “Healers?” Ganfer asked.

  “Yeah, healers. And people who know how to get into dangerous places without anybody knowing they're there. They can explore and know why plants and animals react like they do, and keep colonists from getting into trouble when they land on a new planet. Little groups, not whole squadrons.” Bain sighed, knowing he was making a mangled mess of his dream. Someday, he would know exactly what was needed and how to express his dreams so others would work with him. “All the ships would have Spacers for pilots, so they could go anywhere they had to be, fast. They'd be ready for anything."

  “That sounds very useful. How will you bring these people together and train them?” the ship-brain asked after a few moments of silence.

  “I don't know.” He sighed again; louder. “When I'm old enough, I'll know how."

  “Don't be in a hurry to grow up too fast,” Lin said. She stepped onto the bridge and hurried to her seat at the control panel. “Oh, good, everything's set.” She winked at Bain. “I don't know how I ever got along without you as my crew."

  “You told me to do it,” Ganfer answered.

  “Nothing I say is going to be a good enough reply, so I'm not even going to try.” She tightened her safety strap and played her hands over the controls. “Let's go."

  * * *

  Chapter Three

  The first colony world where Sunsinger landed was solid green-blu
e forest cut by the muddy brown lines of rivers. Only one village, twelve Standard years old, made up the colony. It was so new, the planet still went by its identification numbers, not a name. Sunsinger landed between two overflowing rivers and the medical team went to work.

  Bain and Lin weren't allowed to step foot on the planet. It was spring here, and the humidity and heat contributed to the spread of the plague. The decontamination airlock between cargo hold and bridge was kept closed. The medical team wore protective suits and carried heavy canisters of compressed air in harnesses on their backs. Until Dr. Anyon ran his tests, they had no guarantee the regular breather filters and antiseptics would work.

  Dr. Anyon vaccinated and examined all the healthy members of the colony and taught their resident healer how to administer more medicine if they needed it. He left medical texts for identifying the plague variations that had appeared on other worlds. The last piece of equipment was an emergency signal code that would break through all the other communications chatter wandering through the galaxy. The Rangers would pick up the signal and know what planet it came from, and that would save time in sending help. Timely diagnosis and treatment could turn out to be the greatest weapon the Rangers and Medic Corps had.

  Four hours after Sunsinger landed, it launched again. Twenty-four net bunks were filled with plague victims in various stages of suffering. There were no colony worlds close enough for another stop before they rendezvoused with the Ranger hospital ship Mercy. Lin programmed in the course for the nearest Knaught Point and settled down to wring as much speed from Sunsinger as she could without damaging the engines.

  Dr. Anyon came up to the bridge after Sunsinger had cleared orbit, leaving the twins to take care of their patients. He spent nearly ten minutes in the decontamination cycle of the airlock, scrubbing and cleansing his suit and then testing the air to make sure no bacteria or other dangerous microbes were alive. The air reeked bitterly of antiseptics when the airlock door swung open, letting the doctor out onto the bridge.

  “Thank you,” Dr. Anyon gasped, as Bain hurried to help him remove his helmet.

  He hunched his shoulders and released the buckles for the air canister harness. The metal cylinders clanged loudly as they hit the wall, then bounced off and started floating up toward the ceiling. Bain hurried to grab the air tanks and hook them into place in the compression bay. By the time Dr. Anyon headed down into the cargo hold again, the tanks would be full of clean, compressed air.

  “Bad down there?” Lin said. She glanced away from the controls once and gave the doctor a once-over look.

  “Not too bad. The worst case hasn't reached the delirium stage yet. Fevers, chills, nausea, and a tendency to fall asleep in the middle of conversations.” He shrugged his way out of his protective suit and hung it up on one of the hooks next to the airlock.

  “What do you think it is?” Bain asked.

  “You mean, something new or an old enemy?” He dug through the pockets of the suit until he withdrew a sample tube. “We'll find out in a few minutes.” Dr. Anyon paused before pushing off to fly over to the makeshift lab. He grinned and flexed his shoulders. “You don't realize how heavy those air tanks are until they're off your back. Even in free-fall, they feel like fifty kilos."

  “Doctor—” Lin began.

  “All the symptoms make me think it's one of the first strains we encountered."

  “Is that good?” Bain asked. He wrapped an absorbent sheet around the still-wet suit and pushed off from the wall to follow the doctor to the work cubicle.

  “The fewer mutated diseases we encounter, the easier our jobs will be and the less suffering our patients will endure. It also means less trouble for the healthy people left behind. If they get vaccinated and take their boosters, they won't get sick."

  “Oh. Good.” Bain wondered if he should spend more time on his medical studies unit.

  Questions were fine, and Dr. Anyon was like Lin in encouraging questions as a way of learning; but if he asked too many questions, Bain knew he would only be getting in the way. He could even slow down the progress of treatment. He didn't want to do that.

  He perched on the edge of the bench that used to be a bed and watched as Dr. Anyon slid the sample tube into the diagnostic unit, sealed it, and used the mechanical hands to open the tube and manipulate the samples of blood and skin, hair and excrement.

  “No mutation,” Dr. Anyon said less than twenty minutes later. He stepped back from the diagnostic unit and grinned at Bain. “We don't need those wretched suits for protection and you just might get drafted to help in the hold if we get desperate."

  “That's a hint for you to say more prayers on behalf of the sick,” Lin said. She got up from her place at the control panel and flew over to the galley. “Anyone for tea?"

  “Please.” He grinned and rubbed at his bloodshot eyes. “Bain, could you call down to the hold and tell Dena and Devon they can take off their suits?"

  “Sure.” Bain floated over to the control panel and punched in the commands to open communications between the bridge and the radios in the protective suits.

  Devon took the news with a whoop of relief. Dena sighed and thanked him. Dr. Anyon took cups of tea down to them when he left a few minutes later. There were the ill to attend to, after all, and no respite until they had reached the Mercy and unloaded their patients.

  An hour later, Bain took meal packs down to the medics. He was hungry for his own dinner until he smelled the peculiar aroma of sickness, composed of bitter sweat and the acid smell of vomit, the sickly sweetness of infection in open sores and the metallic taint of pain. He felt like a coward afterwards, but Bain hurried to put down the hot meal packs on the counter where the three medics could reach them, and flew back up to the bridge. He felt queasy until the airlock closed and locked the smell of the hold behind its thick doors. Even then, Bain thought he could smell that particular odor seeping through the ventilation system, despite the special filters and disinfectants. When he went to bed that night, he thought he heard the moans and whimpers of the sick through his dreams.

  * * * *

  The pattern repeated through four trips. Sunsinger landed on a small, isolated colony that hadn't grown beyond the first village site. The medical team disembarked in protective suits, carrying the vaccine. They examined the sick and brought them on board, then left medicine and instructions and equipment for the healthy being left behind. Isolation protocol went into effect until Dr. Anyon diagnosed the plague variant afflicting the ill. If Bain and Lin had been inoculated for that particular strain, then the medics could go without their protective suits and Bain or Lin could come down into the hold to help.

  If they weren't inoculated, or the strain had shown any signs of mutation, no matter how small, the protective suits came on, the airlocks stayed locked, and the medical team lived in the hold except for four-hour sleep shifts. They spent a minimum of fifteen minutes at a time in the decontamination cycle of the airlock.

  On the fifth trip, two people died during the launch. Dr. Anyon reported the deaths to Lin over the communication link. He didn't come onto the bridge until eight hours later. By that time, five more people had died. He was silent and pale and confined himself to the makeshift lab. He worked over the diagnostic unit long through the night shift. Bain didn't dare ask the doctor any questions.

  The plague hadn't mutated in any form that Dr. Anyon could identify. His theory, reluctantly formed, was that the people had been so weakened by the plague and had gone so long without food or water, they hadn't been able to take the stress of launching and breaking orbit.

  Even then, Lin wouldn't let Bain go down into the hold to help. He would have argued with her, but Bain was frightened by Lin's utter quietness, the dark shadows haunting her eyes, and the whiteness of strain around her mouth. He was curious about the dead bodies, even though they frightened him. What would plague-killed people look like? Bain kept quiet after the first time Lin refused to let him go down to the hold. Dr. Anyon had as
ked for him to bring food down, and the man didn't argue when Lin refused. They compromised by putting hot food packs in the airlock, and Devon came up the access tube to retrieve the food.

  That night, Bain woke from a sound sleep to hear Lin crying at her station on the bridge. She leaned over the control panel, head resting in her hands, the tears slowly puddling in the air around her face. Free-fall and crying, Bain realized, didn't work well together.

  The next day, Bain didn't ask again about going down into the hold. Lin never cried. This had to be far worse than he imagined, if the death of strangers could make her cry in the night.

  It was a relief to unload these patients, dead and alive, and get as far away from the Mercy and this particular sector of space as possible.

  * * *

  Chapter Four

  “Lin, we have a little problem here,” Dr. Anyon said.

  “Why am I not surprised?” Lin muttered. She glanced at Bain, sitting in his usual spot at the control panel. The boy shrugged and tried to smile. It was hard. The last two trips had been ordinary, other than Dr. Anyon finding mutations in both strains of the plague, requiring protective suits. No one had died; no equipment problems. Devon had held free-fall acrobatic competitions with Bain in the observation dome, between leaving the hospital ship and reaching the next colony.

  When they landed on Bareen, a rocky world of canyons split by rivers and thin stretches of forest, their reception had been totally opposite to that on previous colonies.

  Silence.

  Lin transmitted the usual message to the colony's center, telling them what ship they were, why they had come, and precautions for meeting the medical team.

  When Dr. Anyon opened the airlock and stepped out onto the landing field, no one came from the shadowed doorway of the administration building to meet him.

  “Ganfer, scan the surrounding area, distance of two kilometers,” Lin ordered.