Warchild

by Esther Friesner

  Dax suppressed a smile. "I'm sure of it."

  "Ah, well!" He clapped his hands to his knees and stood up. "Back to work. The katterpods aren't ready for reaping yet, but Brother Talissin insists we harvest the fields according to his schedule, not nature's. Thanks for what you've done here, my dear; it's good to be able to do your job without feeling like that fever's peering over your shoulder. Give Nerys my love, won't you?"

  "My pleasure."

  "And a kick in the backside whenever she turns stubborn on you." He winked and strolled off, whistling.

  "Any more?" Lieutenant Dax asked Ensign Kahrimanis. The two of them had set up their immunization post in a small lean-to pitched near the katterpod fields. The furnishings consisted entirely of three stools—one apiece for herself and Kahrimanis, one for each new shot recipient. It was more convenient and efficient if they brought the antibody injections to the harvest workers rather than the other way around.

  "I think we got them all." Ensign Kahrimanis rolled his head slowly to work out a kink in his neck. "It feels like we've been at this forever." He checked the tally sheet Brother Gis had given him. The monk had made a special effort to take a reliable nose-count of the people in his care for the immunization program. As the harvest intensified, all able-bodied refugees were accounted for on the field workers' list, all ailing ones in the infirmary. If even one of them missed receiving the lifesaving injection, it would be tragic.

  "I just wish we had something more to show for it," Dax muttered.

  "Huh?"

  "Nothing." Dax was annoyed with herself for that slip of the tongue. Kahrimanis knew nothing of her search for the Nekor. She hunched her shoulders repeatedly and wished for a well-trained masseur to relieve the cramps that tied her shoulder muscles in knots. She had insisted on administering every shot herself, fobbing off Kahrimanis with the job of record keeper. While he checked off incoming patients, Dax was at liberty to question each and every soul for any clue to a camp child from Bennikar.

  Shots do make most people nervous, she reflected. Nervous people tend to talk more. Bajorans are no different. Too bad none of them had anything helpful to tell me.

  She stood and picked up the stool. "Let's go back to the infirmary and see how Dr. Bashir's doing."

  They were a stone's throw from the infirmary when Brother Gis burst through the curtained doorway, his face a study in bliss. "May the Prophets reward you beyond all measure!" he exclaimed, clasping Dax's hand. "You have given us the miracle of our prayers!"

  "Brother Gis, please—" Dax began, feeling herself squirm. As a Trill chosen to carry a symbiont, she had been schooled never to act as if she were better than her less privileged kin. Only one Trill in ten was selected for the honor, and hard feelings were common enough without the lucky ones lording it over the rest. Healthy modesty was a quality the selectors looked for in the candidates for Union. As a result, Jadzia was poorly equipped to handle such effusive praise. She slipped her hand from Gis's grasp, sidestepped the monk, and dove through the infirmary door.

  "Dr. Bashir?" she called.

  "Over here!" An arm sheathed in the black sleeve of a Starfleet uniform stuck out of one of the sheet-walled cubicles at the back of the building. She hurried toward it. As she strode down the aisle she noticed a great change, the miracle that had so overjoyed Brother Gis:

  The stink of fever was diminished. A fresher, less oppressive atmosphere seemed to have crept into the building in spite of the inadequate windows. The patients, large and small, no longer tossed in their bedclothes or stared at the ceiling with glazed eyes or moaned with pain. Here Jadzia passed a child sleeping peacefully, her breath unlabored, her face no longer flushed. There she saw a woman get up from her cot and take a few wobbling steps toward a pallet across the aisle where a little boy stretched out his arms and smiled as he said, "Mama? Mama, you better?"

  The woman stumbled, but Lieutenant Dax was there to catch her and urge her back to her own bed. She paused to transfer the woman's child to a place nearer his mother's side, then told her, "You mustn't overtax yourself. I know you feel much better now, but you're still weak. You'll recover more quickly if you rest."

  The woman clutched Jadzia's hand, her eyes eloquent with gratitude though she said nothing.

  "Are they all reacting to the injection so well?" Dax asked as she joined Dr. Bashir inside the cubicle. The patient on the cot was deep in normal sleep. They spoke quietly, to avoid disturbing him.

  "Amazing, isn't it?" he said. "Astonishing signs of initial recovery. Brother Gis hasn't stopped singing your praises."

  She thought she detected something else beneath his words. "But …?" she prompted.

  "Well, I needn't tell you that I'd like to see whether the effects are permanent. With such a readily adaptable organism, we must be sure we've won the war, not just the first skirmish."

  "Thank you, Doctor." She smiled at him. "It's a relief to hear some good, hard, scientific skepticism instead of all this talk of miracles." I wouldn't say no to a miracle, though, she admitted to herself. Not if it would help me find the Nekor. "Any theories as to how long we might have to wait to be positive we're out of the woods?"

  Dr. Bashir pondered the question. "If the affinities to nanadekh plague are any indication, I'd say the next forty-eight hours should tell the story. That epidemic was also caused by a highly mutable retrovirus, and when it was in a humanoid host, it didn't waste much time changing itself to combat half-measures used against it. I made a special senior honors study of the phenomenon, under Selok's tutelage." For once Julian did not sound as if he were bragging about his past achievements, merely presenting them as facts. "I think we'd know still more if we spoke with Gis. He says this illness resembles another sort of Bajoran fever. If we hear how that one behaved—"

  "—we might be able to make some workable hypotheses about this," Dax finished for him. "An excellent idea, Doctor. Why don't I take care of that?"

  "Please do. I'm making second rounds to check on the progress of the patients. Cedra is helping me, but he might miss reporting some vital detail."

  Dax clicked her tongue. "Still trying to do everything, Julian?"

  "That's not it." He spoke with conviction, but looked as if he'd been caught doing something he shouldn't. "Cedra's a bit preoccupied at the moment. His little sister made a natural recovery from the fever—we might want to sample her blood when she's better to see how her antibodies compare with the one you designed—but the child is still very weak. Talissin views her recovery as a sign of special favor from the Prophets. Cedra tells me that our dour friend has plans for bringing the girl to the attention of his order when the situation here betters itself."

  "What does Cedra think of the religious life for his sister?" Dax inquired.

  "He's all for it. Anything's better than the camps, he says. What we've done here is nothing. News comes all the time about other refugee settlements where the situation is far worse. Cedra keeps his ears open and pays attention to the monks when they talk amongst themselves. In some places they don't need this fever to kill the children; they have other illnesses that take them before the fever can arrive: dysentery, parasites, deficiencies we could set right quickly, easily, if only we could—"

  "You ought to speak with Major Kira when we return to the station," Dax said, her matter-of-fact calm in strong contrast to the rising note of passion in Julian's voice.

  It had the effect of a basin full of cold water dashed in the doctor's face. "Yes," he said dully. "Of course that's what I ought to do. Perhaps it will help if I show her a copy of Cedra's map. He made a rough sketch of where the other camps are located, based on what he heard from the monks. Every complaint they make about the terrain between here and the other sites went down on paper. I can't vouch for its accuracy, but still, what a project for a child to undertake! He's a bright boy."

  "And his sister? Is she bright, too?"

  "Dejana?" Dr. Bashir frowned. "Bright enough, but there's something else about
her … I can't explain it. You'd have to see for yourself. At any rate, Talissin insisted she return to the infirmary. He doesn't believe Gis's course of strengthening teas is enough to encourage her complete recovery." He made a face. "I hate to say so, but I agree with him. However, Cedra's worried."

  "Someone mention me?" Cedra's brown head poked around a corner of the sheet.

  "Eavesdropping again?" Dr. Bashir teased him.

  The boy drew himself up proudly. "You'd think it was something heroic if you called it playing spy. I learn a lot of useful things you'd be glad to know."

  "Then make yourself useful, you young scamp, and find Brother Gis for us. Lieutenant Dax needs to speak with him."

  "About what the old fever was like?" Cedra grinned to see Dr. Bashir's reaction. "He's in the office."

  "Thank you, Cedra," Dax said. "I can find my own way." She walked to the very back of the infirmary. Behind her she heard Cedra asking Dr. Bashir if he would please take a look at Dejana.

  Dax was relieved to find a much less effusive Gis awaiting her in the infirmary office. The monk looked up when she entered and said, "I apologize if I caused you any unease before, Lieutenant Dax." He rose from his rickety chair and attempted to offer it to her.

  She refused it with a gesture and a courteous smile. "I understand your feelings. Let's not mention it again. It looks as if we've been able to solve one of your problems. As for the other—"

  "The Nekor." He spoke the name scarcely above a whisper.

  "None of the field-workers could give me any information. I'm hoping to do better when I can interview the recovering patients here in the infirmary. I hope you will be able to help me. I realize that the children might not know Bennikar village by name, but perhaps you might know something about it that they would recognize—a nearby landmark, a local festival, any detail a child might know, or recall his parents mentioning when they spoke about the place."

  Brother Gis thought about it. "They did have somewhat of a reputation for brewing kis. But would children hear of that?"

  "Hear or overhear. It's startling how many adult conversations children manage to gather."

  "Especially those we do not wish them to." Gis finished Dax's thought for her with an amiable smile. "I believe Bennikar was also reputed to breed a sturdier variety of verdanis. Will that help you in your search, Lieutenant?"

  "It's more than what I've had to go on so far. Thank you, Gis. I think I'll begin making my own rounds of the infirmary and see if anyone is fit enough to answer a few questions."

  She left the office and scanned the infirmary. She saw Dr. Bashir kneeling beside a pallet toward the front of the building. He had a length of string looped over the fingers of both hands and was weaving an elaborate cat's cradle for the entertainment of a bright-eyed little girl. The child lay with her head pillowed on a pile of folded cloth, yet even at such a distance Dax could see that Bashir's young patient was on the way to recovery. Her face was animated, and her feet fidgeted under the covers.

  Maybe that's a good place to begin, Dax thought, starting toward them.

  The little girl turned out to be too young to be of any help. "Lika was born in this camp three years ago," Dr. Bashir told Dax. "This is the only home she knows, can you imagine that?" He laid his hand on the child's head. "Her mother died only two weeks ago, and for a while it looked like she was going to follow her. Your injection saved her life. If you've done nothing else in your life you can be proud of, Jadzia, you can be proud of this."

  "You mean we can be proud of this, Doctor," she corrected him.

  He shook his head. "I've done nothing." He moved on to the next patient.

  Dax became Dr. Bashir's shadow, following him as he made the rounds of the infirmary to check up on the vaccine's effects. While he took readings on the patients' vital signs, she engaged them in casual conversation. With adults, she sometimes asked directly whether they knew of anyone in the camp who hailed from Bennikar. With the children and the more reticent grown-ups, she jollied as much information out of them as she could.

  "What d'you mean, I won't be able to manage a team of verdanis for a month yet?" one fellow demanded, incensed. His hands bore the telltale calluses of reins, evidence that as good as chose Dax's point of attack for her. "I been driving verdanis since I was knee-high to—"

  "But the camp's gotten hold of some of the really big ones," she said smoothly. "I heard only folk from Bennikar were used to handling that breed."

  He snorted. "Then you heard wrong! Remis Jobar's from near Bennikar, and he never could drive even the small verdanis we've got." The man's brow furrowed. "Remis Jobar still alive?" he asked Dr. Bashir. Julian checked his list and nodded toward another male Bajoran lying three pallets farther down the line. The man relaxed. "Good. He can't drive verdanis worth a damn, but he's a good friend."

  Dax moved on to Remis Jobar's side, leaving Dr. Bashir behind. When questioned, the man was groggy and uncertain. "Children from Bennikar … I'm a bachelor, myself. Been here three years. Didn't ask folks many questions about where they come from, did they have any children or not. Some of them did … once. I didn't want to pry. You understand?"

  Dax nodded calmly, though inside she was clutching her fists in frustration. I don't need discretion; I need information! "You didn't ask, but did you ever just happen to hear—?"

  He shrugged. "My sister came here with me. Back home, she used to do for me, keep house, like that. When we came here, she was thrilled to see some of the finer folk from Bennikar proper—we lived a good ways off from the village, you see. She knew each and every one of 'em, all their business, how it was with their families, everything. Now there was a woman who could gossip!" He chuckled softly, then grew wistful. "She's gone now."

  Dax stroked his hand by way of comfort. "She must have shared some of that gossip with you, didn't she?"

  He bobbed his head. "That was her second greatest pleasure, sharing what she knew. Only thing she liked better was getting the word in the first place. She said there was maybe eight, ten children from our village here. She was as proud of that as if she'd brought 'em in safe herself." He sighed. "She died nursing one of 'em. Nice little girl."

  Dax perked at the mention of the child's sex. "And the little girl? Who was she? What became of her?"

  Another shrug. "I don't know. I was still able to work the fields back then. When Brother Mor came to tell me Cathlys was dead, he said she'd given her life for a child's, but I don't know if that meant the girl lived. Could be he was just trying to ease my pain." He sighed again and rolled away from Dax.

  Dax respected his desire to be left alone. Eight or ten children from Bennikar, she thought, rising from his pallet. That's not a lot, but he wasn't sure of the count. There might be more of them … or fewer. Some must have survived the fever. Some probably didn't even catch it. I've got to keep asking.

  She looked around for Dr. Bashir and saw him examining a boy across the aisle. She started toward him, hoping to find fresh clues, when she felt thin, determined fingers close around her elbow and tug.

  "'Scuse me," said Cedra, steering her away from Dr. Bashir. "Would you help me some?"

  "Help?" Dax echoed.

  "My sister, Dejana," he replied. "Come take a look at her, please."

  "Is she sick? I'll get Dr. Bashir—"

  "No, don't do that!" The boy's alarm was almost comical. "He's seen her already. He'll just make it worse."

  Dax frowned. "Dr. Bashir is more than qualified to—"

  Cedra laid a finger to his lips, at the same time making rapid hushing motions with his other hand. "Can you keep a secret?" he whispered hoarsely.

  "That depends."

  "It's nothing bad, I swear! But if Dejana found out I told you, she'd kill me."

  Dax's curiosity was piqued. "I can keep secrets very well, when I have to."

  The boy lowered his voice still further and hissed, "Dejana's in love with him."

  "Him? You mean Dr. Bash—?"

&nbs
p; "Shhhhh!" The child was positively mortified. "I think she's faking feeling so weak, just so she can be in the infirmary and have him see her. Dejana can get Brother Talissin to do almost anything she wants 'cause he's so soppy over how she's been touched by the Prophets. She just needs to sniffle once and he falls apart."

  "What do you think I can do about this?"

  "Well, I heard you're a science officer. Could you maybe do something … scientific to make her stop?"

  Dax's mouth curved up. "The only scientific cure for your sister's problem is time-travel." Cedra gave her a puzzled frown. "We wait for her to outgrow it," she explained.

  Cedra shook his head vigorously. "You come take a look at her and see how weak she really is. If you report to Brother Gis that she's faking, he'll move her out of here, no matter what Brother Talissin says. Please? She's—she's embarrassing me."

  Lieutenant Dax patted the boy's shoulder. "I'll do what I can. Where is she?"

  "Over there." He grabbed her wrist and dragged her into a sheeted alcove on the east side of the infirmary. It had only two walls, supposedly to shield patients with some hope of recovery from turning their heads to the side and seeing others, less fortunate, whose last moments might not be a pretty sight. Three pallets were laid out on the floor inside, and a box holding a clay pitcher and cups. Only the two side pallets were occupied, one by a tall girl who lay sleeping with her face to the wall, the other by Dejana.

  Cedra's sister was sitting on her pallet when they entered. She looked up pertly when she saw Dax. The science officer was struck by the sharpness of the child's gaze. When she had been plain Jadzia, before the Union with her symbiont, the examiners had often fixed her with the same kind of penetrating, unnerving stare.

  "Hello, Lieutenant Dax," she said. "Have you come to visit me? Please sit down." She motioned at the empty pallet with queenly grace.