Tramp Wars: The Enemy

by Larry Roberts

  Mark held up the rags they were using for cloths. “We cut cloth strips into masks and soaked them in the water we were wading in. Kept most of the poison out but not all.”

  The Doctor read the scanner of blood samples Medics had taken from Dian and Mark. “Yes you both have two poisons in you and not just the one.” The Doctor turned to the gurney bent down and took out a red hypo from the bottom drawer. Injecting Dian and then Mark. Then issued a bunch of orders and the medics went to work again on Dian.

  The Doctor took out a hand scanner and ran it over Mark. “Why are you even walking around? You should be in worse shape than Dian. The acid burn on your skin should have killed you already.”

  Mark started to tell him about Mickey but remembered the Captain’s orders. “Well I guise I am just lucky and didn’t get as high a dose.”

  “Bullshit, that burn on your shoulder has given you four times the concentration that Dian has in her. As I said. It should have killed you already but here you are still standing.”

  The hatch opened and the medics ran out with the gurney and Dian as Mark followed with the Doctor keeping a close eye on him. Though Mark was starting to walk slower and slower.

  “Damn Doc. My insides seem to be burning. Especially my muscles every time I move them. Epically walking.”

  Another gurney came rushing up and two medics pushed him onto it and headed into the sickbay.

  Mark was pushed into a room next to Dian with a curtain separating them but with Mickey’s help he could see right through it. Doctor Wells came in checking Dian’s scans as he talked to the Doctor that had brought them up. Mark’s medics started inserting tubes sending fluid into his body as they started cleaning his shoulder. Scraping the skin and blisters off his shoulder. Looking over at them he was surprised that it did not hurt and then he remembered the sedative field they had aimed at his shoulder from movies and videos. Though it was not doing much for the low burning pain that seemed to be running through his body. Though it was not much, it still worried him a little.

  “The Antidote you gave her is taking care of the first poison but the other is eating her from the inside out.” Turning to his comm. “Where is that damn serum! I want it here now!”

  Mark suddenly realized that his body must be doing the same thing and he was suddenly very worried.

  The Doctor that came up with them stepped around the curtain and up to Mark as a medic handed him the probe and pan he had been cutting the skin away into. The Doctor taking over and going deeper. Especially where the blisters were. Then irrigating it with saline.”

  A medic came rushing in out of breath. “I have the Nannite serum already heated up from cold storage Doctor Wells.”

  “Good lad.” Doctor Wells said as he stuffed the vial into a machine and started typing on the screen. His fingers flying over it in a practiced manner and after only a few seconds hit a button and dark liquid started flowing down a tube from the machine and into Dian’s veins. “Now all we can do is wait and see. Damn I hate waiting not knowing and not being able to do anything else. Get her parents down here and the Priest. It does not look good. It simply may be too late.”

  Shaking his head Doctor Well’s came around the curtain and smiled at Mark as if Mark could not have heard what he had just said. “Now let’s fix you up son. Thank Godstar it does not look like you had…”

  The Doctor took one look at Marks scans and blood work and then his burned blistering shoulder and the amount of tissue in the tray from his shoulder and started shaking his head. “You should be dead Mr. Collins. Let’s get these little workers in cleaning out the toxin and then we can start working on the damage.” The Doctor started to slide an identical vial into the machine attached to Mark.

  “No!” Mark said not believing he was repeating what Mickey told him to say as he listened to Mickey’s flash. “Aa. I don’t need. Ah they will interfere sir.” Mark said not understanding what he was saying.

  Doctor Wells shook his head. “Boy you have four times the concentration in your blood that is needed to kill you already. I don’t know why you are alive but you need these to help you.”

  “No. aa Take another sample. That one is 5 minutes old. It may have been mistaken now that most of the acid has been cut away from my arm.”

  Doctor Wells’ eyes opened wide as he leaned back and looked at Mark. Reaching around he grabbed the scanner inserted a new tip and stuck Mark with it. Then sat back and looked at the screen over Mark’s head.

  The Doctor that had been with Mark burst out. “That is impossible. The concentration is a fraction of what it was and it should have gone up with as wide an area he had contaminated.”

  Doctor Wells looked down at Mark. “What the hell is going on here Mark?”

  Mark looked around at everyone else around his bed and frowned as he fingered his glasses. “Ah I can’t tell you Doc.”

  Doctor Wells start to turn red and then a figure materialized in the corner of the emergency room out of the way. The Doctor and most of the staff looked up in shock.

  “Doctor Wells, if I may have a minute of your time, here in private.” The Admiral said

  Looked at Mark. Then back up at the Admiral and frowning. “Something to do with Mark’s new glasses I suppose.” Shaking his head. “Everyone out now.” Pulling back the curtain separating the two beds so he could look at the doctor that had taken over attending to Dian. “That goes for you as well. There is nothing else we can do for her for the next few minutes. I will call you back in shortly.”

  The room cleared and the hatch closed. “Ok Admiral. Why is this boy not dead?”

  “Yes Doctor. Ah Mark’s glasses are old Empire Tech. They come with a very capable A.I. and Nannites to keep the wearer healthy and are keeping him alive, cleaning his body and making repairs.”

  The Doctor got a surprised look on his face as he looked down at his scanner tapping its controls for a few seconds. “Yes I see them now. They are a lot smaller than ours with several different types that seem to be making repairs as well as simply cleaning the blood. “Well, I can see why Mark does not need these then. I will send them back to storage.”

  “No Doctor.” Mark croaked.

  Doctor Wells looked over at Mark and then the Admiral, narrowing his eyes. “Ok why?”

  The Doctors comm beeped. “We are getting reports from medics responding to an increasing number of calls that are sounding like mild to moderate cases of gas poisoning Doctor Wells. Calls are starting to flood in all across the ship.”

  “The Vacuum and fire alarms should have closed off all the decks air supply from the farm decks and the tank deck where I believe the poison has originated. Check for toxicity levels at the scenes and only transport and treat victims with the basic antidote if their tox levels are high enough to warrant it. I will contact the Captain to get the ship flushed with outside air since we are grounded.”

  “No!” Mark croaked as he tried to sit up but flopped back down. “I blew the hull deck hatches. The air outside the ship is contaminated.”

  Mickey flashed Mark. “Very good Mark. With the low wind speed outside the ship at this moment, most decks would suck in vast amounts of contaminated air. In contrast the air on most birthing decks should only have one or two parts per million which should only affect a few with some nausea but do little long term harm to anyone. Though I am sorry that anyone on the farm decks are probably dead already.”

  Shaking his head the Doctor frowned as he turned back to the comm. “I want tox levels checked on all decks and sound smoke alarms on all decks. Get everyone into breathers now until each deck and compartment can be checked for tox levels. Out.” Doctor Wells held up the vial of Nannites and turned back to the Mark. “What about these Nannites? Why don’t you want me to return them to storage?”

  “I only have a limited amount that my glasses can manufacture with the resources I have at this time.” Repeating what Mickey flashed him as Mark looked over at Dian.

  “What? I figured a
s advanced as your glasses are. Your Nannites would be self-replicating.”

  The Admiral turned to the Doctor as he spoke. “Come Doctor. Self-replicating Nannites are only in science fiction horror stories. It takes the industrial might of a dozen worlds to produce the basic materials to produce Nannites. One single or even a colony of Nannites no matter how large it is, could no more produce another Nannite from raw elements than the Star Queen or any ship could produce another ship out of nothing but asteroid rocks or you create a thinking human being from organic matter.”

  Turning from looking at Dian to Dr. Wells. “My glasses tell me that she only has a 20% chance of surviving if your Nannites are as primitive as the ones I am told they are.” Mickey was sending him quite an amount of data in bursts giving him time to digest the information and still talk to the Doctor.

  Glancing at Dian then back to the Doctor, Mark waited until Dr. Wells frowned and nodded yes and said. “Close enough.”

  “As I said, I only have enough material to heal myself at this time but if you will give me a pin head sample of your Nannites that my glasses can analyze, they may be able to upgrade your Nannites to help my Nannites, doing the more mundane chores beside simple cleanup which is all I believe yours can do at this time, while mine do the nastier more delicate repair jobs.” Turning back to Dian. “You will have to reprogram them to respond to my glasses control to work with a large portion of my Nannites you will inject into Dian so they can save her life. Otherwise your large Nannites will simply destroy my smaller Nannites as they do their simple job of cleaning the acid and other foreign materials out of her body.”

  Turning back to Doctor Wells. “The only thing is I will have to replace the Nanotech stock I will lose to Dian’s body that I can never recover. That means you need to acquire the stock for me. The basic building block material that my glasses can use to build more Nannites and continue to make repairs to myself in the future. The basic low grade material or Goo as it is called, is listed on line at quite a reasonable price on this planet though my glasses will have to refine it through one more step our technology has not quite mastered cheaply yet, into Goop.”

  The Admiral looked back at the Doctor. “Fact is Doctor Wells, with this ship headed for the outback, Nannites are going to be very scarce and valuable. We should try to get ahold of a Nannite factory processing machine, though the only ones I can find on line are the size of a container box, and at least 10 tons of base stock material Goo. I think that with the help of Mark’s glasses, I can build a small processor in my machine fabrication shop to cheaply upgrade the Goo to Goop and we can reprogram the factory to produce some very advanced Nannites even if they will be 10 times the size and more clumsy then Mark’s glasses can produce.”

  Mark turned to the Doctor. “Aaaa, you will find that small case Dian had with her, is full of credits and valuables I do not think the dozens of plastic bagged murder victims you will find around an old Ferrari in the tank with the poison gas generators, will object to you using the money for the purchase that will save thousands of lives on the planets we will be delivering to. I am sure Dian would want the same thing if she...” Mark found a large lump in his throat with the last words not allowing him to finish the thought.

  Mark realized that he was talking about Dian dying the same horrible death the two boys had died of only minutes before and he started crying even though he tried not to. Tears pooling into his eyes making it hard to see as he stared at Dian’s still body with rasping breaths even with a machine helping her breath. His neck muscles started to knot up and cramp as he tried his best not to cry in front of anyone giving them a reason to ridicule and abuse him, making it hard if not impossible for him to breath. Let alone continue to talk.

  The Admiral smiled at the Doctor. “I have down loaded detailed directions onto the medical computers. Please keep Mark’s glasses and these Nannites from the rest of the crew as much as possible Doctor. I will let you get back to work. You have a lot to do.” The Admiral bowed slightly since that was all he could do and disappeared.

  Doctor Wells looked down at his screen to see detailed directions on what to do, appear. And then words started scrolling across the screen. “I will guide you through and answer any questions you have Doctor Wells. I am Mickey, Mark’s Glasses AI. Mark will sleep know until his body fully recuperates. Please retrieve a crystal case from Mark’s cabin to deposit your Nannites into for me to upgrade and reprogram to inject into Dian with my Nannites. Please hurry. Time is of the essence. I will light the case with a beeping sound to make it easy to find. Continue to feed fluids and basic antitoxins into Mark but leave his glasses on and his Nannite care to me unless I ask for help.”

  Doctor Wells started bellowing orders as he jumped up and headed for the hatch.

  Mark started to get up. “I have to get Mickey’s case Doctor.”

  Mickey appeared to Mark standing beside him. Knowing Mark’s distress, she said. “Hush little one and lay back. No one else is dying here tonight. I will make sure Dian is safe.” Covering his eyes with her hand. “Now sleep my brave inspector. You have saved the lives of everyone on this ship yet again. Time to recover while we take advantage of this for you to learn and train in your deepest dreams. When you wake from your coma, years will seem to have passed in hard training that you will remember as real to become the officer I know you can be. This nightmare will only be a distant bad dream you had months gone by when you wake. Sleep my love. We have much hard work to do.” Marks body slept dropping down into a deep coma while is mind started to race.

  Hours later Doctor Wells would finally notice Marks incredibly over active brain waves with short almost dead zones spaced in regular intervals making him concerned. Mickey kept sending messages to the Doctor telling him it was normal and that Mark was recuperating rather well. Which the Doctor could see with the toxins quickly removed from his system. When Dian woke before Mark the next morning, Dr. Wells again asked Mickey why Mark was still asleep in a coma and was told again he was training and doing very well.

  Chapter 21 Lock Down

  Captain Cook sat at her desk, bags under her eyes with a half dozen officers seated around the cabin. The planets deep red sun half way up the horizon shining in through the ports had a strange shimmering to it. None of them had had any sleep during the night, during the crises. Taking a puff on a short stub of a cigar while three other cigars laid around her desk both hot and cold in various stages of use or forgotten. She blew a smoke ring up toward the ceiling and took another breath. “Ok, what is the casualty toll Doctor?”

  “I don’t know how to answer that Captain. We have hundreds of sick crew and family. Twenty three children in the infirmary with respiratory problems. At least 13 seniors that died even though the tox levels were not that high and we are still finding more. Two of the first responders to enter the tank deck are in critical condition but should survive with Mr. Collin’s help as has Ms. Abraham. The two bodies on the catwalk in the tank are not identifiable after the acid from the generators exploding melted all the organic tissue off the bones except that they were 19 year old kids. We will have to drill down to the bone morrow to get positive ID’s. We have 14 bodies in the morgue from the tank deck we are in the process of identifying but will have to wait for autopsies until after things settle down. Thank Godstar they were in plastic bags in water preventing them from being dissolved in the acid. Not counting the two skeletons found in that damn car.”

  The Doctor leaned forward pinching the bridge of his nose then downed his drink. “Another 5 minutes and we would be looking at hundreds of dead. Another 15 minutes and most of the crew would be dead.” The Doctor got up and headed for the bar over by the port. “What kind of sick bastered lights off two hold fumigators trying to kill the entire crew and themselves?”

  “I am sorry Doctor but the kids did not light off the canisters and they were not trying to kill the entire crew.” The Chief Master at Arms said with disgust. “We have video of the suspects pl
anting the canisters and leaving the two boys behind to make sure the victims did not escape while getting rid of the two boys as potential witnesses. The video shows the boys deaths before the intended victims left the tank during their escape.”

  “You have the murderers in custody?” The Doctor turned around with relief.

  “No. While we found one of the suspects actually still in one of the access ramp tanks in a vacuum suit with a stun gun nearby, evidentially to make sure they did not escape and was caught when the decks locked down. He was let go before we knew he was a suspect or were sure that any murders had been committed. We are still collecting evidence and now that we know that some kind of mass murderer is loose on the ship we are trying to tie them all together before we arrest anyone so we get them all.”

  “Mass murder?” The Captain sat up shocked.

  “Yes Captain. You don’t think that 14 bodies stuffed in plastic bags all committed suicide now do you? I was trying to put together the facts before I discussed the case with you but it seems to have gotten out of hand with the attempted murder of Mark for the second time in as many days.”

  “You don’t say.” Captain Cook shook her head. “Why was Mr. Collins down in that tank in the first place with Ms. Abraham?”

  The Chief smiled. “They went down to go skinny dipping not realizing that the tank had been all but emptied. The suspect evidentially had a spy cam outside Mr. Collins dorm and the chain room and followed him waiting for a chance to get him alone and make him disappear as has so many other witnesses that have come forward against his family have. We are pulling DNA off the cams now.” Turning to the doctor the Chief shook his head. “I think you will find that most of your bodies will turn out to be people that we had been led to believe had left the ship at the various ports we had stopped at over the years and who the Greedly’s had disagreements with. Explaining why we could never track them down after they left the ship. The Aircar in the tank belonged to the old Union boss we thought deserted the ship some 15 years ago leaving Greedly in charge. Him and his secretary are probably your piles of bones.”