The Clinic

by Cate Culpepper

  Caster paused, smiling. “As you read along, you will see that Phase One of our study involves establishing a baseline of resistant behavior in our test subject. Jesstin?” Caster gestured toward the center of the arena.

  Jess watched the camera pan toward her and understood why she’d been ordered to remove her shirt. A half-naked barbarian was both titillating and easier to objectify. She continued the sequence of breathing rituals that prepared her to fight.

  “As you can see, our Tristainian subject projects quite an intimidating presence.” Caster tapped Stuart to keep the frame focused on Jess as she continued. “Jesstin is a valued member of Tristaine’s elite warrior guild! She is honored among her violent kindred for her fighting prowess and her fearlessness in battle.”

  Jess wished she could fart loud enough to be heard on the tape. It was what Dyan would do. Dyan would focus on her breathing, Shann’s voice corrected her silently.

  “For the gentle layfolk on our panel,” Caster smiled again, “Phase One of our study will demonstrate that brute force alone is unlikely to compel an Amazon to accept defeat. We will test this hypothesis with a series of trials, and the protocol is simplicity itself. Today, as in all of these sessions, Jesstin can end her punishment at any time, simply by agreeing to sign a statement renouncing Tristaine.”

  Jess glanced at Brenna, who was skimming forms on the clipboard with an intense frown.

  “Please see section A-5 of the prospectus for a copy of the renunciation,” Caster added. She raised her voice. “All right, Mr. Jodoch!”

  Jess let her attacker advance, studying his body and lumbering gait methodically. As always at the opening of a fight, Dyan’s voice guided her. Camryn, Jess remembered randomly, actually nodded in moments like this in drills, agreeing with her mentor’s silent instruction. It wasn’t a distraction, thinking of Cam and Kyla now, or of Dyan and Shann. Jess was fighting for her adanin, and their faces strengthened her.

  Jodoch lost the mace after his first ineffectual swing. He was a powerfully built man, but he was no warrior. Jess’s knee in his soft belly slowed him down. The side of her wrist to the back of his neck dropped him. She stood brushing the grass from her hands, breathing easily, as the orderly got to his feet.

  Brenna’s neck ached with tension as she scribbled a quick summary on the clipboard, not hearing the friendly jeers of the other men as Jodoch limped back to them.

  “Well, that was hardly the bloodbath I almost hoped for!” Caster folded her arms and gave Brenna a conspiratorial nudge. “Has your tender care turned our studly Amazon into a pacifist, dear?”

  “She’s fighting without harm.” Brenna shifted away from Caster. “It’s how we drill. It’s a technique that limits the injury inflicted on an opponent.”

  “Ah. Jesstin’s only prudent choice, given her status.”

  “Yes.” Brenna knew very well that the men Jess faced fought under no such restraint. The next man, Karney, was just as big as Jodoch, and more experienced. He wielded a dagger. Jess disarmed and pinned him, but he scored a shallow cut across the top of her chest before she did. High whistles rose among the men at this first drawing of blood, and Brenna gripped the clipboard.

  “You’ll note that after finishing off one challenger, Jesstin immediately turns to meet the next.” There was a note of pride in Caster’s narration. “Our own fine Clinic staff can’t quite claim that level of endurance.” She called teasingly, “Correct, Mr. Jodoch? I see you’re still a bit winded!”

  Brenna’s lips were sore because she kept scrubbing them with her hand—a sign her younger sister would recognize as craving for a drink. She didn’t know the third orderly who jogged out to face Jess. They were becoming interchangeable in their pads and helmets, but he carried a standard issue Prison baton. He connected a few times before Jess took him out, including two solid blows to her lower back.

  She’s tiring, Brenna thought, she has to be. The Amazon was an excellent fighter, certainly the best she’d ever seen, but she was not superhuman. It took Jess longer to finish the fourth bout, with a man swinging a vigorous hand scythe.

  When he finally limped off the field, Jess used the brief recovery time to store as much oxygen in her blood as possible. As she waited for her fifth opponent to emerge from the trio of padded men by the far wall, she admitted that soon the respites between matches wouldn’t be enough. She didn’t feel the pain of numerous minor strikes yet, but they were adding up. All Dyan would ask is that she fight well, Jess reminded herself, and accept defeat with honor. She could manage that.

  “Ladies and gentlemen, difficult as it may be, try not to get caught up in the excitement, drama, and age-old allure of the arena!” Caster paused while Stuart fumbled to focus the lens on her again. “We’ll give Jesstin a moment to recover while we summarize our findings this morning. You’ll note that, far from requesting an end to this trial, our warlike subject seems quite at ease in her natural habitat. Well, let’s take Jesstin at her word and up the ante, shall we?” Caster turned and waved to the three men still standing. “All three of the rest of you, please!”

  “Three at once?” Brenna’s tone was sharper than she intended. “Why?”

  Caster’s sunny smile vanished. “Lower your voice, Brenna. That mike is sensitive.” She clasped her arm to steer her away from the camera. “All of this was covered thoroughly in the briefing yesterday, dear, that you were apparently too ill to attend. However, I will repeat, just for you, that this trial is continuing because Jesstin has not yet conceded defeat. Do you have any clinical objections?”

  “Well, Caster, yeah.” Brenna tried for a light note while she watched the three men surround Jess. “We don’t want to kill her, do we? On the first day?”

  “Brenna, don’t be dramatic.” Caster’s fingers tightened on her arm, but her voice was only gently chiding. “Clinic orderlies and Prison guards are hardly gladiator material. They won’t kill Jesstin today, or even disable her. Phase One consists of at least three trials. Stop fretting, Brenna. Just observe.”

  The three remaining opponents formed a rough triangle around Jess, who waited, braced, her head turned slightly to detect any warning whisper of boots on grass. Her bare torso gleamed under the sun as she steadied her breathing. Red patches here and there stood out against her tanned skin, marking successful blows from earlier bouts. Blood glistened at the base of her throat from the dagger’s cut.

  One of the men she faced now held a net ready, another a quarterstaff, and the third, Dugan, a doubled length of thick chain. Jess brushed her sweat-soaked hair out of her eyes, amazed. These City men fought like children, surrounding her efficiently, but dancing in place, waiting to attack one at a time. She thought, rather sourly, that she should feel gratified that witnessing four previous matches had instilled such caution in her opponents, but she knew their hesitation wouldn’t last long. It didn’t.

  “Full force, please,” Caster called. “Avoid the head, Mr. Dugan. I’m watching you!”

  Sometime during the next fifteen minutes, Brenna realized that she was probably lucky to be alive. The drills she’d run with Jesstin the previous week had been child’s play to the Amazon. Even fighting without harm, she was a blur of whirling kicks and expertly targeted strikes. In spite of Brenna’s considerable hand-to-hand skills, Jess could have taken her out, fatally, at almost any time. And regardless of Caster’s illusions, Brenna knew that Jesstin of Tristaine could have wiped the field with these men, if she were free to use real force.

  The round lasted a long time. Too long. The three men couldn’t quite pin Jess, and they couldn’t keep her cornered for long, but they could and did overwhelm her whenever possible. Blood made a second appearance after Dugan slapped the chains across her upper back, digging shallow cuts.

  Brenna scrubbed her hand across her mouth again, but made herself watch.

  Jess found herself deep in the battle haze Dyan described so eloquently around Tristaine’s storyfires. She didn’t much like it there. She never had
. Neither had Dyan, which was one reason she had been loved in Tristaine, as well as respected. The detached fury did feel familiar, though, and Jess was grateful for it now. It kept Kyla and Camryn clearly centered in her mind.

  Then the man carrying the staff took a roundhouse swing and batted her in the gut. She grunted and dropped to her knees in the grass.

  “Hold it!” Brenna’s cry seemed to burst out of her. The men lowered their weapons, panting, and watched her stride toward them. “You three, back off!”

  They stepped back obediently, even Dugan. Jess thought that was odd until she caught a glimpse of Brenna’s fierce expression. Damned if the girl didn’t look like an enraged Shann on the warpath.

  Caster rolled her eyes and slapped the clipboard against her thigh, but she didn’t stop her. “All right. Cut, Stuart.”

  Brenna dropped to her knees in front of Jess and eased her back into a sitting position as she pulled air into her lungs.

  “Jesstin?” Brenna took her damp face in her hands. “Talk to me.”

  “Good call,” Jess gasped. “I needed the break.”

  “Lean back. Let me see.”

  Jess rested back on her extended arms, and Brenna passed her hands carefully over the flat planes of her belly. “Does this hurt? Any tenderness? It looked like you were clubbed right in the liver.”

  “No, he just winded me.”

  “Jesstin.” Brenna stared at the bleeding cut beneath Jess’s throat. “All you have to do to end this is sign a form. Or just go down, but do one or the other!”

  “I’ll go down soon enough,” Jess acknowledged.

  Brenna gripped her arm tightly. “I know that,” she snapped. “So does Caster! If you know it too, why drag it out?”

  “All right, Brenna, please.” Caster was tapping her pen against her board. “You—Mr. Jodoch? Are you functional again? And—I’m sorry—Karney? You are too? But Mr. Barbeler is nursing a broken hand. Well, the two of you, please join in again.”

  “Don’t pull that macha Amazon crap now, Jesstin.” Brenna’s voice was strained. “Go down.”

  Jess said nothing, but put out an arm.

  Brenna swallowed, then helped her to her feet. Then she left the fighting circle, and the five men surrounded the prisoner.

  Jess steadied herself, nodded that she was ready, and they attacked. The break had helped her. She fought with a cool economy again, rationing her strength, keeping a steady eye on her closest opponent. She returned their blows in a controlled and violent dance that held its own alien beauty, and two of her opponents dropped quickly.

  But her revival couldn’t last, and Brenna knew it, even before Jess took Dugan’s roundhouse right to the jaw and fell a second time.

  Brenna turned to Caster. “Okay, stop the trial.”

  “What? Again?” Caster frowned. “Brenna, look, she’s getting up.”

  “It doesn’t matter. Stop the trial. Jesstin isn’t going to give in today, Caster. They’ll just keep beating her until she sustains a serious injury. That becomes more likely as she tires.”

  “Brenna—”

  “I’m her medical advocate. I say she’s had enough for today. That’s my prerogative, and it’s my call. Now stop the trial.”

  Caster let out a long breath, watching Jess sway on her feet. Karney clubbed her hard across the back, and she fell again.

  “Caster!” Brenna’s eyes snapped with angry light.

  “All right. Stuart? Stop the tape.” Caster folded the clipboard in one arm and clapped her hands. “Gentlemen, thank you for your assistance. That will be all for this morning.”

  Jess’s first opponent, Jodoch, extended his large hand to the fallen Amazon. After a moment she accepted it and let him pull her to her feet.

  “Brenna, perhaps you’re right.” Caster appraised her assistant. “It is the medical advocate’s responsibility to protect the subject’s physical welfare. I don’t want you to think I doubt your professional judgment. And actually…this was a fair place to conclude this trial. We can call it a success.”

  “A success.” Brenna watched Jess bend and rest her hands on her knees, her lean sides heaving as she pulled for air.

  “Well, we wanted to establish a baseline,” Caster explained. “We didn’t force Jesstin to fight to complete exhaustion, but that’s all right. We’ve documented her resistance. We know how far we can push her in one session and still keep her conscious. That’s valuable information for future trials.”

  Brenna felt a cold dread snake through her. “She’ll be doing this again?”

  “Well, no, not this exact protocol. Really, Brenna, that briefing was important.” Caster rummaged in the pocket of her lab coat and checked her pager. “Tsk. Wouldn’t you think a man with two doctorates could look after two reasonably responsible youngsters for just one morning without constant guidance? The second trial isn’t for a few days, Brenna. We’ll give Jesstin adequate time to recuperate.”

  “Recuperate for what? What’s the proto—?”

  “Take our mighty warrior over there back to her cell, yes? It’s all right to treat her injuries, Brenna, but remember, no analgesics.”

  Caster raised her voice as she followed the trailing orderlies out of the arena’s enclosure. “Mr. Barbeler, I am so sorry about your hand! Let me make a quick call and I’ll splint you myself.”

  The man named Barbeler didn’t seem to feel Caster’s sympathetic pat as she passed him. He stopped and looked back at Jess. He could have been just a big farm kid before he became a Prison guard. He stared at Jess, cradling his injured wrist in one freckled hand. Then he nodded at her before turning away, an oddly respectful bobbing of the head.

  Jess lifted her chin slightly in response. Then she bent, stiffly, and tried to snag her black shirt off the grass with two fingers. Brenna was there in time to hand it to her. Jess blinked the sweat out of her eyes so she could see her. Brenna’s lips seemed chafed and raw.

  “I need to take a look at you.” Brenna hovered as Jess painfully eased the shirt over her bare shoulders, then moved to adjust the fabric around her neck. “Can you make it to the detention wing?”

  “I’m on my feet, Brenna,” Jess said shortly.

  She turned her head and spat red into the grass. When she turned back, she moved her head too fast and caught a moment of dizziness. Brenna put her hands on her patient’s chest to steady her, and their eyes met again.

  Jess’s awareness spiraled down to Brenna’s soft hands bracing her and the shadowed eyes searching her battered face. She groaned inwardly. Amazon lust after battle was such a tired cliché. And she was such a tired Amazon.

  It was like bracing a tree, Brenna thought. Winded, bloody and battered, gleaming with sweat, Jess towered over her like a cresting wave. She was stunned by an almost overpowering urge to slide her hands into Jess’s open shirt and run her palms over the corded muscles of her back. Not to comfort her patient, but to find protection herself in the strength of those arms. Unsettled, Brenna dropped her hands and stepped back.

  Jess started wearily toward the arena exit.

  They were halfway across the field when they heard it, a distant, heavy tapping. It sounded like a block of wood hitting plastic, muted, but regular and insistent. Jess turned and looked toward the source of the sound, the Prison next door.

  Brenna was focused entirely on getting her patient back to her cell before she had to call for a stretcher, but something in Jess’s sudden stillness made her turn too. “What is it?”

  She followed Jess’s alert gaze toward the looming brick building at the outer perimeter of the Prison’s electrified fence. The cinder-block wall was pocked with oblong windows, thick plates of glass laced with iron mesh. At the closest window, Brenna saw the outline of two figures—young women.

  One of them, the taller one, raised a fist. The other, Brenna caught a flash of lush red hair, lifted her black prison shirt over her head and began a shimmying dance.

  Brenna looked up at Jess and saw her tight
smile before she turned and continued toward the exit. Her gaze shot back to the Prison window. The two figures had vanished. Brenna trotted a step to catch up with Jess.

  “Brenna—”

  “The sun was in my eyes,” Brenna said. “I couldn’t see through the glare.”

  Jess allowed herself a moment of relief.

  Camryn and Kyla might indeed fail to survive their sojourn in the City, because if Jess ever saw them again, she was going to strangle them herself. She didn’t want to hear about how light security was in the mess hall. That stunt had been both dangerous and pointless.

  But seeing them again returned the steel to Jess’s aching spine, at least until she was sure she had passed out of sight of the Prison wall. She made it back to the detention cell without resorting to the indignity of Brenna’s support, but it was a long hike.

  *

  Brenna flipped on the arc lamp over the restrainer and began setting out medical supplies. Jess limped to the sink and scrubbed her face and arms with cold water.

  The silence was almost comfortable for a moment.

  “Do you know if you’re allergic to aneascin?” Brenna peered at an amber vial through the light. “I put in an order for some. It’s less caustic than the tecathenese.” Her tone held an appropriate note of light professional concern.

  “Soap and water will do as well.” Jess dried her face in a white towel. Most of the marks on her face had stopped bleeding. “You can go home, Brenna, if you want. There’s nothing I can’t take care of myself.”

  Brenna took the towel out of Jess’s hands and tossed it on the sink. “I don’t come and go at your behest, Jesstin. You know that.”

  She took her arm and drew her beneath the wash of light from the lamp. The bunched muscle beneath her fingers tightened, and Brenna touched the stunner at her belt. The impulse shamed her. Jess stood obediently in front of the restrainer while Brenna tilted her face to see the swelling capping one high cheek.