Beyond Varallan (21 page)

“Sorry. Yes, there was a light or something that flashed, just for a moment. I thought it was from an internal scanner.” Even as I said that, I realized how silly it sounded. Jorenian scanners didn’t produce light. “I really didn't think about it.”

“Describe how it appeared to you.”

I concentrated. “Reever had linked with me to project a false image. The projection fooled the mercenary into believing we were inside the launch already. When he came back out, Reever took his rifle and stepped back. Then there was this bright flash of…“ I halted. ”Not a flash. Something else.“ I shook my head, frustrated. ”Why can’t I remember?“

“It is understandable. You were under extreme duress.” Ndo appeared sympathetic, but I heard the same frustration in his tone.

“Why are you concerned about the light? Do you think it had anything to do with—” My eyes widened as I remembered. “Fasala saw some kind of light, too. Just before her accident in the cargo bay. A
ring
of light!”

“That is what you saw?”

“Yes! It
wasn’t
a flash, but a perfect circle.” I was excited as the image finally sifted to the top of my sluggish memory. “Large, perfectly circular, about two meters in diameter. White with a prismatic edge. It couldn’t have lasted more than a tenth of a second.”

“Two meters?” Ndo seized on that. “You’re certain of the dimensions?”

“Of course. Why?”

“The damage to the buffer was calculated to be the same area, given the amount of alloy recovered from the injured.”

“You’re kidding.” I sat back in my chair. “It could have been the same thing Fasala saw, then.”

Ndo nodded as he keyed the information on his data pad.

I speculated out loud. “So what do we have on the ship that creates a two-meter circle of light, slices through adaptable sonic alloy, and dissolves living bone and tissue?”

“Nothing,” Ndo said as he continued entering the data.

While I waited, I went over the shift when Fasala had been brought in. Squilyp and I had argued over how to detect the buffer shards. Roelm had said something…

“The Engineer described equipment used to fit the buffers on ships. He said the technology was based on sound.”

“Harmonicutters.’

“Do you have any those laying around somewhere?”

Ndo shook his head. “They are too large. The vessels they are used on must be docked in specially designed bays in a specific region on our homeworld.”

“There is no such thing as a
portable
harmonicutter?”

“Not to my knowledge.”

That wasn’t exactly a
no
. “How does a harmonicutter work?“ Ndo gave me a slightly exasperated look. ”Please, it’s important.“

“It produces continuous, high-intensity energy, Healer. Rather like your surgical lasers, only a harmonicutter uses sound instead of light. Its sonic beam converts raw alloy material into the dimensions required on the particular vessel being fitted.”

“This sonic beam, is it composed entirely of sound waves?”

“Yes.”

In the past, extracorporeal shock-wave lithotripsy, or ultrasonic waves, had been used to break up kidney and upper ureteral stones on Terra. The primitive procedure often caused mild to moderate cellular damage at the entry and exit points.

This harmonicutter was obviously much more powerful. If used on a living being, would such focused sonic energy have a more lethal effect? It would explain the absence of any toxin and why their insides had been turned into liquid, too.

“Roelm and the mercenary could have been murdered using a sonic beam of that intensity,” I explained my theory to Ndo.

“A harmonicutter is not as focused as a laser, as the energy it generates is utilized on immense areas. A harmonicutter used as you describe would destroy everything within at least a ten-meter radius. You and Linguist Reever would not have survived.”

Okay, so my theory had some holes in it.

“Tell me something. Who on board the
Sunlace
would know how to operate a harmonicutter?”

He looked thoughtful. “Most of our engineers and senior helm staff. Roelm, of course. Xonea, Captain Pnor, and myself as well.”

No help there, that was about a hundred people. Too many to make a viable list of suspects. I pushed a tired hand through my hair.

“S.O., may I continue this discussion with you after I’ve had time to think about it?” I was feeling distinctly ridiculous, fighting off a continuous wave of yawns. Surely I hadn't overdosed myself. Had I?

“Of course.” He rose and offered his hand as I struggled from my seat. “Are you feeling ill, Healer?”

“I’ve had better days, Ndo. Thank you for your patience.”

I trudged off to the gyrlift and took it up to my quarters. Dhreen was waiting for me just outside my door panel. He tried to talk me into a game of whump-ball. I yawned in his face.

“Too tired,” I waved my hand. “Later.”

“Does this have anything to do with the fact you and Reever aren’t speaking to each other? Again?” Dhreen's guileless eyes glinted.

“None of your business.” I barely had enough energy to key myself in. The door panel closed behind me. I was in trouble, I thought. My sluggish brain finally processed the fact that this was not a natural weariness.

Nothing could make me
this
tired. I’d been drugged again.

I reached up and hit the comm panel with an awkward swipe.

“Xonea…” I fell back and slid down the wall. “Alert… Xon—”

He was hurting me again. The man with the hard hands, who relentlessly probed my body. I screamed and writhed until I thought my lungs would burst.

“Resistance test gamma-fourteen negative,” he said. “No signs of contagion.”

“Shall I prepare the next series, Doctor?”

The dark blue eyes looked down at me. “Give me the nasal probe. I want to check the sinuses.”

“If she sounds snotty, it’s because she's been crying for an hour, Joseph!”

The woman pushed him out of the way and took me in her arms. She wrapped my naked body in something soft and warm while she glared at the man.

“Margaret, put her down.”

“You’re hurting her.”

“She will not remember any of this.”

“You hope she won’t.” The woman cradled me close, and my shrill screams died as I nuzzled instinctively at her breast. “When was the last time you fed her?”

“We must keep her stomach empty until the trial is complete.” The man made a curt sound. “It will not harm her to go without nourishment for a twenty-four-hour period.”

“Give me a bottle.”

“Put her down and leave, Margaret.”

“And if I don’t?” she demanded. “What are you going to do, Joseph? Starve me, too?”

“Put her down!”

My body was wrenched from the woman’s arms, and I heard her scream blend with mine.

Take control of the dream, Cherijo.

Take control.

Take take take
—

I was standing in a chamber, my breath burning in my chest. The presence hovered there in the depths of the shadows, just out of reach. I tried to take control, to leave that place
.

“You think you can control me, little one? Me!” The laughter was chilling. “I could crush you with a thought.”

“Then do it.” I centered my consciousness and drew strength from the sense of power it gave me. “Get it over with.”

“You know nothing of power. Watch and learn.”

Before my eyes a window appeared, one that displayed the level where I had just been interviewed by Ndo. He was still there, looking over my report, frowning and making notes on a touchpad.

“He resents his place in the succession, but would never reveal it to Pnor.”

“Leave him alone!”

“Look at him. Ever loyal, steadfast Ndo, who has yet to Choose, yet to make a child. He thinks he knows something, but his arrogance blocks insight.” The voice lowered, became almost gleeful. “Let me show him the true inner path.”

I saw a ring of light form in mid-air behind the S. O. He jerked back, falling from his chair as the light shattered over his body.

“Stop it!” I shouted.

“It is done. Now he will know the emptiness I feel.”

I watched in horror as Ndo collapsed in convulsions. He was dead in minutes.

“You killed Roelm and that mercenary, didn’t you? You bastard!”

The presence turned on me. Smashed into my mind. I couldn’t shield myself from the pounding fists. The shrill voice shrieked disjointed accusations, punctuated by more blows.

“
You let him… believed you… killed for you
…”

Another presence was there. Something vague, far beyond the battering hands. The other spoke to me.

Cherijo. Wake up. You must wake up.

“
… make you wish… never born
…”
the first one was screaming. I couldn’t take much more. I reached out, desperate to escape
.

Cherijo. Wake up. Wake up!

“Cherijo!”

Someone slapped me, hard.

“Wake up!”

I fell out of the dream, and found myself in a convulsive state. Pain clutched at me. I curled up in a fetal position, automatically trying to protect my injuries. Literally every single inch of my flesh throbbed in agony. My eyes fluttered open when six-fingered hands touched me.

Xonea rolled me onto my back. I was on the deck. Then the world went black.

The next thing I knew the big pilot was running, carrying me in his arms. I fought to keep my eyes open.

“Ndo?” Strong hands kept me from getting loose. “Ndo! He’s in trouble!”

“Be calm, Cherijo. You are injured.”

I fell unconscious again, and woke up on an exam table. The Senior Healer was leaning over me.

“Tonetka? Ndo!” I tried to hurl myself off the table. Xonea’s face appeared on the other side. Now his hands held me down. “I have to—”

“Remain still, Healer.” Tonetka opened my tunic and performed a brisk, thorough examination. Xonea averted his eyes, while I glanced down. Saw more bruises forming on my pale skin. A lot more.

“Tonetka.” She met my gaze. “What the hell happened?”

“You were beaten,” Xonea said, his voice low and filled with dangerous menace. Now he looked, memorizing each mark.

I sagged back on the exam pad. “Then it’s too late.”

“Too late?” Tonetka echoed.

“Ndo. He’s dead. Whoever did this killed him.”

I was confined to a berth in Medical Bay. Again.

“Anaphylactoid purpura,” Tonetka said a day later. “Severe ecchymoses and petechiae. Three reasons you will stay in that berth, Healer, until I advise you differently.”

“We’ve done this before, remember?” I said. “I won last time.”

She clutched a scanner and passed it over me. “The last time you were my patient, you did not have ruptured blood vessels over virtually every centimeter of your epidermis!”

“No, I had a stroke and two heart attacks. That was a lot worse than a couple of bruises.”

Tonetka muttered something that the nurse next to her overheard. The younger Jorenian woman’s eyes rounded. “Senior Healer!”

“She’ll never do it,” I told the nurse. “And if she tries, I'll thump her.”

“I would be greatly entertained by such an attempt!” Tonetka said.

A resident came over, brave enough to enter the fray. “Senior Healer. Healer Cherijo. You are disturbing the other patients.”

“See?” I glared at her. “You’re disturbing the other patients. Now give me my clothes, so I can get up and strangle you myself.”

“I should have induced a coma!” Tonetka said. Was that gesture she made a nonverbal obscenity? “Divert your path with your Terran stupidity. I will
dance
at your death ceremony.” She stalked off to her next patient.

The news confirming Ndo’s death had left both Tonetka and me with frayed tempers, I thought, and sighed.

“Pig-headed old witch.” I shrugged at the wide-eyed nurse. “What’s worse is she's probably right.”

Later, one of the residents offered me an analgesic for my bruises, but I refused. My mind was muddled enough. I didn’t want to take a chance and slip into another unprotected sleep.

The next time I might not wake up.

The crew heard, of course, and many stopped by to visit me. The Senior Healer spent more time that day chasing HouseClan Torin out of Medical than she did examining the patients. The only thing I was allowed to receive was a package.

“What’s this?” I turned the slim box over in my hands.

“Our passenger from Garnot sent it for you,” the Senior Healer said. “Dhreen related the nature of your injuries to him, and he wished you to have this.”

I opened the lid, and removed a thin, golden cuff. “Wow. Nice bauble.”

“One he claims will heal the body and soothe the soul.”

“If it does, you’ll be out of a job,” I said, admiring the pretty thing. I slipped it over my hand, but it was a little too big for my wrist.

“Traders will say anything to peddle their wares,” Tonetka said as she examined me, then instructed one of the residents to cover the ward until the Omorr reported for his shift.

“Hey, where are you going?”