Authors: Anne McCaffrey
Amariyah instantly put the flowers down and laid her hands delicately on Peter’s right arm.
“Do you hurt?” she asked, gently touching each of the break sites as if to reassure herself.
“I can’t hurt, honey. My body has no feeling, you know.”
“That doesn’t mean you can’t hurt,” she replied, her fingers lingering. Then she reached into her pocket and pulled out a carefully folded square. “Where shall I put it?” she asked, unfolding the paper.
Peter identified the drawing as a copy of his talisman, the diagram of the
Andre Norton
.
“Good thinking, Maree. Over there, right across from the bed. Stick it over that stupid print. Did you bring tape?”
She nodded, bringing the roll out of the other pocket. “I knew you’d need this to help you get well,” she told Peter.
Alerted by their voices, Lance entered the patient’s room and helped her stick it up.
“You’re here early, Dorotea,” he said, finishing that task.
“You didn’t think I had much choice, did you?” Dorotea said dryly, indicating Amariyah.
The girl settled herself on the chair at the foot of Peter’s bed and said not another word, except “thank you” when she was offered her slice of cake.
———
T
he staff of Henry Hudson Hospital began to notice the various notable people who came to visit the young multiple-fracture case on the thirty-sixth floor of the medical ziggurat. Rhyssa, who came daily, was identified by one of the empaths in the hospital as the head of the Eastern Parapsychic Center. The fact that there were LEO guards posted in the waiting room on Peter’s hall was soon common gossip. The floor nurses mentioned that he was a nice young man, not at all demanding, unfailingly polite, cute in a “young” way, and very personable. One oddity, though, was that he had not been prescribed pain medication, despite having six fractures and severe contusions. Everyone loved a mystery, which spiced up dull and repetitive duties no end. And he had such visitors! LEO Commissioner Boris Roznine was recognized. He arrived with his twin brother, Sascha, and Sascha’s exotic-looking young wife, Tirla. She and her husband were in every day. Jerhattan Mayor Teresa Aiello paid several short visits. But when General John Greene, on whom one of the radiologists had had a crush since he had survived his crash as a famous etop pilot, arrived with his wife, the Senator, in the company of Admiral Dirk Coetzer, Peter Reidinger was established as a celebrity. Their colleagues tried to find out why a nineteen-year-old boy attracted such distinguished guests and quizzed the floor nurses. Naturally, every ambulatory patient who could, found some business on the thirty-sixth floor, welcoming the diversion.
A spry older silver-haired woman and a pretty black-haired girl visited every day with flowers and homemade cakes and cookies but they weren’t relatives nor were they recognizable personages. His grandmother and perhaps his sister, though the patient bore no resemblance to either.
Of course the circumstances of the disgraceful accident were public knowledge. An entire chapter of a fraternal organization was charged with drunk and disorderly conduct as well as causing grievous bodily harm during a fracas in one of the uptown restaurants. The LEO guard made certain that no known member of the media dallied on the floor to pester the victim. Nevertheless, Peter’s amiability was sorely stretched by casual visits from fellow patients and staff.
“I don’t mind, really,” Peter told Rhyssa on the morning of his sixth day in hospital, “but I can’t even change my damned bag unless I lock the door. And then they pound on it, asking if I’m all right.”
“At least I was able to get the vid-cam turned off so you
can
be private.” She pointed to the wall brackets where a security camera had been located.
“Look, Rhys, can’t you get it through their heads that I’m okay? That I can leave here?”
“Not until those breaks begin to mend, Peter,” Rhyssa said firmly to end that argument.
“Do I have to stay in this damned bed all the time?”
“It really is wiser, Peter. You may not feel anything, but the least little jar might displace those bones. You’ve seen the scan report. You know how many fractures you have. Give them a chance. I’ll spring you from here,” and she smiled winningly, “as soon as possible. There’s no reason you can’t work from Dorotea’s, you know.”
“So this is my vacation for the year?” He ’ported his right arm up, cast and all, gesturing around the room.
“Don’t do that to me, Peter,” Rhyssa said, hand on her chest in alarm at his movement. “And no, this is sick leave. Which I don’t think you’ve claimed ever since you came to the Center. Where would you like to go to convalesce? Down to Florida … lie in the sun, swim in the sea?”
“I just want to get out of here,” he repeated, as near to sulky as Peter ever got, shaking his head from side to side on the pillows. “And I’d rather be on Padrugoi than Florida,” he added.
J
ohnny! Johnny! Please wake up, Johnny
. Peter’s urgent voice roused the general.
“Huh? What?”
Johnny, it’s Peter. Wake up!
Johnny tried to focus his eyes on the digital clock on the bedside table.
For God’s sake, d’you know the time?
She’s giving me a bath!
Who’s giving you a bath?
Johnny gave the clock a second look. Yes, it was three-thirty in the morning.
The nurse
.
Which one?
Johnny said, suddenly quite alert and grinning.
Does it matter which one?
Peter’s voice sounded desperate.
I had a bath this morning!
If you don’t want a bath, or anything else, dump her in the corridor, with the bathwater, lock the door, and let me get back to sleep
.
He settled the covers over his shoulders and snuggled up to his wife’s warm body. He wondered if it was the redheaded nurse who had tried to seduce the kid.
A
s far as Johnny knew, Peter followed his advice; neither made mention of that three-thirty
A.M
. call. During his morning visit the next day, he avoided eye contact. He did notice that Peter’s face was flushed when he entered. So Johnny became all business. He’d brought with him some of the elements that were waiting to be transported, one way or another, to the Moon Base.
“I know this accident has put us all off schedule, Pete,” Johnny said, pulling a chair closer to the bed. “And it’s going to affect their perception of you.”
“Why? I didn’t
have
an accident, it happened
to
me.”
“I know, I know, Pete. But you’re going to have to convalesce and pass their physical before you’ll be allowed back up to the Station.”
At the flow of indignant curses Peter let out, Johnny realized that one facet of his education had been remarkably enhanced during his Station employment.
“Where’d you learn all that?” asked the general.
“Oh, the grunts are colorful.”
“Just don’t let Rhyssa or Dorotea hear that kind of language, or my name’ll be mud.”
“I’m not stupid,” Peter said sharply.
“Never thought you were, Pete. Well, to the matter at hand. Dirk’s on our side,” Johnny said, passing sheets over that Peter “held” in front of him. “Especially after I showed him the Bollard Thrust. I’ve been saving that one for a propitious moment. But we’ve now got to overcome the reaction to your broken bones.”
“It’s not my bones that teleport,” Peter said in an angry sullen tone. He
hated
hospitals. He
hated
nurses—especially after last night’s incident. He
had
dumped the bathwater on her after he had kinetically ejected her from his room. Bet she hadn’t known he could do
that!
But the incident
had upset him a great deal. She’d thought he was helpless. Everyone thought he was helpless: built like one of those beanpoles in Amariyah’s vegetable garden. No one knew what he could
really
do if he set his mind to it. Even himself! Then he caught Johnny’s blink of surprise and he tried to suppress his anger and deep frustration.
Johnny had never heard that tone from him. Peter was invariably good-humored and willing. He wondered if he should have responded differently to that early morning conversation. He shot a sideways glance at his profile. Pete wasn’t bad looking, in a young sort of way. He had the sort of features that would age well. And right now, he’d have an especial appeal that could easily rouse feminine lust. Or was it the mothering instinct that Pete awakened?
“We always bill you as the mind-over-matter kid, skeleteam,” Johnny said in a careless drawl. “So let’s use that strength to our advantage. Now the design of these babies,” and he indicated the glossies of the grossly clumsy freighters that Peter was examining. “Originally, we were shoving projectiles, especially devised to break free of gravity and penetrate an atmosphere. These,” and he flicked one with his finger that was a collection of diversely shaped objects secured to a framework, “wouldn’t last in gravity but should be easy to maneuver in space.”
Peter moved that one out of the hovering pack and examined it closely. He gave a little snort and glanced down at the manifest, noting its dimensions and mass.
“We shifted heavier stuff than this from Earth to Padrugoi,” Peter responded, slightly indignant. “If nothing’s fallen off it before now, it won’t in a ’portation.”
“I figured that out myself,” Johnny said caustically. “I know, you know, Lance knows, Dirk knows. No one—except Rhyssa—thought you could land a shuttle in a monsoon at Dhaka. You did. Only a few folks thought you could shift heavy drones from surface to Station, too. We’ll just have to shift something like these, the pickup sticks” and he added the picture of a massive bundle of plasteel girders to those orbiting Peter’s face, “to convince their plodding earthbound minds.”
Peter made a face. “They’re not that massive.”
“Neither were the chips you sent to Lance,” Johnny said.
Peter shot him a glance. “These are not that light,” and quickly he broke eye contact, flushing again.
“It’s still a matter of mathematics, Pete,” Johnny reminded him. “And you don’t have to cope with gravity. Just a slow easy thrust … sending the load on its way.”
Peter’s expression altered from outright denial to thoughtful consideration.
“Look, Pete, you keep telling me that all you need is a place to stand. Right?” And when Peter hesitated, Johnny went on. “So you stand on Padrugoi and ’port to First Base. You’d have all that power available and that’s megawatts more than you had for the monsoon caper. Even more than in Florida, until I made them upgrade the power system.” Johnny’s lips twitched, remembering just how quickly he’d been able to get funding for additional power once Barchenka started seeing the supply shuttles homing in. The bitch had been good for something.
“But that’s still a lot of mass to shift!”
“Okay, so we shift mass!”
“We?” Peter caught him up on the use of that pronoun with an ironic grin.
“Yeah, yeah, this time I’d be in the ’port, I promise you,” and Johnny crossed his heart. “But I proved to you that you could shift something all the way to the Moon, didn’t I? So, we build on that. We use windows when the Moon’s at perigee in respect to the Station.”
“That only cuts it down about fifty thousand klicks.” Peter was still skeptical.
“Every bit helps,” Johnny blithely reminded him. “Or,” and he pretended to submit a second option, “we could send lighter components. Reassembly’s an option, you know. First Base has the technicians.”
“Is Lance back up there?”
“No, but he could be,” Johnny reassured him. “We could push and Lance could catch. No matter how little or how much we send on its way, First Base is that much further ahead. Look, it’s put-up or shut-up time, Pete. Fuel’s just gone up in cost and you know how much those guzzling freighters take to break loose from the Padrugoi orbit. Dirk’s counting on you, too. If we don’t show the Space Authority a cheaper way to continue with our expansion into this system,” and Johnny paused a beat to emphasize his next words, “they might abandon it entirely.”
“
No!
” Peter jerked upright at that, staring in alarm at the general, his face paling at the thought.
“Well, I wouldn’t like that any more than you would, Pete. We’d both be out of the jobs we love. So, look this stuff over. Get familiar with the shape and mass of them. Think hard about just easing them,” and Johnny linked his hands, emulating wings gliding through the air, “where they need to go.” He dumped the pile of pictures onto Peter’s lap. “Hell, for that matter,” and this was an honest inspiration, “we could get them to set up a midway station. All I’m asking you to do now is think about it.”
Peter looked over at the door and Johnny heard the click as he locked it. “People barge in here all the time.” He activated the electrical unit that altered the bed into a sitting position. He rearranged the pictures into a semicircle in the air around him.
“Whatever suits you, Pete.” Johnny settled back down on the chair by the bed and, crossing his legs, idly swung one foot as his partner looked keenly at each picture.
There was a tentative knock on the door. “Who is it?” Johnny called.
“Nurse Roche,” was the reply.
Peter’s eyes rounded and he shook his head vigorously.
Don’t let her in!
“Come back in a few minutes, Nurse,” Johnny called, without interrupting the motion of his swinging foot. He kept his expression bland. “D’you think those girders will give us a problem?”
“Uh? Oh, no, I don’t think so.” Peter glanced back at the specs, glad to concentrate on them. “Those plasglass panels might. Odd shapes.”
He hadn’t looked at more than three sheets before there was another knock on the door.
“Who is it?” Johnny called.
“Dorotea and Amariyah,”was the muffled response.
“Oh, in that case, advance and be recognized,” Johnny quipped, unlocking the door and standing up. He swept a low bow to the visitors, laden with flowers and Peter’s favorite cookies.
Johnny didn’t stay long after that but took the sheets with him. “Top secret, you know. ’Bye, now,” and he waggled his fingers at Dorotea and Amariyah.