Richard

Richard

written by Aelius Blythe

idea by Travis McCrea

First Smashwords Edition

October 2012

#FuckCopyright

"Bandages! We–we can just get some fresh
one–"

"No."

"–and–and some... disinfectant or–"

"Not likely."

"–or whatever. Something like that. Can't be
that hard to find, right? "

"Wrong."

Richard shook his head. "No, it can't be." He
tapped one dirty finger on the useless keyboard, then tried to wipe
away the bloody print it left there. His head wagged back and forth
absently. "No, it can't be too hard to find some.... stuff. It
can't
be. Whatever we need. I'll make a list an–"

"It is." Grimm blew a sigh out from between
clenched teeth. "It really is."

"It's a planet of... of...
some–I–don't–know–billion! They have to have
medical
supplies.
"

"They do. Just not for us."

"Why the fuck not?"

Grimm shrugged. "It's expensive."

"But–"

"It really is, Rich. Just... just don't worry
about it."

"But how can–
shit!
" Richard jerked his
hand off of his knee as his mind registered the warm pool spreading
over it and the drips starting to tickle his shin. He looked down.
The blood was completely soaked into his jeans. "Dammit."
Just
made these too...

"Sorry," said Grimm, his voice muffled
against his hand pressed over his mouth.

Richard shook his head, moving his fist, with
Grimm's blood now oozing out from between his fingers, over the
table. He opened his hand and let go of the bloody rag. Then he
wiped his hand on his already-ruined jeans.

"Don't be sorry," he said. "It's okay."

"Really, dude... sor–"

"Shut up, it's not your fault. I'll just make
some more. Later."
Really not the most pressing issue now...
He shook his head in frustration. "
Dammit.
"

"Sor–"

"Shut up," Richard said again, and forced his
lips to curl into something resembling a smile. "It's not
important. We need to get you patched up. Let me just find a place
an–"

"No. Really. There's nothing on this planet.
Not for us anyway."

Richard shook his head.

He looked at his friend and the knee-to-ankle
gash that was still oozing blood. The t-shirt Grimm was now
attempting to wrap around the wound was already spotted red, and
the bruise under his coarse blond–and–blood–streaked leg hair
looked bigger than it had a second ago.

Grimm looked up and met Richard's stare. He
abandoned the t-shirt and grabbed the ice pack laying on the table
by the bloody rag. Pressed over the wound, the calming blue pack
hid the worst of it.

Fucking idiot!
The epithets swirling
in Richard's head were only directed at himself.
You need to fix
this.
"We'll just... " he started but trailed off.
We'll
just what?
"We'll–we'll just have to find another way."

"Don't worry about it–sorry!" Grimm had waved
a hand, flicking blood around the room. "Sorry. But don't. I'll be
fine."

Richard looked away. It
couldn't
be
that hard to get the supplies they needed. Just a few clean
bandages and some antiseptic.
Pain killers.
.. he added
silently to the list watching Grimm grit his teeth and clench his
fist around the calming blue cold pack, now also streaked red.
Sleep aids maybe...
But just the basics would do. At the
very least. There had to be somewhere around here that could get
them just the basics.
Any
planet with a population this size
had those, or something close.

Finally, Richard just shrugged. "Okay," he
said.

Grimm didn't look up.

Richard nodded anyway. "Okay," he said. "I'm
going to, um... go get some air. You'll be okay?"

Grimm wasn't paying attention. The ice pack
had slid down to the floor, and Grimm was now leaning over his
hands that were cupped like a bowl in front of his mouth, his face
turning green. His eyes were carefully focused on the table leg,
like he was trying to avoid the sight of his own mangled one.

Richard wiped his hands again on his already
bloody clothes, made his way through the mess of the crash and
stepped out onto the primitive planet.

**********

To be fair, it wasn't
that
primitive.
Richard had seen worse.

He'd made for the nearest blob of lights when
the ride'd started to get too rough for comfort. Now, even as he
walked through open fields with short, hard stalks stabbing his
shoes, the night was not dark. Light bubbled up here and there from
lamps on his right that shone on a road and a long wire strung
above it. And in the distance the light was denser, brighter. But
even without the light bubble of the city, he'd have known they
were parked next to civilization. Pieces of plastic dotted the
fields; paper rustled between the dried leaves; here and there a
rusted something clinked under Richard's shoes.

Litter always marked civilization.

Richard walked – trudged, more like it,
plodding along without plan, without strategy, almost randomly – in
the general direction of the light for a few minutes. But after a
little while, his head cleared from the walk, he paused and
squatted down at the corner of the field. He dug around in his
pocket and pulled out his guide. The screen lit up in the shadowy
field like a beacon and he hurriedly poked it a few times before it
dimmed.

Please be close enough...

The networks on this planet were weak, barely
reaching over its own surface. He'd heard of stranded travelers
before – stuck out in Earth's nowhere, out of the reach of the Home
signal and the Earth's networks. The little planet's signal had
flickered in and out as they flew in...

But he wasn't
that
lost.

After some more poking and prodding, he had
piggybacked onto the Earth's net and set to looking around for
something that could help Grimm. He jabbed the keys of the guide in
increasing frustration. Page after page flipped by. Link after link
after link led him in circles.

It didn't matter.

No one here had what he needed.

No one here had much of anything.

Richard snorted in frustration as he scrolled
through pages of stuff he didn't need. Books. Movies. Songs. Games.
Fucking
games!
Nothing useful. He was starting to see why
Grimm had told him not to bother.

The Earth's networks had been scrubbed.

Richard threw the guide onto the dried field
where it glowed dully at him. He rested his head in his hands and
took a breath.

So the Earth's networks didn't have what he
needed. He'd find it himself.

The impoverished Earth networks still had
some
things that were useful, after all: they had maps. Of
everything. And for now, that seemed like the best help Richard
could hope for. So he picked up the guide and poked at it a few
more times until a map glowed on the screen with a cheery "You are
here!"

He studied the mess of streets and buildings
for a few minutes, and then he got up and began to walk again in
the direction of the city lights.

He didn't have far to go.

As the litter beneath his feet got thicker,
civilization got nearer.

**********

H

Richard glared at the blue sign with the
white letter on it. It was the third he'd seen. But a second later
his eyes focused on the space about a hundred yards beyond the "H"
sign, to another sign, bigger and brighter:

Emergency

Richard jogged towards it. In a minute, he
was under the sign. Then a pair of glass doors parted in front of
him and he walked into the hospital.

For a spot labeled "Emergency," it was
weirdly calm. Long lights lined up on the ceiling cast a cheery
glow around paisley couches and a close-cropped carpet. A lady read
a magazine. A girl lay on her side, yawning, swinging one foot over
the side of the couch. Behind a wide desk, a woman filed her nails.
Beside the desk, to its right, some more cheery light spilled out
from a hallway.

Richard walked towards the desk.

Then he caught himself.

Earth was an insular planet, not friendly to
visitors. Or so Richard had heard.

He stood for a moment, just a few feet away
from the desk, one foot hovering in a half-step for a indecisive
moment. No one at the desk looked up. Nobody in the waiting room
paid him any attention as he stood mutely in the middle of the
room. A second later he twisted his course, headed passed the desk
and made it to the hallway beyond. He looked over his shoulder.

The desk woman rubbed the edge of one nail
against her thumb then went back to filing.

He'd find what he needed himself.

Richard turned his back on them and wandered
down the hall.

What now?

His feet kept moving. It was a hospital – it
had to have
something
. He kept moving, without a strategy,
walking and walking and walking down the glowing hallways, past
rooms with doctors, rooms with empty beds, rooms with bored looking
nurses and tables and TVs. And he kept walking. There
had
to
be something. Something useful...

Finally, finally, he saw it:

Department of Supplies

He'd just turned round a corner, and there it
was. He smiled at the sign – giant black letters hanging above a
second set of sliding glass doors. He tried not to trip over his
own feet as he almost ran towards it.

He smiled and nodded to the two big men
standing on either side of the doorway. The doors slid open, and
the sound of a hundred printers churning away filled the hallway.
Richard jogged gratefully towards the noise.

An arm from one of the big men shot out and
barred his way.

"Can I..." Richard gestured to the
warehouse-sized space beyond the glass doors.

"What d'you want?" the man with the
outstretched arm asked. His voice was very deep.

"I need some bandages," Richard explained,
craning his neck to look into the Department, trying to spot what
he needed. "And some antiseptic. My friend got cut up when our sh–
um, when–when we... we had a crash. I just need to get him
som–"

"License?" The man cut off Richard's
babbling.

Richard looked up at him. "What?"

"License?"

"Um."
What?
"Um, I don't have–"

"No license, no supplies."

The other guard, the one who had stood still
like a silent rock up until now, reached out and shoved against
Richard's left shoulder.

"Out," he growled.

"Wait, I just–"

"Out," the rock-like guard growled again.

The other guard moved to plant himself right
in front of the doorway, arms crossed.

"No license, no supplies."

"But I just–"

The rock-like guard grabbed Richard by his
upper arms and spun him around to face the hallway, then pushed him
hard between the shoulder blades.

"Out."

"But I don't even need–" Richard turned back
to the sliding doors.

"Out."

With another shove, the silent guard pushed
Richard away from the doors. Richard stumbled backwards. One hand
on the wall, he steadied himself, straightened his t-shirt with the
other hand and stared open-mouthed at the two men in front of them.
They stared impassively back.

So Richard turned away from the guards and
the supplies he needed.

"Fine," he said as he walked away, peeking
over his shoulder until he was around the corner.

And he was back to wandering randomly through
the cheerfully glowing hallways.

It's a hospital. There must be supplies
laying around somewhere.

His feet moved over the spotless hallway
floors, carrying him around corner after corner. More doctors and
nurses sat in boring-looking rooms, sleeping and depressed looking
patients lay in beds here and there and one green-shirted man
mopped a floor.

There must be something...

And then there was.

At the end of the hall, just sitting there: a
rolling cart, and on top of it a high pile of neatly curled
bandages in sealed plastic. Underneath were little bottles, some
with labels he couldn't understand, some with the labels he'd been
hoping for:
antiseptic
.

Richard jogged towards it.

He picked up a bandage from the top of the
cart.

"What do you want?"

Richard jumped and dropped the bandage back
onto the stack. "What?" He looked around.

A very annoyed-looking face was peaking
around the doorway of what looked like an exam room.