Millie sat up. Swinging her legs over the edge of the bed, she threw back the sheet and stood. She hesitated as her legs buckled slightly then she walked to the door.
In the hallway, Millie turned to the left. The service car at the end of the hall stood open and she entered.
A minute later the car doors opened onto the engineering section. Most of the crew, even those supposedly off duty, were here. People waved and greeted her but all were too busy to stop.
Millie walked along the outer wall then headed to the bank of computer terminals at the far end that were used as reserves only. She was about to sit down at one when someone behind her called her name. Millie stopped, blinking, turned to stare at Chief Rekhaan.
“You are all right, Millie?” Rekhaan asked.
Millie stared down at her bare feet, feeling the chill of the metal deck. “I’m not...” She passed a hand across her eyes. “I don’t know...” What was she doing in engineering? She tried frantically to think. The last she remembered was being kissed by Neal. Lifting her hand again, she pressed it against her forehead. She didn’t feel feverish but if she was she wouldn’t be able to tell.
“I think I had better walk you back,” Rekhaan suggested.
Millie nodded.
The chief took her arm and steered her to the elevator explaining as they stepped in, “We will have all our systems operational shortly.” He dabbed at his brown face with an already oily handkerchief and sighed. He leaned against the back wall of the elevator.
Millie nodded politely. She was clenching her teeth to keep them from chattering. She had the strangest sensation that someone was draining her blood and refilling her body with liquid nitrogen.
Just get me to my room, her mind chanted.
She had a bad moment when the elevator doors opened at deck 12 and her feet refused to move. With a gasp of breath and Rekhaan’s helping hand, she made it into the hall. A few feet more and she fell on her bad arm, sparking tears.
“Millie!” Rekhaan cried. “I will call someone...”
“No. I’m okay just help me up.” She managed a smile, “Guess I shouldn’t have gotten out of bed yet.”
Why had she?
Back on her feet, Millie walked more slowly, gripping Rekhaan’s hand. At least the pain seemed to have caused the cold sensation to lift.
With relief, she crawled back into her bed. It took some doing but she finally convinced the chief that she was fine and he left her alone.
Once again she found herself counting dots in the ceiling but this time the counting was background noise to her brain trying to figure out what had just happened. Maybe I’m going insane, she thought. Or I’m sicker than we figured.
Should she call someone? For some reason, she did not want this for public consumption. Hopefully, Rekhaan would say nothing. He would be preoccupied with his work. The only doctor presently on board that she might ask was Sh’nn L’ruh. Then again L’ruh would be either overly concerned or underly concerned and make flippant remarks. No. She would wait for Aurelia.
Turning carefully on her side, Millie began counting the green tiles on the wall. She ignored the growing ball of fear in her stomach.
A strange sound at the door brought Bridget to her feet. “Hey, somebody’s outside!” she yelled at Miguel and Torp.
Miguel jumped a stack of boxes to reach her side. “Is it Dr. Aurelia?”
“I sure hope so.”
Torp beat them both to the door. He rapped his fist on it. “Doc, is that you?”
Bridget held her breath. No answer.
“Maybe she can’t hear you. Yell louder,” Bridget urged.
“Doc! Hey, Doc, we’re in here!”
Silence. Then a whirring sound sort of like rotor blades and a thump against the door.
“She could at least say something.” Bridget sucked in a breath to yell herself, choked on the exhale when Miguel clamped his hand over her mouth.
“Shutup,” he whispered. “Don’t yell again. Come away from the door.”
“What?” Bridget shoved his hand away as he dragged her back from the door.
“I don’t think it’s her.”
“It has to be,” Torp protested though he whispered too.
“She’d be smart enough to bring an RO not an ion cutter.”
“Who else could it be?” Bridget asked, not really wanting to know the answer.
“Sclarians maybe.”
“They’re only after Kaprinians right?”
Both boys just looked at her.
Torp pulled out his comm link. “There’s one way to find out.”
“Wait, she had a different number last time,” Bridget interrupted.
“What was it?”
“I can’t remember.”
“Well look at your link!”
“Don’t snap at me,” Bridget hissed as she fumbled for her link. Her hands were shaking. The grinding sound at the door was growing louder.
She jabbed at the recall button but the readout screen stayed blank.
“What’s the code?”
“Recall 77,” Torp whispered, “and hurry up.”
Miguel shook his head,” No, it’s 79.”
Bridget glared at them. “Which is it?”
“Try ‘em both just hurry.”
“All right. Shutup.” She punched in 77, was rewarded with Aurelia’s number on the screen, dialed that in.
“What?!” Aurelia’s bark sounded as if it were coming through clenched teeth. A great deal of static and background noise made it difficult to hear.
“Where are you?” Bridget asked.
“About five minutes away if I don’t get killed first.”
“Somebody’s cutting through the door now,” Torp blurted.
“Thank them kindly and run like hell.” Aurelia clicked off.
A carrumph from the door then a tiny ray of light rushed through the small hole. Bridget choked back a scream.
“Brid, see if you can find some kind of weapon in these boxes,” Miguel took charge. “Torp, help me move Steve and Fredrichs.”
The boys easily moved Fredrichs by lifting his box he was lying on by its anti-grav units. Searching frantically, Bridget suffered two broken nails and a scratched finger before she decided the boxes were hermetically sealed. Instead, she started shoving them against the door.
More light poured in. Whoever was out there must have powerful lights as Bridget realized it must be night by this time. It seemed they had been in that warehouse for a lifetime.
Glancing over her shoulder, she saw the boys were having trouble with Steve. He was on his feet now, his eyes gleaming with fever.
“Get behind these crates, Miller,” Torp commanded.
“I’ve got to find Dad. Leave me alone.” Steve’s words sounded slurred.
Bridget ran to help. She grabbed an arm and pulled while Torp and Miguel pushed. “Get down, Steve” she begged. “They may come in shooting.”
They all heard the crack as it reverberated around the warehouse. Now the only things between them and whoever was outside were a few boxes.
***
With her right hand, Aurelia tugged at her shirt to unstick it from her sweaty back. The shirt was soaked. She had a feeling she would never get her left hand unclamped from the stick.
They were weaving in and out of the streets of Zarnek now. Several beings, whether Sclarian or Kaprinian she couldn’t be sure, had taken pot shots at them. She wished the governor’s shuttle had a white cross painted on the underside but even that probably wouldn’t stop them.
She turned to look at Radif. Her neck cracked; that felt better. “You don’t have to go in with me,” she told him.
The Berellian folded his arms across his chest. “You’re still my prisoner.”
“One track mind,” Aurelia muttered.
The console beeped at her. With another beep, the navicomp pad lit up with a more detailed street map of Zarnek and a blinking green light that told Aurelia the exact location of the medical students, or at least the location of Bridget’s commlink.
Looking up, she saw a shuttle parked in front of the targeted building. The rest of the street was deserted. Although it was quite dark by now, Aurelia thought the shuttle looked like the one chasing them earlier.
Aurelia sucked in her breath with a backwards whistle. “What is Conlin up to? I swear it’d be just as easy to lop off his head and have done with it!”
She guided the shuttle to a parking spot behind the other. Punching in a two letter password to lock the controls, she left the engine running.
Aurelia’s hand came away from the stick successfully as she stood up but it was stiff and sore. “Do you have a weapon?” she asked, kneading her knuckles.
Radif patted his utility belt.
“Good. Let’s go.”
Aurelia pushed out the side gull-wing door, banging it against its hinges. It almost came back in her face but bounced up again. As she hopped to the ground her boots skidded against gravel. There was carbonized rubble in the open doorway that she stepped over.
3-D poster gallery, was her first thought when her eyes adjusted to the light from two Lumair44’s in the hands of Renner Conlin and Nicholas Zelan. The kids, two of the humans and the Raman, stood behind a double stacked row of crates, their faces white mimes hung in mute protest. The two men loomed behind the light, counterpoints in black. The characteristic rotten egg-coconut smell of phinotheria enhanced the 3D effect of the picture.
“Family portrait time,” Aurelia announced, her hands planted on her hips. She was aware of Radif’s presence behind her and was glad.
Conlin and Zelan both swung around in her direction. Now she could see they held Strafe pistols as well as the Lumairs.
“No one’s going to invite you to the next office picnic, Renner.” Meng was right, she wasn’t any good at being flippant.
“Ahh, my favorite surgeon.” Conlin’s smile touched only his lips, showing his enormous teeth. “Who’s your friend?”
Aurelia hoped Radif was baring his fangs. “The local gendarme,” she replied. “How convenient I brought him so he can arrest you.”
Conlin laughed, an annoying, honking sound.
Raising an eyebrow, Aurelia watched a bead of sweat form at the arbiter’s brow, roll down his forehead, slant to the right around his eyebrow and slide down his cheek. “What’s this all about, Renner?”
“That young man over there has something I want. A very simple transaction and we’ll be on our way.”
Aurelia craned her neck to see who he was gesturing toward.
She could see a very pale, husky, man lying on a box against the wall.
“Doesn’t look in any shape to make a deal.”
“He only has to tell me where his invention is.” Conlin turned to look at the students, “Or maybe one of these can tell me.”
“We don’t know what you’re talking about,” Bridget spoke up.
Aurelia took a step forward. Zelan brought his Lumair up to shine in her eyes. Freezing, she waited, quite sure he had his pistol centered below, letting the light make a bullseye of her face.
As if a silent communication had passed between them, Zelan lowered the light.
“What are you doing here, Zelan?” she asked. “I had you down as at least semi-intelligent.”
“I’m disappointed. I expected a more creative insult than that,” Zelan replied.
“Actually, that was a compliment.”
“Look, Doctor, I respect and admire you. I really do,” Zelan continued. “I always thought it was a mistake to exclude you from the East India Operation.”
“Shut up, Zelan!” Conlin yelled.
“Shut up, yourself, Conlin. You’ve made a mess of this whole thing. Besides it doesn’t matter what I tell her. Either she’s on our side or she doesn’t leave here alive.”
Aurelia raised an eyebrow. “I like your calm, matter of fact approach to murder.”
Zelan smiled. “It doesn’t have to be like this. The East India Operation is the best thing that could happen to GEM Co. I know the
Pasteur
pulls in more profit than any of the other medical ships combined. And I bet you hate seeing half of that go to the bureaucrats in NA-Mars and another percentage going to cover the other ships’ quotas just so they renew our licenses. All your work going to profit someone else.”
“It’s never bothered me before,” Aurelia commented as Zelan paused for a breath.
“It will when they start taking more and more every year. With East India, we’ll have total autonomy, our own security forces, no restrictions on what we buy and sell, no bureaucrats.”
“What about fat little dictators like him?” Aurelia jabbed a finger in the air toward Conlin. She shook her head,”The system may not be perfect but I much prefer it to having people like you two in charge.”
“I told you,” Conlin hissed at Zelan. “That’s why we all agreed to eliminate her in the first place.”
“Nothing’s gone to plan so far but it’s still going our way.” Zelan waved his pistol around. “Medical students trapped in a warehouse. All found dead of course, victims of Sclarian agression. NA-Mars will jump to give us what we want. Not as good as losing the whole
Pasteur
, but we can build on the emotional appeal of their youth.”
Shifting her weight off her bad leg, Aurelia interrupted Zelan, “I really don’t care about your little game. I’m not playing.”
“You stupid woman,” Conlin’s face was turning a dark crimson, a vein throbbed in his forehead. “You’ll wish this was a game before we’re through. You don’t have the vision. This is bigger than people like you or Meng can even imagine. If you’re not with us; you’re dead.”
“That young man over there has phinotheria. He will be dead if you don’t let me take care of him. I’m a doctor and that’s all I care about.”
“Phinotheria?” Zelan whispered. His face had gone white though his gun hand never wavered. “You’re lying. You haven’t even examined him.”
“I can smell it.”
Something moved behind the three students. A tile in the floor raised up and crashed back leaving a hole.
“Look out!” Torp yelled, jumping to get out of the way. The Lumairs flashed, bounced around the room, focusing on an emerging pair of antennae.
Aurelia took a step. She heard a burst of several rounds, felt pain slice its way across her shoulder. A blow on her back sent her flying into the stacks of crates. Speeding by, Radif was a dark patch of fur between the sparks going off in her head. Several more yells went up followed by more gunfire.
Pushing a palm against the cold, rough floor, Aurelia got to her feet. Her ears buzzed like mad hornets. Something wet trickled down her back.
Conlin and Zelan were both spread-eagle on the ground with Radif over them, linking them together with electric manacles.
Miguel had possession of one of the Lumairs and now lit up the hole in the floor.
Torp elbowed Miguel. “You should have thought of the floor.”
“I should have? What about you?”
“We were all stupid,” Bridget declared. She leaned over the hole, calling, “It’s safe to come up now.”
Picking up one of the pistols, Aurelia skirted Radif and his moaning prisoners to examine the young man on the floor. For the first time, she noticed Steve Miller lying there too. She bent over Miller while watching the hole.
In a moment, a female Kaprinian climbed out of the hole followed by Dr. Rialus.
“Good timing, Jak,” Aurelia called.
“I’m not so sure,” replied the female. “I nearly had my head taken off.”
“What was that all about?” Jak asked, brushing at the dirt on his clothes.
Aurelia motioned toward Conlin and Zelan. “I’m not sure of the details but apparently Conlin is planning to take over the company. The East India Operation.”
“That’s what Keller was trying to tell us. Co-Lanen and I...uhh...” He paused. “Co-Lanen, this is my superior, Dr. Aurelia. Aurelia, Co-Lanen Kentala, she’s an attache at the Rotunda.”
Aurelia looked up from examining Miller. It was rather an odd place for formal introductions and she had never before heard Jak introduce her so formally as his superior. Apparently, he still hadn’t forgiven her for her insults by the Talax. His eyes were cool as he returned her glance.
Co-Lanen nodded politely then pointed out, “Excuse me doctor, but your shoulder is bleeding.”
Putting up her right hand, Aurelia fingered her shoulder. It still smarted. “I think it’s just a nick,” she said.
“Better let me look at it.” Jak said. His voice held only a professional tone.
Aurelia stood up, shaking her head. “I’m all right. There’s no time. We need to get these two back to the ship now.”
No time for apologies either.