Dominant Species Volume Two -- Edge Effects (Dominant Species Series) (10 page)

“That’s a remarkable eye you have,” he said, a little uncomfortable.

“Runs in the family,” she said evenly. “Every few generations the
meanest girl-child in the family gets born with an eye like this.”

“Fascinating,” he said cautiously.

“You know, maybe someday you’ll get squeezed, then you’ll know
what it feels like.”

“I’m just doing my job. I’m sure you understand.”

You bet I do.

She walked out of the facilitator’s office and down the hall
toward the bathroom to pee. What she really wanted to do was piss right there
in the hall—right on the floor.

She recognized several other people sitting on the bench outside,
waiting to get screwed by him, too. Judy Hattie was there with her baby. Judy
had worked as a Record Keeper at the Fuji clinic and Donna had seen her almost
every day for three years. She hadn’t been especially well-liked, but she’d
done her job well enough. The baby was crawling around on the floor while Judy
watched him. That surprised Donna. Dirt, trash and crap covered the floor. Judy
knew better than that. Sitting with her chin in her hand and her feet turned
in, Judy was the very picture of hopelessness. Maybe that was it; she just
didn’t care. Apathy was not a good card to bargain with, and it sure as hell
wouldn’t increase her chances of cutting a decent contract with the worm-lipped
bastard behind the door.

“Hi, Judy,” she said with a smile.

“Oh, hi, Donna.”

“How are you? Is that little Duncan?”

Donna reached down and picked the baby up. Before she handed him
to Judy, she gave him a quick once over. He was dirty and sticky but seemed
healthy enough. No fever she could detect.

“There’s mommy. Duncan wanna be with mommy? Yeah . . .”

“Did you sign up for the Verda thing?” Judy asked taking the
child.

“Verde. Yeah, I’m afraid so. Are you going? It’s not a very good
deal.”

“I know. I don’t have a choice,” she bounced the baby a little
jiggle as if to drive home the point.

Donna sat down close to Judy and, with two fingers and a grin,
shook the baby’s hand.

“Judy,” she whispered. “Isn’t there another contract you could
take? Anything? This one really sucks. It’s going to be hard there. Verde’s
only been open about a year, and it’s no place for a baby.”

Judy put her chin back in her hand and shook her head. She had no
options. Donna knew the feeling.

“I don’t know what to do,” Judy said finally.

Donna studied her and the baby, giving the baby another
two-fingered handshake.

“Well, I guess we’re off to the planet Verde!” she said to the
baby, shaking his tacky hand yet again. “Won’t that be fun?”

Judy and Donna looked at each other and mirrored lopsided
grins.

“Oh, whee,” Judy said.

“Wheeee,” Donna replied.

She said goodbye to Judy, told her she’d see her on the flight and
gave her some parting words of encouragement. She got the feeling Judy appreciated
it, but being the odd duck she was, Judy didn’t show it.

She went home to get packed. That was one of the easiest jobs
she’d done in months because there wasn’t anything much to pack. After the
shitty deal with the clinic administrator, the government had come in and
reclaimed most of her furniture and clothing.

Forfeiture.

That’s what the sheriff had called it.
Forfeiture.
All because Philip Edgars was a crook who screwed up and contaminated
everything and everybody around him. Until the trial was over, her things would
be the property of the state. Even if Edgars was proven innocent, after all,
she could only recover a portion of the value of the goods. She was lucky she
still had a roof over her head.

* * *

She got to the shuttle early, got herself settled and browsed the
propaganda the steward had transmitted to her. There was none of the clever
prose or pretty pictures she’d seen for other off-world projects like
Coral Six
or
Cunningham Moors
, just several data sheets describing the climate
and existing facilities in general terms. There were a few paragraphs that had
a flavor of newspeak to them, but with none of the usual dash and flair.

She looked for Judy but didn’t see her anywhere. It was possible
she didn’t take the deal. Donna found that oddly hopeful and refreshing.
Thinking about it later, she decided it was far more likely that
Worm Lips
found a contractor to do her
job for even less than poor Judy wanted.

Verde did sound interesting and exotic, though. That was a minor
plus. But as a
Nurse Grade V
, she was
concerned about the heat and the humidity. They were simple physical attributes;
heat and wet together, but so much could grow in hot, humid places. There would
be heat and rain, dirt and bugs, and no telling what else. Spores, bacteria,
viruses and their vectors would flourish in such an environment. Larger
bio-hazards that bit, sucked and stung would be common, she was sure. The data
sheets warned about the nocturnal nature of the insect life. The description
made it sound like a curious sightseeing phenomenon that you just shouldn’t
miss. Hype aside, Donna reasoned that the nighttime nature of the insect life
might be the reason there had been so few incidents of reported infection and
attack so far. The biological inventories would give her a complete picture.

She had a lot to do. Thinking about it almost overwhelmed
her.

The trip would take nearly a month. She could use that time to
develop a plan. Her contract set out the goals she’d signed up for in great
detail, but provided no plan to achieve them. She could get dinged for not
complying with any one of the contract goals she’d committed to.

She sighed and called the goddamned thing up on the pad. When she
read the first line, she felt her guts twist with dread.

I, Donna McNeil Applegate, GHHA8223, do hereby . . .

Oh, hell. There was no use crying over it. She’d gotten a raw
deal, and there was nothing she could do about it now. It wasn’t her fault.

She was to set up a new clinic on the planet itself, equip it and
staff it. She was allowed four contractors in Jantomar and could add two more
in each period thereafter. That wasn’t too bad. Only one
Physician First Class
for the first year, though. That wasn’t so
good. She carried no certifications herself for invasive surgery, although she
could do most emergency cutting herself in a pinch. What she would need was at
least one staffer who had the certs to keep it straight.

The supplies and equipment budgets seemed okay at first blush, but
she’d have to study them in greater detail to be sure; they looked a little
canned. Shortages of the right medicine, or surpluses of the wrong anything
could always be a problem, let alone on a fetid ball like Verde. The receiving
detail for the object “Medical Clinic” said that a shipment of two hundred and
twenty ProPak first aid kits had preceded her and would arrive two days in
advance of her arrival. That was a start; crude, but a start. Those kits were
the best money could buy.

The only thing the project had right now in the way of medical
facilities was the infirmary on the orbiter. She would relieve the
Medical Technician II
who had staffed
it. His contract was completed, and he was going back to Earth. That was fine.
He wouldn’t be much use to her in any event. She had a long and legitimate
gripe with that particular certification, and the alleged competence it
carried. She’d seen his files: they were incomplete and shoddy; just as she’d
expected.

Later in the day, she tried to access the biological inventories.
Those documents would give her a clearer picture about what she might really
need. They should have been part of the Med Tech’s data objects, but they
weren’t. At first she thought they might have been misplaced. It made sense
given the condition of the other files, but when she searched his cabinets,
she came up empty. They just didn’t exist. That was distressing. If the
inventories hadn’t been done, the entire project was out of compliance with
Government Order EHBS 2344
, and
Richthaus would be subject to an enormous, crippling fine or outright shutdown.

The worst part of the deal was the obvious danger to the
contractors. It was almost a certainty that the planet harbored a few
Class I Biological Hazards
.

She made a note to get that issue resolved as soon as possible. She’d
have to see someone in the Superintendent's office to get a current status.
They would know.

By the time the transport arrived at Verde, she’d developed a
pretty good action chart that suited her. She’d worked in all the milestones as
outlined in the contract, and the task list was comprehensive. She wasn’t sure
of some of the delivery parameters yet, but there was plenty of wiggle-room
built in.

She felt better, like she was under control again. After what
she’d been through, it was a relief to be able to chart her own course again.
Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad.

She stepped off the shuttle into Verde’s hot, wet atmosphere, and
the heat made her want to catch her breath. She could barely do it. It felt
like something solid had lodged in her throat. Her mind had been prepared for
it, but her body was a step or two behind. She started to sweat.

There was a buzz of seemingly random motion around the dock.
Things were getting underway, taking on an inertia of their own. There were
stacks of packages and ragged piles of materials strewn all over it. Loaders
moved back and forth like ants carrying stacks of containers to the open-air
warehouse connected to the loading dock. From her vantage at the top of the
shuttle’s ramp, she could see the entire installation. Beyond the dock and
warehouse were a smattering of rectangular shelters and various facilities.
She could make out what had to be the power station adjacent to the warehouse
and could see the heavy conduits running out from it to the buildings and shelters
in the distance. Beyond this cluster of activity, was a vast plain of chopped
and poisoned plant material. Most of it had been bulldozed up into huge
mountains of debris that dotted the landscape. She wondered how long it would
take Homo sapiens to fill up that wide, empty spot with crap.

Beyond the plain was the jungle, thick and impenetrable. From
where she stood, it looked like a solid thing, a veritable wall of dark green
foliage. She breathed in the air through her nose. Behind the heat and humidity
was a rich and fertile scent that gave her no pleasure. It was sweet and
cloying, like decaying meat.

The installation was situated close to the jungle perimeter on one
side. She wondered if that was such a good idea. The sight of all that dead
plant material, the closeness of the jungle, and the heat and smell put her
into a funk all over. This was it.

The guy in front of her was standing there like an enormous
statue, blocking the ramp. Donna exchanged perturbed looks with the woman
behind her.

“You gonna stand there all day?” she said to the hulk.

“I might.”

“Well how about getting out of the way while you’re deciding.”

The steward pointed out the little clinic, what there was of it, and
Donna headed straight for it. It seemed to get bigger as she got closer, and it
turned out to be good-sized for a modular. It had an attached shelter,
effectively doubling its size. It wouldn’t be too bad. She’d lived in worse.

She ran her ID through the lock and went inside. It was basically
empty except for the built-ins and the smattering of stuff brought down from
the infirmary. She’d expected it to be in worse condition than it was, but it
was clean and fairly new. She ran her hand over one of the examination tables
and looked for dirt on her fingers. Not bad.

She found the controller for the air-cooler and turned the unit
on. She was rewarded with a brief, distant hum and a soft hiss of cool air that
flowed from the ceiling vents.

Thank God for little miracles.

There was ample storage in the form of built-in cabinets and
shelves around the walls. A long stretch of one wall was lined with attached
lab benches and, except for some boxes, a scope and a few racks of labware from
the orbiter’s infirmary, stood uncluttered at the moment. Curtains divided six
examination tables, and, at the far end of the structure, were two air-locked
surgeries that looked well-equipped. The floor was clean and still whitish, and
the lighting was good. The data center was neatly tucked in the corner. To her
way of thinking, it was probably as good as it got for an off-world, miner’s
field clinic.

She walked through and gave everything the once over, then found
the door that connected the clinic to the resident’s quarters and checked that
out, too. The living quarters were neat and clean, not luxurious but sufficient
to the job. She liked that. It was a two-bedroom with a small kitchen. She
suspected it was no better or worse than any of the others on this God-forsaken
ball.

There was an air controller like the one in the clinic in the
narrow hallway. She fiddled with it in anticipation, looking for the cooling
switch, but found none. The damned thing had heat, but no cooling. She’d be
spending even more time than she thought in the clinic where the cooler
did
work.