Shockball (7 page)

“It may even influence your own personality.”

“Ouch. That was a low blow, darling.” I pretended to clutch my abdomen. Then I went still, thinking of the miscarriage. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to— Sorry.”

The little drone led us to the galley level, and went into some rambling dissertation about the functions of the prep units. I nudged it aside and started dialing.

“What are you hungry for?” I asked Reever over my shoulder, deliberately forcing a cheerful note into my voice. “And don’t pick anything from that third planet in the Tupko system. I can’t handle food that talks back to me.”

“A simple vegetarian dish will suffice.”

The program produced two reasonably attractive Tuscan salads, along with Jorenian morningbread and two servers of mint tea. I checked everything first with a scanner before I let Reever touch a single crumb, but found no trace toxins.

“He had to rig something on this ship. He’s not capable of simple decent human behavior.” I cautiously tasted my tea. It was on the weak side; I’d have to fiddle with the unit’s preparation submenu algorithms later. “If not the drones, the computer, or the food supplies, then what else could he have sabotaged?”

“Perhaps he truly meant what he said. He wanted you to attain freedom from the Hsktskt and the League.”

I gave him an “oh, please” look as I fed the Lok-Teel a crust. The blob enveloped the scrap of bread and ingested it immediately.

“People are capable of changing, Cherijo.” He gave me a slight smile—something he’d been working on, practicing in the mirror for months. “You changed me.”

“You never told me what you were like before I met you, so I can’t exactly judge.” I sampled the salad. Not bad. “Joe hasn’t changed. He’s just trying a new angle, like the good little mad scientist he is.”

“Do you want to know what my life was like before I met you?”

It would keep me from having to come up with dinner conversation. After that thoughtless remark I’d made before, I was all for that. “Sure.”

“When I was a child, traveling with my parents, I often considered suicide.”

I spilled my tea, and the Lok-Teel oozed over to mop it up. “What?”

Duncan calmly picked up his server and took a sip. “It seemed a logical solution. My experiences were for the most part unpleasant, mentally and physically.”

“Okay.” He was serious. “What changed your mind?”

“Establishing telepathic links with other species. Sometimes their emotions filtered through. They were all different, and often confusing. Only one thing did they all seem to have in common. A desire to love, and to be loved. I didn’t understand it, until I met you.”

“This is the part I don’t get. What’s so special about me? Other than the fact I’m a genetic construct being hunted by everyone on this side of the galaxy.”

“I wasn’t sure myself at first. You are physically attractive for a Terran, I suppose—”

I sat back in my chair. “You
suppose
!”

“And you are a skilled physician and surgeon. But it was more than that. I have spent most of my adult life living among and communicating with thousands of other species. Yet all I had to do was see you, hear your voice, and I knew I had encountered someone more unique than any life-form I’ve ever known.”

I was still burning over that he-supposed part. “And you got this from just seeing me at the Trading Center on K-2?”

“It was not limited to that. I watched you. I could feel the emotions emanating from you, more clearly than anyone I’d ever met before. You immerse yourself in what you do for others. Yet you rarely if ever give a thought to what will benefit you personally.”

I shifted, uncomfortable with the picture he was painting of me. “Don’t make me out to be a saint, Duncan. I’m not.”

“No. You are completely dedicated to your work. You devote yourself to healing the sick and the injured, no matter who they are or what they have done to you, when others would simply let them die.”

I thought of SrrokVar, the Hsktskt physician who had tortured me and dozens of other slaves on Catopsa as part of his research into xenobiology. I’d mutilated and nearly killed him with a pair of bonesetters. “Not always.”

“You fight for freedom, for yourself and others like you. Alunthri, the slaves on Catopsa. Even a Hsktskt OverSeer.”

I didn’t want to think about FurreVa. After fighting so hard to give her a normal face and learning to become friends in spite of our differences, losing her had been agonizing.

“That’s just doing the right thing,” I said. “Any decent person tries to live their life like that.”

“Then decent persons are rarities indeed, for you are the only one I know.”

“I keep telling you, you need to get out more.”

He reached for my hand, and the light fell on the terrible scars crisscrossing the back of his. “All of this drew me to you, but when we linked for the first time, I felt your emotions through you, as if they were my own. I began to understand how empty my life was. How meaningless it had always been, until I met you. I had finally found the reason to live.”

“So, that’s when you fell in love with me?”

He shook his head. “No. That was when I decided I was going to have you as my mate.”

I made a face at him. “And love just happened to get in the way later?”

“I knew I loved you the day you limped into the medical bay on the
Sunlace
, your hands broken and torn, your leg bleeding from an open artery. And still you went over to the cleansing unit to scrub for surgery.”

That seemed a pretty gruesome moment to pick. “What, the sight of all those compound fractures and third-degree burns dragged you completely under my spell?”

“No.” He looked away for a moment. “Before I came to Medical, I had been told a Healer had been blown out into space when the buffer on level seven reformed. I thought it was you.” He paused. “A few minutes later I came to Medical and saw you there. Alive.”

He’d never told me that. “God, Duncan.” I started to shake as I remembered that day. That moment. The same moment I’d finished reading the list of the injured and dead, and hadn’t found his name on it. The exact moment I’d realized I’d fallen in love with him. “You know, on the cosmic scale of coincidences, this one blows everything away.”

His eyes narrowed as he looked at me. “You felt the same? At the same time?” I nodded. “Then it is simple, isn’t it? We were meant to be together.”

“I suppose.” When he frowned, I winked at him. “Gotcha back.”

I found the quarters Joe had prepared for me about an hour after we finished our meal. Reever gave me a proximity scanner and a pistol, the latter of which I promptly returned to him.

“If there are hostile life-forms on board—”

“Then you get to shoot them,” I finished for him. “And if you do shoot them, make sure you don’t hit anything important. Otherwise, you get to assist me in surgery again.”

He pocketed the weapon. “I will go with you.”

“You will go work on the computers while I take a look around,” I said in a firm, don’t-argue-with-me tone. “I’ll take the drone with me. Nine-Six-whatever your name is, you’ll protect me, right?”

The little drone immediately stepped between me and Reever. “Affirmative. Safeguard function activated. Step away from the doctor, Captain.”

I grinned. “You know, this little guy is starting to grow on me.”

Nine-Six-One dutifully protected my body and led the way as we walked through the
Truman’s
sixteen levels.

“Where’s Medical located?”

“Medical is located on level sixteen.”

Bottom of the ship. We were only on level eight. It figured.

When we passed through the two levels of crew quarters, the little drone stopped in front of one chamber located at the end of the last corridor.

“Notification. Dr. Joseph Grey Veil assigned this compartment to you, Dr. Torin. Would you care to inspect the rooms?”

“Not really. What’s in there?”

The drone had to process that for a minute. “Contents of compartment C-l, food preparation unit, entertainment unit, communications console, personal computer terminal console, utility storage unit, garment storage unit, sleeping platform, lavatory—”

“Discontinue inventory. I get the idea.” I looked at the closed panel again. “Is there anything in there that will harm or incapacitate me?”

“No such item is listed on the compartment inventory file, Dr. Torin.”

Okay, so maybe I was a little curious. “You go in first.”

Nine-Six-One directed a sensor stalk at the access panel, and the door panel slid silently open. He walked in, and after a moment, so did I.

I don’t know what I expected to see—maybe something sterile and utilitarian—but certainly not my old room back at The Grey Veils, the family mansion on Terra.

“God, this is… creepy.” I walked around, still in a state of total disbelief. Everything was there—my Parrish prints, my personal entertainment unit, my collection of archaic jazz discs, even the clothes I’d left behind, hanging in the garment unit.

I went over to a shelf where I had photoscans of Maggie and me when I was little. I picked one particular frame up and turned it over. I’d dropped the original a few years ago, and nicked the back of the case. There was no scratch on this one.

So he’d hung on to the originals and duplicated everything. But
why
? Joe didn’t make sentimental gestures. He didn’t do anything without a specific reason. Especially where I was concerned.

Why had the drone told me about this room? “Nine-Six-One, were you programmed by Joseph Grey Veil?”

“Negative.”

“Well, then who programmed you?”

“Full programming was scripted by Willa Cline Industries, auto-format download unit—”

“Never mind.” I went over to the utility unit and opened a door. My old medical case sat inside. Along with a pair of boots I’d forgotten to sterilize. There was still Terran soil caked in the treads.

It’s not the same. It’s simulated. The real boots are back on Terra. So is Joseph.

“Cherijo.”

I jumped, swiveled around, and yelled. “Will you stop doing that!”

My husband stood in the open doorway, and didn’t look a bit sorry for scaring ten years off my life. “These quarters are already occupied?”

“Yeah. By me. Back on Terra.” I swung my hand around. “Joe replicated everything that was in my old room.”

He studied the stark, colorless decor that had been the latest trend three years ago. “It is not very appealing.”

Three years ago.

“He hasn’t changed a thing since I left. I just realized that. Joe has the entire mansion redecorated every six months, and yet this room hasn’t been altered in the slightest degree. There’s even a copy of a pair of old muddy boots I left behind.” I didn’t know whether to be amused, or sick. “It doesn’t matter. I’m not sleeping here tonight.” Or ever. “How are things going with the computers?”

“It will take several hours for the core to ascertain there are no errors from initialization.” Reever held out his hand. “Come with me. I want to show you something.”

He took me down another eight levels, to sixteen, where Medical was supposed to be located.

Level sixteen
was
Medical. The entire deck was one huge medical treatment facility.

“Only the best for Cherijo,” I muttered under my breath as I walked around. “Look at all this stuff, Reever. Diagnostic simulators, full medsysbank array, multispecies drug and plasma synthesizers, and if I’m not mistaken”—I opened a panel and looked into what had to be the most advanced surgical suite I’d ever seen—“yeah, there it is. My own personal paradise.”

Jenner padded in, and planted himself next to my ankle. Absently I picked him up and started stroking him.

Reever was busy fiddling with the database. “Your creator knows you very well.”

I closed the panel without going in. “My creator doesn’t know that I’d trade all this fancy tech in a heartbeat for a chance to be a FreeClinic trauma physician again.”

That seemed to surprise him. “You would return to Kevarzangia Two?”

“If it wouldn’t put the colony in danger, yeah, I would.” I picked up a new style of syrinpress I’d never seen before. “No chance of that, I’m afraid.”

A signal came in over the main console, and Reever acknowledged it.

It was Xonea. “ClanBrother, ClanSister, we are reading some minor fluctuations in the flightshield surrounding the
Truman
. Are you experiencing any power loss within the vessel?”

“No, Xonea.” Reever frowned. “Have you located the source of the fluctuations?”

“It appears to be coming from the stardrive. It would be best to run a simulation on it before we transfer your passengers.” The screen went blank for a moment, then Xonea’s face reappeared. Suddenly he wasn’t smiling anymore. “Our signal is being jammed. We are reading multiple vessels closing—

The console went dead. Something smashed into the side of the
Truman
, sending me, Jenner, and Reever sprawling on the deck.

We ran back to the helm, and found our three ships were surrounded by a horde of star vessels in attack formation. No one was firing on anyone, from what we saw on the viewer, but the
Perpetua
was spinning out of control, showing huge, new gaps in its hull.

They wanted to be sure we couldn’t use it.

“Thank God we got everyone off,” I said as I went to the communications station and secured Jenner in a storage compartment next to the unit. He didn’t like that, naturally, but he’d have to yowl for now. “
Truman
to the
Sunlace
. Xonea, what’s your status?”

His signal came in, audio only. “We have sustained damage to the Command control and ship’s Operational, along with minor casualties on four levels. Are you and Reever unharmed?”

“Yes.” I looked at the viewer. “Where did all those ships come from?”

“We do not know. Even now they do not appear on our scanners. Salo speculates they are using some form of energy shunt to conceal their ships and stardrive functions.”

That was when our attackers overrode both our signals, and took control of communications.