The Genius Asylum: Sic Transit Terra Book 1 (7 page)

Chapter 8

The SPA
room looked like a torture chamber. Dimly lit, it was filled with metal frameworks resembling chairs, at least a dozen of them, each with a rainbow of wires cascading off its back and sides, some tethering it to the floor, some leading to a light-studded metal column in the center of the room, and the rest ending in interface plugs that seemed to sprout like bulrushes out of the armrests.

“So where’s Doctor Frankenstein?” Drew wanted to know. “Out having a java?”

Beside him, Ruby was chuckling. “Doctor Petroff says this room sends a chill down his spine — reminds him of the examining lab at his old dental college. Nonetheless, he’s in here for three hours every few days, playing a round of virtual golf. Lydia put together a SPA wafer for him, containing the twelve most challenging courses on Earth. Sometimes Devanan Singh joins him — he’s our electrical and field maintenance expert. You know, I’ve heard that a lot of business gets conducted on golf courses. If you have questions about the Meniscus Field, going eighteen holes with Singh might not be a bad idea. The skins are stored in individual compartments in the bulkhead, and there’s a change room, over there,” she added, pointing to the wall right behind them.

“Skins?”

“The body suits that interface with the chairs. We call them skins because you have to strip down and wear them next to your skin to get the full effect of the program.”

“Do you know whether Khaloub spent any time in here the day he died?”

Ruby frowned suddenly. “Why?”

“You said he was a sports enthusiast. If he had some kind of medical condition that contributed to his death, and if he perspired inside one of those skins close to the time of his death…?”

She shook her head wearily. “Are you sure you’re not a Ranger, Drew?”

“If I were, I’d be working on Zulu. Answer my question, Ruby. Did Khaloub log any SPA time the day he died?”

“Yes, but you can forget about finding any evidence inside his skin. For health reasons, SPA suits are sterilized between uses.”

“And who is responsible for making sure that happens?”

A beat, then, “The wearer. Each suit is custom-fitted to a single user. When it’s replaced in its compartment, the lockpad activates an automatic decon cycle.”

“What if someone isn’t feeling well at the end of an exercise period?” he persisted. “What if he leaves in a hurry, still wearing his skin, and forgets the cycle?”

“Lydia doesn’t let that happen. Her console monitors the vital signs of anyone wearing a skin, whether they’re running a program or not, and alerts her at the first indication of medical distress. If the alarm goes off, she terminates the program and summons Med Services. She’s programmed the monitor board to do that automatically if something happens while she’s off-duty. And, to answer your next question, Lydia was at her console during Karim’s SPA session that morning, and Karim was in no distress whatsoever. He pitched nine innings, then showered and went to the caf and had an early lunch. Several crew members have already testified to the Rangers that they saw him there, and that he appeared in excellent health.”

Drew heard the unspoken warning in her voice and realized that this was why she was called ‘Mom’. If the day ever came when he was wounded and in need of solitude, he hoped someone would protect him as fiercely as she was obviously shielding Lydia Garfield right now.

Poor Lydia. Had she been so easily rattled when she arrived on Daisy Hub? Or was her nervousness a recent development? Had she sensed that he was a cop? Perhaps the shy little nerd was more involved in Khaloub’s death than anyone around here was prepared to admit.

Meanwhile, Ruby had pinned a smile back on her face. “Decks E, F, and G are living quarters, nothing interesting there,” she declared. “Next stop, Deck H — Medical Services.”

The tube car door opened for them as if on cue. Drew let Ruby step through first. She thumbed the pad beside the door and waited for the car to begin descending before she spoke again. “Marion Ktumba is a walking database. She knows more than the rest of us put together. So, word to the wise, whatever you do, don’t argue with the Doc. She always turns out to be right, and the last thing a station manager needs while making a first impression is to look foolish.”

“I’m not another Jovanovich,” he assured her.

“You’re no Naguchi, either.”

“Yes, Mom.”

She made an exasperated sound.

According to the floor plan, Med Services took up all of H Deck, at roughly the midpoint of the station. Unlike Deck C, however, it had a circumference corridor, with entrances leading off it to a variety of storage and work rooms in the central area of the deck. All the corridor walls were smooth and plaincoated pale green, and the air smelled clean and faintly antiseptic. As he walked with Ruby past closed doors labeled Radiography, Pharmaceutical Supplies, and Regeneration, hearing nothing but the humming of air purifiers and their own footsteps, Drew felt as though he’d been teleported back to the fifth floor of Mercy Hospital in New Chicago.

“Here,” said Ruby, gesturing toward a door marked Clinics and Consultations. He paused and let her precede him into the waiting room.

Now they were in a triangular space that reminded him of the triage area of a family health clinic. The decor was definitely Earth Institutional, from the imitation rosewood walls to the beige falsahyde chairs with their bent-pipe armrests. Most striking, however, was the smell in the air. Drew sniffed experimentally. “Strawberries?”

“It’s her favorite,” Ruby confirmed.

There were four doors providing access to four different clinics, according to the lettering beside each one: Trauma, Rehab, Counseling, and Dental. Drew would have guessed that a medical professional who knew everything about everything would probably spend her time in Counseling; but it was the door marked Trauma that slid aside just then for the most formidable female he’d ever seen in a white coat.

Marion Ktumba was a tall, sturdy black woman with a helmet of densely curled hair, piercing dark eyes, and an air of authority that would have made a charging rhino stop and rethink its plan.

“Is this him?” she demanded.

Yes, Trauma was definitely the appropriate place for someone like this.

“Doc Ktumba, meet Drew Townsend, our newest fearless leader. He has many questions,” Ruby added with an impish smirk.

“And I have many answers,” said the Doc, her faint smile eloquent with disdain. Drew had seen the same expression cross his division commander’s face five years earlier when he had informed her of his plans to reapply for full Eligibility status. Now, as then, all it did was stiffen his resolve.

He met the Doc’s gaze with a challenging stare of his own. “And I would like to hear those answers. Let’s begin by going into your office,” he said, keeping his voice steady.

“Yes, let’s do that,” she agreed. As she turned to lead the way, Drew couldn’t decide whose brand of condescension was more infuriating, Bonelli’s or the Doc’s.

The Doc’s office was a doorless cubbyhole off one side of the Trauma room, little more than a desk and some chairs in a pale green alcove. After waving her guests into two of the chairs, she went behind her desk and sat down. “Now, how can I help you, Mr. Townsend?” she inquired.

He was her superior and she was treating him like a patient. Understandable, but unacceptable. Under Jovanovich and Khaloub there had clearly been a power vacuum that the Doc had moved in to fill. Now that Townsend had arrived, with “more mileage on him and a lot more savvy”, according to Ridout, things would have to be different; and she needed to realize that sooner rather than later.

“Let’s start with this place,” he said briskly. “I’ve been looking over the deck plans, and you have an impressive arrangement of space here. A complete hospital, including a pharmacy, a burn treatment unit, and a state of the art medical laboratory. What do you do with it all?”

“I treat patients, Mr. Townsend,” she replied tartly.

“Yes, of course, but how many Human patients can you possibly get here? One trained physician for—let’s see, there are forty-six adults on Daisy Hub, and about fifteen Rangers over on the Zoo, assuming that their infirmary is only equipped for first aid. That comes to just over sixty people. There are places on Earth that are lucky to have one doctor for five thousand children and adults. And all your patients are Eligibles. That means they’re genetically resistant to most of the common Human diseases and conditions. You can’t be treating the passengers of arriving or departing vessels, since very few ships stop here for inspection, and the ones that do stop have their own doctor aboard. Aside from the occasional accident, then, since Khaloub put an end to the Nandrians’ drunken violence aboard the station, you must have a lot of spare time to fill. I’m curious, Doctor — what do you do with it?”

That wilted the corners of her smile. “I stay up to date, Mr. Townsend,” she informed him in a voice that could have doubled as a scalpel. “I read medical journals. I reproduce experiments that have been done elsewhere and confirm the findings for myself. I also conduct my own scientific research. I do what a mentor of mine once advised me to do — I never stop learning.”

“That sounds like Nayo Naguchi.”

“Yes. A great teacher. I knew him before he was assigned to Daisy Hub. He showed me his design for this Medical Services Unit and I came here hoping to work with him again, but he’d already—” Surprised, Drew heard a catch in her voice as she concluded, “He was a brilliant and very honorable man who cared about the future of Humanity.”

“And so you took his place on Daisy Hub?”

“No, I took mine. I would never presume to be his equal in anything.”

Humble words from the infallible Doc Ktumba? Perhaps Jensen was right, and Naguchi really was a saint.

Okay. Drew took a breath and zagged. “When you examined Karim Khaloub’s body, what did you find was the cause of death?”

“I didn’t get to perform an autopsy. The Rangers removed the body directly from the scene to the morgue on Platform Zulu.”

“So they have a medical examiner over there?”

“No.” A faint smile again.

“Are you saying there was no autopsy done? A man died under strange circumstances and the investigators simply took custody of the body and stored it, without ordering a medical examination?”

Still smiling, she nodded.

Prison mentality, Drew realized. No way are you moving up, so you do what you can to bring the warden down. Volunteer nothing. Make him drag it out of you, one detail at a time. One syllable at a time is even better. If he gives up in exasperation, you win. If he loses his temper and smacks you around, you win.

Drew had never been good at that game, in or out of detention. He’d never had much patience for anyone else who played it, either. But he’d spent enough time behind tall fences to learn the rules, and he had a possible murder to solve. As long as the crew of Daisy Hub insisted on acting like inmates, they gave him no choice but to behave like a cop.

“Did they give you a reason for that?” he persisted, applying his sternest expression and deliberately leaning forward in his chair. He was pleased to see the Doc sway slightly away from him, even if it
was
for just a second. “Did they mention calling in an expert from outside, for example?”

“They said they already knew what the cause of death was, and that it would violate Karim’s religious practices to cut up his body without good reason. Then they told me not to worry about it, that their report would take care of everything. Finally, they left, taking the station manager’s corpse with them,” she concluded, her expression and tone of voice both freighted with warning.

Townsend ignored it. “And have they shared any information with you since then?”

Ruby had been sitting quietly to this point, listening attentively as Drew conducted his interrogation. Now she shook her head and replied with undisguised annoyance, “No. Not a byte.”

“Well, I’m going to,” Drew decided. Zagging had worked for him in the past. Perhaps revealing a lie could shake loose the truth. “In their report to Security, they said that the body was discovered, frozen solid, inside an airlock.”

The two women gasped in unison.

“What?”

“That’s not right!” declared Ruby.

“That’s what I suspected,” Drew agreed. “So, tell me, where
was
the body found?”

“You already know that, Drew. His quarters were sealed off to protect—”

Townsend got to his feet then and raised his voice, overriding the rest of Ruby’s response. “I’m having trouble understanding why, if Khaloub died in his quarters and the Rangers already knew the cause of death, they wouldn’t simply report it that way, instead of making up something about an airlock. They ignored standard Security procedure, and they lied. What I need to decide right now is, do we allow them to continue this — this farce of an investigation? Or do we take it over ourselves and do it properly?”

Ruby looked as though she was about to swallow her tongue. “Take over the investigation? Oh, I agree with you that we could probably do a better job, Chief. But exactly how do you propose we reassign the case? We can’t simply elbow the Rangers aside. We need a trained field officer to head things up, and Bonelli would never—”

“We don’t need Bonelli,” Drew cut in, dropping back into his chair. “I’ll head it up, and I’ll write the report.”

“Oh, you will?” The Doc crossed her arms slowly over her chest, fairly radiating skepticism. “And who will convince the Space Installation Authority to put any credence in that report, let alone pass it along to Security?” she demanded.

“That’s easy,” he replied. “We don’t report our findings to the SIA. We go directly to the Security Agency.”

“Bypass the Rangers?” Ruby wondered aloud.

“Not exactly. Is there anyone aboard who can fake Bonelli’s thumbprint?”

Her eyes lit up. “I’ll check,” she promised.

The Doc flung her arms skyward and breathed an exasperated syllable. “Now you want to file a false report?”

“No, we’d be filing a completely truthful report,” he pointed out patiently, “with a Ranger captain’s thumbprint on it to make it believable.”