The Phoenix Rising (11 page)

He was surprised to hear her say this. “You
want me to go back to it?”

“
Not quite. I think you
should take a scheduled, controlled, decreasing amount of it every
two days until you can safely go off Xinocodone altogether. That’s
the safest, most effective way to break this kind of
addiction.”

“
Won’t taking it just remind
me of it and make me want it more?”

“
If you haven’t felt any
serious withdrawal symptoms from the Xinocodone yet, I’m sure you
will before long. They are not only maddeningly unpleasant, they
can also cause harm to your body.”

Calvin had to cut her off before he heard
all her reasoning. He didn’t doubt she knew what she was talking
about, and that she was the expert here, but he also couldn’t bear
the thought of taking equarius again. Not after all it had done.
And he was genuinely afraid that if he had any, even a single
milligram, it would only whet his appetite for more. “Thanks, but
no thanks, Rain. I’m done with equarius for good.”

She looked at him skeptically. “If you say
so. But, should you change your mind, on the drug treatment or the
physical, I’ll be here.”

“
Alright. But don’t hold
your breath.”

The door whisked open and both Calvin and
Rain turned to see the newcomer.

He was tall, broad, and extremely muscular.
His hair was as white as his soldier’s uniform and his skin was
grey with a faded blue quality. He had wide, steel-colored eyes and
his dark lips formed a scowl. He wore a handgun on the left of his
belt and a dagger on his right—Calvin understood the bladed weapon
had spiritual significance. The Polarian commanding officer,
supreme leader of every member of the Polarian detachment on this
ship, stepped toward them. “What is the meaning of this, human
doctor?” In his hand he waved a piece of stationary.

Rain looked at him and folded her arms, not
the least bit intimidated even though the Polarian towered over
her. Calvin guessed his height to be a full two meters. “You’ll
have to be more specific than that,” said Rain.

“
Explain this!” he said,
thrusting the stationary at her once he was close enough. Calvin
caught a glimpse of it; it looked like an order from the
XO.

“
Seems like you’ve been
given an order to have your men inoculated against Hylacre
disease.”

“
I know what it says,” he
locked eyes with Rain. “Please explain to your Commander Presley
that my brothers and I should not be subjected to this.”

“
But you definitely should
be,” said Rain.

“
Do you not understand what
you are asking of us?”

“
To not catch and spread
Hylacre disease to everyone on the ship?”

The Polarian looked furiously annoyed. His
tough skin wrinkled somewhat and he muttered something in his
native tongue. “I see you are useless. I must take this to the
commanding officer himself.”

“
What a coincidence, he’s
right here,” said Rain.

Up until now Calvin had been content to stay
out of it. He hadn’t yet gone to meet the Polarian newcomers, a
detachment of thirteen, and didn’t want resolving a dispute to be
his first contact with them.

“
You? You’re the commanding
officer?” the Polarian asked, looking at Calvin. “But you’re just a
lieutenant commander,” he spied the silver bar on Calvin’s uniform
and knew what it meant.

“
Regardless,” said Calvin,
“I am the CO of the Nighthawk.”

The Polarian’s whole demeanor changed and he
stood rigid, offering a Polarian left-handed salute. “I am
Imperator Rez’nac. Please accept my apology, sir, I did not know I
was in your honorable presence.”

Calvin wasn’t used to be addressed this way,
and he didn’t really care for it. “That’s okay,” he said. “Now tell
me, Rez’nac, what is the problem you and your men have with getting
the inoculation recommended by Dr. Poynter here?”

“
It is not our way,” said
the Polarian, as if that was sufficient reason.

“
He means it’s against his
religion,” said Rain, apparently picking up on Calvin’s
confusion.

“
Ah,” said Calvin, now
understanding. Unlike the Polarian Confederacy, the practice of
religion in the Empire took wild variations in form and was not
very widespread. He guessed that fewer than one in ten humans
considered himself religious in any way. So it was hard for any of
the humans aboard, himself included, to respect the value in
another’s tender belief that seemed so irrational, such as refusing
protection from infectious disease.

“
So then you understand why
we must challenge this order,” said the Polarian.

Calvin understood in theory, for some reason
the Polarians had deemed the inoculation as a violation of the
sanctity of their bodies or some such idea, but since he was
skeptical of that belief in the first place, he knew he didn’t
truly understand where Rez’nac and his men were coming from. But,
since they were under his command, he had to at least pretend
to.

“
Rain,” said Calvin, looking
at her. She seemed young for a doctor, probably not older than
Calvin, and she would probably have been quite attractive in
clothes that complimented her figure better than baggy blue scrubs.
“How essential is this inoculation? And is this something that
everyone has to have, or just the Polarians?”

“
It is very important. Rumor
is we’re going towards Rotham space, possibly even into the
DMZ.”

“
That’s true,” Calvin
confirmed.

“
The virus that causes
Hylacre disease is much more widespread on those planets than
anywhere else in the known galaxy. And, because of how Polarian
physiology works, they are more likely than humans, or even Rotham,
to contract the disease. Once they have it, they could spread it to
the whole ship. The symptoms are severe, including loss of muscle
control, loss of weight despite having an appetite, intense nausea
and vomiting, difficulty retaining water, loss of memory, severe
anxiety... ”

“
Yeah, I get the picture,”
said Calvin. “It’s bad.”

“
And about one in four cases
results in death,” said Rain.

“
Okay, what about this,”
Calvin tried to concoct a solution. “How about everyone who wants
to be protected gets the vaccine and if the Polarians don’t get the
vaccine they do so at their own risk?”

“
The whole point of this is
about risk management,” she said. “We lessen the chance of everyone
getting the disease by trying to get every person immunized, but
immunity is not guaranteed. Someone who’s been inoculated could
still get the disease—it’s just less likely. And anyone bringing
the disease aboard the ship puts everyone else at risk. It’s not
necessarily a high risk, but it is high enough to be concerned
about.”

He nodded. So now he had a choice, he could
put his crew in unnecessary danger, or he could trample the
personal religious beliefs of a minority of people on his ship,
potentially alienating people he wanted to assimilate into the
crew. Neither choice was attractive.

“
I’m sorry Rez’nac, but I
believe it would be best for everyone if you and your soldiers
agreed to be vaccinated.”

To Calvin’s surprise, Rez’nac showed neither
outrage nor frustration. He bowed his head. “Very well, Lieutenant
Commander, I will submit to your judgment, for you are master of
this house. I shall obey.”

“
But as a show of good faith
and support,” said Calvin, wanting to fellowship his new shipmates,
“is there anything I can do for you to make you more comfortable?
Perhaps let you use the observation deck for religious services?”
He wasn’t sure that Polarians even congregated for their rituals
but he wanted to make some kind of peace offering.

“
That would please us
greatly,” said Rez’nac. “And we would be honored to have you join
us.”

Calvin hesitated. He knew instinctively that
he should accept, however he’d never been a church-goer of any sort
and the thought of being locked into the routine of going to these,
for however often and long they were, wasn’t appealing. Still he
kept a smile on his face and just as he opened his mouth to reply,
Rez’nac spoke.

“
I only ask that you go
once.”

“
Yes, definitely,” said
Calvin, “I’d love to.” Perhaps he was coming across as too
enthusiastic, he hoped he didn’t sound insincere. Truthfully the
thought of observing the Polarians and their rituals sounded like
an excellent way to gather more intelligence on who they were as
both individuals and a collective. He just didn’t want to be roped
into attending dozens of meetings when one alone would
suffice.

“
You honor me.”

“
I’d like to go too,” said
Rain. “If I can. I’ve never been to a Polarian church before.” This
request took Calvin by surprise. Most people he knew that came from
scientific backgrounds tended to dismiss spiritualism in any form
as superstitious nonsense. He’d never known if that was because the
empirical mind—taught to test hypotheses and seek out concrete
evidence—

found nothing to relate to in the world of
faith, or if it was a byproduct of being a part of a culture that
was almost uniformly atheist. Perhaps it was a combination of
both.

“
You of course are welcome
to join us,” said Rez’nac. “Perhaps if the brothers see you paying
your respects to our ways, they will not be so afraid of your
needle.”

“
Actually it’s an oral
tablet. But I get your meaning.”

“
Excellent, then I’ll see
you there,” he smiled at them. Not the pleased-with-himself grin of
someone who hoped to win two converts to his religion—in fact
Calvin was pretty sure humans were not allowed to join the Polarian
religion—but rather the look of someone who valued being respected.
“I shall take my leave of you both now, and see to my
brothers.”

“
Actually I’m leaving too,”
said Calvin. “Do you mind if I walk with you?” He wanted to get to
know Rez’nac a bit more, and had an important question for
him.

“
Do I mind? I am honored by
the request.” He motioned and Calvin led the way out of the
infirmary.

“
Nice to meet you Calvin,”
Rain called from behind.

“
You too,” he waved at
her.

Once he and Rez’nac were in the corridor,
Calvin was glad to see that it was empty. “Rez’nac, if I were to
ask you a very serious question, you would answer it truthfully,
wouldn’t you?”

“
Of course. I know no other
way.”

“
Then tell me, who are you
most loyal to? Raidan? Mira? The Organization? The High Prelain of
your religion? Someone else?”

“
I serve only the Light,” he
replied simply.

“
I’m not sure what that
means.”

“
It means, Lieutenant
Commander, that as long as I am here, and I serve under you, you
may trust me more than any other person in the galaxy. For I am of
the essence of Khalahar.”

Calvin still didn’t quite understand what
that meant, but he didn’t think Rez’nac’s answer was deliberately
evasive. Calvin simply wasn’t very well versed in the nuances and
idiosyncrasies of Polarian culture. He knew that essences and
ancestors were very import parts of the Polarian religion, but that
was about as far as his knowledge went. He took Rez’nac’s answer as
a positive sign, though. He’d stated his loyalty to Calvin in no
uncertain terms. Hopefully he’d meant it.

Chapter 8

Shen could understand how Calvin became
addicted to equarius. The drug, more officially known as
Xinocodone, had been administered to him in controlled doses as
part of his treatment. It had a way of making all sense of pain,
stress, and fear fade away into absolutely nothing. The world was a
wonderful, apathetic spiral of serenity and harmony. Live. Die. It
didn’t matter. There was no pain. Simply peace.

The burn injuries he sustained on the Rotham
ship in Abia, as a result of being grazed by a Rotham firearm, were
beginning to heal thanks to treatment he’d received on the
Harbinger and Gemini. It had been a strange experience, submitting
himself into the hands of Polarian physicians. He hadn’t trusted
them, and had wondered if they even knew human physiology well
enough to treat him. But he’d had no choice but to have faith in
them, and they’d proven every bit as competent and effective as
human doctors. Now that the major operation in his recovery was
done—a skin graft—he felt much better.

He’d recovered use of his wounded
arm—learning to manage and endure the pain that came with using
it—and now felt spectacularly bored. He was not only out of the
loop regarding what was going on, he also felt useless. Like
deadweight. He was the very blood and guts of the computer systems
of the Nighthawk, he knew them better than anyone, probably better
than their original designers, and so he felt like a fish out of
water lounging around his quarters or wasting away in the
infirmary.

There was nothing to do except a lot of
thinking. Finding himself again and again trapped in circular
self-reflection. Sometimes with pity and frustration, other times
optimism and determination. There was a lot about his life that he
didn’t like: he hated the way he looked, he hated his questionable
fitness—barely achieving the minimum standards set by Intel Wing—he
hated that he had no confidence with women, or experience. And now
he was injured and useless. It was a growing avalanche of internal
disappointment and frustration that almost made him collapse on
himself completely. Surrender his last traces of morale and take
the path of least resistance—ending it all. But whenever his
thoughts became so dark, he’d either be doped back into apathy,
thanks to equarius, or he’d think of Sarah’s tender face and
warmth—someone so familiar and close and yet so out of reach. She
kindled a fire inside him. And made him believe he could make his
life into something worthwhile. If he wanted to bad enough.