Admiral's Challenge (A Spineward Sectors Novel: Book 8)

by Luke Sky Wachter

  “Oh, be sure I will,” he shook his head angrily before stomping away.

  The Lieutenant Commander looked at him levelly as the Major started barking orders to the Lancers. Apparently the group of mutineers was still going to be escorted up to the brig for processing, no matter what decisions were made later on.

  “Thank you, Commander,” Tiberius said reluctantly, the words needing to be forced out of him. He didn’t want to say it, but if it saved the lives of his people then there was very little he wasn’t willing to stoop to.

  “You had better be worth it,” the young, blonde-haired officer said coldly, her previously frantic demeanor suddenly transforming before his face into a hard-eyed woman who looked like she could—and would—kill him in a moment if she thought it was necessary, “you don’t want to make me regret this.”

  Tiberius believed her.

  Chapter Thirty-nine: Medically-Induced Outrage

  “I’ll take you all together; I’ll tear you both apart!” howled the irate patient tied to the hover-gurney, right before it—and him—were pushed into the opening of the doughnut-shaped medical scanner.

  “I would have thought he’d be past this sort of behavior by now. It’s odd; we’ve repaired virtually all of the gross physical damage to his neural tissue, and between therapy and the regeneration treatments we’ve managed to restore about 80% of the lost function,” the younger doctor boggled.

  “This is what we, in the medical industry, call a ‘preexisting condition,’ Doctor White,” explained Chief Medical Officer Willis Presbyter, running a hand through his grey hair.

  Doctor White’s eyes widened. “You mean…he was always like this?! I thought it was just a temporary condition; a personality change brought on by the degenerative damage to his brain from the radiation damage, with the forced-growth brain tissue rejection being compounded by the failure of follow-up care and regeneration treatments,” he said genuinely shocked. “You mean…he’s always been like this?”

  “Sadly, he seems to have been restored to the same mental state he was in when I originally met him,” the grey-haired Doctor said wryly, as the scanner beeped and the diagnostic unit slowly ejected the hover gurney carrying the restrained engineering officer.

  The younger Doctor looked ill at ease.

  “Don’t pretend to ignore me like I wasn’t here and then talk about me behind my back!” shouted the aging officer.

  Doctor Presbyter turned to face the engineer with a sigh, “I was simply discussing the state of your care with my colleague here, Doctor White,” he said.

  “Turn me loose!” the old Engineer bellowed.

  “I’m afraid that’s not possible right at the moment,” the grey haired Doctor shook his head in negation.

  “Free me from this prison, you probe-wielding tyrant,” the man strapped to the gurney howled.

  “Listen, the tests will all be over shortly and you can return to your room,” the younger Doctor said soothingly.

  “Am I a child to be poked and prodded against my will, then given a lollipop and a pat on the head as you send me on my way?” the aging Engineer demanded.

  “That’s not what I meant to imply—” the Doctor said quickly.

  “Name’s ‘White,’ is it? I’ll be sure and remember your part in this medical house of horrors, Doctor,” the engineer warned with an evil glint in his eye.

  “I was only following orders,” Doctor White said, taking a step back and raising his hands, “you were sick and you needed treatment, sir. I was only doing my job.”

  “’I was only following orders,’ he says! ‘I was just doing my job! I had to take him in for his state-prescribed mental hygiene treatment, sir; I had no choice’,” mocked Spalding furiously. “That’s exactly what the Order of Anti-Viral Cleansers on Copernicus VIII said in their defense at the end of the AI Wars—and we all know what happened to them, don’t we Doctor!”

  “There’s no need for those sorts of threats, or the melodrama, Mr. Spalding,” the grey-haired Doctor warned strictly.

  “This is medical malpractice, forced imprisonment, extortion, and the kidnapping of a Confederation commissioned officer! I’ll have your rockets for this, Presbyter,” raged the old Engineer referring to the Doctor’s rank insignia, “just you wait and see!”

  “Calm down, you old fool,” shouted Doctor Presbyter, finally losing his own cool. “Because you didn’t go to a single, solitary follow-up treatment session, you were going senile, old man. Thankfully, we managed to reverse most of the damage while you were in a medically-induced coma. Saint Murphy knows how much damage you would have caused if we’d brought you out sooner than we did. You ought to be thanking me on bended knee for saving your life, not plotting some kind of high-strung revenge fantasy.”

  “Set me loose, Presbyter, and you’ll see just how thankful I can be,” Spalding said in an overly-reasonable voice.

  “Gah!” the grey-haired doctor said throwing his hands downward in disgust. “Did we administer the mem-block already?” he asked, turning to White.

  “Before we even brought him into the room,” the other doctor reassured him, “he should forget everything from the time he entered the room up to a half hour later.”

  “Good,” the old Doctor said in disgust, “he’ll still be suspicious—and likely blame me for everything—but your name will be out since he’ll forget everything about you ever even being here. I can deal with the old goat.”

  “Dag blast it; I’ll get you for this, Presbyter, if it’s the last thing I do! I swear it,” screamed the old Engineer thrashing, from side to side, “set me free or suffer the consequences of an engineer enraged!”

  “We had a tech turn off your arms and legs, so you’re not going anywhere, you old goat. And with the medication you’ve been given for this diagnostic, you won’t remember anything about it anyways. So just suck it up for a bit and this will all be over before you know it. The next thing you know, you’ll be waking up and the diagnostic will be over and done with, so your threats don’t work,” Presbyter sighed. “Now, if only the rest of us could be so lucky…” he muttered.

  “You only think you’ve found a way to escape my wrath, you dumb son-of-a-quack,” Spalding said, and the younger doctor realized that both of the engineer’s eyes—his biological and his mechanical one—were burning an ominous, if not quite matching, shade of red.

  “Oh?” Presbyter cocked his head. “Enlighten me,” he instructed right before hitting the button to send him right back into the machine for another few minutes for a follow-up test.

  “You may have turned off my arms and my legs, but you forgot about my eye and my cranial implants; I’ve recorded this entire conversation, you pluming idiot,” Spalding howled as he re-entered the scanner. “The world, the galaxy, and the entire Fleet will soon know exactly what you butchers do in here. You may have turned me into a paraplegic in order to work your foul ways upon my helpless body, but the worm has turned and—” his words were muffled and cut off as he fully entered the machine.

  “Of all the confounded…” Presbyter swore before activating the intercom, “can we get a tech in here to turn off Commander Spalding’s eye?”

  Doctor White turned to him with something in his hand. “Gauze?” he offered, miming placing it over Spalding’s eye like some kind of white, piratical eye patch.

  The older Doctor looked at him a moment and then snorted. “Oh, whatever. You know what? Let him keep the copy.”

  “You aren’t worried about his threats?” asked the other doctor.

  Presbyter grunted, “Not in the slightest. I already spoke with legal. He signed a medical waiver—just like the rest of us—when he entered the military. In fact, the actual waiver he signed is ten times more restrictive on his individual rights than the one you did, because his was from over fifty years ago,” the older man said wryly. “And, as far as any kind of personal revenge over saving his life, I say ‘bring it on.’ I’ve wanted to pop that old coot in the mouth for a
few years now, but never had the chance. A butcher and a quack, am I? It’s time someone shows him that Medical isn’t made up of pushovers he can shout at and insult till his heart’s content—and then spit on them afterwards for saving his life,” said the grey haired Doctor, his professional veneer wearing dangerously thin as a vein in his forehead began to bulge.

  Doctor White looked shocked at the idea of Presbyter hitting a patient, and turned away. However, Presbyter could hear him mutter, “Better you than me,” under his breath as he walked over to see the next set of test results.

  “Aaargh!” shouted Spalding as he came back out. “You may take my life, but you’ll never take…my freedom!”

  “Oh, brother,” sighed Presbyter. This was going to be a long day.

  Chapter Forty: Unwanted News

  There was a chime and a stir at the entry which Akantha ignored. Thanks to the curse they called the ‘miracle of interstellar communication,’ personified most annoyingly by that ComStat network which everyone was so infatuated with, she was now able to receive messages from the homeland. That meant that even out here among the River of Stars there was no rest from her duties.

  True, she wasn’t the woman on the spot, so the great majority of day to day details never reached her. But the more important—or irritatingly difficult to unravel—still managed to land on her desk.

  For instance, the woman petitioned for an exception to the holy rules of pair-bonding. While custom might encourage such, MEN’s holy laws did not, in point of fact, require a woman to refrain from sharing her affections as widely as she herself might desire—at least within her holding and, with permission, outside of it. Serial monogamy, or abstinence, on the other hand was expected of women who had taken upon themselves Defenders, Guardians or Protectors for their land holdings.

  Even then, however, the only actual restriction upon the Land Holder was the expectation that any heirs of her body come from the male who had devoted his life to her service.

  Of course, normally even this wouldn’t be an issue—unless the sire-Defender, sire-Guardian, or sire-Protector became suspicious and requested a blood reading. Then, and only if the child was not found to be of his blood, would the Holy Punishments of MEN be exacted upon the law-breaking Land Holder. With infanticide, loss of goods, lands, people, war or, even in some cases, the death of the Holder being the result. For common women, the law was much less restrictive unless they voluntarily took upon themselves an exclusive pair-bond vow—which brought her back to the case before her.

  Ten years ago, a woman of Argos—who, at that time, was nothing more than a common woman—posted a pair-bond bans in the temple of Argos. Which in and of itself wasn’t a problem. However, five years ago the other member of the bond—a warrior of no real means—was lost on expedition when half his war-band was forced against the ocean by an enemy warlord and swept out to sea.

  Assuming he was lost, she mourned for two years and then resumed her life. Then, three years ago, at the end of her mourning period and having little to hold her in Argos, this same woman decided to follow Akantha’s migration to Messene and eventually, because of her good judgment, became a Small Holder by appointment. At the time of her elevation, she took upon herself a Defender, a warrior she had met in Messene.

  All of which would have been fine—except that, after being swept out to sea, her warrior pair-bonder did not actually die. After surviving the last five years on a deserted island, he finally managed to build a raft, avoid the sea monsters, and make his way back—first to Argos, and then Messene, to reunite with the love of his life.

  While Akantha could only imagine the grief-stricken, tearful reunion—and pre-destined heartbreak for one or more members of this unlucky love-triangle—the law was clear: the woman could only have one man. The easiest seemed to be to release her current Defender and take up with the old common pair-bond holder. Let them duel to the death or, if she couldn’t bear to see them kill each other, leave the Hold to one of her children and return to commoner status.

  Alas, the woman, claiming she couldn’t exist without the two loves of her life—and apparently with the two men’s consent, each of whom the father of one or more of her children—was asking for a writ of exception from her Hold Mistress for both her holy pair-bond vow and her obligations under MEN’s law toward her Defender.

  But even if Akantha were inclined to grant such a request, because of the multi-jurisdictional aspect of the Small Holding in Messene and the bans posted in Argos, such a writ would need to be endorsed not just by the Hold Mistress of Messene and the Messene Council of Priestesses, but co-jointly endorsed by the Hold Mistress of Argos and its Council of Priestesses. This had all the markings of a tragedy in the making.

  The love-stricken women, one Heterodona, simply didn’t realize what she was asking. Two local ecclesiastical councils in two, separate Polis’ both needed to endorse the questionable request; the amount of back and forth paperwork, wrangling, and favor-trading to make it happen was mind boggling. And all of this just for a man…or two men, even, neither of whom was overly remarkable, she found very difficult to understand.

  The sound of another chime was soon followed by the sound of footsteps approaching, and she broke out of her contemplative trance as she looked up inquiringly. Seeing Isis approaching the desk with a strange expression on her face, Akantha felt a premonition of danger.

  “What is it, Isis?” she asked coolly.

  “There is a warrior outside your door who requests the honor of a private audience, Hold Mistress Akantha,” Isis replied stiffly.

  “You know my position on the subject,” Akantha said coldly, “I refuse to entertain the requests of common, one-name warriors—or those of generally low standing.” She’d had the suspicion for quite some time now that things were moving under the surface. Quietly, true, but slowly and surely all the same. Now was a time of great peril for not just her Hold, but for her personally. All of Tracto’s and, by extension, Messene’s external enemies had either been defeated or were on the run and laying low like the cowards they were. She was in as vulnerable of a position as she could be in, as she was heavy with her first children, who could only claim hereditary title to her Hold if they survived long enough to do so.

  It didn’t take a genius to see the opportunity in that situation.

  “Understood, Mistress,” Isis said but the attitude she was projecting didn’t promise a quick and happy resolution to this ‘request’, “however, the one-named warrior making the request claims he has been a in your personal service for nearly two years.”

  Akantha felt a chill. “You may inform the warrior outside that, due to my current condition, I am unable to entertain those less than Warlord status. I will, however, be more than happy to greet him after the traditional post-birthing period or, if that will not do, then I can meet him informally now,” she said firmly and then continued with irritation. “You already know this, yet still you bother me with this tiresome business, Isis!”

  Isis took a breath, like a woman taking arrow fire who could do more than crouch behind her shield and hope for the best. “In hopes of sparing your time, I did previously inform this warrior that such was likely to be your response. He said that if this happened, I was to relay that he is not just a common warrior dedicated to your service, but is the self-styled Warlord Nikomedes with a fighting war band of more than 300 souls who requests a moment of your time and attention, Hold Mistress,” Isis said clearly.

  She’d been temporarily out maneuvered, it seemed. “I see,” Akantha said emotionlessly, a second, ominous chill running down her spine, “bring him in. I want to make this quick.” Woe betide the man who risked her wrath—no matter what good service he’d performed in the past.

  Isis turned on her heel to go and returned moments later with the warrior-turned-Warlord, who wore a simple tunic bearing the colors of Messene, though it lacked the official heraldry since he had not been inducted into her personal forces.

  �
�Hold Mistress Akantha,” Nikomedes said, his eyes burning with a quiet, inner fire which had, at one time, very nearly been enough to make her relent in her refusal to take a Protector—nearly, but not quite, “you look as radiant as ever; the years only serve to enhance your power and presence, my Lady.”

  “Nikomedes Minos…you speak with a courtiers tongue,” Akantha said with disapproval, having remembered him to be a less-than-sly warrior during their last encounter.

  “Nikomedes only, please,” the burgeoning Warlord said with a wince. “And well I know how you dislike the courtiers’ speak. To give offense was not my intent.”

  “It seems somehow inappropriate to address a former suitor by his familiar first name,” Akantha replied, her voice slicing like a scalpel as she added extra emphasis on the word ‘former.’

  “Then simply address me as a Warrior, or the Warlord of Red Hunt Banner, if you must,” Nikomedes said, stiffening slightly. But despite his body posture, his eyes never quite lost their quiet, inner fire as he leveled a determined gaze at her, “I lost the right to the Minos name when I lost the Dark Sword, and I have no wish to be pretentious.”

  “And yet, despite your many losses, here you are: at my doorstep and seeking my audience,” Akantha said, letting the pause linger just a moment before perfunctorily adding, “Warlord. Although, why you would have me call you ‘Warrior’ when you have laid claim to a superior title leaves me wondering.”

  Nikomedes nodded. Then wonder no more,” Nikomedes said gravely, “for while I am a new Warlord of men, machines, and other creatures of the stars, I have ever—since the first real choice I made as a man—desired to be called your Warrior.”