by Becky Black
Maiga frowned. Ah, she hadn't considered that. Getting them together, could that be a good idea? What if Max said something?
"It's not really ‘news' though is it?" She said.
"It's what they call a ‘human interest' story. A terrible accident, a lone survivor, a struggle for survival against the odds, the triumph of a man over the hostile wilderness."
"Seemed quite pleasant territory actually."
He laughed. "A ‘struggle to survive in quite pleasant territory' doesn't have the same ring to it."
"I suppose not."
"Hmm, and then the twist about him not knowing about the huge events going on, while he's fighting to survive, that's even better. No home to come back to, making rescue a bittersweet moment. Oh, there's a series in this. I have to set up a meeting with him."
"Chervaz," she said, not just thinking of herself now, but of Max, and a little shocked at Chervaz. "I know you want a good story, but I think you should give it a few days. He's got a lot to adjust to. It's not fair to pressure him about it too soon."
He grimaced and then smiled, embarrassed. "I'm sorry, you're right of course. I get carried away sometimes. It must be very difficult for him and I certainly don't want to make it any more so. I'll give him some time before I contact him."
Maiga sighed, and then nodded, to try to turn relief into approval. At least she'd put that off for a while.
"Now it's your turn." She touched his face gently with the tips of her fingers, not enough to make him wince. "What hit you?"
"A chair." He smiled at her surprised expression. "It's a long story."
He told her about the meeting, two nights ago now and her reaction wasn't the interest and excitement her story had induced in him, but rather irritation, annoyance, oh, admit it, she thought, anger. She stood up and started to pace back and forth.
"Bara must have set that up."
"The Trebuchet wasn't docked at the time. I don't think even those men she has guarding the brothel were there. So you can't really say her people started it."
"Her people aren't just her crew." Maiga shook her head. "Not anymore."
"There do seem to be a lot of, I suppose you could call them loyalists, defenders."
"I'd call them apologists." Maiga snorted. "It's hard to call someone a pirate if they give you free food and medicine."
"There were a lot of people wearing that Watch badge too," Chervaz said. "I'm not sure station security authorised so many. I've put in a request for an interview with Chief Neex; see what he has to say about it. But I don't know when he'll make the time to see me."
This was building, Maiga thought. But to what? Could conflict be Bara's aim? What purpose did that serve? Why set drifties against lifers? They certainly had interests in conflict, but they were all humans; they had more interests in common. To break them into factions like this, to provoke humans to fight each other on any scale beyond a bar room brawl, it was unconscionable.
Humans had eliminated all the reasons beyond personal disputes to fight each other. It had taken them hundreds of years, but they'd got rid of it all: nationalism, tribalism, religion, even family feuding, all gone. And they'd become stronger for it. United.
Yes, and united, we hired ourselves out and spilled the blood of others instead, she reminded herself, so let's not get too proud of ourselves, shall we? But whether it was something to be proud of or not, humans didn't fight each other like this. Bara might call herself a traditionalist, but Maiga saw instead an atavist, dragging them back to a past they had escaped long ago.
And she wanted no part of it. If the station erupted into a stupid, wasteful conflict, she would leave. With Wixa, if she would come. And Chervaz?
She looked at him, silent for a change, watching her pace. Was he still thinking about Bara, or just enjoying the way Maiga moved? If she did decide to leave, could she talk him into coming? And what about Jaff? They'd been friends for years; Chervaz probably wouldn't want to leave him behind.
So Maiga, Wixa, Chervaz and Jaff, not to mention Glyph and Smoke the robot cats. And the Friss only slept two.
She might need a bigger ship.
Chervaz smiled at her, a little nervous looking and she realised her gaze had become rather intense. She relaxed and glanced at the clock. Time to out for some supper, perhaps. She turned back and smiled at Chervaz.
"Let's go to bed."
Chapter 22
"Right, lunch!" Jaff said, stopping the maintenance department cart outside Chullan's. He and his two colleagues piled out of the vehicle and strode to the counter. As they waited for food, Jaff smiled back at the cart.
He liked the little vehicles. They were supposed to be no more than slow-moving, electric trolleys, for hauling trailers of heavy parts. But the maintenance workers considered it a matter of pride to modify them to squeeze out every last drop of speed. Not that anyone drove them recklessly where there were people around. But quiet sections of the station, well that was different.
A few people gave Jaff, or rather his two alien colleagues, odd looks, but he ignored them. Chullan served alien foods; everyone with money welcome here. Jaff led them to a table beside Dr Sheni and Jasini.
"Hello, ladies," Jaff said, still milking being their hero after taking care of Sheni at the meeting. "Always a pleasure to see you. How's the cat, Mrs Jasini?"
"She's very well, Jaff. I hope we see you at the next club meeting. You've missed the last two."
"Always busy," Jaff said, "But I promise I'll be at the next one." He glared at his two colleagues, who appeared amused. "Something funny?"
"Of course not," one said. "What could be funny about the way you humans make yourselves the willing slaves of small non-sentient beings?"
"Well, you're not getting an invite to the next party." Jaff bit into his sandwich.
Conversation flowed between the two tables, for a while, until a buzz from Dr Sheni's Snapper interrupted them.
"Where's my damn earpiece." Sheni muttered, searching her pockets. "Oh never mind, you can all eavesdrop." She answered the call, letting the voice come through the Snapper's speaker.
"Dr Sheni? It's Lini." Jaff recalled Lini. One of Major Jax's girls, the one who'd come to apologise to Sheni right here. Hard to forget her. He hoped she wasn't going to start talking about cervixes again.
"Hello, Lini, what can I--" Sheni gasped and almost dropped the Snapper at the next sound that came from it. A woman's scream of pain. Everyone in earshot froze.
"Doctor." Lini's voice came again, breathless and scared. "I'm at the free clinic. There's a girl here, a driftie, in labour and it's all going wrong and those young doctors, I don't think they know what to do. They're shouting at each other." Raised voices somewhere behind her confirmed that. "I think you should come, Doctor," Lini pleaded. "I really think you--" Another scream cut her off.
"I'm on my way."
Jaff stood as Sheni started to move away from the table. The old doc could hardly run all the way. The free clinic lay only one floor up, but there was a maze of corridors to negotiate.
"I'll get you there, doc." Jaff took her arm and nodded at one of his colleagues. Between them they lifted her right off her feet and rushed her to the maintenance cart parked beside the coffee house.
While Jaff deposited Sheni in the passenger seat and she strapped in, his colleague uncoupled the trailer full of heavy parts. No doubt this counted as unauthorised use of department property, but screw that. Medical emergency.
Jaff jumped into the driver's seat, waved his colleagues and the gawkers out of the way and the small vehicle set off at an absurd pace. Sheni gasped at the speed. Even the electric cabs in the marketplace didn't zip around this fast. Jaff grinned at her.
"Hang on, doc, we'll be there in five minutes."
He made for the ramp that took them to the next level in a long curve, piled on all the speed he could and leant on the horn, to clear the path.
"Make way!" he yelled. "Medical emergency!"
It wa
s that, and something else. Sheni rushing to the aid of the young doctors at the free clinic? However this turned out the free clinic looked bad.
"Stand aside!" Jaff yelled as they hurtled on through the corridors, the motor whining in protest. He feared he could smell burning and hoped the damn thing would hold out until he reached the clinic. "Coming through! Medical emergency!"
Oh, man, this is fun.
They made the clinic in four minutes and the instant Sheni undid her seatbelt, Jaff lifted her out of the seat.
"Oh! Put me down, you idiot," she gasped. "I can walk!"
She didn't just walk, she ran into the clinic. A scream came again, from somewhere inside, weaker than the ones they'd heard over the snapper.
"Doctor!" Lini ran up to them, took the doctor's hand and pulled her away. "In here! Quick!" The doctor and Lini ran through into the treatment rooms. A door closing cut off the screams and the raised voices of the other two doctors.
Jaff glanced around, as the adrenaline rush of the race here began to wear off. He was in the waiting room. People sat around, frightened and worried looking. A small child cried.
"You lot might as well leave," Jaff told them. "I don't think you'll be seen today."
He walked away from the people, back into the corridor. Blue smoke poured from the engine housing of his cart, but he didn't care. He took out his Snapper.
"Vaz? There's a situation at the free clinic. You'd better get down here quick. Bring your notebook, man. This is gonna be big."
Chapter 23
"‘Mercy Dash'." Jaff looked up from the Chronicle and smiled across the crowded table at Chervaz. "Good headline."
"Thanks," Chervaz said, but blushed and Maiga, who sat beside him, felt him fidget. He didn't like being the centre of attention of the group spread across a couple of tables in Chullan's.
"‘Doctor's race to save mother and baby'." Jaff read the sub heading. "I hope you've got me in there. Ah there I am. At least you spelled my name right. ‘Maintenance worker Jaff, 34.' What's with the age anyway? You always put that in."
"It's a newspaper thing." Chervaz shrugged. "It's traditional."
"It's rather impertinent," Jasini said. "I doubt Sheni is pleased with you putting 68 by her name."
"She probably hasn't even had time to read it," Jaff said. "I passed her clinic earlier and it was chock full. Unlike a certain other clinic I could mention."
That led to laughter around the table. Wixa positively cackled.
"I like this bit." Wixa cleared her throat and read aloud from her copy. "‘Doctor Sheni has delivered several dozen babies during her many years of serving the human community on the station. She said ‘my colleagues did absolutely the right thing asking for my advice. I was glad to help them, and I'm delighted that together we brought about a happy outcome for mother and child'." Wixa smirked. "Very gracious."
"She's too generous." Jasini said, sternly. "She should have made it clear that girl and her baby would have died if she hadn't taken charge."
"Doctors stick together though," Wixa said. "Even rival ones. Everybody knows what really happened. Just from the rest of this. Vaz, you don't try to make anyone look bad, I know, but it's clear what the stakes were. ‘The mother, Isha, 24, suffered severe haemorrhaging.' and ‘the baby boy had to be resuscitated.' Yeah, nobody should be in any doubt what the stakes were."
"Isha certainly isn't," Jaff said. "See her quote? ‘If it wasn't for Dr Sheni I'm sure me and my baby would both have died. I'll be grateful to her for the rest of my life'."
"This is going to knock Bara's nose so far out of joint she'll have trouble wearing sunglasses." Wixa chuckled. "The free clinic will be a wasteland. Lini tells me Major Jax's girls have already insisted on going back to Sheni's and that the Major barely argued with them. Even Isha has already been moved to Sheni's."
Maiga had seen the circus. Four men carried Isha there on a stretcher and Sheni walked behind with the baby in her arms. Although late at night by then, many people had wanted to take a look at the baby, and ask about exactly what happened. By the time they walked through the Plaza it had almost turned into a parade.
Chervaz's story was carefully factual, Maiga thought, picking up the Chronicle. However, lurid stories were circulating about the incident. Even people loyal to Bara couldn't fail to think again about using the free clinic.
"It's rather unfair really," Chervaz said. "Those two are good doctors, but they just didn't have the right experience to handle this."
"That's no help to Isha and her baby," Jasini said. "If either or both of them had died--"
"Well that really would have put the nail in the coffin for Bara," Wixa said. "It would have been a terrible thing, of course. But for our side, it would have been a tipping point."
Maiga felt Chervaz stiffen beside her and moved back to see him scowling at Wixa. He'd picked up his coffee cup, but slammed it back down on the saucer.
"Our side? This is not a game." His face flushed as he spoke, his tone harsh. "I reported the facts. That story is not a chess move, or a salvo in a war."
"I… I know." Wixa looked more rattled than Maiga had ever seen her. Everyone else fell silent. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean it that way. You know I respect you and your paper, Chervaz. I think it's important work you're doing."
"Please, don't patronise me. You think the paper is a weapon you can use against Bara. Well it's not. The Chronicle isn't on anybody's side."
He shoved his chair back and walked out of the coffee house, bumping a couple of tables as he went, then strode off across the Plaza. Maiga started to get up to follow him, but Jaff leaned over and put a hand on her arm. She looked at him and he shook his head.
"Don't. Best left alone when he's in that mood, take it from me."
Maiga considered following anyway, but Jaff had the benefit of experience here, after knowing Chervaz for years. And they'd all just had a salutary lesson, hadn't they, about how experience is what counts. So she nodded and sat down again. A few moments of glum silence followed, and then Jaff finished off his coffee quickly.
"Okay, I have to go to work."
Wixa nodded. "Maiga, we've got a meeting, see if we can get that load of spare parts to take to Klesanraa station."
"Right." Grateful for the distraction, Maiga left with Wixa. She'd go and see Chervaz later, she thought. Make sure he was okay.
As they walked away from the coffee house, Wixa pulled out her Snapper, hearing a chirp from it. She read it and looked up at Maiga.
"The Trebuchet just arrived."
~o~
Bara strode ahead of her landing party. Back again to Hollow Jimmy. She always called it by that nickname. Some officers insisted on using the proper name Olojimi. Even tried to get their tongues around the Klaff pronunciation. Why bother? Humans called it Hollow Jimmy.
She came here so often now. Her trading and--hah--salvage activities had become more successful lately. The thought made her laugh aloud as she walked. Her name was becoming legend. Feared. As it should be.
She liked to see the looks on the faces of the humans as she passed. Awe, curiosity, admiration. When she got deeper into the station, away from the docks where so many drifties worked, she saw other expressions on the faces of the lifers. Resentment and yes, fear. She regretted that, but it was a necessary stage. Things would change later.
Oh how she loved to walk through the hustle and bustle of the station. The noise, the voices, the cooking smells that drifted from bars and cafés. She loved her ship, but sometimes she hated the quiet of it. The noises she could hear in the quiet. That scratching sound.
"We'll go to Dav's first," she told the landing party. Then she'd send Alex and Sev, the damn freak, to conclude the deals for the goods they had to sell. Meanwhile she'd see to the distribution of the free goods. She enjoyed that much more than negotiating business deals.
Yes. Let Alex do the negotiations. Get him the hell out of her face, get away from that look he kept giving her. He could go and do t
he work and then do whatever he did with his pet freak boy. If the freak didn't cut that hair soon she'd do it for him, she swore it. If he didn't button his jacket up right, she would…
"Captain."
A man stopped in front of her and it took her a second to recall him. One of her watch commanders. He handed her a copy of the Chronicle. Across the front page, in big letters, she read the words, Mercy Dash. What the hell was a ‘mercy dash'? She began to read.
The words drowned her senses. She could have been there and seen it all. Her doctors panicking. The old woman sweeping in to save the day. The whole story might as well be a commercial for Sheni and her precious clinic. Would there be a single patient at the free clinic now? Aside from those she ordered there? Perhaps not even them.
Disaster.
"Captain?"
She turned to look at Alex and realised she had stopped in the middle of the walkway between the docks and the marketplace, blocking the way. Though people seemed happy to skirt around her party. She stuffed the paper into the pocket of her coat.
"You two," she said to her bodyguards. "With me. The rest of you, wait for me in Dav's." Her throat felt so tight, her words were almost a growl.
"Where are you going to be, ma'am?" Alex asked.
"The free clinic."
Her coat tails flew out behind her as she walked, with the boys striding along behind her. Fear showed on almost all of the faces she passed. Mothers pulled their children closer. Mothers. Children. Made her sick. Some fucking driftie gets herself knocked up, comes to squeeze her brat out in my clinic, and when it all goes wrong, I'm the one taking the blame.
The doors into the clinic stood open, but the waiting room held only a couple of wasted looking patients.
"Get out," Bara snarled at them, damn sure what they were here for. Well hell, there'd be plenty of drugs going spare. They fled. A moment later Lon and Anishk emerged from their consulting rooms. More fear. She could almost smell it from these two. Bara pulled the paper from her pocket and read aloud one of the parts that especially irked her.
"‘My colleagues did absolutely the right thing to ask for my advice. I was glad to help them'."