by Kate Steele
Chapter Three
Jor left his room and walked into town. He found a nice little restaurant and ordered a meal. While eating he watched the people coming and going, inside the restaurant and outside through the big glass windows at the front. The world was moving on apace, yet Jor felt like he was floundering in quicksand. The forming of the mate bond should be the most joyous thing two people could experience, and yet both he and Dane repudiated it.
There were too many obstacles to overcome, too many black marks against him and too many hurts that neither of them could live with nor let go of. The weight of his life was pressing in on him and the only solution was to go. Dane had clearly stated his position. He wouldn’t honor the bond. And why should he? He’d had the best. Why settle for someone so far beneath him? With that bitter realization souring his stomach, Jor paid his bill and left, determined to catch the first ship out no matter where it was headed.
Arriving back at the shuttle station, he started for his room and stopped as a disconcerted murmur ran through the crowd of customers and service personnel. Jor frowned in consternation. Blinking red lights came up on every visible monitor drawing attention to the quarantine warnings being posted. The station was shutting down. People began rushing from place to place some with what looked like purpose, others in a fashion that screamed pure panic.
Jor continued to the hotel and once there he grabbed the nearest porter. “What’s going on?” he questioned the man.
“Oh, sir, haven’t you heard? We’re under quarantine. A shuttle arrived with several passengers who were ill. Dr. Jeffers was called and he’s diagnosed them with Runcalis Fever.”
“But that’s not possible. There’s vaccine for that. It’s standard practice to vaccinate against that. How the devil could someone come down with Runcalis? He’s got to be mistaken.”
“I don’t know, sir, but that’s what we’ve been told.”
“Where’s Dr. Jeffers now?”
“I don’t know, sir.”
“Does the station have a med center?”
“Yes, sir, level two, section B.”
“Thanks.”
Jor headed in the direction supplied and found the place deserted except for a very young and flustered med tech. “Can you tell me where Dr. Jeffers is?”
“He just left with the ill passengers. He was taking them to his clinic.” The man ran a hand over his hair in agitation. “Frankly, I’m glad he stepped in. We’re only here to dispense bandages and mild analgesics, not handle epidemics. He said isolation was imperative and he could care for them better at his place since this facility isn’t set up for any long term care.”
With a muttered thanks, Jor went back to ground level and noticed the security men in place at the nearest outside entrance. Checking several others, he was unsurprised to find them all guarded. Jor returned to his room and took up the small tote in which he kept his toiletries. He placed his own bottle of medication in it then returned to the station med center. Once there, he persuaded the med tech, with the help of a little cash, to give him a supply of analgesics, antacids, laxatives and any other pills that rattled nicely in their bottles when he shook the bag.
As prepared as possible, Jor headed for the nearest outside exit. He was stopped at the doors by security. “I’m sorry, sir. No one enters or leaves the station. Haven’t you seen the quarantine notices?”
“Of course I have, but I’m Dr. Jeffers’ assistant. I have the medicine he needs. It’s imperative I get these drugs to him.”
Jor took his own prescription bottle from the bag and showed it to the guard while subtly shaking the bag. The guard read the bottle, his brow furrowing with incomprehension. Just as Jor hoped. The guard had no idea what was in the bottle but it looked official.
“Mmm, well, in that case, you can go but don’t expect to return until the quarantine is lifted. I’ll need your thumb print for identification. And I’ll warn you now, your picture is going to be circulated to the security staff here and in the surrounding towns. If you’re spotted anywhere you’re not supposed to be until the quarantine is lifted, you don’t want to even think about how much trouble you’ll be in.”
“Of course, I understand completely. I just want to get to my boss.”
“Get going,” the guard invited, opening the door for him.
Jor stepped out, took a deep breath and started the three mile walk to Dane. It was only when he was on the road and almost there that the thought came to mind. Why the hell am I doing this?
* * *
Dane was settling the last of his three patients in the infirmary when a steady knocking brought his attention to the clinic’s main entrance. He rushed out, yelling as he went. “Don’t you see the quarantine notices? Go away!”
“Yes, I see the fucking quarantine notices! Why does everyone keep asking me that? Do I look like I’m blind or so stupid that I can’t read?”
Dane’s stomach flipped. Jor. He was the last person Dane had expected to see. He threw open the door on the last of Jor’s rant. “What are you doing here?”
Jor rummaged in the tote bag for his pills then shoved the rest into Dane’s hands. “Here, I brought your much needed medicine.” He pushed past Dane and stood waiting while Dane looked at the contents of the bag.
“Not that a person could ever have too much laxative, but is this supposed to be a joke?” Dane asked with a raised brow and an edge of sarcasm to his voice. “The station and town are under quarantine. How did you get out and once again, what are you doing here?”
“I told them I was your assistant and that you desperately needed this stuff,” Jor answered, indicating the bag. Before going on he shuffled his feet as though unsure, then suddenly brought his gaze to Dane’s while raising a hand to his head. “These stitches. They itch. They need to come out.”
Much to his surprise, Dane felt a frisson of amusement. Jor’s transparent reason for being there was laughable. He found himself struggling to hide a smile. “Of course they itch. It’s a sign the wound is healing and it’s much too early to remove them. They have to stay for at least another five days.”
“Five days! Well how was I supposed to know that? I’ve never had anyone tie bits of my anatomy together with string.”
Dane turned away to hide the smile tugging at his lips. What the hell’s wrong with you? You don’t like this man, remember? Something gave him a sharp, mental pinch. “Ow! Don’t do that!” He turned back to glare at Jor.
“Do what?” Jor looked totally confused.
“You really don’t know, do you?”
Jor shook his head.
“God, I hate this metaphysical Maleri’ crap!” Dane cursed then saw and felt the quick flare of hurt his words caused him before Jor shut down. His green eyes lost their luster and went dull. He dropped his gaze from Dane’s and headed for the door. “I’ll get out of your hair.”
Dane’s hands fisted at his sides in frustration and anger directed at himself. Fuck! “And just where do you think you’re going to go?”
Jor shrugged.
“You can’t go back to the shuttle station and you sure can’t go back to town. You’ve come in contact with a contagious disease.”
“I’ve been vaccinated against Runcalis Fever,” Jor replied, his voice cold and even.
“Doesn’t matter. You could still spread it. Besides, what are you going to do? Wander the wilds for the next couple of weeks?”
“What do you care?”
Dane cleared his throat. “Look, I’m sorry about that Maleri’ crack, okay? I’m a little stressed here. Runcalis isn’t normally serious, but in a place like this it could become so. The majority of the people on this planet haven’t been vaccinated against the simplest of contagious diseases. Like I said before, medical funds are stretched tight. We’ve been lucky that most travelers are fully immunized against a plethora of diseases and are unlikely to bring them planet side. Most adults would make it through a bout of Runcalis with little problem. It’s about as
severe as measles on Earth. It’s the children I worry about. If Runcalis makes a run through the population, we could lose thousands of children to secondary infections like pneumonia.”
“Are you sure it’s Runcalis and not just some simple cold virus?”
“I’m sure. They have all the symptoms, including the distinctive yellow striations on their arms and legs.”
“How is it that these people ended up not being vaccinated against something so common?”
“For the very reason that it is so common. Once a vaccine was discovered for it, Runcalis pretty much disappeared. You’ve heard the saying ‘out of sight, out of mind’? Everyone starts thinking, oh, this disease doesn’t exist anymore. Why get vaccinated against it? And just when everyone’s guard is down, bang, it sneaks in again.”
Jor nodded. “So, I can’t go back to town or to the station. What do I do?”
The sound of retching in the next room was loud and clear. Dane met Jor’s gaze, a smirk on his lips. “Since you told security at the station that you’re my assistant, I suggest you get to work. There’s a bucket and mop in the closet in the infirmary along with disinfectant and gloves. You can draw hot water from the sink. Welcome to the medical profession.”
“Don’t you mean the janitorial profession?” Jor asked with a moue of distaste.
“That too,” Dane agreed and left to check on the patients while Jor got the bucket and mop.
* * *
A few hours later the patients were settled, medicated as well as possible to lower their fevers and relieve their other symptoms. They’d each been given a bucket to avoid further accidents on the floor, something Jor was inordinately glad of. While emptying those buckets wouldn’t prove to be a treat, cleaning up the noxious mess on the floor had been far worse.
Fortunately Dane had something that settled queasy stomachs as well. “As long as we keep them medicated, they should rest comfortably. No one seems to be showing any particularly virulent symptoms, thank God. I just hope no one at the shuttle station contracts it.”
Jor looked up from the sink where he stood scrubbing his hands and arms up to the elbow. “From what the porter at the hotel said it sounds like they were isolated fairly quickly.”
“They were,” Dane nodded. “The pilot of the ship they were on herded them straight to the station med center.”
“He should have kept them isolated on his ship.”
“That would have been the best solution but unfortunately theirs was a short pleasure cruise. The ship wasn’t a large one and there was no sickbay or doctor on board. They were closer to us than to anyone.”
“What about where they came from originally? Do you suppose anyone’s thought to backtrack the beginning of the infection?”
“I put in a call to station security and told them to do just that. That’s the best I can do. It’s up to them to report the incident and make the necessary authorities aware.”
Jor finished washing up and dried his hands under the heated air unit, he sighed, suddenly tired. “So what do we do now?”
“Now we relax. Are you hungry?”
“Um, maybe.”
Dane furrowed his brow. “Maybe?”
“Well I am hungry and I think I could eat. As long as what we have doesn’t resemble any of that stuff I cleaned up off the floor.”
Dane chuckled. In the past few hours, working side by side with Jorrian had eased some of the strain between them. “Let’s see. As I recall there was some nasty brown stuff in that puddle you cleaned up. Oh, and something sort of yellow-green.”
Jor groaned as he followed Dane out of the infirmary. “Now that’s just cruel.”
“Hey, I’m a doctor. We’re gentle, humanitarian creatures.”
“Yeah, right.” Jor mumbled.
Dane just smiled and led the way to his personal quarters which were across the yard from the infirmary. It struck him as he walked, that the yard they were walking through was the very one that had been in his dream. The thought of that dream had his cheeks heating and his groin tingling. Dane glanced back at Jor. His face was a study in neutrality but his eyes were hooded, his face flushed.
Dane opened the back door which brought them into the kitchen. “Do you like Italian food?” he asked Jor.
“As a matter of fact, I do. I spent a year on Earth. It’s a very interesting place. I especially liked Las Vegas.”
“Las Vegas! Oh that’s right, you’re a gambler.”
“Mostly. There aren’t too many jobs you can have when you wander from place to place.”
“Umm, I can see that. I’ve got leftover lasagna. Will that suit you?”
“Sounds good.”
“Good. Do me a favor and get that loaf of Italian bread out of the fresh-keeper. We can have garlic bread with it and I have salad. I assume you like garlic?”
“If one likes Italian, one must like garlic.”
“Smart man.” He handed Jor a flat metal sheet. “Slice off two pieces for me and however many you’d like. Use this to put them on. There’s butter in the fridge and garlic powder in the cabinet above the keeper. Oh, and knives and other utensils are in that top drawer by the sink.”
The two of them worked quickly and efficiently. Dane slid the lasagna in the oven along with the tray of bread that Jor prepared. He directed Jor to plates and glasses while filling salad bowls with a premixed concoction of greens. He offered Jor a choice of dressings while Jor filled their glasses with water.
“Would you like something else to drink? I could fix some iced tea,” Dane offered before joining Jor at the table. “I don’t keep much in the way of liquor in the house or I’d offer you wine.”
“The water’s fine. I drink but not excessively. I like keeping my wits about me.”
“I suppose, being a gambler, you’d have to.”
Jor nodded while chewing his first bite of salad. “This is good. And yes, it would be hard to learn the other player’s ‘tells’ through a fog of alcohol.”
“Tells?”
“Little habits or gestures they have that give away the state of the hand they’re holding. They’re usually subtle little things like pursing the lips, a certain way of flexing the fingers, lack of or increase of eye contact.”
“In other words, you read their body language.”
“Yes, precisely.”
“Like outside when we crossed the yard. Your face was flushed and you kept your eyes down. Did you, perchance, have a dream that took place out in my back yard?” Dane had to hand it to Jor. His experience as a gambler paid off.
Except for a slight pause of the fork that was bringing another bite of salad to his mouth, Jor gave nothing away. He took the bite, chewed and swallowed before answering. “And what would happen if I said I did? Will you blame me for invading your dreams?”
Dane waited a moment then shook his head, filling the tense silence between them. “I wanted to, at first,” he replied honestly. “But I know I can’t. Despite what you may think, I’m not a cruel or unfair person. I realize that what’s happened between us is the fault of neither one of us.”
“I never thought you were cruel or unfair. You’re more than justified in your feelings about this.” Jor gestured vaguely. “About me.”
The oven timer chose that moment to go off, and Dane rose from his seat to retrieve the rest of their meal. He dished out the lasagna and garlic bread and did his best to alleviate this new tension but the former feeling of ease between them was strained. They finished their meal, limiting their conversation to inconsequential and impersonal matters.
After the cleanup, Dane gave Jor a quick run through of the house. It was a small yet cozy place, consisting of one bedroom, one bathroom, the living room and the kitchen. “There’s only one bedroom. I’m afraid you’ll have to sleep on the sofa,” Dane apologized while pulling a couple of light blankets and an extra pillow from the closet in the short hallway that separated the bathroom from the bedroom.
“Are you sure you want m
e to stay here? I could sleep in the infirmary.”
“With the sickies? Hell, no.”
Jor met Dane’s gaze, a startled look in his eyes. “Sickies?”
Dane shrugged. “In my profession, if you don’t keep your sense of humor you crash. And okay, maybe calling the patients ‘sickies’ isn’t the most politically correct thing to do, but it’s not hurting anyone and it certainly doesn’t change the quality of care they receive.”
“Don’t get defensive. I was just wondering if it was some ultra modern medical term I’d never heard.”
Dane snorted and smiled. “So you do have a sense of humor. I was beginning to wonder.”
It was Jor’s turn to shrug. “There’s not too much about my life I find amusing.” He turned and walked back into the living room, bending to place the blankets and pillow on the sofa.
Dane followed and let his gaze wander the length of Jor’s back. His lips quirked in a small smile at the sight of Jor as he bent. This time he got a good look at the man’s ass and it had been well worth waiting for. Round, firm cheeks stretched the fabric of his pants. Instead of just a tingle in his groin, this time Dane felt a distinct thickening of his cock.
When Jor turned back, the somber look in his eyes made Dane’s amusement fade. Without thinking, he stepped closer. Laying a hand on Jor’s shoulder, he gave it a light shake. “You’re too hard on yourself.”
Frowning, Jor met Dane’s gaze, his eyes searching. Satisfied with what he saw, he nodded curtly. “I don’t know why you would say that but thank you.”
“Maybe it’s something you should spend some time thinking about. And you’re welcome. Goodnight.”
“Goodnight.”