“I don't know if Sunsinger could stand that,” Lin said. But she grinned, and the Rangers all laughed with her.
* * * *
“Bain, Lin wants you outside,” Ganfer said.
“Huh?” Bain crawled backwards out from under the control panel.
Sunsinger had two hours until it was time to launch and search out another farm to evacuate. He had a lot of inspection work to do. There was no telling how much damage had been done to the ship when Sunsinger fled the pirates. Ganfer's diagnostic programs pointed out dozens of strained, burned-out areas in the wiring, gaps and scrapes in the skin of the ship, boards and crystals and links that had been jarred loose and needed to be tightened before their systems failed. There was also the chance that something had gone wrong badly enough that signs of the damage didn't appear in the diagnostics. It was Bain's job to check the wiring in the bridge while Lin did an outside check.
“Lin wants you outside,” Ganfer repeated. “She's standing by the rear port thruster bay, talking with the doctor and Captain Gilmore.”
“Okay. I'm going.” Bain scrambled to his knees and then to his feet and hurried down the access tube.
His boots rang in the cargo hold, which smelled strongly of the disinfectant the Rangers’ tech crew had sprayed through the whole ship. No one had gotten sick on the journey back from the Knaught Point because no one had been taken out of stasis until they landed. Still, it was good to wash down the inside of the cargo hold and disinfect the ship. With all the far-flung trips Sunsinger made, they wanted to avoid transporting odd diseases and germs from one section of the planet to another.
Lin, Captain Gilmore and Dr. Wooler stood at the foot of the ramp when Bain reached it. He saw them and skidded to a stop. They were looking for him; he just knew it. Had he done something wrong?
“Goodness, do we look that serious?” Lin smiled and gestured for Bain to join them. “We have some good news, Bain.”
“About what?” He walked down the ramp.
“Remember all those plague samples we were carrying with us?”
“Dr. Wooler has been working on them,” Captain Gilmore said. “We have the first generation of vaccine ready. There isn't much, though—”
“There's enough for a few people to get their inoculations,” Lin interrupted. “You're one of them, Bain.”
“Inoculations?” Bain felt his stomach turn over. He never felt this sick even when Sunsinger was twisting the worst through space. ‘Inoculations’ was another word for shots. With needles.
“The Mashrami could start lobbing their plague bombs at Dogray any day now.” Captain Gilmore hunkered down so he had to look up at Bain. “Everybody who's doing a lot of traveling is going to get inoculated with the vaccine, to make sure if the plague does hit, they won't get sick or pass the viruses on to other people. We have enough vaccine for twenty people. Lin insists you be one of them.”
Bain nodded and swallowed hard. His parents had made him get shots all the time and explained that it was better to put up with the pain of the needles for a little while, rather than get sick and maybe die or be disabled for the rest of his life. That didn't mean he had to like it.
Then another thought came through, and Bain felt even sicker.
“What about Lin?” He turned to her. “Aren't you getting a shot?”
“I'll get my inoculation when the next batch of vaccine is ready,” she said.
“But what if we find a place that already got the plague?”
“Then I'll let you deal with the people, and I'll stay on the bridge where it's safe.”
“But what if we don't know? You could get sick.”
“Bain.” Captain Gilmore stood up and rested both hands on the boy's shoulders. They were eye to eye now. “Lin knows the chance she's taking. Do you really think she'd take a risk like that unless it was absolutely necessary?”
“No.” Bain shook his head.
“If Lin gets sick, you and Ganfer can get Sunsinger back here without any trouble, in plenty of time to heal her. I made her promise me that you were good enough crew to handle any emergency.”
“As if anyone, even a Ranger, could keep Sunsinger grounded,” Lin growled.
Bain managed a grin. He still worried about Lin, though. Then Dr. Wooler yanked up on the sleeve of his shirt, and Bain remembered something even worse than Lin getting sick.
The shot.
He looked away, gritted his teeth, clenched his fists and held his breath.
“Don't do that,” Dr. Wooler said. “Tensing all your muscles like that just makes it hurt worse.”
“It does?” Bain turned back to the doctor. “Nobody ever told me that before.”
“That's probably why it hurts so much.” The doctor winked at Bain and took hold of his arm by the wrist. He tucked Bain's wrist between his arm and his side, holding it still, then slapped his arm, just above the elbow, making it sting a little. “Here, hold this.” He held out his equipment case. Bain took it with his free hand. Then something bit into Bain's arm, barely felt through the stinging of the slap. “All done.”
“That's it?” Bain turned his arm, trying to see the spot where the doctor had stabbed him with the needle.
“That's it.” He winked again. “I used to be scared enough to wet my pants, when I was your age and someone came at me with a needle. Not so bad when you do it right, is it?”
“No, sir.” Bain grinned and handed back the equipment case.
“Just remember that when it's time to stab me,” Lin said. “Bain, remember, this is the first generation of vaccine. If you feel anything wrong, you tell me immediately, understand? We don't know if there will be any side effects.”
“Like what?”
“Anything,” Captain Gilmore said. “Too tired, or dizzy, or you hear funny sounds, or you can't eat, or your eyes get all fuzzy. Anything that doesn't feel normal. Understand?”
“You're a lot braver than me,” Lin said. “Nothing in this universe could get me to be a test subject for a bunch of crazy Ranger scientists.”
Captain Gilmore sighed, loudly. Dr. Wooler chuckled. Lin winked at Bain. Suddenly, it was easy to laugh.
[Back to Table of Contents]
* * *
Chapter Thirteen
Eight days later, Sunsinger landed at dusk in a dusty field at the edge of a processing station. Six families spent the spring and summer months searching for, identifying and gathering medicinal plants. In the fall and winter, they gathered at the processing station and prepared the plants for medicines and did all their analysis work for determining how the new medicines could best be used. They also spent this time developing better ways to harvest and preserve the plants. At this time of the year, in this part of the main continent of Dogray, the station should have been bustling with activity.
Now, nobody moved. There should have been at least a few dogs running around, barking at the strange ship, or children playing outside in the grass after dinner.
Nothing.
The dark blue and silver and brown of the processing station spread out over the flat plain. There was more than enough room for ten families to spend the winter months indoors in comfort, without getting in each other's way. Brown wall panels, silver support bars and dark blue window panels reflected the lights from Sunsinger's cargo hold as the ramp slid down and the hatch opened.
“Something's wrong here,” Mistress Harrol said. The short, white-haired woman started down the ramp. She was so plump that she wobbled from side to side as she walked.
She was still fast enough that Bain had to hurry to catch up with her. She had volunteered to come with them on this trip because her cousin was the leader of the team that ran the processing station. As Bain and Lin had found on their second trip out, the people of Dogray believed the evacuation orders if one of their neighbors or relatives was on board the ship.
“Hallooo!” the woman called, with her hands cupped around her mouth to form a megaphone.
“Go away!” a
man shouted from somewhere close by.
Bain turned quickly, looking in all directions. He couldn't see any movement in the shadows of growing dusk. This place was totally new to him—he had no idea what belonged there and what could be someone hiding or camouflaged.
“Ganfer, can you find anybody?” he muttered into his collar link.
“Eleven people inside the building. Five more in an underground chamber over by those bushes to the left.” Ganfer paused and Bain didn't like that. It either meant the ship-brain didn't understand the readings from the sensors, or he thought Bain might not like what the sensors said. “The eleven are sick. I read fevers and toxins and bleeding wounds.”
“Sick?” Mistress Harrol bunched up her wide, long skirts in her hand and stomped across the open ground to the door of the building.
“No, stay away!” A man jumped out of the bushes and raced to intercept them.
He was tall and sunburned, with shaggy blond hair sticking out from his head in every direction. He looked like he had just gotten out of bed, until Bain got a closer look and realized the man looked like he hadn't been to bed in days. His eyes were bloodshot with dark smears under them, and his hands shook.
A salty, dirty aroma seeped out of the man's clothes as he spread his arms and legs and tried to block the doorway into the processing station five meters behind him. His clothes were stained and muddy. There were smears of something dark brown and gritty on his clothes. Bain's stomach turned over when he realized those stains could be blood.
“Ivar Tooly, you let me in there. If there are sick people inside, I can help!” Mistress Harrol said. She jammed her chubby fists into her waist and glared up at the tall man. For a moment, Bain thought the strength of her stare alone would get her through the door.
“No, Aunt. Can't. People are sick and dying fast,” Ivar said. His voice trembled, and then his whole body started shaking.
“What are they sick from?”
“Don't know.”
“We have medicine. Maybe it can help,” Bain said. He wanted to run back into the ship and fly away. What if the Mashrami plague bombs had already landed on Dogray? What if that's what was making those eleven people sick?
“How can you treat it, if you don't know what it is?” Ivar nearly shouted.
“These people think they do,” Mistress Harrol said. “Listen to me, boy.”
Bain nearly giggled at Mistress Harrol calling Ivar a boy. He was a grown man, old enough to be Bain's father.
“The Mashrami are coming closer to Dogray, just like the Rangers said. They're lazy, nasty little monsters, and they send plagues ahead in little probe ships that look like simple little meteorites and asteroids. The plagues make everybody sick so they can't fight when the Mashrami come. All they have to do is come in and kill everybody and take over our world.”
“We already have three dead,” Ivar said. “Aunt, what're we going to do?”
“We can stop more people from getting sick,” Lin said, coming down the cargo ramp behind Bain and Mistress Harrol. She wore dark blue and green today, with red patches on her knees and elbows, and her hair was braided and wrapped up around the back of her head. Lin carried the long box with the vials of vaccine and disposable needles and she held it out to Bain when she reached him.
Bain took it and held it flat so Lin could open the box. She pulled out the first single-dose vial and slid a needle into it as Ivar and Mistress Harrol watched.
“You look like you're not sick yet. Come here and get your shot, and then it'll be safe to help the ones who are sick.” Lin held out the needle. She didn't smile. Her seriousness seemed to calm Ivar.
“What about the ones who are sick already?” he asked. He stepped up to Lin and rolled up his dirty sleeve, revealing a dirty, skinny arm covered with red-blond hair.
“I'll be honest with you, Master Tooly. All we have is vaccine right now to prevent people from getting sick. We won't know what cures people until we actually cure them. Let's gather everybody together, inoculate them all—even the sick ones—and then take your people to the spaceport. The Rangers have good doctors who can help. If anybody can cure this plague, they will.” Lin pressed the tip of the needle into a big vein in the man's skinny arm. He didn't even flinch. Bain was impressed.
“Who else is sick?” Ivar asked.
“You're the first we've found.”
“Then how do you know what it is?”
“The Mashrami bombed my home, Lenga,” Bain said. “We took samples to the Ranger doctors and they made the vaccine.”
“Fi'in help us all,” the man whispered.
“Keep praying,” Lin said. She smiled and patted his shoulder. “Come on. Show me where the others are.”
* * * *
It was morning by the time everybody had come out of hiding and had their shots, the sick inside the building had their shots, and the well people had started loading everybody into Sunsinger.
Bain and the children who weren't sick were given the job of loading all the belongings of the different families into the ship. Sometimes, Bain wondered if he would ever do anything but carry boxes and bags and store them in the nets along the side of the hold—and then go back outside and carry in more boxes and bags and crates. His back and legs and arms ached from the weight and constant walking. His hands were rubbed raw by the harsh fiber of the netting. His eyes were gritty from the dirt stirred up by dozens of hurrying pairs of feet. All he wanted in the whole world was to curl up in his own bed and sleep for two days straight.
“What do you mean, missing?” Lin said. Her voice cut through the buzzing haze in Bain's head.
Bain grabbed a drink bulb of a hot, sweet stimulant Mistress Harrol had been handing out to everybody. As far as he could tell, they were only minutes away from closing the cargo bay door and launching. What had happened now? Bain punctured the top of the bulb and sucked hard on the drink. It went down his throat and hit his empty stomach hard. He drained it in three gulps and stuffed the empty, collapsible bulb into his pocket and hurried over to join Lin.
She stood with Ivar and a woman who had been introduced as Miri Coor, the head scientist for the processing station. She was the one who tested all the new plants found during the summer, and decided if they could be used as food or medicine or if they were dangerous.
“We sent a group of the older children away with the youngest, the babies, for safety,” Miri said. Her words were slow, like she was about to fall asleep. Bain knew how she felt. The woman brushed silver-streaked, dull brown curls out of her dusty face and rubbed at bloodshot eyes. “We didn't know what we were dealing with, and children are almost always more susceptible to new diseases than adults. We were doing all we could to protect them. If this wretched planet didn't have such a nasty electromagnetic spectrum, we could have called for help days ago.”
“We could have been warned about the plague bombs,” Ivar muttered.
“I could remind you that you had been warned about evacuating nearly a month ago,” Lin said. Her smile was thin, and she spoke between clenched teeth. “That's all useless. What matters is finding those children.”
“There are a couple hundred places where they could be holed up,” Miri said. She shook her head. “My two boys are the oldest, and they were put in charge. Marco was supposed to stay with the children, and Mattias was supposed to come back and tell us where they were.”
“He should have been back already?” Lin said softly. She turned and looked right at Bain. The boy saw the pain in her eyes. “I'll be honest with you, Doctor. My ship-brain just told me he spotted some approaching dots that could be pirates. They're too far away for us to get sensor readings accurate enough to be sure. By the time they get close enough for that, I want to be up and ready to leap out of the atmosphere if they decide to chase us. That means we have to launch in another fifteen minutes, tops.”
“You're just going to abandon our children?” Ivar squealed. He rocked back on the heels of his boots as if Lin had punc
hed him in the jaw.
“I never abandon anyone. Especially not children,” she growled. Lin's fists clenched and her shoulders hunched. “I have a plan. It could be risky.”
“We're the ones taking all the risks, not you.”
“Shut up, Ivar!” Miri glared at the man.
Mistress Harrol came hurrying over with the news that everyone was settled into the bunks and stasis chairs and ready for launch. Lin listened, nodding, but she watched Bain. A cold, prickly feeling crawled up his back as he realized Lin only looked that worried and tired when she had to do something she didn't like.
“The problem is finding the search party when Sunsinger comes back,” Lin said, after Miri had explained the new problem to Mistress Harrol. “Bain and I both wear link collars to talk directly with our ship-brain, Ganfer. I'm very sure we can use the collar as a homing signal even through the atmospheric disturbance.”
“Put one of your collars on us?” Miri nodded. “It sounds good.”
“Not exactly. Bain—”
“Yes,” the boy hurried to say.
“You don't even know what I'm going to ask,” Lin said. She reached out to squeeze his shoulder. The tired wrinkles around her eyes and mouth deepened.
“You're going to leave me here to help find the kids who are missing, aren't you? So he won't keep griping that you're going to abandon everybody,” he added, jerking his thumb in Ivar's direction. The skinny man stared, his eyes bugged, and his jaw dropped open.
“Ganfer has your biological signal imprinted in his memory banks. He can find you even in the middle of the Marketplace on Refuge. That's our extra help, cutting through the interference here on Dogray.” Lin squeezed his shoulder again and shook him. “Don't you dare take any stupid chances, you hear me? Walk softly, stay in the shadows and hide when you hear something that doesn't sound right.”
“How am I supposed to know what sounds right and what doesn't?” Bain said, trying to make his voice like Lin's when she was growling in fun at someone.
“My point exactly. As far as you're concerned, everything sounds wrong. If I find out you took a stupid risk, I'll dock your chocolate for three moons, understand?”
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