"As it so happens, I had this brought over for you to put it on." He handed her a stiff looking parchment paper looking rectangle with handles on both ends.
Her gaze shot back to him. "You're going to make me touch it and then carry it all the way back? Are you crazy?"
"Not you," he answered, "yous. Plural. Both of you. You and Arthur. That's what you have gloves for, dearie."
Ugh. She glared jealously at all of the other doctors and nurses who were treating actual patients. Ugh.
That's when Arthur jumped into action. He accepted the offered improvised carrying device and set it down next to the rat. Then he wrestled the thing onto the mat. Unfortunately, the only way to do that was to turn the thing from right-side up with the blown off head to upside down with all of its insides exposed and paws pointed in the air in all different directions. Its mouth was open and its tongue was hanging out. Again. Ew. Still, she was grateful to him. "Thank you, Arthur," she said.
"What's the matter, Lyra?" Grayson taunted. "You're a doctor. You see this stuff all of the time."
"Yeah," she said, "but it usually doesn't smell this bad. And I don't do particularly well with rodents. Seeing as we never have rodent patients. Hey!" she said, realizing something. "Arthur, how are you doing this?"
"What?" He looked up as if he were very happy to have been temporarily left out of the conversation and was visibly uncomfortable at being sucked back in. "What did I do?"
"You can't even operate on cephalopods, and here you are, just fine with a disgusting rat?" She had to admit, he was braver than she gave him credit for, and she would have to give him some of the brownie points he so greatly desired for taking point on rat duty.
"I'm not weirded out by rats," he replied simply. Then he grabbed his end of the makeshift rat gurney and nodded to her. "Ready?" he asked. "The sooner we get this thing back to the hospital, the sooner you can be done with it. Maybe. Unless you're going to make her do the necropsy?" He looked up at Grayson.
"You wouldn't dare," she said to Grayson.
"Don't worry," he answered, "I'll have plenty of other things to keep you busy once you get back to the hospital," Grayson said.
Lyra nodded to Arthur and lifted her end and they made their way past the still-gawking eyewitnesses and out the door. All she could think about as they lugged that idiot thing back to the hospital was how Arthur could deal with giant rats and not normal, everyday cephalopods.
In fact, there were several Cephalopod nurses and doctors and they all had volunteered to help him get past his fear, but for now he was still resisting. It was the one discipline keeping him from completing his residency. He had been stuck for months. She looked at him as they went, which she could do because he was busy concentrating.
"How about hypnotism. Have you considered that?"
He raised an eyebrow at her. "It's a good idea, but I think this patient is a little too far gone for it to work."
"Smartass," she said. "I mean for you. Uh, for your Cephalopod aversion. And I thought you were dying to get off of this space station and back to your girl or something."
"I don't know," he said.
She expected him to say more, but it was a touchy subject for him. "Look," she said, "I'm only saying it because in my opinion you are a fine doctor, despite what I said this morning." She grinned. "I want you to be able to move forward with your life."
Lyra was out of brownie points, so thank goodness that's when they burst through the bay doors of the Emergency Room waiting area.
Vax and Nancy were busy working on a Frenzy patient when Grayson materialized in the doorway, making Nancy start.
"I wish you would stop doing that, Grayson."
"How are you two kids doing?" he asked. "Stitching up the nice bar patrons, are we? Any problems?"
"None," Vax said.
"Yeah, that about sums it up," Nancy answered. Just when she felt like she was getting a handle on the situation somebody else appeared in the doorway. She did an angry double take. I'm trying to work here. But it was just Lyra.
Lyra stood in the doorway with her arms crossed boring holes into Grayson with her eyes. "Your giant, hairy, disease infected menace is sitting in research waiting for whatever weird party you have planned for it, Grayson.”
Then Lyra continued, "Anyway, funny how Grayson here just happened to be at Frenzy, again, in the middle of a chaotic event that involved injuries,” she said.
"Hilarious," Grayson added. "Except it wasn't my fault this time. Ask any of the eyewitnesses."
"Likely story," Lyra continued. "While all the other doctors got shiny new patients, I had to lug the giant hairy rat down to research."
Lyra was barely paying attention to them anymore, she was looking down at her phone. "Okay, I gotta go. So, in conclusion, enjoy your rat, Grayson."
5
A strid paced around her new room that functioned as both her home and office. It was the second biggest room on the space station. If she was going to live here, she needed lots of space, and now she'd got it.
It had taken a full six months, but she had finally gotten the room just the way she wanted it. Now she could concentrate. It wasn't that she hadn't been doing her job in the meantime, she had. After all, she was a professional.
What life boiled down to in the end, though, was enjoying your own space. If you could make it your own, then you could accomplish anything. It's the creed she hocked in her self-help books, and she believed it fully.
She looked around approvingly. The room now sported new earth tone carpeting and hand-woven accent rugs. Exotic art hung on the walls, and there was a ceiling surround aquarium with neon fish. The aquarium was her favorite idea and a stroke of genius for this particular space.
Unsure how she would react to living in a completely manmade environment, the added attention to detail of the glowing, living creatures calmed her right to sleep at night.
Yes, this will work. Her living space was perfect, and in the back was her office where she could see clients. She let herself enjoy the moment, also one of her principles for living.
As she moved between the living and working areas of her apartment, she caught sight of herself in the carefully-placed confidence mirror. The bottom half of her, of course, was beautiful shiny blue tentacles, while the top half was gorgeous dark-haired, fair-skinned, green-eyed goth girl. Oh yeah, she thought, still got it.
That done, she crossed the room and sat down behind her desk and looked at her to-do-list, going in the usual order: highest paying clients first. She dialed the video chat number. A dark-haired man with a serious five-o-clock shadow and a red fedora appeared on the screen.
"Vincent, hello. You are a strong, brilliant, confident man. How's it going? I said you'd be the first to know when I had settled in, and now it's happened. So how do you want to do this? Online?"
Vincent, on his end of the video chat, looked around nervously and shook his head. "Astrid! How's my all-time-favorite goth Cecaelian? Online doesn't work for me," he said, "you know that. There are too many people listening in. How about we meet here on Galderbash?"
"Can't do it," she said cheerfully. "Not allowed in that system."
"Wow, bad girl, eh? How about we meet halfway then, on Orion Eight?"
"Nope."
He raised an eyebrow. "Is there any place within a few dozen planets that you are allowed to meet me?"
She took a long, cleansing breath and then let it out. "Let's not focus on that," she replied. "Look, you're a guy that doesn't like online interaction because he, um, values his privacy, right?"
He nodded.
She had no idea what it was that Vincent did for a living, but she knew it wasn't legal. That wasn't something they had discussed as of yet, and she wasn't about to ask him. She made it a point never to judge.
Furthermore, she wasn't going to tell him why she was now banned from most of the civilized galaxy. Her law enforcement issues were not relevant to the matter at hand, which was her paid services. And what she w
as paid for, was in fact, to break down ideas and motivation to the bare necessities and then repackage them in a new and effective way, sort of. And she was good at it. A lot of times that involved a significant amount of thinking on her feet. She got an idea.
"I know that you do not ordinarily like stepping out of your comfort zone, Vincent. I also realize that I now happen to be farther away from your normal garden variety portal service. But you are a man that has the means to travel by private channels, and when I tell you where I am, I have a feeling that you will agree that it is a perfectly acceptable place to meet."
Vincent looked dubious. "Ok, try me."
"You may not believe this, but I'm on Celestica Space Station." Then she smiled and sank back into her expensive faux leather chair. She waited for the information to sink in.
"You don't mean THE Celstica. Outside of the civilized galaxy?"
"Yup."
"Near the edge of the supermassive black hole?"
"That's the one."
She could see the wheels in his head turning now.
"That'll work for sure. Your terms are acceptable. What we'll do is the garden variety sessions online and the, um, more specific monthly sessions at your new office. And I'm on my way, right now, for the initial session."
"I figured you'd say that. You know me, I'm full of great ideas."
"Of course," he said with a wink, "that's why I pay you the big bucks."
Astrid hung up and sighed happily. Yes, this place is going to work out just fine.
That done, she switched on the television to her new favorite comedy, All The Things That Motherboard Never Told You.
Floyd crossed two of his four arms over his green chest and squinted at the tablet.
He was very aware of the guest in his office squirming in the chair opposite him. The squirming was good. Squirming meant he was distracted and in a hurry. Floyd glanced up at him. He was a hulking guy, not quite werewolf build, but very hairy. In truth, Floyd had no idea what species Lorn Dakks was, and he didn't care. All he cared about was getting the timing right.
"It only took me fifteen minutes to read my portion," Mr. Dakks said. "You've been on that thing for twenty-five minutes." He looked at his watch to double check the elapsed time and settled into an angry glare.
"Look, Mr. Dakks," Floyd said. "I gave you your time, now you have to give me mine. You do want this done correctly, no?" Glancing up at the digital clock in the left-hand corner of his office, Floyd did his own calculations. Two more minutes, then he was in the window.
He flicked through the pages of the lawsuit on the tablet. He tried his best to look serious, concerned even. Got to make this look right, or they catch on to you quick. Almost time. He ticked off the seconds in his head. Four, three, two, one. And now. He scribbled his name onto the bottom of the line on the tablet and slid it over to Mr. Dakks.
"Mr. Dakks, I am reasonably sure after looking everything over that everything should be to your satisfaction."
Mr. Dakks looked down at the tablet and then back up at him again. He looked wary for a moment, like he could sense something was up.
Floyd played it cool, rapping an index finger on the fake wood desk and letting the noise reverberate around his office. This was his space, his domain, his turf. And he would be darned if he was going to let some guy just walk in and legitimately sign a lawsuit against his hospital.
It was important to keep up appearances though. He held up his hands in mock surrender. "Hey, you don't have to sign it if you don't want to." He didn't risk another glance at the clock. He only had another ninety seconds or so before he'd lose the advantage.
He sat further back and smiled. The smile wasn't at Mr. Dakks, though, it was just a general smile. He lived for this. This was his high stakes poker. Most gamblers would risk tens, hundreds, or even thousands of galactic credits on a card game. This game was worth thirty-four million credits.
He drummed his fingers on the desk again in an attempt to look bored. In this case, looking at his watch might actually help, so he did. Then he got an even better idea. "You think it would be easier for you if I look away?"
"You guys are going to pay for what you did to me," Mr. Dakks said and signed it.
Floyd listened for the submission noise, which was music to his ears. He looked at his watch. He had thirty-five seconds to spare. Victory.
This guy was suing them, nothing he could do about that. What he could do is make sure that the paperwork was signed just outside of the civilized boundary of the galaxy. And it just so happened that his office rotated out of the boundary for several minutes at a time once every four-point-five hours.
By the time Mr. Dakks got back to his home planet and had his lawyers look over the contract that was legally pristine in every other way, it would be too late and the damage would be done. The location, date, and time stamp snafu would add ten years and thousands of galactic credits to his legal tab. The legal obstacle could be rectified of course, but the odds of winning went way down. Never bet against the house.
The poor guy stood up, certain he had won the day. "Take that, I'll teach you to be more careful when slicing through species that are outside the top four thousand most common without knowing exactly what you're doing."
"Once again, sir, I apologize for that. However, you were brought in after you apparently lost a fight with the back end of an out of control star destroyer. The EMTs found you severely injured on a cement landing platform. Your fellow employees testified that you were under the influence of something. And also intoxicated by something else. And also naked. Frankly, you were in such bad shape that nobody could tell what species you were when you got here. You were minutes away from death, and that is the reason that the surgeons didn't take more time deciding which exact organs were most precious to you in which exact order in the carnage. You should thank Vax for putting the functioning organs back in as well as he did."
"Oh yeah, that reminds me. You'll find an emotional suffering clause in there." He pointed at Floyd for emphasis. "A Krull Warrior surgeon? You know what I think? I think you put him there just to frighten me out of suing. Well, it didn't work, did it?"
"No, it did not." When it came to patients like this, Floyd wished that he could let Vax be Vax sometimes, but that was another situation entirely. "But I assure you, as Chief of Surgery, Vax is second to none. You were lucky he was there when you came in."
"I don't feel very lucky these days," he said, tapping in the information to email himself the completed contract. "I can't wait to get off of this piece of junk and back to normal civilization." He got up and stomped off.
They can have you, Floyd thought.
And that was why it was made very clear in writing upon entering Celestica that all lawsuits had to be originated in this office and with Floyd's knowledge, if not consent. It also stated that once any lawsuit contract was signed by both parties, the papers could be emailed, faxed, or shoved up any orifice the ex-patient wanted, because by then it was way too late.
6
A rthur paced around the doctor's lounge. It was the only place on this god-forsaken space station at the minimal safe distance from a supermassive black hole that he actually liked.
And that was mostly because of the gorgeous floor to ceiling windows out into space. The view was breathtakingly beautiful, except that the thousand blinking lights were a constant reminder that he wasn't where he was supposed to be. And that he wanted to get back.
The rest of the lounge simply looked like an expensively decorated college dorm. There was a smattering of good quality, but mismatched chairs, tables, and sofas that were scattered around and a couple of televisions mounted on different walls.
To his left, a human girl named Emily and a squid-like creature played a board game he didn't understand. They pushed brightly colored crystals around a spherical board with their minds. Arthur wanted to give it a try, but he was embarrassed to ask how it worked. He was unsure if it was A.I. enabled or if it requi
red actual telepathy, which he obviously lacked.
A giant, hulking warrior doctor sat in front of the television with his feet up, guffawing loudly at what looked like creatures falling into a hole set to silly music. His name was Vax. Of all the Krull species in the universe, Vax was the only Krull doctor that Arthur knew about. Arthur had the sneaking suspicion that Vax was only here to make the rest of them feel inferior.
A tingle of fear ran through Arthur's body every time he was in the same room with Vax. Every time. Three months on the space station had not made things any easier in that regard. It didn't help that Vax usually carried a sword around.
Arthur had asked about the sword once, going as far as suggesting that it was a very bad idea to let an already terrifying doctor carry a lethal weapon around with him.
The disappointing answer he received pointed out that the sword was both Vax's emotional support object and it also had religious significance, and as such it was not subject to normal, common sense restrictions.
That's when Arthur heard a chirp. He turned and saw the robot. The robot's name was MACRO. MACRO was silver and roundish and had red eyes. The robot's eyes were capable of glowing a piercing Rudolph the Reindeer red, or so he had been told. He also had a cool looking blue fin on his head that made him look vaguely fish-like.
MACRO made a different chirpy beep this time. It was a lower pitch.
Vax stood up. "You people heard MACRO, there's an ambulance coming."
"Hey, Vax. Why does MACRO's chirp sound different," Lyra asked. Lyra crossed to the little robot and knelt down to look at him.
Vax just shrugged and turned off the television.
Lyra was a human in her late twenties with a sandy brown ponytail. To Arthur she was equal parts terrifying, attractive, and comforting. The comforting part came from her ability to usually know what to do when things went wrong.
Arthur ran to the window and searched for an approaching ambulance ship. "I don't see anything."
A.I. Zombie: Book 1 of the Space Station At The Edge Of The Black Hole Series Page 3