by Diana Palmer
“Beg for your life, Cehn-Tahr,” the Rojok taunted. “I might spare you.”
“I will never beg,” the old alien said in a deep, gravelly voice. He raised his pugnacious chin. “Kill me.”
“That will be a pleasure,” the dusky-skinned alien said with a twist of his thin lips as he aimed the chasat.
But before he could fire, Madeline yelled and made a flying leap at him, hitting the surprised alien in the stomach with both feet. Paralyzed momentarily by the unexpected loud yell, he was unprepared for the body blow. He went into the ground on his side, with his head inches from the old Cehn-Tahr’s leg.
The Cehn-Tahr kicked out with a booted foot, dislodging the chasat at the same time that he rendered his enemy unconscious.
Madeline got to her feet and rushed in. She threw the Rojok on his back, activated the drug bank in her wrist scanner and laserdotted a large dose of narcotic into the main artery at the Rojok’s throat.
“So much for you,” she muttered.
She turned to the elderly Cehn-Tahr. He was a big fellow, with thick snow-white hair and the same elongated cat-eyes that she’d become so familiar with after serving with the Holconcom. His uniform was royal blue with gold trim—the colors of the Alamantimichar empire. He had a chest full of medals as well. He must be a Cehn-Tahr regular, she thought. A high-ranking officer.
She saluted him. He glared at her, openly hostile, and didn’t return it. His distaste was evident in every hard line of his face.
She dropped the salute, feeling foolish. Her green eyes went to his bloody leg. Obviously, she thought, not the one he’d kicked the Rojok with. “Do you have other injuries, besides this one, sir?” she asked him formally.
He was watching her warily. “No,” he said, after a minute. He noticed that she wore the red uniform of the Holconcom. His scowl grew blacker.
She saw that, but she pretended innocence of his dislike. She picked up the Rojok’s fallen chasat and stuck it in the mission belt of her uniform, looking around to make sure there weren’t other Rojoks in the vicinity.
“We have to hurry,” she said, kneeling beside him. He jerked away from her.
Her face softened. “Look, I know this is against protocol,” she said quietly, “that your culture forbids the intercession of alien medics and that your law forbids me even to touch you.” She aimed her wrist scanner at his bloody leg for a diagnosis. It, thank goodness, was still functional because of its superior shielding. “But you’re in rather a tricky situation. Your leg is broken,” she added, meeting his eyes. “It’s a compound fracture. I don’t have the equipment to do a restructure job here. I can make a temporary fusion of the bones, but you won’t be able to walk far on the leg, even if I can find you some sort of stick for support.”
Having given her medical opinion of his case, she remained silent beside him, resting on one knee, waiting for a reply.
He was suspicious of her. He seemed to find her very presence offensive. Well, she reasoned, he was elderly and humans were held in contempt by his race. He might refuse her help, despite the desperate situation he was in. But she didn’t dare treat him without permission. Not unless she wanted Dtimun to court-martial her. She had no doubt that the C.O. would enjoy that, given her mutinous record.
The old fellow was in obvious pain. He tried to hide it, but he grimaced involuntarily when he tried to move. He muttered something under his breath in his native tongue that was unprintable. Komak had taught her those words in Cehn-Tahr for a joke, and roared with laughter when she started to show off her new linguistic skills for the commander. The explosion that resulted had been quite colorful. The commander had been even more eloquent than usual. She cocked her head and waited, saying nothing.
“Very well,” the old Cehn-Tahr said finally, biting off the words. “Mend it. But be quick.”
“Yes, sir.”
She slid back the panel in her wrist, which contained her medicomp and tools, and pulled out a tiny tool that mended bone through fabric and flesh. It was one of the newer instruments developed by Tri-Fleet Medical Command, a welcome addition to her other tools. She noticed then that she’d left her ring communicator on the ship. The flux in the accelerator had fried her compass. Fortunately her wrist scanner and the mender, new tech, had better shielding.
“You weren’t out here alone?” she asked as she focused on her work.
“No,” he confirmed. His anger-dark eyes narrowed, watching the skillful movements of her hands. “A Rojok fighter disabled our scout ship, stranding us here. In the firefight that ensued, I was separated from my squad. The Rojok you knocked down hit me with a chasat blast before I could defend myself.” He watched the instrument in her slender hands. “Old age is dangerous.”
She smiled. “You aren’t old, sir,” she replied. “You’re aging like a nice synth brandy.”
He made a rough sound in his throat, which passed for laughter in a Cehn-Tahr, and then cleared his throat, as if to disguise it. “You wear a Holconcom uniform,” he said after a minute.
“Yes. I’m Cularian specialist and medical chief of staff aboard the Holconcom ship Morcai.”
There was a pause. “You are Ruszel.”
She glanced up, her green eyes wide and surprised. “Yes.”
“We know of you,” he replied. “Although until today, I thought what we heard of you must be exaggeration.”
She laughed, finishing the last suture. “That’s what my C.O. says,” she told him, “every time he has to chew me out for brawling. He has no respect for people who defend the honor of the Morcai, or himself.” She put the tool away. “The First Fleet guys called him a cat-eyed benny-whammer. I ask you, how could we sit back and take that sort of insult about our commanding officer? Of course we had to mop the floor with them!”
His eyes flashed green, so quickly that she wondered if she’d imagined it. He didn’t seem to be a man with a sense of humor.
“As I mentioned, this is just a stopgap measure,” she said, indicating his leg. “I carry minimal supplies in combat—only what fits in my wrist scanner. You’ll need to have your own medics check it before you start kicking people again,” she added with a wicked little smile. He’d made short work of the Rojok with his good leg.
He eased up, using a boulder for a prop, and stood. He seemed surprised. “There is no pain.”
“The instrument produces a painkiller matched to the DNA of the patient,” she explained. “It’s a revolutionary invention. In the old days, mending one of the long bones of the body would have required a cyberscalpel and sterilization modules. The instrument I just used is cutting-edge tech, a mender that works through fabric as well as flesh.”
“Amazing,” he mused. He glanced at her. “Are you here alone?”
She grimaced. “I was with our astrogator, Holt Stern. He was my captain when I served aboard the SSC starship Bellatrix. We were dropped on the other side of the spaceport and I was ordered to look for casualties among an ambassadorial party holding hearings on the planet while the Holconcom targeted a Rojok ship at the spaceport. Stern and I separated to get directions to the council chambers, and I accidentally stepped on an accelerator ramp that I didn’t see. I ended up here. It fried my compass. My medicomp is about the only thing I have that’s still functional.”
He only nodded, giving away nothing. “For a physician, you have something of a flair for combat.”
“Oh, that.” She took her wrist scanner offline and pulled down her sleeve. “I commanded an Amazon attack squad for many years before I studied medicine.” She grinned, and her green eyes twinkled. “In other words, I learned to create patients before I was taught how to repair them.”
This time he did laugh. “You are not what I expected when they spoke of the human female aboard the Holconcom flagship.”
Her eyes twinkled. “I get that a lot.”
She looked around, listening. “Do you have any idea how many Rojoks we’re going to have to disassemble before we can get to a ship? It’s a long walk back to the city.” It wasn’t, for her. Several miles was nothing for a soldier in good condition. But she was thinking of her companion, who would never manage the hike.
His eyes, inexplicably, flashed green as she processed the thought. “We will have to commandeer a vessel, and I think it will require the disassembly of many Rojoks to accomplish this,” he replied. He straightened. He was very tall, and there was a parade of medals on the royal blue tunic of his uniform. He had to be regular Cehn-Tahr military, she concluded, but despite his lack of rank insignia, she imagined he was an officer.
“I accidentally left my ring communicator in my quarters aboard the Morcai, and my compass is dead,” she added. There must have been some leakage of electromagnetic flux in the accelerator unit she’d stepped on before it malfunctioned. The units had sustained similar damage once before due to radical electromagnetic fields. “Can you determine the direction of the spaceport from here?”
He closed his eyes for an instant and then opened them. They were an opaque blue; the same shade, in fact, that the Holconcom commander’s turned when he was reading minds. “The spaceport is just east of the direction my squad took, looking for a secret Rojok base here. That way. North.” He pointed. “A long walk,” he added, but without complaining.
She looked worried. “Yes. And that suturing won’t hold if you trek so far.”
“In that case,” he replied, staring toward a formation of rocks some distance away, “we must require my troops to come to us. We must call them.” He grimaced as he checked his comm unit. “I fell on it when the Rojok shot me. It is useless.”
She held her hand out, palm up. “If you can call soldiers without a communicator, be my guest. I only know how to call Meg-Ravens.”
He seemed interested. “Truly? How did you learn such a skill?”
“One of my patients was a Jebob ornithologist,” she said with a smile. “I always take advantage of free knowledge. You never know when it may come in handy.”
“I can also call Meg-Ravens, and communicate with them in their own language,” he said surprisingly. “I frequently seek the nests of Meg-Ravens, to track changes in their young,” he said. “It is a...hobby...of mine.”
“You’re only the second person I’ve ever become acquainted with who studied them. It’s a hobby of mine as well. I wish there were time for you to teach me how to talk to them,” she added whimsically. “It’s a skill I covet.” She stared out over the desert. “How can we attract your troops without giving away our position to the Rojoks?”
There was something oddly familiar about the twinkle in his eyes, suddenly green. “Observe.”
He cupped his hands over his mouth and made a sound like a galot. It was such a good facsimile that Madeline shivered. The great cats of the Eridanus sector were fierce and aggressive. Few who came across them in the wild ever lived to tell the tale. They moved like blurs and devoured their prey. Even their matings, from what little information Madeline had ever gleaned, from a single survivor of such an assault, a researcher, were so brutal that the females occasionally died of injuries incurred in them.
Almost instantly, there was a reply. Blurs in royal blue uniforms raced toward the old man and the female officer, so quickly that they were standing beside her before they came into focus. Despite having been in the field with the Holconcom, Madeline was impressed by the speed of these aliens. She’d only ever seen her commanding officer that fast rarely, most recently just after he’d spared her a killing fall on their last mission.
One of the younger Cehn-Tahr scowled at Madeline and the chasat in her belt and produced a weapon, as if he thought she’d wounded the old fellow.
The old Cehn-Tahr held up his hand. “This is Ruszel,” he told them.
The weapon was lowered. The men stared at her as if they’d never seen a female before.
“The Ruszel?” the tallest and most authoritative of the newcomers asked the old one, surprised. He was wearing a line of medals, almost as many as the older alien. Of the unit, only he wore a helmet.
He nodded. “She saved me from the Rojok, there.” He indicated the fallen enemy.
“I helped,” she corrected with a smile. “I only knocked him down. You immobilized him so that I could hit him with a tranquillizer.”
His eyebrows arched, as if he was surprised by her modesty.
“Ruszel, this is the kehmatemer, a bodyguard unit of the Dectat. Captain Rhemun leads them,” he added, indicating the soldier in the helmet. Madeline saluted them respectfully, curious that she’d never heard of them in her years with the Holconcom. But, then, the C.O. had little contact with the Dectat. His feud with the emperor was legend.
The old fellow turned to his men and spoke to them in rapid-fire Cehn-Tahr. They replied with the same rapidity. She could only make out a word here and there. It seemed to be an ancient dialect, not the modern Cehn-Tahr language that Tri-Fleet personnel learned.
The old one turned to Madeline. “There is a squad of Rojok scouts between us and an outstation which may contain a transport vehicle. We shall not be able to avoid them. They have biosensors capable of detecting even phantom movement. No doubt they are already aware of our presence here.”
She pulled the chasat from her belt. “If we can’t avoid them, then we can neutralize them,” she said calmly. “Then we can appropriate a ship to get us back to our lines.”
“I will certainly require one.” The old Cehn-Tahr moved a little awkwardly.
“You must make slow movements, even when you turn, sir,” she cautioned quietly. “The bone is only partially mended. If you break the suture, a blood clot could end your life.”
His eyes softened as he looked at her, measuring her easy courage and her beauty. Even with her long, red-gold hair damp with sweat and her uniform stained, she was attractive. Dtimun’s efforts to merge the two races were laudable, but the humans still had little knowledge of what the Cehn-Tahr were really like behind their mask of civilization. Nor did Ruszel know how hopeless were her carefully hidden feelings for Dtimun, which he saw quite clearly in her mind. What a shame. She would be a fit mate even for a Cehn-Tahr, if only their species were compatible; which they were not.
“In that case, you must command the unit,” he told her bluntly.
She gaped at him. “Sir, I’m certain that these soldiers are of higher rank than I am,” she protested. “They won’t follow me.”
“Ruszel, you are Holconcom,” he said simply. “Holconcom always leads in battle.”
She looked at the stern alien faces with a little trepidation. These were seasoned veterans. At least two of them, including Rhemun, were wearing campaign ribbons and battle stars that denoted superior command rank. Surely, with their prejudices they would never allow a human female to command them!
To her surprise, the men straightened into formal fist to heart salutes.
“You lead. We will follow,” the tallest of the Cehn-Tahr squad said respectfully.
“Very well.” She pushed up her sleeve and brought out a small Milish Cone. It was an emergency water synthesizer, taking oxygen and hydrogen out of the atmosphere to produce water. She handed it to the elderly soldier.
“It isn’t much, sir, but it will keep you alive in this heat until we make a path to the spaceport.”
He took it, his eyes warm as they met hers. “You must not let yourself be killed,” he told her. “Your commander would have my stripes for it.”
“I don’t think he would miss the aggravation, sir,” she said with a grin. “He once offered to trade me for a Yomuth in the Dacerian colonies.”
“I am certain the Yomuth could not treat broken bones,” he replied, tongue in cheek. “Be wary, warwoman,” he cautioned as he f
ound a bit of shade to sit in. He glared at his men and shot something at them in commanding tones.
“The threat is not necessary, sir,” the ranking officer replied in the same language with a flash of green eyes. “It will be a story to tell around campfires.”
“Captain Rhemun will translate for you,” the old fellow told her. “Some of the younger members of our squad do not speak English.”
Madeline nodded. “Very good, sir. Comcamrion,” she added in passable Cehn-Tahr as she faced Rhemun and the others. “Ca Makesh!”
The command to form the unit and move out, in Cehn-Tahr, seemed to surprise all the aliens, including the old fellow, but the unit snapped to attention, and became solemn as she took the lead. The old Cehn-Tahr watched her with quiet admiration. Whatever he had expected when he first learned of Dtimun’s effrontery—the installation of a human female aboard the Morcai—his attitude had undergone a rapid revision since their meeting. There was more to this human than he had anticipated. Much more. He was curious to know if the Holconcom commander had feelings for his human medic. But, then, it was impossible to read Dtimun’s mind. He had often tried, and failed.
Madeline led off at a rapid trot, her movements almost as graceful as theirs. She knew she couldn’t match their speed, but she was a combat veteran. She knew how to lead.
The captain didn’t speak as they neared the camp and became stealthy. He gestured, using sign language that only Holconcom or Cehn-Tahr troops would understand. He hesitated, not certain she would understand. But she smiled and replied in the same way, directing a two-pronged assault on the Rojok camp, which was enjoying a brief meal under the blistering sun. Unlike the Cehn-Tahr, and humans, Rojoks had minute traces of vestigial reptilian DNA, proof of genetic tampering. Nothing pleased them more than hot sun and desert.