The Morcai Battalion: The Recruit

by Diana Palmer

  She swallowed hard. “Just a little bruising,” she lied, as she ran a mender over her arms and repaired the muscle tissue.

  “Lies,” he murmured. “I am truly sorry.”

  “I know. It isn’t something you can help.” She studied him curiously. “Sir, what was...?” She wanted to ask him about the sudden sharp pleasure.

  “Forbidden knowledge,” he said curtly. His eyes narrowed and became an opaque blue. “You will forget it.”

  She blinked. She frowned. Hadn’t she just asked him a question?

  “Hahnson!” Dtimun called, to prevent any more questions. He had effectively blocked the memory of what he had involuntarily shared with her.

  Hahnson came back in. He glanced from Dtimun to Madeline and relief claimed his features.

  “I rigged the wiring,” he said with a grin. “Not bad for a physician, either. I doubt Higgins himself could have done better.”

  Dtimun managed a tight smile. “Thank you. And not only for providing a logical reason for the AVBDs to malfunction.”

  Hahnson nodded and smiled. “You’re quite welcome.”

  Dtimun turned back to Madeline. “We must go, before the dravelzium wears off. Fare well, Dr. Ruszel,” he said formally.

  “And you, sir,” she replied, saluting him smartly. She glanced at Hahnson with a sad smile. “I’ll miss you, Doc.”

  “I’ll miss you, too,” he began, smiling back.

  A low, threatening growl stopped him at once.

  “We have to leave, right now,” Hahnson told Dtimun. “That dravelzium has a short life and it isn’t as effective when it’s given in successive doses.”

  “I agree,” Dtimun said, regretting the behavior he couldn’t control. He grimaced. Even Hahnson, his friend, wasn’t safe.

  “See you, Maddie,” Hahnson said to her, but he didn’t dare approach her.

  “See you, Doc,” she replied softly.

  Dtimun paused when Hahnson was out of earshot.

  “That white noise ball that Hahnson gave you when you left the ship,” he began, laughing softly at her guilty flush. “You must activate it when I leave,” he added more seriously, “and never turn it off. You must deny me access to your thoughts.”

  She didn’t question why. She was certain that her hopeless feelings for him might trigger disaster.

  He nodded. “You are correct. I can invade your dreams, influence them,” he added surprisingly, his voice hard. “Enough stimulation, even of a mental kind, could bring me here unannounced. The behavior is uncontrollable when it reaches a certain point.” His face grew taut. “I would kill you. I could never live with the shame of it.”

  She drew in a slow breath and looked up at him with hopeless longing. She bit her lower lip, hard. “I’ll turn it on the minute I get to my quarters,” she promised.

  He searched her pale eyes quietly. It would feel strange not to hear her thoughts. He was in her mind a great deal more than she realized.

  His eyes narrowed as he sketched her delicate, beautiful features for the last time.

  “What might have been,” she heard in her mind— or thought she heard—in a tender, wistful tone, “if you had been Cehn-Tahr, or I human.” He turned, then, and left her.

  He didn’t look back as he walked out the door.

  She went back to her quarters and activated the small white ball Hahnson had given her. A second later, her vid player buzzed. She answered it. Hahnson smiled at her.

  “Something I forgot to mention,” he told her. “There’s going to be an attempt by Ambassador Taylor to grab your research grants. But don’t worry. We’ll find a way to stop him.”

  She was still absorbing what she’d learned about Cehn-Tahr behavior in one day. She shook her head. “It’s been a hell of a day,” she said heavily.

  “I don’t doubt it. We’re leaving port, so Flannegan is safe, in case you wondered.”

  “I hope he doesn’t discuss what happened,” she worried.

  “That makes two of us. One other thing. Your Holconcom assignment has been revoked by the commander,” he added gently. “There may be some gossip about why. He had to do something to explain your continued presence here at HQ.”

  “I’m not surprised,” she said gently. Dtimun had done what was necessary. She didn’t blame him. He’d said already that her future would have to be here, in the medical center on Trimerius. “I’ll deal with it, don’t worry.”

  Then she remembered what else Hahnson had said. “The ambassador is going to try to take my grants away?” she asked suddenly. “I won them in competition, fair and square. Is he holding a grudge because I knocked him on his butt at the Altair reception?”

  “You did what?” he exclaimed, laughing.

  “He made a nasty remark to me and put his arm around me, and the C.O. growled...” She stopped. That had been the beginning. Dtimun had been ready to attack the ambassador because he had insulted her. “So Taylor’s getting even.”

  Hahnson just smiled. “He won’t succeed. No worries. Komak knows things, I don’t know how. He says it’s not going to be a long separation. And that you’ll be back with us in no time.”

  Would she? She wondered. In just over two and a half years, Madeline had come to call the Holconcom home. She loved the Morcai and its crew. She loved the camaraderie of her fellow soldiers. She was accustomed to the pace aboard ship, the Cehn-Tahr fare in the canteen, the odd sounds and smells, the sometimes outrageous playfulness of Komak when the crew went together to the officers’ club. There was also the daily sight of Dtimun, which gave meaning to life. All those things would be gone forever.

  “Don’t borrow trouble,” Hahnson advised. “I’ll shepherd Mallory. Maybe,” he added hesitantly, “things will work out.”

  She nodded, but she was recalling Dtimun’s violent anger at Flannegan when he touched her and the abrupt, violent move he made toward her. Obviously, absence hadn’t helped his situation. If anything, it had made him hungrier. No, things were not going to work out. She was sure of it.

  * * *

  DURING THE NEXT WEEK, she worked out in the gym, alone, reworked medical filing systems, went through the motions of seeing patients and writing up reports. But her heart felt like lead in her chest. The joy of that incredible day on Memcache, the memory of what she thought she heard Dtimun say in her mind, in the gym, seemed as distant now as the three moons of Enmehkmehk when the crew was transported to the horror of Akhmau. And about as hopeless. His remarks had been tender, but beneath them had been the furious hunger that was consuming him, driving him mad. That hunger had separated her from the Holconcom, probably forever. She felt the separation like a wound.

  Her misery was made complete by a visit from Aubrey Taylor, the Terravegan ambassador to the Tri-Galaxy Council. He’d replaced the former one; a kind and sympathetic man who frequently played vid games with Madeline’s father, Paraguard Colonel Clinton Ruszel. Taylor looked as if he’d never played a game in his life. He was cold, unyielding and as friendly as a Nagaashe serpent in a fever.

  “If you’re attached to the Holconcom, Lieutenant, why are you here on the base?” he asked curtly.

  A good question. She wished she had a decent answer. “I had a bad case of Altairian flu, sir,” she replied courteously.

  “Flu. You’re a doctor and you couldn’t inoculate yourself against it?” he asked.

  Her face colored. She didn’t dare argue.

  He glanced at her. “They say your commander values you.”

  “I’ve heard that myself,” she said, trying to sound amused.

  He didn’t laugh. He paced around her medical ward, inspecting things. “You have two classified military research grants coming up for renewal, I believe.”

  Her heart felt cold. “Yes, sir.”

  He glanced at he
r. “And how do you conduct research as a battlefield medic?” he asked.

  “I do the research in my downtime, sir,” she replied.

  He scoffed. “Downtime. This is your first downtime of any length in over two years, I believe?”

  She felt her teeth clench. She didn’t reply. She hadn’t wanted to be away from the Holconcom even for the small space of time required to do intensive research. That was a failing she couldn’t deny. Adventuring in space was far more suited to her taste than bending over beakers and test tubes—or the modern equivalent.

  “There’s a young Jebob woman in the Terravegan unit who has excellent grades in graduate school and has asked for your grants. She’s already won prizes in molecular biology. I favor transferring the grants to her.”

  Madeline was winded, as if he’d punched her in the stomach. So Strick had been right. It had never occurred to her that she could lose her grants. There had been no deadline on her research into a new strain of bacterial parasite that infected Cularian bronchial passages—linked to Rojok DNA—and was almost always fatal. She couldn’t say that she was reluctant to develop it, remembering how noble Chacon was, and that she owed her life to him.

  Taylor waited for her reaction and seemed irritated when she didn’t reply. “No comment?”

  “Sir,” she said politely, “the grants aren’t mine by right. I won them through hard work and debate.”

  “You’re welcome to debate my Jebob candidate,” he said easily. “You’ll lose, of course.”

  She could have kicked him. The obnoxious little worm!

  He picked up an antique beaker and studied it through the light. “It also seems unacceptable to me that a human female, a Terravegan national, has been transferred to an all-male battle group across racial lines. My predecessor approved the transfer, but I’ve had second thoughts. I think it looks bad. One woman, among all those men.”

  “Sir, the military are mentally neutered...” she began.

  “Oh, don’t hand me that bull,” he muttered. “The process can be reversed, and many times, it doesn’t even work. We’ve got a pregnant supply sergeant right now who’s being dishonorably discharged and sent to a breeder colony. Once the child is removed, she’ll be spaced for her actions.” He stared at her. “Some of your colleagues say you’d die for your commanding officer.”

  “We all would, sir,” she replied smartly, although the reference to the misbehaving supply sergeant’s fate made her feel even sicker. She didn’t let it show. Not that she herself would ever experience that particular fate.

  Taylor gave Madeline an irritated glance. He moved around her, his hands on his hips, and the way he looked at her made her uneasy.

  “Your pal Flannegan is talking about an incident in the gym a few days ago. It seems your commander threatened to attack him when he found you sparring with him. Does the Holconcom C.O. have an interest in you that isn’t professional, Ruszel? Pity, considering that he’d kill you if he acted on it. His military authority at the Cehn-Tahr Dectat would be very interested to know about that, wouldn’t they, Ruszel? I mean, you’re a human. It’s against his law for him to even touch you.”

  His comments made tragic sense. He couldn’t get at her directly, so he was going after Dtimun, to get at her that way. He was going to dig until he discovered that her commanding officer had an involuntary attraction to her. It would mean the end of Dtimun’s career, perhaps his life, if Taylor persisted.

  She had to think fast. This was dangerous territory. She had to protect Dtimun, whatever the cost. “Sir, Flannegan called my C.O. a ‘cat-eyed benny-whammer’ in the officers’ club not too long ago,” she said, improvising. “I got in trouble for slugging him, and I had to tell the C.O. what prompted me to get into a brawl. That was why he threatened Flannegan.”

  Taylor looked disappointed. He paced some more. He brightened. “I notice that the Holconcom commander has replaced you with your assistant, Mallory,” he said. “In fact, you haven’t been on missions with the Morcai for some weeks now and your Holconcom assignment was recently revoked.” He smiled coldly. “Are you incompetent, or is your commander leaving you behind for some other reason? Some...unmilitary reason?”

  She bit her lip, hard. She would have to act. Dtimun couldn’t be sacrificed because she couldn’t control her own feelings. Her behavior had prompted his. He couldn’t help it, either. This was going to hurt. But it had to be done. There was only one way she could think of to save the situation.

  “Sir,” she said in a hopefully conspiratorial tone, “I’m not happy in medicine. Not the way I thought I would be.” She averted her eyes, as if shamed by what she was admitting. “I was better suited as an Amazon captain. I asked to be relieved from duty with the Holconcom, to have time to review my options.” She glanced at him covertly. “There’s not much hope of a transfer. Admiral Lawson says it gives our services a boost to have an SSC medic, a human female at that, posted with a crack Cehn-Tahr commando unit.”

  Taylor pursed his lips and looked elated. “I can manage that transfer, with or without Lawson. That what you want, Ruszel, to serve with humans again?” He emphasized the word “humans.”

  She wanted to slug him, but she couldn’t afford to. She needed the transfer. It might spare Dtimun his career and his life. He stood to lose both if he had to be around her for any length of time.

  “Yes, sir,” she lied. “I want to serve with a human division again.”

  He smiled. It was a chilling smile. “I’ll get the paperwork through. Since you’re going into a forward division, you won’t need those grants or your research. I’ll give them to my Jebob candidate. Have a good day, Ruszel.”

  He left. She waited until he was out of earshot, behind the closed door, before she let loose with a barrage of Cehn-Tahr curses, learned from Komak, which would have incensed the commander.

  “An apt description of Ambassador Taylor, indeed,” came an amused, deep voice into her mind. “This is a sacrifice of some proportion, Ruszel,” the voice continued quietly. “Why are you making it?”

  “You’re invading, sir,” she said, recalling the grizzled old face and snow-white hair that went with the voice even while she marveled at the reach of his mind through the distance between them. And his ability to pierce the white-noise generator. “It isn’t ethical.”

  “Many things are not. Taylor wants your research because it threatens the Rojoks.”

  “I suspected that.”

  “Yet you are playing into his hands. Why?”

  She closed her mind with mathematical formulae. The old voice chuckled.

  “I see more than you realize,” he said gently. “Your commander will not understand your decision. It will enrage him.”

  “Better enraged than dead, sir,” she said, and then could have bitten her tongue for the slip.

  “I would never let them harm him,” he replied. “Or you.”

  She recalled what Dtimun had told her, about the old one’s attempts to have her spaced when she was added to the Holconcom.

  “I did not know you then, warwoman. I deeply regret my actions,” he said quietly. “I lived in bitterness, with my grief and my guilt. Dtimun and I have been at odds for many decades. He goes out of his way to enrage me.”

  “You and the emperor, sir,” she said with a smile in her voice.

  He chuckled. “As you say. I am in good company, am I not?” He became serious. “You may think your assignment will profit you both, but Taylor has an agenda. He will seek to harm you.”

  “He’ll have to go through Admiral Mashita, sir,” she said, “and she knows me a great deal better than the ambassador does.”

  He sighed. “Very well. But be wary of any dangerous assignments. Things are progressing at a pace I had not anticipated,” he added. “I must double my efforts to effect research progress, and also change
in my own government.”

  “Sir?”

  “Never mind, Ruszel.” He hesitated. “Your feelings for the Holconcom commander—you do not understand the obstacles.”

  “I do, sir,” she said stiffly. “Better than you realize.”

  There was another hesitation. He saw her last conversation with Dtimun, in his office, in her mind. It saddened him. “I have committed many crimes in my long life, warwoman. Now I begin to pay for them. I will not interfere further. But there is a danger in being near your commanding officer, a grave one.”

  “He would never hurt me,” she began defensively.

  “He would never intend to hurt you,” he corrected.

  She frowned. “Sir, I have a white-noise ball and it’s activated,” she began. “It blocks telepaths...”

  He chuckled. “Some telepaths.”

  She laughed. “Okay.”

  There was a brief pause, as if he was speaking to someone. His voice came back into her mind. “I must go. Keep well. I must now attempt to find solutions for problems I, myself, created.” He hesitated. “One more thing, Ruszel,” he added quietly. “If Ambassador Taylor attempts to put you in harm’s way, contact me. I will hear your thoughts, and I promise you, I will stop him.” His tone was as unyielding as the commander’s on a bad day.

  “Thank you, sir.”

  “It is little enough to do, considering the trouble I have already caused. Farewell.”

  And he was gone. Well, at least she had a way out, for Dtimun and for herself. It would mean giving up everything she loved. But at least Dtimun wouldn’t have to give up his career, or his life, if she left. It was her fault that he’d had to sideline her, because of her helpless attraction to him, which had caused him to react in that violent way with Flannegan. Now she had to provide a solution, however she could.

  Ambassador Taylor was a sick little man. He was already notorious for his racist views about the Cehn-Tahr Empire and aliens in general. He was also an advocate of family rights groups who felt that the government’s policy of neutering was a detriment to the human genome. The groups were trying to do away with the mental neutering of the military and even the breeder colonies. They had some radical idea that humans should choose their own mates and breed when they chose. It was a revolutionary attitude that was gaining strength.