Gates of Hell

by Susan Sizemore

  “Fine,” he answered Linch. There was no need to mention that it was about time for their daily dose of Rust. He finally gave his attention to Kith. “Yes?”

  Flat black eyes flamed briefly, then deadened again. “You let the ship trail us. Why don’t you strike?”

  Pyr held up one finger. “I’m giving you one raid. That ship is as likely to belong to Security as it does to Denvry. I’m not starting a war.”

  “It’s expensive to maintain ships,” the League rep reminded him after a glaring silence. “Expensive to buy loyalty, Captain. And then, there are the toys to pay for.”

  It was easy to ignore the contempt; he was used to it from Kith. “I know all that. I know anything you might want to tell me,” he reminded in turn.

  “There’s a ship out there. Strike.” Kith emphasized his point by pounding his fist on the sturdy surface of the table.

  “No.”

  “A simple statement,” Linch said, coming up behind Kith. He already had the ligret in one hand. “Even you should be able to understand such a simple word, Leaguer.”

  Kith growled a few words in his native language. Linch smiled, and drew his fingers across the ligret strings. Kith was not a music lover. Pyr watched Kith’s cold expression for any hint of the respect Linch deserved. None. Hatred, anger, and arrogance vied with each other on the ugly face. Nothing Linch could use. Kith really would have to die. After he’d had his raid and made his report.

  Pyr leaned forward, resting his right elbow on the table and his chin on his hand. “Do you understand the word ‘dismissed’?”

  After a prod on the shoulder from Linch, Kith answered, “I do.” He swiveled the chair, lunging off the seat. But Linch was already out of his reach, grinning wolfishly. He held a knife poised to throw out of habit, not because it would do anything more than bounce off the Leaguer’s shield. Kith pretended to ignore him and stomped out of the common.

  Linch’s knife disappeared into a forearm sheath. He picked up his dropped ligret and took the vacated seat. He settled the instrument on his lap, bent his head and began to caress the metal strings. Notes sharp as the blade were drawn from the instrument.

  Kristi appeared from the galley and placed plates in front of both of them. “That Leaguer’s getting boring,” she observed, then left them to their meals.

  “Observant,” Linch said affectionately. “And she can cook. Every pirate’s notion of a perfect woman.”

  “Not mine,” Pyr answered, too quickly. He didn’t want to start that old discussion again.

  Linch put the ligret down, propping it carefully beside his chair. He dug into his food, and observed around a mouthful, “You always were picky, Dha-lrm.”

  Pyr passed a Rust capsule to Linch, and took one for himself. He made himself take a sip of tea to down the drug. The drink was cold and tasteless, and the drug did nothing but keep the plague at bay. He tried another sip from the cup before pushing it away. “She said she put honey in this.”

  “A type of Terran insect spit.” Linch took far too much pleasure in informing him of that. “Quite sweet. I like it. You should try it. And a woman.”

  The smell of the food nauseated Pyr. “I have restraint,” he said, finding he’d risen to the bait after all.

  “You have scar tissue.”

  “Well-healed—thanks to you,” he admitted “Besides, Kristi has a mate and—”

  “You’re looking for intellectual stimulation, not a mother. I’ve heard it before. And, oh, yes, the galaxy is going up in flames. Such poor excuses, Dha-lrm.” He gave his dangerous grin again. “Of course, you’ll always have me.” He put his fork down and rubbed his hands together briskly. “What do you want to do about Denvry’s ship? It would be easy enough to lose them.”

  “You’re absolutely certain it’s Denvry’s and not Bucon Security?”

  Linch looked mildly offended. “I’m certain. Do I lose them?”

  “I’m considering it.”

  “But… ?”

  “Depends on Mik’s skills.” So much they accomplished depended on Mik’s skills.

  Linch retrieved his ligret, brushed his long fingers across strings before speaking. “I see. Wonder what’s taking so long.”

  “He’s trying to keep her sane.”

  “A romantic, our Mik.” He began to play something soft and melancholy. It hurt Pyr’s ears. “Why don’t you keep her, Dha-lrm?”

  Who was the romantic? “No.” Pyr got to his feet, happy to leave the common to Linch and his ligret. “I’ll take the watch.”

  “You do that.”

  “Fifty-nine hours,” Mik said, stepping away from the padded table in the center of the room.

  To one side of the table was a control console, to the other a bank of monitors. The unconscious woman was held down by padded restraints. Her hair and clothes were soaked with sweat and her head lolled to one side, but she showed no physical signs of damage.

  “She was full of useful information,” Mik went on regretfully. He held a datacube out to Pyr. “Only she didn’t know she knew where Axylel is. She’d have been happy to tell me as soon as we got started, but all she actually had were some random facts we had to trace to a conclusion.”

  Pyr almost understood what Mik was getting at. “Whoever gave her the brooch intended her to pass it on to us?”

  Mik nodded. “Laying down a false trail. Somebody who wanted Denvry out of the way and thought we’d do the job for him, is the conclusion we came to. She didn’t understand that at first. It took her a long while to realize who must be behind the information screen she thought she was manipulating.” He looked admiringly at the prisoner. “Fascinating thought processes.”

  Pyr waited impatiently for Mik to recall why he’d questioned the woman in the first place, but the man was lost in the details of tinkering—mechanisms or minds, Mik could easily get carried away. “Well?” Pyr finally demanded.

  “It’s on the cube.”

  “Who?”

  “Robe Halfor.”

  “Damn!” Pyr bit down hard on his annoyance. “I have to kill Robe Halfor?” Mik nodded unhappily. Bloody typical of Axylel. Boy never had been anything but trouble.

  “What about Hanni?” Mik questioned, dealing with the present and leaving Pyr to worry over the bad news he’d given him.

  Pyr spared her one quick glance. “How is she?”

  “Seventy percent chance of recovery.”

  Pyr was impressed. “Let’s hope Denvry’s grateful for your care.” When the engineer gave him a puzzled look, Pyr explained, “There’s one of his ships hovering behind us. It’s scared to open fire, but it’s not going away, either.”

  “You could have mentioned this before,” Mik complained.

  “You were busy.”

  “What do you plan to do?”

  “Sneak up on them and use your Door to give Hanni back to her brother. We won’t mention any of this to Kith.”

  Mik nodded; he looked relieved. “Better than spacing her.”

  Pyr patted the engineer’s arm. “You weren’t planning on spacing someone you worked so carefully on.”

  Mik looked briefly contrite. “She’s real smart, Pyr. You’d like her.”

  “She goes back to Denvry.”

  Mik tried a different tack. “What about the plague?” Linch would have been proud of him. “She’s probably caught Sag Fever from us. Does Denvry have Rust?”

  Pyr refused to let the engineer make him guilty. “Give her a five-day supply,” he told Mik. “Then stand by with her at the Door. I’ll signal you when we’re ready to send her over.”

  Chapter Eight

  You’re an odd girl, aren’t you?

  When Roxy looked up, she saw pale, green sky overhead and the swaying branches of the tree she was sitting against. When she looked around, she saw the rest of the small, walled garden outside the pediatric wing. The flowers that had just begun to bloom when she first arrived on Bonadem were fading. The grass needed trimming. The fountain wasn�
��t working. No gardener, biological or droid, had set foot or antigrav pad here for a while. Roxy closed her eyes again, and continued soaking in the warm sunlight, happy to be alone. She ignored the voice that had spoken in her head.

  It didn’t extend the same courtesy. Rude, isn’t she?

  That was a different presence. Too long with the silents, the first presence answered the second.

  You two go on without me, Roxy thought at the other koltiri. I’d hate to interrupt. The two koltiri had been avoiding her since they arrived, and that was just fine with Roxy. Having Reine and Racqel in her head occasionally was as much contact with Koltir as she wanted. They were her sisters and understood where she was coming from about most things. At least, Reine did. Racqel was usually too busy seeing the future to take much interest in the present.

  Roxy didn’t know why these two strangers were bothering her now, but she gave a mental sigh and told them, I live as a silent among silents, and I like it. So I’m odd. So what? I’m also on my break.

  Your being distresses us, one of the koltiri answered.

  She might have asked, ‘my being what?’ but she knew what they meant. It was her very essence that grated on them. Live with it, Roxy responded. We’re here to heal, not get along.

  The two telepathic voices blended into one. It is time we spoke. You disturb our peace.

  Her nickname was Sting. Their thoughts hurt, so she stung back. I disturb your presumptions—your arrogant, elitist, narrow-minded assumptions.

  You do not behave as koltiri of Koltir Prime.

  Roxy rose to her feet and looked around the empty garden. She was tired, lonely, and vulnerable. The healings were hard, and the whole process seemed ultimately futile, even though every life saved was a small reward. She didn’t even know how long she’d been on Bonadem. Her husband didn’t answer her letters. Her best friend insisted on putting herself in danger in the hunt for a drug that might not exist. She had a lot to think about; the last thing she wanted was to be thought at. She wondered where in the huge hospital complex the two koltiri were, because they put her in the mood for kicking some serious telepath butt. I put my life and sanity on the line every time I heal. Last time I looked, that was the job description for koltiri.

  Speak softly, child. You give us pain. We do not have long to meld with you.

  Good. She kept the thought to herself rather than send it. Why were they bothering her now? She forced herself to physically and mentally relax, to be calm and koltiri-like. They were older, supposedly wiser, they were deigning to share their wisdom with one who had strayed from the peaceful philosophy of their kind—the interfering old biddies. It was her duty to accept their wisdom. Right. Still, better to play along if she wanted them to leave her alone. They weren’t the only ones who found the contact painful. She looked up at the calm green sky and made her thoughts as gentle as the blossom-scented breeze. How should I behave as koltiri of Koltir Prime?

  When the answer came it was not at all what she expected. Koltiri have vowed to blend our gifts with the younger seedlings. The Genesis Continues.

  The Genesis Continues, Roxy responded automatically. Oh, great. She’d been expecting a lecture on nonviolence, and they’d thrown religion and reproductive policy at her instead. She crossed her arms, and glared at the women who weren’t there in the garden with her. Your point?

  Where is your bondmate?

  Onboard the Tigris.

  You have not sought the bondmate Racqel has Seen you with.

  She didn’t understand this one. Racqel had claimed years ago that Roxy would bond with a great warrior, and she was married to the hero of the Trin War, just like the great Seeress predicted. Okay, they weren’t bonded, but she was determined to go back to the Tigris and work on her marriage as soon as the Sagouran Fever epidemic was under control. She did chafe at the unfairness of it; Reine didn’t exactly have a complete bond, either, but nobody yelled at her. Roxy rubbed a spot on her forehead that was beginning to ache. Koltiri shouldn’t get headaches, but it was a symptom of Sagouran Fever she couldn’t seem to shed. I’m going back on duty now, she told the koltiri matchmakers, and built up her shields to keep them out. Odd girl, the thought trailed after her anyway.

  ———

  “Did you know I’m an odd girl?”

  Alice Phere did not bother looking away from the diagnostic board as she replied, “No surprise to me.”

  Roxy stepped out of the doorway of the Section Monitoring Room. She poured herself a cup of ‘caffeine beverage’ from the refreshment cart sitting in the center of the circular room, then took a seat at one of the other monitor stations. She was not surprised to see that Alice was the only doctor on duty. The staff, both native and offworld volunteers, was being spread ever thinner as the plague infected more and more of the population.

  Roxy liked the SMR and ducked in when she wasn’t napping between healings. Each diagnostic station was set up to cover an entire wing of the giant hospital. It was as modern as anything she recalled from her stays on the hospital world Nightingale. Far more modern than what MedService personnel had to work with on low-tech worlds. The monitor boards with their arrays of bright flashing lights and multiple screens and readouts gave a reassuring feeling of medical personnel being in control of any situation. She ran her hand along a row of cool, sleek touchpads. Control was a lie, of course, where Sagouran Fever was concerned, but this stuff sure looked pretty.

  Alice was in uniform, and Roxy took some comfort from the sight of the familiar mint-green and cream MedService clothing, even with the added faint blue glow given off by Alice’s environmental belt. She missed MedService, even though right now she was considering changing back into her black MilService uniform just to make a point about being a warrior among warriors with the other koltiri. Which they probably wouldn’t get, so why bother?

  “What are you staring at?” Alice asked. “My ears on crooked?”

  Alice wore her hair in shoulder-length dreadlocks. Roxy wasn’t sure if even biosensors could see through her heavy black hair. “I bet you don’t have ears. I was staring at your halo.”

  Alice cackled. “A halo? Oh, God!”

  Alice had been born on a Terran colony world settled by a Christian sect. She’d run away from home at fifteen, actually stowing away on a freighter to escape a life of rigid fundamentalism. Roxy knew Alice’s history, but she also knew that when Dr. Phere said ‘God’ she meant the God of her fathers. She practiced her faith quite sincerely, if not as strictly as she was brought up. So there would be no heart-to-heart talk with her old friend. What truly bothered Roxy about her mental run-in with the other koltiri was that she’d been reminded that she was duty-bound to help Spread the Genesis and go and have babies with someone from another planet. She and Alice could agree that evolution was a fact, but past that agreement there could be no discussion if religious wars in the United Systems were to be avoided.

  “A tarnished halo,” Roxy assured her friend. Then she slumped back in the chair and asked, “It’s okay to be married to someone you love, right?”

  “Nothing in the rule book against it,” Alice answered. She began running a medication check on an overflowing ward’s patients.

  “We work by different books, darlin’,” Roxy muttered under her breath. She finished the poor excuse for a cup of coffee and moved to peer over Alice’s shoulder, automatically checking data screens herself. “Isolation wards.” The beds were occupied by patients with serious illnesses other than Sagouran Fever. The patients in each shielded ward were tended by a pair of meddroids.

  “Probably the safest places on Bonadem at the moment.”

  “Mmm.” Roxy rubbed a finger along her chin. “Wonder if we should ask the hospital administrators to put security guards on the . ward entrances just in case?”

  Alice glanced up at her. “Just in case of what?”

  Good question. Nobody came near the hospital if they could avoid it. And nobody inside wanted to get out. “I’m Military.
We’re paranoid.”

  Alice shot her an annoyed look. “I think the Military needs to stop fighting a war that’s over.”

  “Over?” Roxy heard the sharp rise of her own voice, and fought down the indignant anger. Safer not to discuss the war with anyone who hadn’t seen action.

  Roxy said nothing, and Alice went back to tracking the flowing patterns on a quartet of screens above the console.

  After she’d taken readings, Alice said, “The research people up on Floor Twenty are threatening to jump out the windows. Or throw their equipment out.”

  “They still haven’t a clue to stopping Sag?”

  “Still nothing. Dr. Callen says he wants to talk to you. Physician,” Alice added for emphasis.

  “I don’t have the time to go over his ever-mutating data.” She wasn’t quite sure she had the brains for it, either, not with what the healings were doing to her.

  “Well, make some time, Physician,” Alice said sharply. “I thought the Trin were bad, but this epidemic could kill the Systems.”

  “Yeah.” She wasn’t going to talk about how bad the Trin really were.

  Alice tapped instructions on a keypad and adjusted a dial on the board, followed by quick calls to meddroids in other wards. Roxy found watching all this purposeful activity soothing; she could almost pretend that Alice was engaged in normal medical procedures. She felt recovered enough to get back to work, but waited a moment longer, listening in as Alice answered a call from Dr. Jeraldo. Patrisia Jeraldo was the head of Pediatrics. Roxy admired the way the petite woman and her medtech husband handled children. Kids seemed to naturally love and trust the couple. Their own three-year-old daughter had died of the fever when it first struck Bonadem, before the evac plan had been established. Rumor had it that it was the Jeraldos who came up with the plan to get the children of Bonadem safely offworld. The Jeraldos didn’t talk about their loss or take any credit, they simply worked harder than anybody else in the hospital to get as many children to safety as possible. In the time she’d been here, Roxy had never known either of them to take more than two hours of sedated rest. Seeing Patrisia Jeraldo’s haggard face on the view screen made her guilty for pausing for even a brief conversation.