Endurance

by neetha Napew

  “Did you brand Alunthri?” It didn’t bother me that Reever had used a laser on me. I was a big girl, I could handle that. But Alunthri- “Did you?”

  Reever nodded once.

  My jaw locked. “I’m going to kill you for that.”

  “No, you won’t.”

  He had little idea what I was capable of. I had nothing else to lose. Calmly I watched as he moved to stand before me. Let him think I was subdued, beaten. The moron. “So I’m your designated... what? Slave-girl?”

  He inclined his head. The smug gesture cost him. He didn’t have quite enough time to avoid my fist when it connected with his diaphragm, or the follow-through punch I landed against the unbruised cheek. “Cherijo-“

  I would have tackled him to the floor, but inexplicably, the interior lighting went off. I froze, resisting the recoil of pain stabbing through my newly healed wrist and my burned arm. “Lights, damn it!”

  Before I could land another blow, Reever flung me back on the sleeping platform, then landed on top of me.

  “Stop it,” Reever muttered, spreading his legs over mine. I gulped in enough air to shriek, and his hand locked over my mouth to smother the sound. At the same time, his other hand encircled my throat and clenched. “Quiet.”

  The door panel slid open.

  “Pretend you’re asleep.” Without a sound, Reever rolled off me and over the side of the sleeping platform.

  There was someone in the room with us. I could hear the thickened breathing, the shuffling footsteps as they approached my bed. Was it that rat-faced, vigilante nurse? Through my eyelashes I watched the glimmer of tiny indicator lights as the intruder lifted a pulse rifle. The slight hum of the weapon as it activated made me stiffen.

  Something Dhreen, the Oenrallian pilot who had originally helped me escape from Terra, had said to me on Furinac came back to me. Doc, what is it with you and weapon-carrying assassins?

  At that time the Furinac First Scion had been trying to kill me, planning to later frame me for his father’s murder. He’d ended up committing suicide by blowing his own head off, an inch from my face. It’s a gift, Dhreen.

  I wanted to pound something. Was there anyone left on this blasted ship who didn’t want to beat, poison, burn, or shoot me?

  This latest assassin moved in closer. The scent of acrid alien sweat drifted to my nose. It wasn’t the nurse-I’d have known that smell anywhere. It took every ounce of willpower to remain motionless and let him cross those last few inches. A low, soft sound disturbed the air.

  Former fleet commander Colonel Shropana was giggling.

  I don’t know why. Patril should have been rather upset with me. He’d come all the way to Varallan Quadrant on League orders to abduct me, had threatened to blow up Joren, and then had suffered the ultimate humiliation by falling for my Trojan horse trick. I’d turned him and his forty League troop freighters over to the Hsktskt in exchange for Joren’s safety.

  Considering our history? Laughing or not, he’d definitely use the rifle.

  A metallic clunk came from across the room, and Shropana swung back around. I took the opportunity and rolled off the sleeping platform in the same way Reever had. I landed face-first on the deck, and cringed at the resounding whack. How had Reever done it so silently?

  “Torin.” Shropana kicked something out of his way. “I will make it quick. Come out where I can see you.”

  “Don’t move, Cherijo.” Reever’s voice came out of nowhere, sounding very much in charge. “Drop the weapon, Colonel.”

  For once Reever had a good idea. I stayed put and covered my head with my arms.

  Shropana cursed. The door panel opened a second time. The pulse rifle fired, causing a muffled explosion. A sibilant roar echoed the shot. Then complete chaos ensued. Furnishings flew over my head. Heavy objects crashed into plasteel panels. Bones snapped. Flesh ripped.

  “Stop it!” I pushed myself to my feet just as the lights came on and I saw who had taken care of business.

  “Shall I kill him for you, HalaVar?”

  TssVar held the Colonel suspended a few feet above the deck. Shropana’s broken body twitched with spasmodic shudders. Reever had the pulse rifle in his hands and was deactivating it. He looked from the League Commander to me, then made a gesture I’d never seen before.

  “Very well.” TssVar dropped the wounded man to the deck. The body made a distinct, wet thud.

  “Oh, for God’s sake.” I ran to Shropana. The Hsktskt had done an excellent job, I saw as I crouched down next to the unconscious man. He was very nearly dead. “Couldn’t you have just knocked him out?”

  The Colonel was a mess. Deep head wound, obvious fractures in both front and back hocks. Dark purple blood spilled from the sagging flews around his mouth and pooled on the deck beneath his blunt, balding head. When I jerked aside his tunic and palpated his abdomen, I swore.

  “Shattered ribs and internal hemorrhaging, from the feel of it.” I checked his pulse, then jerked my head toward the room panel. “He’s taching on me. Call for medevac. Now.”

  With swift movements I tore a piece of linen and bound it around Shropana’s skull. I had no case, no bonesetters, no scanner. Unless I moved fast, I soon wouldn’t have a patient.

  “Well?” I glared at Reever.

  TssVar nudged the Colonel with one huge clawed foot, making Shropana groan. “Isn’t he dead?”

  “No. Don’t do that.” I swatted at the Hsktskt’s leg. “He needs surgery. Now. I’ll have to perform a thoracotomy to see how bad it is.” If his heart would stand the strain. Since my heroes evidently weren’t going to signal Medical, I rose and headed for the console.

  The big Hsktskt got in my way. “This one tried to kill you.”

  “Not my problem.” I went around him. “Let me do my job, will you?”

  TssVar made no indication whether he was going to grant me permission to do it, but waiting for approval was never one of my strong points. Behind me, I heard him say to Reever, “I will observe her, HalaVar.”

  “As you wish, OverLord,” Reever said.

  Like I was a bug under a microscope, doing some fascinating tricks.

  “You two can stand here and chat all day,” I said, and keyed in a signal. “I’m moving the Colonel before he bleeds to death.”

  The charge nurse dispatched two orderlies and a hover gurney to aid me. Once we loaded Shropana, I trotted down the corridor alongside him, my fingers wrapped around the pulse point in his arm. His thready heart rate had seriously weakened by the time we reached Medical.

  I started handing out orders before the entrance panel slid shut behind me. “Thoracic surgical team, one minute. I need a breryliumine infuser setup and full portable cardiac array, stat. Nurse”-the League staffer gawked when I pointed at her-“yes, you. Get your backside over here.”

  Malgat began protesting at once. I shoved him out of my face. He trailed after me, still squawking some nonsense about seniority. From the corner of my eye I saw TssVar nod to one of the cenrurons, who grabbed the furious physician and hauled him out of my face.

  Having the OverLord around had its advantages, I thought, then looked down at the patient. Sometimes.

  Between me and the suddenly cooperative nurse, we had Shropana prepped by the time the surgical team had assembled. I had an intern take the Colonel in, while the nurse and I geared up. She didn’t offer to help when I changed the dressing on my burned arm before I scrubbed. She just stared at my brand, then the collar around my neck.

  “Yeah, I’m a slave, too.” I secured the new ban-dage and shook down the sleeve of my gown. “Just like everyone else.”

  “Doctor.” TssVar walked in, looking around with interest. “This appears to be much more efficient than your center on Kevarzangia Two.”

  A supply closet would have been an improvement on K-2’s FreeClinic. I missed it anyway.

  “Here.” I handed the largest set of surgical gear to TssVar. “Put this on and scrub.” I nodded toward the sink, then turned t
o the attending nurse. “Help me.”

  The nurse went pale. “But-but—“

  He wasn’t contaminating my sterile field with all his Hsktskt germs. “Do it.”

  I left the two of them at the biodecon unit and entered the main surgical suite, where Shropana lay shrouded and ready for the procedure.

  “Status,” I said, and one of the surgical interns hesitantly rattled off Shropana’s vital signs. The tachycardia had leveled out. “Okay. Let’s get rolling.”

  League medical equipment might be better than K-2’s, but it hardly compared to the Jorenian tech I had worked with on the Sunlace. The same main control console governed most of the surgery’s various apparatus. I muttered to myself as I accessed the panel and activated one of the table scanners. This junk seemed to take forever to scan the body and chest cavity before it extrapolated a diagnosis.

  “Pneumothorax, right lung,” I said, reading the displayed results out loud. “Multiple fractures in both arm hocks and seven ribs. Looks like one of those pierced the gland cluster behind the cardiac organ.”

  TssVar was indeed very efficient.

  On top of that, Shropana’s heart displayed the unmistakable signs of severe coronary arterial disease. As if I didn’t have enough of a challenge to deal with. I checked the other scanner.

  “Head wound is superficial. No sign of subdural hematoma.” I inspected the laser rig as I powered it up. “All right, people, we’re going to have our hands full. He’s a myocardial infarction waiting to happen.” I checked and saw the Hsktskt standing at the back of some nurses. “OverLord, you’ll want to come inside the field perimeter now.”

  The Hsktskt quickly stepped forward. He must have remembered the last time he encountered the bioelectrical wall-also the last time he’d seen me at work, back on K-2, when I’d delivered his mate’s quintuplets. At gunpoint.

  The glamorous life of an intergalactic surgeon. Maybe I should have listened to Dhreen and opened a restaurant on K-2. “Activate sterile field.”

  The static buzz was followed by the whispered suction of the air replacement unit. I pulled down the rig and checked the settings. The beam regulator badly needed calibration, and I had to fool with the stream injector for a minute before it produced the proper bandwidth. My arm hurt, but not enough to make it difficult to handle the instruments.

  “Tell me something,” I asked no one in particular. “How is it that the League will waste untold millions of credits tracking down a single Terran female, but won’t spend a tiny fraction of that upgrading and maintaining its own medical equipment?”

  No one answered.

  “Stats.” When I got no answer, I glared at the nurse handling the Colonel’s anesthesia. “Well? Are you taking a nap over there, or what?”

  “He’s barely stable,” she said, muttering under her mask. “You should know.”

  I powered down and pushed the rig to one side. The slave brand under my gown throbbed in time with the invisible hammers on each side of my head.

  I didn’t really have the time to do this, I thought, as I surveyed the numerous insubordinate eyes watching me. However, that was one thing I learned in my first year of residency-if you wanted to be in charge, you’d damn well better act like it.

  “Okay, children,” I said, insulting the group at large. “Here’s how it works. I am the surgeon. You are the surgical support team. I ask questions. You answer me. I cut. You mop up the blood. If you won’t do that, get out and send in someone who will.”

  The League med pros exchanged glances. One of the male residents cleared his throat.

  There’s always one brave one. “You have a comment you’d like to make, resident?”

  “You turned the fleet over to the Hsktskt,” he said, glancing nervously at the OverLord. “Why should you wish to save the Colonel’s life now?”

  TssVar made an ugly sound.

  Brave, and possibly suicidal. “As I recall, you people were prepared to destroy an entire world to get me. The way I see it, we’re even. Got it?”

  Everyone appeared to get it.

  “Good. Now, can we do this, or watch him die?” I waited for the length of a heartbeat. “Stats.”

  The nurse sounded furious, but she rattled off the appropriate readings. My instrument nurse positioned her setup tray. The interns moved in to assist.

  Hey, it worked.

  I silently released the breath I’d been holding, reactivated the rig and pulled down the lascalpel. The bright optic lights made Shropana’s hairy torso appear bloated and purplish.

  “Here we go.” I made the initial incision and pulled the beam down the median line from his chest, through the brisket and around into his upper flank. “Clamp back that subcutaneous tissue. Like that. Modify the rib spreader to clamp on the left withers only. Suction.”

  “Explain what you are doing, SsurreVa,” I heard TssVar say.

  I’m cutting open this man to repair your mess. “Standard traumatological procedure: get his lungs working, arrest the internal bleeding, then fix anything that threatens the cardiac organ. His heart is already diseased, so I have to proceed with caution. I’ll do a laparotomy-that’s abdominal exploratory surgery- if necessary, after that.”

  I didn’t bother to elaborate, but continued cutting, and addressed my two resident assistants at the same time. “We’ll plug the plural cavity first, then deal with the gland cluster and the ribs.” To the nurse, I said, “Give me a series two chest tube. More suction. Yes. That’s it.”

  I had to move fast. The pneumothorax compressed the Colonel’s diseased cardiac organ (not a good thing), so I evacuated the air from the space between his lung and sternal plating and sealed the rupture. Once that was done, I was wrist-deep in blood.

  Shropana’s species possessed a network of glandular nodules-delicate-looking systemic clusters-that regulated every organ in his body. The high concentration of vessels in the clusters redefined the term “bleeder.” He was a sieve. By the time I located and sealed off the main culprits, fluid was spilling over the table onto the deck. The nurse spent as much time suctioning as I did cauterizing micro-tears in the arterial walls.

  “Doctor, his pressures are starting to red range,” the vitals nurse suddenly said. “We’re running low on plasma, too.”

  I didn’t need him having an MI on me now. Why was plasma a problem? “Get more whole blood in here.”

  “There isn’t any more,” she said.

  Unbelievable. “Does this flying waste station possess a whole-blood synthesizer?”

  The nurse took a step back at my tone. “Of course, Doctor, but-“

  I tossed a bloody instrument in her general direction. “Then have someone to whip me up a few gallons, will you?”

  I rapidly completed my repairs while the residents clamped bonesetters around his arms. His shattered ribs would have to wait for another day. I closed his chest and watched his vitals monitor myself. I didn’t dare move him from the surgical suite until he’d been fully transfused, but the immediate danger was over.

  “Deactivate sterile field.” I turned and found my nose about an inch from TssVar’s surgical gear. I kinked a neck muscle as I glanced up. “Well, OverLord? Enjoy the show?”

  “It is interesting to watch you work, SsurreVa,” the Hsktskt said, stepping out of my way. Was that respect in those big yellow eyes? Surely not. I’d just ruined all his beautiful handiwork.

  “Glad to hear it.” I stripped off my mask and gloves. He nodded curtly, and left the surgical suite in silence. Most of the team followed. No one said a word as they passed by me.

  A simple thank-you would have been nice.

  I stood by Shropana and watched his vitals as one nurse, who had stayed behind, cleaned up the bloody instrument tray. A resident wheeled in a new batch of synplasma and I set up the infuser feed lines myself. The Colonel’s vitals responded accordingly.

  Patril might just live through this, after all.

  I was still enjoying my success when the nurse j
umped at me, and something slashed at my chest. “What the hell-?”

  My half-turn was swift and reflexive. Fortunately. The dermal probe aimed at my heart buried itself in the flesh of my upper arm instead.

  The good arm, too.

  “Hey!” Through a mist of pain and fury 1 saw dark, glittering eyes blazing over the rim of her mask. Fury-spawned adrenaline allowed me to ignore the wound and grab her skinny throat with my hands. I took a moment to tear away her surgical mask, although I already knew who it was.

  “Nurse Lucretia Borgia,” I said. “What’s the matter, couldn’t lay your paws on any benzodiazapene?”

  I didn’t let her have enough air to speak. Not that I cared about what she had to say. I backed her into a plaspanel wall and held her there.

  Time to use some Hsktskt tactics. To keep the lizards monitoring us from interfering, I pulled off my headgear, then hers.

  “Now you listen.” I leaned in, felt something warm run down my sleeve. Blood from the new wound. As if I needed more problems. “I’ve had enough of this. Enough. If I signal that big monster in charge, he’ll put you on a tray and pass you around. Want to end up an appetizer?”

  Gasping, her tail thrashing frantically against the panel, the nurse shook her head.

  “Then we’re going to make a deal. You don’t try to kill me, and I won’t feed you to them. Agreed?”

  She gave a weak nod. I let go, and she dropped to the deck, choking and coughing as fresh air filled her cheek pouches.

  I gave her a few moments, using the time to check out my brand. The tussle had cracked the burns open, and they were bleeding, too. I snatched a couple of sterile dressing packs, then nudged her with my foot. “Get up.”

  Unsteadily she pushed herself off the deck, then staggered as I grabbed her by the arm.

  “Come on.”

  I hauled her over to the scrub unit, and stuck the dressing packs in her paws. I couldn’t help grumbling as I pulled the probe from the shallow wound in my good arm and tore the sleeve away. That hurt.

  Her beady eyes bulged again. “That, why are you doing?”