Arkadian Skies: Fallen Empire, Book 6 (7 page)

The neck rub resumed, and he said, “I doubt Alejandro will need your help to get into the hospital—and he may have trouble getting extra people in—so I suggest you resume your shopping for combat armor while you’re waiting for him. You liked the suit you tried on back on Cleon Moon, right?”

The deliberate change of topic made her scowl into his shoulder, but what more could she do to sway him from his pigheadedness? She wondered if all of the imperial cyborg soldiers had been afflicted so. Maybe stubbornness was a desirable trait in someone who fought for a living. A refusal to give up and die. A refusal to let those he was protecting get killed. He had admitted that he had lost people he was in charge of before—how could he not have, when his side had lost the war?—and logically, she understood that it must have shaped the person he was now, but she couldn’t help but find such thinking exasperating, especially when he had originally agreed that it would be good to have her at his back. What had happened since then? He’d realized the kidnapping had gone from theoretical to possible?

Leonidas lowered his hand and gazed down at her. Waiting for a response.

“I think Alejandro needs all the help he can get,” Alisa said, reluctantly going along with the topic change, “but I will look for armor. Especially since we agreed that wearing a full suit is the only logical way for me to sleep with a cyborg afflicted with nightmares.”

“
We
agreed on that?”

“You were in the room when I talked about it.”

“I see. And that denotes agreement?”

“Absolutely.” Alisa laid a hand on his cheek. “You’ve never been married, so you’ll have to trust me. This is how it works.”

“Huh.”

She kissed him, releasing him much sooner than she would have preferred, and opened the hatch. As she walked out, she schemed about far more than armor shopping.

Chapter 4

Alisa walked into sickbay to see if Alejandro had come up with a better plan. He was pacing and talking to someone on his comm, the hem of his gray robe snapping as he made irritated turns when he ran out of room in the cramped space. Durant lay on the exam table, as usual, wired up as if he were in a hospital. Ostberg was bent over the patient, shaving him with a laser razor. He was doing an admirable job of taking care of his “uncle.”

Alisa paused to eye Durant, as usual, feeling a mixture of hope and irritation toward the comatose man, the man who had kidnapped her daughter from her sister-in-law. But since he was also the only person she had access to who knew where Jelena had been taken, she tried to think charitable thoughts.

“How far are we from the hospital, Captain?” Ostberg asked, meeting Alisa’s eyes.

“About five miles to the one our doctor here picked out. It was hard to find closer parking.” She didn’t mention that they were in a junkyard, and that Beck and Mica were outside now, doing their best to camouflage the
Star Nomad
.

“If I’d brought a thrust bike, I could have gotten him there quickly. Do you think we could borrow a bike and I could pull him there on a hover gurney? I’d be in and out, real fast. The grubs would never see me.”

“I, ah, the grubs?”

“Er, uhm.” Ostberg glanced to Alejandro. For help?

Alejandro, still pacing and speaking to someone else, did not acknowledge him.

That’s a term we have for mundanes
, Abelardus spoke into her mind dryly. So thoughtful of him to monitor her frequently.

Sounds derogatory,
Alisa replied silently, wondering where in the ship he was.

Only if you are one.

Gee.

“The doctor could ride behind me,” Ostberg said, apparently deciding that expounding on this daring plan was better than explaining the word. “I could get him there faster than a solar flare.”

“I’m not sure where we would find a thrust bike here,” Alisa said, thinking that sounded like a polite way to reject the idea of a thirteen-year-old boy careening through the streets with a coma patient bouncing along behind him.

Ostberg’s shoulders slumped. “Wish I could have brought the one I was racing. It was mega-stellar. But it belonged to my corporate sponsor. She knew my secret and knew I could win. She took half my earnings, else I could have
bought
a bike.” His forehead wrinkled, and he looked at Alisa. “Oh, uhm, but I still have some money. In case—you never said if we need to pay.”

Ostberg had been tense and wary when they first met him, but he had grown more bubbly as the trip to Arkadius had progressed and he’d gotten used to them. Maybe he felt safer now, since Alejandro was taking care of Durant, and because everything Alisa had told him had turned out to be true. She had no idea if the things Abelardus had told him were true. Or if what Abelardus told
her
was true.

Really
, Abelardus shared.
Such suspicion.

Ignoring him, she told Ostberg, “You don’t have to pay. These days, the
Nomad
gets its money from the brave dinosaur hunters on board.”

“Yes, I believe you’ll find it an interesting case,” Alejandro said, after listening to what must have been a long medical diatribe on the other end. Or maybe someone had put him on hold. “My patient is the victim of a Starseer attack…. Yes. Completely unresponsive.… I tried nanobots, but they are, of course, limited with what I could program them to do, and since I haven’t done extensive scans… Very limited, yes. This ship is extremely antiquated. I might as well be making splints out of branches and bandages out of caveman furs.”

Alisa propped a fist on her hip. Would it be inappropriate to punch him while he was talking on the comm?

“Yes, I’m aware of the work you did in the field,” Alejandro said, putting his back to her. “That’s why I’m contacting you. I see. Thank you.” He tapped his earstar, but responded to another caller instead of turning to face Alisa.

“How many people has he contacted?” she whispered to Ostberg.

“Five or six,” he whispered back, since Alejandro was speaking again.

“Five or six people who now know he’s on the planet and could have reported that fact to the authorities?” When Alisa had suggested he try to find a local contact, she hadn’t imagined him comming the entire hospital staff.

“Do you think we’ll have to
fight
?” Ostberg whispered. “I can get my staff and be ready.”

“Let’s hope not.”

Alejandro frowned at them, made a shushing motion, and kept talking. “Yes, that would be excellent, Doctor. Two hours? We’ll be there.”

Finally, Alejandro closed the comm. He lifted his chin.

“I’ve found an old medical school colleague who works at the hospital and who has agreed to let me in with my patient and a colleague.”

“Which colleague did you have in mind?” Alisa glanced at Ostberg. “He’s a little young to pass as a nurse or a doctor, don’t you think?”

“Leonidas.”

“He’s a little brawny to pass as a nurse or a doctor, don’t you think?” she asked, though she agreed that a chaperone for Alejandro would be a good idea, and she couldn’t think of anyone she trusted more to send along.

“It’s possible for a doctor or a nurse to be muscular,” Alejandro said.

“Oh? Did you find a lot of time to exercise when you were working eighteen-hour days in the ER?”

“No, but some people use growth stimulants to get the look while bypassing the need for exercise. And my days were rarely that short. But not everybody is an ER doctor. My hours were less demanding when I moved into specialized surgery.”

Alisa almost wished she could go along to see Alejandro trying to pass a six-and-a-half-foot-tall cyborg off as a nurse.

“If you’ll excuse me, I need time to prepare Durant for transport,” Alejandro said. “My colleague is meeting us soon at a pharmacy near the hospital, and he’ll escort us in, vouch for me, and handle the questions and paperwork.”

“Really?” Alisa hadn’t expected that much assistance. She tried to decide if she could imagine anyone liking Alejandro enough to go to that much trouble—and risk getting into that much trouble—for him. “Are you paying him?”

“Of course not. He’s a neurosurgeon with twenty years of experience, and the Alliance trusts him.” Alejandro curled a lip at that. “He saw the tides changing, turned early toward the rebels, and treated many of their injured officers during the war. He has money and an impeccable reputation in this city.”

Another reason he might not be quite the staunch ally Alejandro thought he would be. Alisa hesitated to point that out since she had been the one to suggest this tactic. Maybe it would have been better to hijack an ambulance, make fake idents, and sneak in. But until Mica found that forgery correspondence course, Alisa did not have anyone with the expertise to create fake idents.

“What’s his name?” she asked.

“Gregory Gutteridge. And don’t worry. He owes me a favor. I let him copy off my tests a few times.”

Alejandro shooed her toward the hatchway, and Alisa went out, but not without worries dancing in her head. She thought about going to help Mica with the camouflaging, but decided to look up the doctor’s old school buddy and see what his public record said about him. She had some time before the men headed out.

When she passed through the mess hall, she found Beck in his apron, whisking something in a bowl while omelets fried in a griddle atop his grill. Leonidas leaned against the counter.

“Are you two bonding?” Alisa asked him. “Or is Beck requesting the use of your enhanced taste buds again?”

“I’m putting a unique spin on a South Perunese sauce,” Beck said. “If it turns out, I can bottle it up and include it along with the package of samples I’m sending to Chef Leblanc. Do you think there’ll be time to stop at a post office here? Or a CargoExpress?”

“If you do it soon.
Before
Alejandro visits the hospital. Just in case we end up having to flee rapidly.”

“His plan didn’t meet with your approval?” Leonidas asked.

Beck handed him a whisk. Leonidas accepted it, licked it, and returned it.

“More lemon,” he said.

“You think so? All right.” Beck squeezed a condiment bottle into his bowl. “I’ll use real lemon when I’m preparing the final package, so keep that in mind. I’m sure I can get all kinds of fresh produce here, things that are too difficult for Yumi to grow in her cabin. It’s hard to find a lemon even on a space station with a full hydroponics level.” He sighed wistfully and stuck the licked whisk back into the sauce, stirring vigorously.

Alisa lifted her lip. “Will you also be using clean utensils when you’re preparing the final package?”

“I didn’t think you’d object to a little cyborg spit.” Beck grinned at her and winked at Leonidas.

Even if she was moderately disturbed by Beck’s cooking hygiene, she decided to appreciate that the two men had gotten over their animosity and suspicion of each other, at least when it came to the mess hall. Leonidas hadn’t even given that whisk a suspicious sniff before tasting from it.

“
I
don’t.” She touched her palm to her chest. “But your chef may not find it particularly sanitary.”

“Chef Leblanc was a soldier. I’m sure he’s tasted worse than spit.”

“An accolade that oddly wasn’t painted on the side of any of his ships.”

Maybe there hadn’t been room among the doughnut and hamburger murals.

As Beck handed Leonidas the whisk again, Alisa resumed her walk, heading to NavCom. She didn’t have much time to dig into this acquaintance of Alejandro’s.

She closed the hatch as she entered. Even though Alejandro would probably be busy in sickbay until he left, if he came up here, he wouldn’t appreciate her snooping, she was certain.

When she tied into the local sys-net, the public information on Dr. Gutteridge matched what Alejandro had said, but that didn’t assuage her concerns. It only made her wonder anew why the man would risk getting into trouble for Alejandro’s sake. It wasn’t as if he was only helping an old comrade; he would be helping someone who was still loyal to the empire, what little remained of it. If the Alliance found out about that, they wouldn’t be happy with the doctor, trusted citizen or not.

A knock came at the hatch, and Alisa turned the holodisplay on her netdisc to private before waving for the person to enter.

Mica walked in and flopped down. “I finished camouflaging the ship, no thanks to Beck, who left after twenty minutes, declaring that he had a limited time to get his parcel together.”

“Sorry, I should have come out to help you myself.”

“Yes, you should have. Especially since…” Mica leaned forward, tapping at the controls to bring up a live map of the surrounding area. “Yes, there they are.”

“What?”

Mica zoomed in and pointed at something flying through the sky over the city. A nearby section of the city with a sports stadium and a shopping arcade. Alisa recognized it from their flight in.

“That looks like an automated search drone,” she said, nodding toward the object in the air.

“It’s one of many out there, scouring the city in a grid pattern.”

“What are they searching for?” Alisa asked, though her gut already knew the answer. She hoped her gut would be wrong and that some other problem in the city had the authorities excited.

Mica gave her a frank look.

“Oh.”

“We’re on the news too.” Mica pulled up another display, a newscaster talking beside an image of a very familiar freighter. “Looks like the planet patrol got their comm fixed. One hand knows what the other is doing now.”

“Always inconvenient when that happens.”

“I’ve thrown as much junk as I could lift myself atop the ship, but you might want to close down all but minimal power, if not
all
power. A search drone might notice an energy signature coming out of a junkyard and find it suspicious.”

“The doctor may object to removing a catheter by candlelight.”

“He’ll get over it.” Mica pushed herself to her feet. “I knew nothing good would come of returning to Arkadius. We’ll be lucky if we’re not all in prison by the end of the day. Or we might just be dead.”

“I don’t know why you’re worried. I’m the captain. You’re just an employee I wrangled into helping me with my dastardly criminal pursuits. This is the Alliance, not the empire. You shouldn’t be convicted in one of our courts.”