Star Cruise - Outbreak (30 page)

“What’s our play, boss?”

“I’m making this up as I go,” he admitted. “I’m no diplomat. We get there, make sure the kid’s okay, see what she wants to do. See who she’s with. Ask Captain Fleming for orders. Like I told Scorsshyn, CLC probably only cares we deliver her to Sector Hub in one piece. I care she’s okay.” He asked Maeve to connect him with the captain and held a brief discussion with Fleming while leaving the gravtube on the beach deck. He hastened onto the beach itself, Red on his six. “Stay away from the water,” he said over his shoulder to his deputy as they crunched onto the sand.

“Absolutely. You couldn’t pay me to dip a toe in there. Just being close to the damn stuff is making my skin crawl.”

Jake slowed as he came to the picnic grounds, where about ten people were standing in an elaborate formation, surrounding the princess. An older man spoke to Falyn briefly, then came to greet them. “There is no cause for alarm, Officer. The Hereditary Princess has chosen this day to accept the oath from House Derondor, which I have the honor to head. We shall be conveying her to the religious observances and then return to our world.”

“I’ll need to hear from Her Highness myself, sir. And Captain Fleming is on his way down to talk to her and you.” Jake holstered his blaster. “We have to wait for him.”

Falyn came forward, holding her pet. Her face was as grave as usual. “I’m fine, Officer Dilon, I assure you. Sylvann and her husband helped me get away from Scorsshyn. We’ve been planning the revolt for a long time. I was only hesitating because of Arln, trying to talk him into coming with me.” She closed her eyes for a moment, and Jake saw tears on her cheeks. “But he died.” She swiped at her eyes with the back of her hand and sniffed. “I’ll be much happier now, with House Derondor. I have distant cousins in Derondor.”

He bowed slightly. “I’m happy to hear that, Your Highness, but it’s my job to ensure your safety on board this ship.”

“I won’t return to Scorsshyn.” Reacting to the intensity of her tone, Midorri scrambled from her arms to crouch, bristling, at her feet. The pet unsheathed impressive claws, raking deep ruts in the sand.

Keeping one eye on the unpredictable animal, Jake nodded. “No one’s going to try to make you, I promise. Lady Scorsshyn is in sickbay right now anyway. Her heart is causing her serious problems.”

Falyn didn’t say anything.

More people were coming onto the beach. “What the hell?” Red took a position protecting Jake’s flank. “Who are all these people?”

“Falyn has requested all passengers from our planetary system to assemble here in order for her to make her change of regent known,” said the head of House Derondor. The beach is a deserted area, thanks to your captain having closed it four days ago.”

“Sir, this deck is unsafe. It’s the hot spot for the outbreak of a disease we’ve been fighting. The last thing we need here today is a crowd.” Jake ordered Maeve to seal the deck and not allow anyone else onto the level except Captain Fleming.

“The captain requests that the assembly be moved to the main theater on Level A, where the dance troupe performs. It should hold the Tregallovan passengers aboard and Your Highness can speak from the stage. He will be there in approximately five minutes,” Maeve reported. “I believe the blind-eye device the Socialites used on my ganglions on this deck has damaged the controls. With my renewed focus on the issue, I find I’m unable to seal the deck, although my indicators show the portals as closed and locked.”

“Kid left himself a back door,” Red said. “Figures.”

“We’ll have to do an after-action report on this entire cruise. Work on some things.” Having just received a subvocal message from the captain himself, Jake redirected his attention to Falyn and her new regent. “The captain wants a few minutes with the two of you alone before the meeting. He’ll meet us there.”

“Your proposal will be completely acceptable,” the Head of House Derondor and now the new regent as well, said after checking with Falyn. “You may escort us to the venue.”

“You round up the stragglers here on the beach,” Jake told Red. “Clint and a few of our other officers are handling traffic now in the gravlift and the corridor. I’ll get the princess and her immediate party to the theater.”

“Yes, sir.” Red saluted and took off at an angle to intercept the Tregallovan citizens who’d been at the beach with Falyn earlier and were now trudging across the sand toward them.

Jake indicated for Falyn and her regent to precede him toward the exit. As the princess approached the portal, he scanned the small knot of her people lingering there. He focused on two younger men standing off to the side. Something about them made his well-honed instincts sit up and take notice, although he couldn’t put his finger on the reason. No sooner had he jogged to get ahead of Falyn than one man pulled an object from under his shirt and threw it at the princess, while the other started spraying blaster fire.
 

“Bomb!” Jake thrust the regent aside and tackled Falyn, dropping her to the sand, completely covering her with his much bigger body. She was screaming, and the pet was snarling, snapping at him, when suddenly a blast of heat and pressure assaulted them. He was deafened, pelted by shrapnel and sand, stunned by the shock wave. He felt as if he’d been kicked in the spine. Forcing himself to move, he uncurled, pushing the princess behind him. Midorri exploded from the sand beneath him, launching itself at one of the men racing toward Jake and Falyn. Finding that his blaster remained clutched in his hand, Jake shot the oncoming terrorist at point-blank range, the world going black around him even as he pulled the trigger. If there was to be a second blast or more shooters, he was helpless to protect anyone, even himself, no matter how hard he fought the enveloping darkness and crippling pain.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

Emily was just finishing the surgery on Lady Scorsshyn, a fairly simple procedure to enable her heart to function more smoothly and pump a higher volume of blood through her sadly blocked arteries, when Bevar entered the
Zephyr
’s
small operating room, moving fast.

“I’ll finish closing for you,” he said.

“Aren’t you off duty? She glanced at the wall chrono. “We haven’t been in surgery more than an hour.”

“There’s been an explosion, Doctor. You’re needed on the beach deck, stat.” Bevar swallowed hard. “It’s Jake. He’s wounded pretty bad from what Red’s reporting.”

She felt as if her heart stopped, and she couldn’t breathe or move for a moment. Then she was out the door, shedding her operating gown and running through sickbay, pausing to grab the emergency medical kit Vicente thrust into her hands. He ran next to her, carrying more gear. “What do we know?” she said as she dove into the crew gravlift and arrowed down.

“Princess Falyn was on the deck for some reason, and terrorists tried to blow her up. Jake got in the way, killed one bad guy, but was caught in the blast.”

“Maeve, how is he?”

“My primary ganglions are disabled on that deck,” the Ship said. “I believe Officer Thomsill mentioned Officer Dilon was hemorrhaging quite badly.”

Emily took a deep breath and burst through the portal on Level 5. She steeled herself to ignore the other wounded and dying passengers inside the entrance and to focus on where Red crouched over a prone Jake a few yards ahead. Falling to her knees in the sand, she said, “What have we got?”

“Piece of shrapnel from the second bomb lodged in his gut, I think.” Red was holding a compress made from his own wadded-up shirt tightly to a bloody wound on Jake’s stomach. “Bastards threw one bomb. Jake shot one. The other guy blew himself up when our security forces entered behind him from the corridor. Pretty lousy bomb builders, fortunately. Not much collateral damage, other than to the ship’s holo generators.”

“Let me see the wound.” Emily took a fast glance as Red briefly shifted the compress away from Jake’s stomach and blood welled. “Internal bleeding.” She did a fast scan with her instruments before administering emergency stabilizing injects. “Only one wound, ugly but not too much damage to his organs, thank the Lords. I need to get him to the OR now.”
 

“Ready to transport, Doctor,” Vicente said. “If we can get him onto the litter, we can go.”

As the nurse and Red shifted Jake to the antigrav stretcher, Emily hovering close by, Jake groaned and opened his eyes for a moment. He reached out to her with one hand, and she clasped it tightly.

“The kid?” he said.

“She’s fine, not even a scratch,” Red assured him. “Already evacuated to safety.”

“Worry about yourself, doctor’s orders,” Emily said as she hurried along next to the litter, moving toward the exit. “You’ve had a close call.”

“You’re here.” Jake tried to smile. “I’ll be fine.” His eyes rolled back, and he lost consciousness.

Emily glanced over her shoulder, taking in what was now only a huge, empty metal ship’s deck with sand and a deep tank of quiet water. Other casualties were being attended to by her beleaguered staff and some volunteers. Jake was clearly the most severely injured, and she had no qualms about departing the scene with him to begin the necessary treatments.

When they got to sickbay, Bevar was setting up their tiny but fully equipped operating room to handle Jake’s needs. Emily went to the small prep room to change into fresh surgical gear. As she was washing her hands in the small sink, she realized her fingers were trembling. In disbelief, she spread her hands in front of her face.
Because this is Jake, because I love him.
“I can’t flash back to Fantalar now. He needs me at the top of my game,” she said out loud, leaning against the wall, hands clenched against the tremors. “Like I was the first time we met, on that damn beach.”

“Ready for surgery, Doctor.” Vicente’s voice came through the comlink. “Patient is fully prepped.”

Emily took three deep breaths, trying to center herself.
There’s no one else on board who can do this.
I have to get myself under control.

The com sounded again. “Dr. Shane?”

Closing her eyes, she gritted out an answer. “I’ll be right in.” At least her voice was calm.

“Jake trusts you,” Maeve said unexpectedly, her voice soft. “You saved him once. You can do it again. You’ve treated hundreds of blast wounds. Once you pick up the pulse scalpel, the muscle memory will take over, and he’ll be like any other soldier you’ve ever helped. No time for hesitation or doubt. Just do what the wound requires.”

“I never thought I’d need a pep talk from you,” Emily said, moving to rewash her hands. Maeve’s words were what she’d needed to hear, what a medical colleague might have said to her, in combat or elsewhere.
 

“You know I’m right. Focus on the injury for the next hour, not the man, and you’ll be fine. You’re the best trauma surgeon the Sectors has ever seen, and that’s what Jake needs. I’m grateful you’re here.” Unbidden, Maeve opened the door to the operating room.

Emily stepped across the threshold, strode to the operating table and held out her hand for the tools she needed.

A long time later, she sat next to Jake’s bed in the intensive care unit, holding his hand while he remained unconscious. She was exhausted, still wearing her scrubs, but the surgery had gone well, no complications. There was a theory in military medical circles that soldiers who’d been through the rejuve regenerator process healed faster, and she thought that it was going to be true for Jake, based on how his body was reacting to the injury and the surgery. She remembered he said he’d been treated the maximum three times in the machine during his years of service, so if the legend was true, he had an advantage.

He muttered under his breath and stirred in the bed. She did a quick check of his vitals on the monitors and was pleased by the results. Leaning over, she kissed his cheek. “I hope you weren’t out of body and watching me do surgery this time. You just concentrate on doing your part and getting well, okay?”

She leaned her head on the back of the chair and closed her eyes. After those few moments in the prep room, there’d been no more flashbacks to the horrors of Fantalar. Maeve had been right—once she began the surgery, the procedures she’d needed to perform followed predetermined steps with no problems, and her hands were rock steady as she’d repaired the damage to his organs.
 

There was a knock on the doorframe. “Doctor?”

“Yes?” She was so tired she didn’t even open her eyes to glare at Vicente for disturbing her.

“Security is on the com. They need you right away.”

“Now what?” Reluctantly, Emily released Jake’s hand and rose from the chair, stretching, as if that was going to banish the tiredness in every inch of her body. She walked past the nurse and went into her office to answer the call. “Dr. Shane.”

It was Red. “I’m sorry to bother you, Doc, but we’ve got a new patient, another Socialite, but he swears he never set foot on the beach. I’m holding him in his cabin. I figured you’d want to see him?”

A shiver worked its way down her spine, and she was suddenly wide awake. “Good call. Tell me which cabin, and I’ll be there in five minutes. You’re taking full biohazard precautions, right?”

“Yes, ma’am. I’ve got zero desire to risk being exposed to any new versions of the bug.” He hesitated for an instant before lowering his voice and asking, “How’s Jake doing?”

“Pulled through surgery just fine. Resting comfortably. I’ll have to keep a close eye on him for the next twenty-four hours, but I’m optimistic.” And didn’t it feel good to deliver
that
report?