Hospital Ship (The Rim Confederacy #5) (19 page)

The labs had had nothing but failure on vaccine strains from the start, and changing their focus to these new artificial Kupffer cells—ones that were cloned according to new specs supplied by the labs—intrigued him. He thought about the PET items that were sitting on his consciousness from last month's M&M meeting—perhaps there had been a contaminant in the recent shipments. The message noted the company that supplied these new Kupffer cells was the same one that had supplied the PET media too.

That was worrisome, and he looked away at the far wall in his office and the view-port there. Rising, he picked up his plas-glas of chal and ambled over to the room-width port. He stared out first inwards, as that was what one could see right now, as the Hospital Ship slowly rotated in its orbit. From here over Neres, he could see ITO and Roor and all the way to Pentyaan space as well, just beyond the RIM border. Almost ninety planets were now in the Confederacy and each waiting to find out if they will get a vaccine to lengthen our lifespan.

Rumors abounded about the Ikarians, but he had it on good authority that the oldest living Ikarians were more than 300 years old right now. And each it was stated plainly looked like middle-aged aliens. Not old aliens but middle-aged aliens.

He snorted at the new thought that perhaps he might live to be 600 years old himself.
Would play with one's life, he knew, if you could have that kind of longevity after taking a simple pill or a shot
. He shook his head.

All he needed to do was stay on top of the secret labs and their vaccine status until they solved the problem—until they came up with a vaccine that would work. There'd be testing on mice, of course, which would be the final stage—but then they'd also need to test it on humans and aliens too.

His time would be in between—if he could get the vaccine out between the mice and the human-alien trials that would be best.

How I'll know is the issue
. He would need as much help as he could find, persuade, or yes, even threaten others to do his bidding.

It wasn't going to be easy, and he was going to have to start with Ward and his gambling. He'd already had his EYES ONLY with the Caliph who would wash away the young man's Caliphate Casino debts for his help, and that would be his first chip to play.

Even with what little he knew about the addiction of gambling, he knew if an addict was offered a clean slate with no debts, he might do anything he was asked.

####

The Baroness looked at the far gardens and almost smiled, as today they looked acceptable.

It had taken yelling once again at the head gardeners who were in charge of that small plot of plants from Gazaya. Each of the gardens out this southern side of the personal tower of the Palace was named after one of the Barony planets, and the ones from Gazaya were the closest here. She had often looked out on the gardens and wondered who in the world had cut those shrubs so they were always brown and looked like they were dead. It had taken a bark or two at her aides to find the right gardener to berate, but doing so had seemed to work. He had approached her and looked like he was going to pass out, but she had tried to tell him that no matter what color the plants were over on Gazaya, she wanted them green here. Gazaya was the Barony planet that was the breadbasket for the realm, as Olbia had been for the Caliphate. Its job was to be a planet-wide farm able to produce huge crops of various foods as well as raise animals of all kinds. All was harvested or slaughtered and then exported out to the Barony.

On Gazaya, the shrubs were brown, but this was not acceptable to her.

She wanted green—so green they were.

She had another sip of the Quaran Pinot Noir.
This vintage—what, four years ago—is very good.

I must have a talk with the sommelier
so that he has a better idea of what I like—because I like this one very much.
She licked her lips and enjoyed another large sip.

She looked farther down the squares of each of the ten Barony planets, and from here, she could barely see the new one from Throth. Not knowing much about plants, she had agreed to the request from the Ikarian Ambassador that perhaps they could add some of their own Ikarian plants to her gardens, as they were busy doing on their new planet. From here, the blue large leaf trees looked interesting, and she made a mental note to take a walk down there to see them up close tomorrow.

But today there was no time.

She had already held consular meetings with three of her realm planets—Tarvos, Ishtar, and Zadra—on issues concerning the new threats on trading sanctions and tariffs from the Leudies. The damn Leudies were once again playing hell with interstellar trade, and the tariffs they were charging were atrocious. She had handled it as well as she could at this point—but there would be more fine-tuning needed, and she again made a note to arrange for the Leudi Ambassador to pay her a visit. She'd make sure to put that meeting deep, deep within the Palace so the sheer size and posh surroundings would be a good way to remind the alien she was a Royal.

She nodded to herself and made notes on the tablet on the large coffee table in front of her, to remind herself of all of these items, and as she did, it vibrated and buzzed at her.

She quickly punched a few buttons and an EYES ONLY came up on the screen, and she quickly punched in her authorizations and the screen faded to black. She waited only a moment, and then Dr. Sam Etter came on screen from up on the Hospital Ship in orbit.

He looked at the screen from his point of view and seemed to steel himself—at least that's the impression she got right off the bat.

"Doctor," she said kindly, "why have you messaged me would be the question of the day—well, of the morning, perhaps?"

He nodded and cleared his throat. "Baroness, it is with some degree of humility that I message you today—but your strict orders were that when I had a working diagnosis of Captain Scott, I was to contact you forthwith, I believe, 'Ma'am," he said solemnly.

She nodded but did not interrupt him. If he was ready to make that diagnosis, then no time like the present as it'd already been two months.

"After careful testing and with all the diagnostic results carefully tabulated—he is fine. He does suffer from PTSD, which we are still facing some issues on—but the alcoholism is gone. It was a simple gene therapy treatment—and we have tested and it's fine. He can still drink, but the alcohol has no effect on him whatsoever. I just wish we could do that with all dependency issues. But Captain Scott is fine and can be returned to duty after his ninety days are up," he said and smiled at her.

It was a fair diagnosis and that she realized was a start.

The fact that her captain was ready for duty was more important than everything else was—but the ninety-day upcoming release date was a bit worrisome.

"And I believe that you will also," she said with a slight burr on her tone, "need to sign off on his 'compos mentis.' Am I correct there too?

That was the real issue—well, only if she allowed it. If there were going to be any issues with his being found "un-sane," then she'd just have to relieve those judges from their robes. While that was happening, Captain Scott would be back on the
Atlas
, and that was a simple fact of being a Royal.

He looked down at the paperwork in front of him, nodded, and then looked up.

"That report was sent two days ago, Ma'am. He was found sane, yes, as we all knew he would be. The fact that he appears to have gone berserk and badly mauled more than eight other Caliphate marines is not our worry. He did that. He has no memory of that happening, but it did occur, and that's for sure. The PTSD will eventually be conquered—our work using the latest therapy techniques—EMDR it's called, seemed to have gotten some traction with the captain. He drums his fingers as a coping mechanism more than I'd like—but it does as it's supposed to do.

"During the reprocessing phases of EMDR therapy, Baroness, the captain focuses on the disturbing memory in multiple brief sets of about fifteen to thirty seconds. Simultaneously, the captain focuses on the dual attention stimulus, which consists of focusing on the trauma while I initiate his tapping of his fingers on his knees."

He shook his head.

"It is new, yes. It is tried though, and it appears to have gained some leverage with the captain. So over the next few weeks—in the time that we have—we will work on that, Baroness. And Captain Scott will improve."

He looked at her with what she felt was a need to be stroked, so she did that.

"Doctor—that is very good news. Congratulations—and yes, do work hard on getting our captain healthy. I'll look after the courts, and as always, the Barony treasury will make the Caliphate marines sign off.

####

Nathan double-checked the table in his small kitchen and wished he had something a bit bigger, but the apartments for Hospital Ship staff were all small unless you were a department head. "And that's not me," he said to himself as he straightened out the fork at Nancy's place and mentally checked off the dinner settings.

He had spent an hour last night alone using Gallipedia to find the correct dish to prepare and serve as tonight was his confession night. He shrugged that off again for now as he still didn't know how to broach this, but he knew it had to be done tonight. Their relationship had grown so strong that he felt like he was being more than unfair with Nancy—he was being dishonest, and that was something he never wanted to do again.
Tonight
, he thought,
would either cement their relationship or end it
.

The stove chimed at him. It was time for the final baste as he checked his PDA and saw Nancy would be out of aural therapy in just a few minutes and arrive at his apartment soon after. He opened the oven door and basted his roast crown of pork. He was careful to ensure the center stuffed area was well covered with those cooking fats too. The stuffing was a combination of apricots and figs. He'd stolen a taste or two, and he loved how it complimented the pork taste.

Table done. Roast on final approach. His steamer of complimentary rice was coming up to boil, and the fresh sourdough bread he'd gotten earlier in the day was ready to be sliced and served too.

He had also been able to get, at no small cost, two bottles of superb Quaran Chardonnays. Both were chilling right now and he was set.

He sat for a moment at the table and didn't want to think about it, but the call earlier in the day to his brother came to mind.

He'd not lied to him, and his plaint for help financially was as honest as he could have made it.

He told Taylor he was a gambler who was more than 70,000 dollars in credits behind with the Caliphate Casino, but he was getting help even though he hadn't as yet gone to anyone about that. He also told his brother he had a girl—really that he was going to ask her to marry him and could Taylor help a bit with just enough credits so he could buy a ring and cook her a hell of a meal.

Taylor had been reticent at first, but then blood took over, and he congratulated his little brother and reminded him that he'd have to come clean with his fiancée before he asked her to marry him. That was the fair thing to do.
It had been good advice
, Nathan thought, and he'd both listened and followed. With the credits sent by Ansible service, he'd also shopped this morning down in Neres City. He had been able to find a wonderful engagement ring—a Faraway azure diamond of almost a whole carat on a band of Eon gold, which was in the small box in his pocket, and he toyed with the corner of the box through his khakis.

Taylor had also been very firm as he ended his conversation—Nathan was on his own for the repayment of the debt. He and his new wife would have to worry about it, as Taylor would not help a bit.

"Love Taylor," he said to himself again, and he'd already decided to follow through on his honor with all of the various items on his list.

Nancy breezed into his quarters a few minutes later, and she was excited, as her latest aural scores from rehab had been excellent.

"So good," she said, "that I'm going to be a superb Ansible navy officer. I can hear items that many others can't in the testing, and the docs are looking into that too. I'm so, so happy," she said and she leaned down to hug him as he slowly rose from his chair.

Guess this is the time
, he thought and slowly turned to place her in the chair.

Walking to the counter over on the left, he opened up the small fridge and grinned at her. He twisted the cap off the Chardonnay, poured her a glass, walked it back to her, and put it on the table at her side.

She was about to say something when he shook his head and held up his forefinger in front of her lips to tell her not to say anything.

She looked at him somewhat oddly but nodded and instead picked up the wine and had a sip. A short glance over at the lit-up oven told her dinner was in the oven. She saw a pot on the stove that was simmering too. She looked back at him with nothing but love in her green eyes.

As he dragged up the other chair from the table to sit right in front of her, his face was solemn and she noticed too.

There was no other way, so he just told her.

He was a gambler. He won—but more than that, he lost. He'd been on a bad streak—in fact, as he tried to be honest, his streak was now years old.

He owed the Caliphate Casino more than 70,000 dollars in credits. He missed payments too at times. And as yet, he had no repayment plan.

But he loved her, he said, and noticed as her face changed as he confessed. She was incredulous at first, then sad, then resigned, and finally as he had worried, she looked mad at him.

He saw that and said he knew weeks ago that he had to come clean. He knew if he wanted to make his life with her—he had to. And that's what this was all about.

For a reason he never would understand, it was at this point—before she made a single comment—he pushed his chair back and knelt in front of her. Nancy's eyes changed from what he thought had been anger to worry, but he was already pulling the box from his pants pocket.