Plague of Memory (4 page)

I would have to ask Reever about her. "She sounds like a brave woman." His white eyes lifted to mine. "Indeed." He took

one last look at his stumps before he reclined. "I revoke my request for my Speaker. I would know more about these prosthetics, and how it will be for me."

Squilyp summoned the resident responsible for fitting amputees with artificial limbs, and we left him discussing the details with Dapvea. I walked out into the ward and looked down the row of berths. A nurse was clearing Knofki's morning meal, which he had apparently wolfed down, while another was measuring him for support braces. He was trying very hard not to squirm. I would have to keep a close eye on the boy, or he would be racing through the corridors on them.

"We have time to perform a halo-stim," the Senior Healer said as he joined me.

I stiffened. "I had one only yesterday."

"The stimulation is necessary if we are to make any progress with recovering your memories."

"Her memories," I said, wishing an emergency appendectomy would walk in at that very moment. "Not mine."

"When we achieve a successful recovery," the Omorr said with the deliberation of a tested patience, "they will be yours. Come now."

I did not wish to go with him into the neurological treatment room, but Reever had directed me to allow the Omorr to continue his attempts to revive my former self's memories. Thus I went, although slowly and without a great deal of enthusiasm, and sat in the padded patient's seat.

The room contained the latest technology being used to treat patients with brain injury, disorder, or disease. A long bank of consoles measured brain activity, performed continuous neurological scans, and applied finely controlled doses of medications, sonics, energy, and other stimulants to the patients.

"Try not to wriggle this time," Squilyp said as he lowered a bowl-shaped web of alloy bands studded with stim ports and sensor pads over the top of my head.

The feel of the cold metal on my skin made my nose wrinkle. "Would you sit still if you felt as if lice were crawling in and out of your ears?"

"If I knew the lice were going to give me back my life, yes." The Senior Healer hopped over to the console and initiated the treatment program. "Sit back, close your eyes, and relax."

Relax, when my life might be eradicated in favor of hers. Impossible. Only his past failures reassured me enough to do as he told me. "When will I have had enough treatment?"

"When I see some positive results from the stim," Squilyp said, and switched on something that made the short hairs on my neck rise. "Cognitive impairment from trauma-induced amnesia is not always permanent. A substantial amount of memory loss is to be expected, but over time that should reduce until your memories are intact up to the time of your injury."

No sensation of lice in my ear canals, but I resisted a sudden, terrible urge to squash what felt like invisible worms inching under my hair. "Which time? When the prisoner shuttle crashed, or when Daneeb shot Cherijo in the head?"

"Don't fidget," the Omorr said. "When the native woman shot you, obviously. The crash landing only fractured your skull."

"I reviewed the last set of brain scans you performed," I said over the faint buzzing in my ears. I did not like it any more than the lice-infested sensation. "You noted that the bilateral lesions to the hippocampus were severe."

He nodded in an absent fashion. "They should be. You were shot twice at point-blank range. That it did not destroy your hippocampus is a miracle."

"You agree that such would be enough to inflict irreversible retrograde amnesia," I suggested, cringing a little as I felt the energy of the first round of stim come through the bands. I opened my eyes and saw white spots. "As would damage to the entorhinal, perirhinal, and parahippocampal nodes. Judging by the age of the tissue in those cortical areas, all three were virtually destroyed by the head injuries Daneeb inflicted."

"I disagree." The Omorr left the console and came over to adjust the halo device. "Your semantic memory is largely intact. You recalled words spoken to you just before the head injury. You even remember specific medical skills and how to function as an adult in society, limited as yours was."

"After two years of wandering about and behaving like a mute madwoman," I reminded him. The outrage in his eyes made my heart constrict. "Senior Healer, I do not mean to offend, or show disrespect, but all you do with this"—I tapped the halo—"is disrupt my brain waves, make my skin crawl, and give me a headache."

The door panel opened abruptly, and Xonea Torin, captain of the
Sunlace,
strode in.

I waited in silence for Cherijo's adopted brother to speak to Squilyp. He was almost as tall as Teulon had been, but much broader through the shoulders and chest. When I had first come on board the ship, the crew's blue skin, black hair, and white eyes reminded me so much of the Raktar that it had been a comfort. Only in time did I learn how different the Torins were, collectively as friendly as children who had never left their shelter.

They were nothing like Teulon.

These people might all have eyes the color of new snow, but the subtlety of emotion in them ran the spectrum from soft powder to sharp ice. Xonea's gaze most often relayed the cool, watchful attention of a battle-seasoned warrior, but presently something much fiercer blazed in his eyes. Xonea turned his attention, but he did not smile, and he did not bother to address the Senior Healer at all.

"Cherijo," he said. "You are to come with me to the command center at once."

After the damage inflicted on the
Sunlace
during the Jado Massacre, the ensleg had retrofitted the vessel, and constructed not one but two command centers within the ship. The first was located in the customary position, near the primary helm and navigational array, where most of the ship's flight officers performed their duties.

That was not the command center to which Xonea Torin escorted me. In the heavily shielded and reinforced engineer

ing section, located in the heart of the vessel, a second command center had been added. From this secondary flight deck, the
Sunlace's
crew could perform the same functions that they would on the primary with far more protection and safety. Reever had told me that the second command center was only used while the ship was under attack or engaging in the field of battle.

We were doing neither, so I was somewhat confused as to why I had been brought here. Still, the captain was the highest-ranking male on the ship, the equivalent of a rasakt among the Iisleg, and a female did not speak to such a man unless commanded by him to do so.

Xonea and I submitted to a DNA test before we were permitted access to the command center. He led me past the consoles and equipment, which were not in use, and into a room with a large table, many chairs, and a sophisticated computer array with multiple terminals and access consoles. Waiting for us were Reever and eleven Jorenian officers who supervised various operations on board the ship.

There were more men than women here, and all of them were staring at me. This promised to be unpleasant. Hopefully I would not be stripped and beaten here. I saw no discipline posts or whips.

"Sit down, Healer," the captain said.

I sat down in the chair Xonea indicated, to the right of his own and directly across from my husband's, and waited. My face felt as immobile as a Lok-teel mask in a blast of ice wind.

"We have received an urgent relay from the
Hsktskt Faction homeworld of Vtaga," Xonea said, activating the central console. A data copy of the relay appeared on the screens set into the table before us. It was shown in a language I could not read, so it meant nothing to me. "As you can see, it came from SubAkade TssVar, the former general of the Faction armies, and currently the chief Hsktskt negotiator at the Jado peace talks. He has personally requested our immediate assistance. Specifically, he asks that Cherijo come to Vtaga."

The other men were reading the relay. Their reactions appeared to be a blend of surprise, disbelief, and, oddly, anger. I recalled TssVar as the big reptilian who had been present when Raktar Teulon delivered his ultimatum after the rebels had taken control of Akkabarr. TssVar had not struck me as a being who would casually ask for anything—and how was it that he knew Cherijo?

Reever finished reading the relay. "No," he said to Xonea.

"This is not a matter of simply refusing their request, Duncan." The captain looked distressed, as if he did not wish to say those words. "There is precedence."

"Not this time." Reever looked at me. "Jarn, leave us."

Surprised that my husband had called me by my name in front of so many who did not, I rose to my feet.

"Sit down, Cherijo," Xonea said.

I sat down.

Reever folded his arms. "She is my wife. Jarn, leave."

I stood. "She is a member of my crew/' Xonea shot back. "Healer, you will remain."

Bobbing up and down seemed ridiculous, so I stood and silently waited for them to sort it out. I belonged to Reever, but Xonea was the leader of the Torin and captain of the ship. Iisleg custom would have placed Xonea as the ranking male, but we were not on Akkabarr. The protocol officer's briefing had not covered what to do when caught between two men issuing conflicting orders, or to whom I owed obedience under such unusual circumstances.

Someone would simply have to tell me which order to obey.

Reever noticed my expression and turned to Xonea. "She does not understand. I will speak for her here. Go back to Medical, Jam."

"You may not speak for her, Linguist. She is yet a member of the Ruling Council, and as such outranks both of us." The captain eyed me. "You will stay here, Cherijo."

This Ruling Council business was something else new to me; no one had mentioned it. Why would anyone elect a physician to rule them? Why had Cherijo not written about any of this in her journals? I did not wish to leave now, but I did not want to defy Reever.

"I have an objection." Salo, the head of the communications department, stood up. A stem-looking Jorenian with many battle scars, he commanded instant attention. His daughter often came to visit Marel and had proved to be a cheerful, polite child.

"One cannot follow two guides, or walk two paths." He gave me a bleak smile. "Jarn, wish you to stay or go?"

I felt a small twinge of pleasure at being addressed by my true name by one of the crew. "Am I permitted to answer that?" I asked, keeping my voice carefully neutral. Tension made the air thick; I did not wish to be the cause of a fight between these men.

My husband came to me and rested his hands on my shoulders. "What will be said here will be confusing to you. Without knowledge of what has happened in the past, you cannot make this decision. You can trust me to decide this for you."

Could
trust, or
had
to trust? I did not know, but his logic seemed reasonable. If only I trusted him.

"I do not wish to make uninformed decisions." I glanced at Xonea. "Is it permitted for me to stay so that I may know what is decided for me?"

One side of the captain's mouth curled. "You can have no objection to that, Reever."

My husband released me. "As long as it is understood that I serve as my wife's proxy." When Xonea nodded, he gave me a long, piercing look before he returned to his seat.

I sat down and released the breath I had been holding. I had traversed ice fields pocked with unexploded ordnance with less worry.

Naln Torin, the chief of engineering, occupied the seat next to mine. Another blue-skinned giant of a female, she had a gentle manner and had come to Medical each day since the accident in her section to visit Knofki and the others who had been injured.

She bent her head so she could speak softly to me. "Need you explanation of anything said here, Healer, you have but to ask me."

"I thank you." I picked up a datapad to take notes, and to give my hands something more to do than clench with nerves.

"Very well, let us examine what details we have," Xonea said, removing the relay transcript from the screens and replacing it with a star chart. "Here you see the Faction homeworld of Vtaga, where the unidentified plague has emerged. We have no live or recorded transmissions from the planet—the Hsktskt have never permitted such—but TssVar claims this disease is killing everyone who contracts it."

"The plague itself is not lethal," Reever countered. "He stated that in his relay."

"True, but the symptoms induced by the contagion are driving the infected to extreme violence. More than two-thirds of the victims have committed suicide." Xonea paused to reference another file. "The medical data provided show victims suffer from progressive psychotic delusions and brain dysfunction. TssVar assures us that these symptoms are not being experienced by the non-Hsktskt portion of their population—"

"Their slaves," Reever said. "No humanoid is permitted to set foot on Vtaga unless they are in a collar and chains."

"As you say, Duncan." Xonea displayed current world population figures for the Hsktskt home-world. "TssVar's physicians are unable to account for the spread of the plague, the source, or the
means of transmission. That is all the information we have."

"During the war, whole companies of Hsktskt chose to cut their own throats when defeated rather than be captured and taken prisoner by the League," Salo said. "Is it possible this plague is more a form of mass hysterical response to the peace talks?"

"It seems unlikely." Xonea frowned at my husband. "Duncan, you know these people better than any of us. What say you of Salo's theory?"

"Some conservative Hsktskt might protest the end of the war and having equal dealings with the warm-blooded, but they would not be driven to violence and suicide by them." Reever sounded slightly impatient. "It does not matter. After the liberation of Catopsa, the Faction levied a blood bounty on my wife's head. Whatever TssVar may say, that bounty cannot be lifted by anything but her death or execution at the hands of the Hsktskt. She cannot go to Vtaga."