Shadows In Still Water (9 page)

She had taken too long to answer. Millie gripped her arm, pulling her into the commissary. In a few minutes they were loaded down with soup and sandwiches. It was after the lunch hour so they had the place to themselves.

Sliding into a booth, Millie said, “I just thought of something else. Why don’t we have extra emitters?”

Aurelia shrugged. “How come we can process a guy through I.G. charges and ship him off to jail in a couple hours but we don’t have a spare emitter? You got me.”

She took a huge bite of sandwich. Perramon meat, tender, and juicy, topped with lettuce, carodols, fello seeds and a thin layer of tangy garlic and tossid oil dressing. The
Pasteur
’s food wasn’t this good despite their chief cook’s heroic efforts, but Davis was meant to be a showplace for its visitors. Aurelia had to admit she was hungrier than she thought.

They were both almost finished with the meal when Aurelia’s comm-link beeped. A red number 2 flashed on the screen indicating a call from Dr. Rialus. Pulling the link off her belt, Aurelia put it in the middle of the table. “What is it, Jak?” she asked.

“I’m still planetside,” Jak replied, sounding like his mouth was full. “They’ve had a pretty bad flood down here. We should start vaccinations right away.”

“Flood? As in lots of water?” The muscles of Aurelia’s throat were constricting so she could hardly squeeze the words out. The Perramon turned sour in her stomach.

“That’s what the word flood means right?” Jak sounded puzzled. “My English is excellent. So can you start sending some people down?”

“No!” The word exploded out of Aurelia’s mouth. “Get back up here. We’re getting out of this hell hole.”

Soup went flying as she banged into the table, trying to get out of the booth.

Jumping out of the way of the soup stream, Millie stared at Aurelia. “Aura, what’s wrong?”

Aurelia scooped up her comm-link, abruptly cutting off the call. “I’ve had enough of this place. I don’t care if we’ve got communications or not. We’re leaving.”

Mopping at the spilled soup with a napkin, Millie watched Aurelia limp out of the commissary. The chief surgeon was always a volatile mixture waiting to go off, but Millie couldn’t fathom this outburst. The meeting had been very frustrating as well as the last two days, but it wasn’t like Aura to refuse medical aid of any kind. Not like her at all.

Catching the eye of one of the GEM Co. workers, Millie called, “Can I get a cleaner here?”

Her comm-link beeped just as one of the robot cleaners whirred its way to her table and started vacuuming up the mess. The call was from Jak.

“Mil, what’s going on up there?” Jak asked.

“Aura just stomped off in a huff. Says we’re leaving right now.”

“Didn’t she understand what I said? They’ve had major flooding down here.”

“We got that.”

“If we want to prevent an outbreak of phinotheria we have to start vaccinating now.” Jak sounded like he was getting huffy himself.

“I know. Look, we just came out of a meeting with the governor.” Millie quickly described it to him. “Needless to say Aura wasn’t very happy about the whole thing.”

“What was that Kosapi, what’s his name, Tahk, doing there?” Millie could hear the frown in Jak’s voice.

“I don’t know.”

“What’s Arnott doing? He shouldn’t let people like that at a GEM Co. meeting. I should...”

“Jak, Jak,” Millie stopped him. “You’re preaching to the choir here.”

“What?”

His English might be excellent but old idioms sometimes stumped him. “You don’t have to argue with me. I agree with you.”

“I’m not arguing,” Jak replied though he did lower the tone of his voice. “I just might turn Tahk’s name over to Co-Lanen.”

“Who’s that?” Millie asked.

“She’s the Triad Council’s liaison officer.” He paused then asked, this time with a worried tone in his voice. “You don’t think Aurelia’s serious about leaving do you?”

“I’m not sure. You know what she’s like when she gets mad.”

“But I don’t remember her ever leaving a medical situation no matter how mad she got.”

“Give her a chance to calm down. I’m sure she’ll come around.”

“I hope so. I have a meeting with Co-Lanen tomorrow night.”

“Hot date?” Millie asked, lightly.

“Ha. Very funny. It’s an official meeting.”

Something told Millie he wasn’t being exactly truthful. She would have to worm the details out of him later.

“You could always take a vacation day if you have to,” Millie pointed out.

Out of the corner of her ear, she heard her name being paged. “Millie Konoho to the C.C. please.”

“I have to go, Jak.” Millie got to her feet.

“Let me know what’s going on.”

Clipping the link back on her belt, Millie hurried out of the commissary heading for the communications center.

When she arrived at the C.C., Gar-Gar, Conlin and Zelan were all waiting for her. The Jidalian female behind the front desk rose to greet her.

“The emitter is set. You may sit here,” The Jidalian said, offering Millie her seat.

Millie glanced at the men then back at the Jidalian. “I would prefer one of the booths, please.” She wasn’t going to make a call with those three hanging over her shoulder.

Gar Gar opened his mouth and Millie rushed to fill the gap. “I work much better without an audience, gentlemen. If you’ll excuse me.” She hurried off, following the Jidalian to a booth before they could say anything.

The Jidalian flipped several switches then stepped back out of the booth. Sliding into the seat, Millie lightly traced the outlines of the presspads, suddenly hesitant to make the call. Her stomach was beginning to jump a little.

Come on, Mahealani, she thought, don’t be a coward. Just because you haven’t talked to the man in eight years...They still exchanged Christmas cards...no, come to think of it both of them had missed last year.

Straightening in her seat, Millie reached out to thumb the pads. It took a few minutes but her call was finally answered by one of the clerks in GEM Co.’s security division headquarters on Mars. “I’d like to speak to Commander Neil Sanders please,” Millie told the woman.

“Commander Sanders is out of the office may I take a message?”

“Page him,” Millie demanded. “My name is Millie Konoho. I’m calling from Space Station Davis. We have an emergency situation here and I need to speak with him immediately.”

“Very well. This may take a few minutes.”

“I’ll wait.” Millie sat back, a little surprised that she hadn’t had to use any strong arm tactics or one of Aurelia’s patented brow beating techniques. But then Neil wasn’t the kind of man who hid behind secretaries. He was always ready to tilt at windmills or rescue damsels in distress. Millie smiled, remembering the first day she met Neil Sanders when she had been the damsel.

Millie had risen early that morning more than thirteen years ago to fly her twelve-year old brother to Maui for a class field trip. The flight back to Honolulu in her new, red, open-air flitter was peaceful. She passed over Waikiki beach and waved at the tourists below. Flipping on the radio, she settled back into the warm leather seat with a sigh of pleasure. This was her first chance to relax in weeks. Her nursing classes were out for spring break and she had already completed her clinical work.

“Weather Control is planning a brief rain shower at 8:30. It will last half-an-hour,” said the radio announcer after the last song.

With a glance at her watch, Millie saw it was 8:25. “Shoot,” she muttered, “I should have asked Dad last night about the weather.” She sniffed, already smelling the dampness in the air. Lifting her head, she glanced up at the gathering dark clouds. “Right on time, Dad. Good job,” she said to the air. She reached out to flip a lever. The hood of the flitter slowly slid forward, enclosing her in a glass bubble.

It happened when she banked to the left over the Mauna Loa resort. A splice of lightning skimmed past the back end of the flitter, making it rock like a boat on open water. “Help!” Millie screamed, yanking on the control stick. “What the...What was that?!” Thunder cracked and she yelped again, her heart giving a leap before scrambling for the safety of her toes. “They didn’t say anything about a thunderstorm!” A slight bell-like noise startled her then she realized the cabin lights had come on. Outside, the sky turned black as sulfur powder, waiting to be touched off by more lightning sparks. Looking down past the flitter, she could see palm trees beginning to bend with a fierce gale.

Her mouth suddenly dry, Millie desperately turned the flitter around, hoping to outfly the storm. The wind hit with slamming force, throwing her forward into the control panel. “Oh, please somebody help me!” she cried, struggling to gain command of the wildly revolving stick. She jabbed at buttons trying to stabilize the vehicle. The flitter slowly stopped rocking enough for her to hold on to it through the continuing blasts of wind. Then the rain began. Not a brief shower but sheet after sheet of it, the drops so heavy they looked like silver lines.

A warm salt taste trickled into her mouth and Millie wiped the back of her hand against her cheek, coming away with blood. She could feel a good sized, half-moon shaped gouge right over her cheek bone. It must have happened when she hit the panel. So much adrenaline in her system started to make her lightheaded as she reached a shaky hand out to tune the radio call knob. “Honolulu Control this is FJ575 Macadamia Nut with an emergency. Please respond.” She laughed slightly hysterically, suddenly wishing she had picked a different name.

“Macadamia this is Control. Are you in the air?” A man’s abrupt voice replied. Static and other voices filled the background.

“Yes! Affirmative! Can you guide me down?”

“You are off all regular flight paths, Macadamia. We’ve got massive traffic problems right now. Get on the ground as fast as you can. Control out.”

“Wait! Visibility is zilcho out here! What am I supposed to do, crash, then you’ll come help me?” No reply came. Tears mingled with the blood on her face.

Millie blinked at a bright red light off her port bow. With a ping, the radio came on with a deep, pleasant voice. “Hey, Macadamia Nut, this is Starlight. Follow my tail on home, okay?”

“Okay!” She laughed with shaky relief. She got a dim impression of a sleek cruiser, twice the size of her flitter, sliding past, then all she could see were two red taillights. Millie kept as close as she dared and followed the cruiser safely to the ground.

The second the gull-wing doors opened, Millie was drenched to the skin. Shoving wet hair out of her eyes, she scrambled out of the flitter and almost fell into the arms of her rescuer.

“There’s a school just up ahead,” he yelled in her ear and took her by the hand, his grasp warm and solid in the middle of a suddenly chaotic world.

They dashed for the low, square dark form a few hundred feet in front of them. As they got closer the school’s doors opened, spilling soft yellow light into the darkness, and slid silently shut after they entered. Gasping for breath, Millie leaned against the smooth concrete block walls. She realized she was in her old grade school, Madison, and felt the sudden comfort of familiar surroundings.

Millie looked over at her companion. He stood in the middle of the hall, dripping into a rapidly growing puddle of water, leaning over with his hands on his knees trying to catch his breath. He didn’t look like he would be very tall if he stood up straight, probably about 5’8” but he had a tough, husky build. Dressed in a flying jacket and jeans, he had light reddish-brown hair and a pair of pale blue eyes. He noticed Millie watching him and smiled. “You okay?” he asked.

“I’m fine, thanks to you.”

He stood up and smoothed his hair back. “I heard your call to Control and figured I was close enough to help. My cruiser has a few handy gadgets to get through a storm. Did you ever see anything like this rain?”

Shaking her head, Millie replied, “No. I don’t know what happened. They were supposed to have a brief shower but this is more like a hurricane!” She extended her hand and added, “My name is Mahealani Konoho. You can call me Millie.”

He took her hand and bowed over it, “Neil Sanders at your service. Say, you’re bleeding!” He pulled a handkerchief out of his jacket pocket and, folding it neatly, pressed it against her cheek. “Don’t worry, it’s clean,” he assured her with a grin.

“Thank you,” Millie said then realized how close they were standing and reached up to take the handkerchief, stepping away from him at the same time.

“I thought I heard somebody out here.” Both Neil and Millie turned at the sound of a new voice. A gray-haired woman, wearing a pink jumper, stood down the hall outside a wide red door, holding it open with her left foot in sensor range. Millie smiled and started toward her. It was her old fifth-grade teacher, Mrs. Smythe. “Come on in the cafeteria you two and get dry.”

“Mrs. Smythe, how are you?” Millie greeted her.

“Millie! I thought that was you. How is nursing school going for you? What’s wrong with your face, child?” The older woman put an arm around Millie’s shoulder and guided her into the room, giving Neil an interested glance as he followed behind them.

“I banged it on the dash. I got caught out in the middle of the storm in the flitter.”

“Looks like a lot of people got caught,” Neil commented.

The cafeteria was filled with people of all kinds, most of them damp and bedraggled. The decibel level rose by the second. An argument seemed to be in progress between a couple of men at the front of the room and everyone else. Recognizing one of the men as someone who worked with her father at weather control, Millie moved toward them.

“I’m telling you I don’t know what happened,” the man was saying. “I was caught out in it too.”

“They said it was a brief shower. Now I wanna know what you people are trying to pull. I got two kids hurt and you are about to see what it feels like.” This came from a big man to the left, his muscles bulging out of his shirt.

“Hey, take it easy,” said the weather controller but the crowd was getting ugly. Someone recognized Millie and shouted, “Where’s your Dad, Millie? Bet he can’t talk himself out of this one!”

With a bewildered look and her heart beginning to pound, Millie glanced at all the faces suddenly turned in her direction and backed up a step. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she protested. “My father didn’t cause this hurricane.”

“Right. Isn’t he the director of Weather Control?”

“Yes, but...”

“Our flitter crashed because of you!” one woman screamed. Others added their voices and the room filled with angry chaos. The woman was practically in Millie’s face until Neil took Millie’s arm and pulled her behind his strong, comforting back.

“Everybody shutup!” His short, sharp bark cut through the din like the lightning still going on outside. “It’s stupid to start blaming people when we don’t even know the whole story yet. I’m sure this is all an unfortunate accident.”

“They’re supposed to control the weather!” shouted the man with the muscles. Others agreed with him and the noise began to rise again.

“Look! The fact is they can only control it to a certain extent. They’re trying to deal with forces we still don’t completely understand. When was the last time you thanked them for the 364 days of good weather?” Neil asked. The crowd calmed somewhat but they were still angry. Millie felt relieved when Mrs. Smythe tapped them both on the shoulder and motioned for them to follow her. She led them to an empty classroom.

“I’m sorry, children,” she said, shaking her head. “A crowd like that has a mind of its own. You two just stay in here and relax.” She bustled out and Millie looked at Neil.

“Thank you,” Millie said quietly. “I don’t know what I...they were so...you were great.” She reached up to stem the tears with his handkerchief.

Neil shrugged shyly and smiled. He pulled out a chair for her. It was a bit small but she sat down gratefully. Sitting on top of a desk, Neil said, “Hey, Miss Konoho, anytime you’re in trouble you just give me a call and I’ll be there.”

Neil had meant every word. After the hurricane, subsequently named Mephisto, had spent itself the entire island had been in an uproar for weeks with rioting and looting. Her father and their entire family had endured a very thorough investigation and hounding by reporters and angry people. Neil Sanders supported Millie through it all with his strong, solid presence. It was he who finally convinced her to apply to GEM Co. when she completed her nursing studies later that summer. He also almost convinced her to marry him and even now she had no idea what had held her back. Perhaps it was merely her desire to see space or the delightful sense of freedom being on a hospital ship gave her after the burden of being the oldest of six with no mother to carry the responsibility. Perhaps it was simply the fact that Neil turned out to be a neatness freak. Millie shrugged; it was too late for regrets now. Their parting had been amicable enough and maybe someday...