saw cadets run so fast. Pity they bothered. He had all three of them before they made the front door. They were so shaken up that the military police didn’t even have to cuff them.” She shivered with mock fear. “The C.O.’s pretty scary when he loses his temper.”
“To everybody else except you,” Hahnson mused, tongue-in-cheek. “He could space you if he wanted to. But all he ever does is ground you.”
She leaned forward. “He’s not sure that I didn’t sew up a boot or a glass of synthale inside him when I operated on him at Ahkmau,” she said with malicious humor. “He wouldn’t dare space me until he’s positive that I didn’t.”
“He keeps you for a pet,” Hahnson said with a chuckle.
“Eat worms, Hahnson.” Madeline made a face at him before she followed Mallory into sick bay.
SICK BAY WAS FULL. Not only were there combat casualties brought in from all parts of the battlefront, but a new type of influenza was making itself felt among members of the Tri-Galaxy Fleet. There was no vaccination so far, and hardly any treatment that worked.
“I remember Dr. Wainberg, head of the Exobiology Department at the Tri-Fleet Military Academy, lecturing us on viruses,” Madeline said as she and Edris Mallory worked side by side on combat wounds encountered by two Dacerian scouts who’d been ambushed near Terramer.
Edris laughed. “So do I. He and our human anatomy chief, Dr. Camp, gave lab exams that were, to say the least, challenging.”
Madeline grinned. “Challenging to cadets who thought they could pass those courses by dissecting holospecimens instead of the real thing. The medical sector didn’t tolerate slackers. They meant us to be taught proper surgical techniques, and we were.” She frowned. “You know, it’s still fascinating to me that viruses aren’t actually alive. They’re like a construct, an artificial construct.”
“Who knows,” Mallory agreed, “maybe they were originally part of some long forgotten engineered bioweapons tech.”
“Viruses are already dead, Mallory,” Madeline repeated.
Mallory frowned. “But, ma’am, how can they be dead if they were never alive?”
Madeline rolled her eyes. “That controversy still rages. They are alive in one sense, not in another. And I’m not joining that debate,” she added on a laugh. She finished a restructuring job and motioned for one of the medtechs to take the unconscious patient in his ambutube out to the floor. She stripped off her glove films and smiled at the younger woman. “We can debate that over a nice cup of java after lunch.”
The younger woman hesitated. Her blue eyes grew large. “Java? You don’t mean, real coffee?”
Madeline leaned closer. “I have it shipped in illegally from the Altairian colony on Harcourt’s Planet,” she confided. “Then I grind the beans and brew it in my office.”
“Coffee.” Mallory’s mouth was watering. “I dream about it. What passes for coffee in the mess hall is an insult to a delicate palate.”
“I agree.”
She pursed her lips. “Ma’am, are you going to tell me something I won’t want to hear? Is that why I’m being treated to such a luxury?”
“You have a suspicious mind,” her colleague replied. “Hurry up. We don’t have a lot of time. There’s a medical transport coming in from Terramer in about a standard hour and we may have more work.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“I have to go over to Tri-Fleet HQ and report to the commander about this latest batch of casualties. You can flash me if there’s anything urgent before I get back.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
* * *
MADELINE LOCATED DTIMUN in his temporary office at Tri-Fleet HQ. It was smaller and more cramped than the one he maintained aboard the Morcai, but closer to fleet operations.
He frowned when she was admitted. “You have never reported to me directly on battle casualties. Is there a reason for this deviation from protocol?”
“Yes, sir,” she said, standing at parade rest. “It’s about Mallory.”
His eyebrows lifted.
“Lieutenant J.G. Edris Mallory?” she prompted. “My assistant?”
“Yes. What about her?”
“Sir, she needs to be familiarized with the routine aboard ship, in case I ever have to bring her with me on a mission.”
He stood up, cold and unapproachable. “I will not authorize the presence of a second human female aboard my flagship,” he said flatly.
“Only to observe,” she persisted. She let out an exasperated sigh. “What if I were captured by Rojoks on the battlefield?”
“I would send them my condolences,” he returned.
She glared at him. “You’d have nobody aboard who could save you from a health crisis,” she tossed back.
“It amazes me that you have never questioned the reason I carry no complement of Cehn-Tahr medics aboard the Morcai.”
She blinked. “They said you had a fine contempt for medics of your own species. I assumed that was the explanation.”
His eyes narrowed and became a steady, searching blue as they explored her face. “You know nothing about us except what we permit you to know.”
“You can pin a rose on that,” she returned bluntly. “I’ve had to resort to black market vids to find out anything at all about Cehn-Tahr society.”
His eyes flashed green with humor. “Those vids are made at Benaski Port...”
“...by pirates who never saw a live Cehn-Tahr, yes, I know. Hahnson informed me after it was too late to demand my money back!” she muttered.
The green grew broader in his eyes. He cocked his head. “It did not occur to you to ask me?”
She cleared her throat. “I wouldn’t dare!”
“I have found very little that you would not dare, Ruszel,” he retorted.
She shifted restlessly and averted her eyes. It would be embarrassing, even for a physician, to put any of her burning questions to him.
“I realize that,” he said softly.
She grimaced. “I wish you wouldn’t walk in and out of my mind, sir. It’s very disconcerting.”
“You are far too easy to read,” he pointed out. “Telepaths learn to block unwanted intrusions at a very early age.”
She lifted her eyes to his, searching them quietly. “You healed the little Altairian child with
