Exiled to the Stars (18 page)

"Doesn't look serious," she said after a moment. "but I'll bet you've got a bad headache." She took one of the strips and folded it into a pad, and then secured it with another strip.

She gave him a smile and a wink. "The bleeding had mostly stopped, and the wound isn't serious," she said cheerfully. "But I can't do stitches, and the bandage will keep a lot of people from arguing with you. Besides, it makes you look rakish."

Cesar frowned until a twinge in his forehead reminded him. "Rakish? What is rakish? I do not know this word."

She laughed aloud. "Ha! Finally! It means dashing, jaunty, adventurous. Add an eye patch and you could be a pirate!"

He chuckled, but she had already turned away to check on the rest of the family. With a grimace, he rose from the camp stool. He turned, and gasped as his chest reminded him to move slowly.

He started out into the dorm's central corridor. It was crowded with crying, weeping, talking, and shouting people, who began to crowd around him, demanding, asking, or begging for information he didn't have. The cacophony of voices made it impossible for him to answer any one of them. Cesar didn't mind, though. It was also important to reassure his people that he was all right. In fact, he was planning to visit dorm 8 when he could escape here.

"Cesar! Thank God!" Cesar turned carefully, and a broad smile spread over his face as he saw Vlad hurrying toward him, limping slightly.

"Vlad!" he cried happily. "Are you all right?"

Vlad grinned and slapped his leg. "It's just a bruise," he said. "But what about you?" He eyed Cesar's head bandage worriedly.

Cesar chuckled. "It's just a cut. The bandage is my granddaughter's idea. She says it makes me look 'rakish'.

Vlad laughed aloud, a laugh tinged with relief. "Oh, yes," he said with broad sarcasm, "it's vital that young man of, what, seventy? look dashing and debonair. The ladies will be mobbing you."

"I beg your pardon! Sixty-nine!" Suddenly Cesar had finally noticed the young man accompanying Vlad. "And you've brought Boyet! Excellent!" Boyet Mamerto was the 'sheriff' of dorm 8. Cesar was delighted to see him.

"Boyet, do you know if Raymond is all right?" He asked.

Boyet exchanged glances with Vlad before shaking his head. "He didn't make it, sir. Neither did Ron Creding."

Cesar shook his head and swore; the first time Boyet had ever heard him do so.

After a moment of intense thought, Cesar turned back to Boyet. "All right, Boyet. You're the ranking officer of the militia, and we need you very badly. I'd like you to get around and find as many of your militiamen as you can. We're going to need search parties, and your militia is the only organized group aboard to build them around.

"We have no
time
, gentlemen. People are bleeding to death as we speak. Try to get each of your people to round up a couple of volunteers, and begin making the rounds of the dorms. In each dorm they should try to get volunteers to start gathering search parties of their own, if they're not already started."

He paused as he realized the enormity of the catastrophe. "There will be thousands of injured and dead. We will need hundreds of searchers." Boyet started to turn away, and Cesar added, "You might check the med stations for first aid supplies, and maybe even surviving Med Techs."

Boyet threw him a quick nod. "Yessir!" he snapped crisply, then turned and began pushing his way through the crowd.

Vlad nodded at his retreating back. "Good man. I woke up to him slapping my face and yelling that we needed to find you." He turned back to Cesar. "What about me? I can search as good as anyone."

Cesar shook his head with a chuckle. "No, old friend. At our ages, we'd just be in the way. Besides, I've got a more important job for you. It occurred to me that if the computer survived, it may have a lot of information about our situation. It has sensors all over the ship."

Vlad snorted. "You think the computer lived through
this
?"

Cesar shrugged. "I don't know. But remember, they told us in training that the computer was in a sealed, armored chamber in the center of the ship, and that it's solid-state. If I had to guess, I'd say it lost a lot of sensors and ancillaries, but the computer itself will be all right. Actually, I'm more concerned about its power supply."

Vlad shrugged. "You may be right. What do you want me to do? Go talk to it?"

Cesar shook his head. "I need you more as a deputy and advisor. No, what I was thinking was that I'd like you to see if Robert Franks survived." He sighed. "I'm going to miss Ron and Raymond." He straightened. "And Tara! We're going to need Tara badly."

Vlad shook his head. "I dunno. I like Tara, but I've never been able to understand why you think she's so important. I mean, there are sure to be farmers among the other dorms."

Cesar smiled. "We have some farmers among our ghetto people, Vlad. But they know how to farm using hand tools on small plots in the Philippines the way their grandfathers did – with hard work and low yields." He waved a hand. "Other Drones will know how to farm using hand tools in Korea, or China, or Vietnam. Tara grew up farming using modern techniques and equipment. If we can salvage any of that stuff in the hold, Tara could mean the difference between the success or failure of the colony." He shrugged. "It would be nice if we could find a few more like her from the Undie dorms. But for now, she's vital to us."

Vlad looked unconvinced. "If you say so. But if the computer
is
all right, it can teach anyone modern farming, and even qualify them for degrees in Agriculture or Agronomy."

Cesar shook his head. "It's not the same. Look. Suppose we found a very intelligent Drone here, and he took every course the computer contains in robotics. Would you consider him a world-class roboticist?"

Vlad sighed. "Okay, Cesar, if you say so." He straightened. "I'll go find them, and if Franks is all right, I'll send him into the classroom to talk to the computer. Do you want to see Tara?"

Cesar started to shake his head, then paused as a thought occurred. "Yes, I do, if she's all right. I have a job for her, too."

Vlad just nodded and waved, then hurried off.

Cesar grabbed the nearest middle-aged man. "Raoul! I want you to count heads in the dorm. Find out how many were killed, how many injured, and how seriously. Send a boy to me with the count. Then you can start recruiting volunteers to put the bodies into storerooms, take the injured to the med bay, and for search parties. Lots of search parties." He gestured toward the ceiling, now bulging down in places. "I have a feeling that the Undie dorms are in a lot worse shape than we are!"

Cesar fought his way through the dorm's central corridor, and then out the hatch and into the corridor outside. It was slightly less crowded out there, but just slightly. He pushed his way into the hatch leading to dorm 8, ignoring the whispers of the people who recognized him as he passed.

He grabbed a young boy by the arm. "Son, would you find one of the Elders and tell him that Messer Montero would like to talk to him?" The boy looked unhurt, and he threw Cesar a wide grin and a sketchy salute. "Yes,
sir
!" he replied crisply before diving into the crowd.

Meanwhile, people were recognizing him. He heard his name repeated in loud whispers and he was once again besieged by people seeking information he didn't have.

Luckily, the boy was back in less than a minute, with Reynaldo Pereira in tow, leaning on an improvised crutch.

"Cesar!" he cried, his relief obvious. "Are you all right?" he asked as he caught sight of Cesar's head bandage.

Cesar smiled and nodded. "Yes. A broken rib, a head cut." He started to shrug, and winced at the pain. "What can you tell me?" he continued.

Reynaldo frowned. "There are many dead, perhaps forty. Francisco, Benigno …" he shook his head in sadness at the deaths of his fellow Elders before continuing. "And at least twice that many injured. I am gathering volunteers to take them to the med station."

Cesar shook his head. "I suspect the med station is overwhelmed by now. Take only the most seriously injured to the med station." He raised his eyes to meet the Elder's. "You understand that means the most seriously injured that are likely to survive. Do not send the dying." He said grimly. "The rest will have to settle for first aid for now. Use your volunteers to move the bodies to storage rooms and to form search parties." He pointed to an area where the ceiling bulged down. "I have sent people to all the dorms on this deck, but I'm afraid those on deck 5 will need more immediate help. It appears there will be many deaths up there. Every injured person that dies reduces our chances of survival. We must save as many as we can!"

Reynaldo eyed the bulge grimly. "I understand. The Captain deliberately crashed the ship upside down, didn't he?"

Cesar nodded. "I think so. It seems obvious that he sacrificed himself and the crew to ensure that the supplies our colony would need would survive. Now we must give his sacrifice meaning by saving enough people to make up that colony."

A boy slipped through the crowd and pulled on Cesar's shipsuit. "Messer Benares sent me," he said after gaining Cesar's attention. "He said to tell you that twenty-two are dead and seventy-six are injured. Twenty-four are critical, and fourteen of those have been taken to the med station." Cesar could read between the lines Raoul had given the boy. The ten critically injured not sent to the med station were so severely injured they were not expected to survive.

He was shocked. 32 dead in one dorm, and more than forty in another, both on a deck that suffered comparatively little damage. It gave him little hope for those on deck 5.

Vlad was waiting for him when he returned to Dorm 7, with a weeping Tara. "Robert had a dislocated shoulder," Vlad reported, "but I jerked it back into position." He smiled grimly. "I'm surprised you didn't hear him scream. I think everyone else did. He fainted, but after I woke him, I sent him to the classroom to check on the computer."

He paused. "Uh, I'm also starting to hear complaints. People who lost loved ones aren't happy about being dragged into search parties."

Cesar frowned at him warningly. "I'll talk to you about that in a moment. Right now, I need to talk to this young lady."

He turned to Tara, and put his arm around her shoulders. "I'm really very sorry, Tara, Ron was very important to me, too.

"But right now," he continued as her weeping subsided slightly, "I need your help. I'm sorry." He smiled sadly. "It's the price of being an important person, I'm afraid."

Tara straightened, struggling to regain control of herself. After a moment, she raised tear-filled eyes. "You need my help?" she asked in a timid tone.

Cesar nodded. "I have a job that you are uniquely qualified to perform. And it's very important."

She straightened even more. "What is it, Cesar? What can I do?" Suddenly, she sounded almost desperate.

"Well," he said, "It occurred to me that we have landed, no matter how. That means we are grounded on an alien planet; one we know very little about, with threats we do not know and are not expecting. You are the only person I know that is an experienced hunter and outdoorsman. Or woman," he added. "I'd like you to take your laser and try to find a way off the ship. I need you to scout for threats and patrol the area until we're in a condition to actively explore."

Her eyes were dry now. She nodded seriously. "I can do that, Cesar. But a hand laser isn't much of a weapon." She smiled weakly. "I doubt I'll need it, though. The crash probably scared away every animal for miles."

He nodded. "I know. But I'm afraid the hand laser will have to do until we can figure out how to get access to the ship's armory. I'll also try to find others with outdoor skills I can send to help you. Oh," he added, "Make sure you put on isolation gear or a spacesuit. We don't want any bugs to get you, either."

Tara nodded. She was standing ramrod straight now, and her eyes were dry. "I'll get on it right away," she replied. "After that crash, I don't think I'll have trouble finding a way off the ship!" She strode away, hand resting on the butt of the laser she still wore, her stride confident.

Vlad smiled admiringly. "That was great, Cesar."

Cesar suppressed a shrug. "When my wife died, a man I knew found a way to come up with a job that needed doing, and that he claimed only I could do. It saved me; it kept me from wallowing in my grief. That's why I stopped you when you mentioned the complaints. The best thing we can do for those who lost someone is to give them an important job to do; especially since we won't be able to provide ceremonial funerals."

He sighed. "In fact, if the fusion reactor is still safe to run, all we will probably be able to do is use the bodies for reaction mass. There won't be much opportunity for grieving."

Vlad smiled grimly. "And if the reactor isn't usable?"

"Then we'll have the largest funeral pyre since the black plague in the middle ages."

Vlad's smile widened, became genuine. "I don't think they burned bodies much during the plague years. I think they did mass graves. So you'll probably set a record."

Cesar started to reply, and then stopped as he noticed Boyet Mamerto approaching. "Boyet!" he greeted him. "What can you tell me?"

Boyet was tired. His shoulder were slumped, his manner weary. "We've been to almost every dorm on both decks. Most down here seem to be running 30 to 40 percent deaths. The med bay on this deck is all right, and we have three Med Techs. We ended up with a lot of search parties, so I took them upstairs. It's a lot worse up there. The problem is the collapse isn't uniform. In the center of a dorm, we have to crawl through areas where the ceiling has been collapsed to within inches of the deck. Nothing left but red jelly. But near bulkheads and in smaller spaces, the added support prevented total collapse. A lot of people are trapped between bunks, and we're working like crazy to get them out before they bleed to death or suffocate. So we have to crawl through the jelly. But it's pretty gruesome.

Cesar frowned. "'Almost' every dorm?"

Boyet's eyes widened. "Oh, yeah. Dorm 25. The door's still welded shut. Somebody's pounding on it, though, so
somebody's
alive in there."