The Death of Sleep (34 page)

Lunzie's recovery surprised Knoradel. That gave her her first advantage. She didn't want to kill them unless as a last resort. If she could disable them, knock them unconscious or lock them up, she could get to safety. Curling her good hand to stiffen the edge, Lunzie feinted forward at the man. Automatically, rather than consciously, his hands balled into fists. He danced backward, one leg forward, and one back. So he'd had some martial arts training—but not the polish of Discipline.

Lunzie had the edge on him. Her left hand, deprived of muscle tension because of the snapped bone, was beginning to curl into a claw. She curved the other hand so it looked as though she had two good ones. She had to get away from her assailants before the adrenaline wore off and she would again feel the pain. As long as it looked as if the broken bone hadn't affected her at all, Knoradel would be disconcerted.

The Ryxi was also on her feet again. Lunzie had to take care of the man before dealing with the wily avian and her long reach. He was sweating. His ambush plan had gone wrong and he hadn't the brains or experience to adapt. Lunzie feinted left, then right, then a double left, which made Knoradel unconsciously step in front of his cohort to counter Lunzie's moves. When he was just far enough in front of the avian to block her attack, Lunzie spun backwards in a swift roundhouse kick. It took the man squarely under the chin and flung him against the wall. His head snapped back, connecting with the metal bulkhead with a hearty
boom\
He slid down to the floor, his eyes rolling back in his head. If Lunzie could dispatch the Ryxi quickly, Knoradel wouldn't be able to chase her.

But Birra stepped swiftly into the fray as soon as her partner was out of her path. She was relying on her clawed feet and the heavy expanse of her wings with their clawed joints as weapons, keeping the delicate three-fingered manipulative extremity at the tips of her wings folded out of danger. Lunzie fought to grab at one of those hands, knowing that Birra would be thrown off guard to protect them.

"You wingless mutant," Birra hissed shrilly, raking at Lunzie's belly with one claw. It tore her tunic from the midriff to the hem as Lunzie jumped back out of the way. She countered immediately with a sweep kick at the avian's bony knees. As the avian moved to guard herself, Lunzie grabbed the fold of a wing that flapped above her head, threw an arm across Birra's body, and flipped her.

Automatically, the wings opened out to save the Ryxi. Birra shrieked as her hands rammed against the walls of the narrow corridors. Her wingspan was too great. Swiftly, she folded her pinions again, with the single deadly claws at their center joints arching over her shoulders at Lunzie. She pecked at the medic with her sharp beak. Lunzie drew up her crossed hands to block the blow and knocked the avian's head up and back.

"Fardles, I really hate to do this to you," she said apologetically. With both hands balled into fists, she smashed them in under Birra's wings against the avian's exposed rib cage. Wincing, she felt the delicate bones snap.

The Ryxi shrieked, her voice carrying into higher and higher registers as she clawed and flapped blindly at Lunzie.

"You're still ambulatory," Lunzie said, moving backward and countering the attack. "If you get to a medic right away he can set those bones so you don't puncture a lung. Let me go, or I'll be forced to keep you here until it's too late."

"Horrible biped! You lie!" Birra cradled one wounded side, then the other. She was gasping, beak open.

"I'm not lying. You know I'm a doctor. You knew that when you were sent to attack me," Lunzie threw back. "Who told you to attack me?"

The Ryxi gasped with fury, and clenched both wings against her midsection. "I die." Her round black eyes were starting to become glassy and she rocked back and forth.

"No!" Lunzie shouted. "You daft bird."

The Ryxi was going into shock. She was no longer a danger to Lunzie but she might put herself into a lethal coma.

Disgusted to be caught by the moral dilemma, Lunzie limped to the nearest communications panel and hit the blue stud.

"Emergency, level 11. Code Urgent. Emergency involving a Ryxi. Rib cage injury, going into shock. Emergency." Lunzie turned away from the panel. "Someone will be here in minutes. I meant to inflict no lasting damage on you but I'm not staying around in case the person who gave you your orders shows up first. You will keep my name out of an investigation, won't you? Good luck."

The Ryxi rocked back and forth rhythmically, ignoring Lunzie as she slipped through the access hatch to the stairs at the end of the corridor.

Impatiently Lunzie tapped out the sequence of the officers' lounge. She couldn't go there, even with an overlarge smock covering the shreds of her bloodstained uniform. But she prayed to all the gods that govern that Zebara was available. The adrenaline of Discipline was wearing off and she would soon be caught by the post-Discipline enervation. She had to hand over the cube asap.

"Officers' lounge." To her infinite relief she recognized Lieutenant Sanborn's bright tenor voice.

"Is Captain Zebara here?" she asked, trying to sound medium casual. "It's Lunzie Mespil. Something's come up and I need a word with him."

"Yes, he just came in from the brass meeting. Having a drink and he needs it, Lunzie. Is this really urgent?"

"Let him judge. Just tell him I'm standing by, would you, Lieutenant?" She wanted to add, "like a good boy and go do as mother asks" but she didn't.

"Right you are," Sanborn replied obligingly.

She fidgeted, blotting blood from the wound on her temple. The flesh was awfully tender: she'd shortly have a massive hematoma and there weren't many ways to conceal that obvious a bruise. What was taking Sanborn so long? The lounge wasn't that big.

"Zebara." He announced himself in a deep voice that made the intercom rattle. "I'd just placed a call to your quarters. Where are you?"

"Hiding, Captain, and I need to see you as soon as possible." She heard him sigh. Well, he might as well get all the bad news at once. "First they dropped a wall on Orlig, then they strangled him while I had him stashed in a nice out-of-the-way treatment room. I've just had an encounter with a life-seeking duet and I'd like to transfer the incriminating evidence before my demise."

"Where are you?" he repeated.

She gave him the deck, section and corridor.

"How well do you know this vessel?"

"As well as most. Medics need to get places in a hurry."

"Then I suggest you get yourself to Scout Bay 5 by the best way and wait for me. I certainly have a good reason to return to my ship. Over and out."

His crisp voice steadied her. In the first place it had none of the soggy mushmouth tones that most heavyworlders seemed to project. His suggestion was sensible, keeping her out of the way of anyone likely to see her, and surely the scout ship would be the last place "they" would expect her to go.

She took the emergency shafts down to the flight decks, assisted by the half-gee force at which they were kept. She got the wrong bay the first time she emerged into the main access corridors, but they were empty so she continued on to Five. He entered from the main turbovator and didn't so much as slow his stride as he caught her by the arm. He pulled out a small com-unit and mumbled into it as he half carried her up the ramp into the not-so-small scout ship.

"You got rightly messed up if your face is any indication," he said, pausing in the airlock to examine her. He twitched away the large coat and his eyebrows rose. "So they got Orlig. What have you got?"

"One of those neat little message bricks which had better go forward to its destination with all possible speed."

"There's usually a phrase to go with a brick?" He arched an eyebrow in query. It gave him a decidedly satanic look.

"I'm paranoid at the moment. I keep thinking people are trying to kill me." Her facetiousness brought a slight smile to his face.

"We'll get your message off and then maybe you'll trust this heavyworlder. Come!"

He took her hand and led her through the narrow corridors of the scout vessel to the command deck. A centimeter less on each side and the ceiling, Lunzie thought, and he wouldn't fit. Then he handed her into a small communications booth, slid the panel shut and went on into the bridge. She sat down dazed while he spoke briefly to the heavyworlder woman on duty. She instantly swung around with a grin to Lunzie and made rapid passes over her comboard.

"This is a secure channel," she said, her voice coming through a speaker in the wall. "Just insert the brick in the appropriate slot in front of you. They're usually constructed to set the coding frequency. I'm shutting down in here." She pulled off her earpiece and held up both hands. For a heavyworlder, she had a very friendly grin.

Lunzie fumbled with the brick but finally got it into the slot which closed over it like some weird alien ingesting sustenance. There was no indication that anything was happening. Abruptly the slot opened, spitting the little brick out. As she watched, the thing dissolved. It didn't steam or smolder or melt. It just dissolved and she was looking at a small pile of black dust.

She sent the communications officer the finger-thumb O of completion and sagged back with a deep sigh of relief. Zebara rose from his seat next to the com-tech and came around the doorway into the tiny chamber where Lunzie was seated.

"Mission completed in the usual pile of dust, I see," he said and swept it off onto the floor. Then he took a handful of mineral tablets from his pocket and popped a couple into his mouth.

Lunzie looked up at him limply. "I thank Muhlah!"

"And now we're going to do something about you." He sounded ominous.

Lunzie tensed in a moment of sheer panic which had no basis whatsoever except that Zebara was pounding on the quartz window with one massive palm.

"Flor, tell Bringan to get up here on the double. You look like hell, Lunzie Mespil. Sit tight for the medic."

Lunzie forced herself to relax when she noticed Zebara regarding her with some amusement.

"So what do we do about you?" he asked rhetorically. "Even on a ship as huge as the
ARCT-10
, you can't really be safely hidden. You escaped once but you are unquestionably in jeopardy." She wished he would sit down instead of looming over her. "Did you get a look at your assailants?"

"A Ryxi female named Birra and a human male she called Knoradel." She rattled off physical descriptions. "The Ryxi has a crushed rib cage. I left a few marks on the man."

"They shouldn't be too hard to apprehend," Zebara said and depressed a toggle on the board. She heard him giving the descriptions to the Ship Provost. "You won't object to remaining here until they have been detained? No? Sensible of you." He regarded her for a long moment and then grinned, looking more like a predatory fish than an amused human. "In fact, it would be even more sensible if you didn't go back to the
ARCT-10
at all"

"In deep space there aren't many alternatives," Lunzie remarked, feeling the weakness of post-Discipline seeping through her.

"I can think of one." He looked at her expectantly and, when she didn't respond, gave a disappointed sigh. "You can come back to Ambrosia with us."

"Ambrosia?" Lunzie wasn't certain that the planet appealed to her at all.

"An excellent solution since you're already involved up to your lightweight neck in Ambrosian affairs. Highly appropriate. Assassins won't get another chance at terminating your life on any ship I command. I'll clear your reappointment with the
ARCT-10
authorities."

Lunzie was really surprised. Somehow, she had not expected such positive cooperation and solici-tousness from this heavyworlder. "Why?"

"You're in considerable danger. Partly because you gave unstinting assistance to another heavyworlder. I was well acquainted with Orlig. My people are beneficiaries of your risk as much as yours are. Do you have any objections?"

"No," Lunzie decided. "It'll be a great relief to be able to sleep safely again." She was beginning to feel weightless, a sure sign that adrenaline exhaustion was taking hold.

Zebara grinned his shark's-tooth smile again, and crunched another tablet. "If Orlig's murder and the attempt on your life are an indication, and I believe they are, then Ambrosia may be in even more danger than I thought it was. Orlig was keeping his ears open for me on the
ARCT,
which was receiving and transmitting my reports. So we'd already had an indication that this plum would fell into the wrong paws. You confirm that. I came back to ask for military support to meet us there to stave off a possible pirate takeover until a colony can be legitimately installed with the appropriate fanfare. Relax, Lunzie Mespil."

"Thank you," Lunzie called faintly after him, the weight of her own indecision and insecurity sliding off her sagging shoulders now that someone believed her. She let her head roll back against the cushioned chair.

Soon, she became aware that someone was in the tiny cubicle with her.

"Ah, you're awake. Don't move too quickly. I'm setting your arm." A thickset man with red-blond hair cut short knelt at her side. "I'm Doctor Bringan. Normally I'm just the xenobiologist but I'm not averse to using my talents on
known
species. I run the checkups and bandage scratches for the crew. Understand you're signing on as medical officer." Very gently, he pulled her wrist and forearm in opposite directions. The curled fingers slowly straightened out. "That'll be a relief," he added with a welcoming smile. "I might just put the wrong bits together and that could prove awkward for someone."

"Um, yes," Lunzie agreed, watching him carefully. Mercifully the arm was numb. He must have given her a nerve block. "Wait, I didn't hear the bones mesh yet."

"I'm just testing to see if any of the ligatures were torn. No. All's well." Bringan waved a small diagnostic unit over her arm. "You were lucky you were wearing a tight sleeve. The swelling would have been much worse left unchecked."

"So I see," Lunzie said, eyeing the reddish wash along the skin of her arm which marked subcutaneous bleeding. It would soon surface as a fading rainbow of colors as the blood dispersed. She poked at the flesh with an experimental finger and, with curious detachment, felt it give.