Renegades, page 6
“But Clairbaugh is going to be there? You’re sure?”
“He’s the one that sent the message, so yeah, I imagine he’ll be running the meeting.”
As Volo finished his answer, a loud chime rattled through the cab of the transport.
“Here we go,” Volo said, and tapped his way to the new message on the console. “Corridor 281-MC4, approved for 28 hours. Great, it’s only a few minutes from here.”
“Are you sure you don’t want me to fly this thing?”
Volo rolled his eyes and started the undocking procedure.
7
Only a minute after sitting down to his morning coffee, Len Bellinger’s assistant walked into the courtyard where he and Messia sat. He was nervously optimistic, as today was the day that he would travel back to the medical facility that housed the envoy, Garrett Rhodes, and hopefully receive good news regarding his progress. Len glanced up at his assistant but took a sip of coffee before speaking.
“Good morning, Charles. What is it?” Len’s voice was calm, but he hoped it also gave the impression that it was a bit too early for business.
“Good morning, sir,” he turned to Messia, “Ma’am. I apologize for the early morning interruption, but you have a message, and I think you would want this one immediately.” He handed the small, folded piece of paper to the Commander, who took it and unfolded it at once.
Link: 117 – Cyl: Riva-6
Message Body: He’s awake. – Dr. Nia Keel
End
Len stood and shot a look of urgency toward his assistant.
“Get my transport ready. I’m leaving as soon as possible!”
“I called for it to be ready before coming in here. It will be waiting for you.”
“Excellent, thank you, Charles.” Len stood and looked at his wife.
“Go!” Messia said, smiling. Len took his coffee to his dressing room. He could not have hoped for better news.
Only thirty-six minutes passed between the time he started dressing in his formal uniform and the moment he crossed the threshold into the medical facility on Riva-6. As he did, the young desk attendant once again shot to his feet.
“Good morning, sir. I’ll get Dr. Keel right away.”
“No need, son. I know my way around now. If you wouldn’t mind, though, just inform her of my arrival?” Len never actually paused in his stride, and he was in the greater hallway as he heard the attendant saying “yes, sir” behind him.
To his surprise, the room in which they housed the Envoy was silent when he stepped into it. The equipment was quiet and dark, and the lights were dimmed. He smiled at his own ignorance as he realized he was in the treatment room, and if the envoy had awakened, then he would no longer require such treatment; they had moved him to a more appropriate facility. When he moved to exit the room, he almost collided with the attendant, who was attempting to enter.
“Oh! Sorry, sir. They moved the patient to a new room. Will you follow me?”
“I will, but first, will you tell me your name? I feel silly not knowing it at this point.”
“Of course, sir. It’s Edgar.”
“Thank you, Edgar. After you?” Len gestured with his hand for the attendant to lead the way. They walked for what seemed to Len like less than a minute before Edgar pushed open a heavy metal door and held it open for the Commander.
The room was much smaller than the first, no larger than an average-sized hotel room, but instead of a bed was a platform made from steel tubing, painted a glossy black. The frame supported a large but shallow container on its surface, with electronic equipment packed underneath. The container itself measured roughly three feet by eight feet, but it was only around eighteen inches deep. It was filled with a clear liquid that Len assumed was water, and the only other contents were the man himself, Garrett Rhodes. Sensors covered the Envoy, and an intravenous needle was fixed into the crook of his left elbow. His head was propped up out of the water, and his eyes were closed, but he was breathing again.
“Good morning, sir.” A young woman had entered behind him, and Len recognized her at once as Dr. Keel’s assisting physician, the one who had accompanied her on his last visit.
“Good morning. Canda, isn’t it? But I suppose ‘Doctor’ would be more appropriate.”
Canda smiled. “Either is fine, sir. I take no offense. Dr. Keel will be in shortly, but she asked me to greet you in case you have any questions.”
“A few, but first, is he sleeping now? I assume he was awake earlier?”
“Yes, the treatment worked exceptionally well. The irradiation system constantly monitors for brain activity and shuts down as soon as it’s detected. It turned itself off this morning at 3:17 and immediately sent a notification to me and Nia at home. We came in to find him awake and that’s when Nia sent you the notice.
“He isn’t sleeping, exactly. We put him in a coma. Sterilex recovery after a long time under is normally a very painful process, but we’ve found that bringing someone out of a large dose can be almost unbearable when they wake up. We did it for his comfort. It will give us time to fully hydrate him and get nourishment into his system. It will also give his body time to adjust to being alive again.”
Len nodded. He was disappointed, but he understood the logic behind it. Meeting a man who was screaming in pain would not be an improvement on the situation.
“When do you…” Before he could get his question out, the door swung open again and Dr. Keel entered the room.
“My apologies, Commander,” she said. “Where are we in the update?”
“I was just about to ask when you expect to bring him out of the coma,” Len said.
“This evening. He’s already hydrated, his body is metabolizing the nutrients we’re giving him, and his core temperature is stable. The drugs we use to induce the coma can have their own side effects, so we don’t like to use them for longer than necessary. We think taking him out of the coma tonight will be the right balance.”
“If his temperature is stable, why is he in the bath?”
“As a precaution, now. When he first woke up, we used it to help get his temperature back up.”
“What time do you expect him to be coherent?”
The two young doctors looked at each other for a moment, and Nia nodded to Canda.
“I’m going to stop administering the drug at 16:00. He should be awake by 20:00, but if you want to talk to him, I would recommend not coming back until 21:00. Each patient reacts to the drug a little differently,” Canda said.
Len nodded. “Thank you, ladies. I’ll be back at 21:00.”
8
Volo docked the transport, which he had renamed the Phelan-Ri, in CCD-12, one of the two small-craft receiving docks on the Command cylinder, about an hour after leaving Rear Command. The two men stepped through the door into the dock only to be immediately stopped by a short, chubby man with tightly kept short blonde hair and a thick mustache that looked ridiculous on his pudgy face.
“Good afternoon, gentlemen. Badges, please.”
Jerrick had his prepared and held it out to the man, the receiving clerk, he presumed, while Volo dug through his pockets hunting for his own. The fat man took the badge, scanned it with his handheld device, and handed it back to Jerrick.
“Thank you, Mr. Yunis. Sir?” He nodded at Volo, who finally produced the badge from his breast pocket. The clerk scanned it and immediately frowned. “You have a travel restriction, sir. You shouldn’t be here.”
Volo raised both of his hands in a defensive position and shook his head. “No, sir, if you look again, you’ll see my restriction expired last month. I’m free to travel anywhere on Orris again. It was a terrible misunderstanding in the first place.”
The clerk read through the details of Volo’s profile and nodded. He offered the badge back to Volo. “Yes, I can see that now. How long will the two of you be visiting the Command cylinder?”
Volo shot a glance at Jerrick and then returned his eyes to the clerk. “Just tonight, sir. We return to Rear in the morning.”
“The reason for your visit?”
“We’re here to attend a lecture at the Command Administration Building, sir. We were invited by Dr. Clairbaugh himself. We’re very excited.”
The fat receiving clerk snorted and shook his head, pawing at his device. “It’s witchcraft what that man does, if you ask me. I’ll never understand it. People seem to love him, though, so who am I to criticize?” He finished with his device and stuffed it into his back pocket. “Very well, gentlemen, thank you and enjoy your visit.” After the well wishes, the clerk turned and walked toward another bay door with a red light flashing above it.
Volo and Jerrick hurried toward the exit with the word “RAIL” printed in bold letters on the wall beside it. After they pushed through the door and were descending the stairs, Jerrick spoke. “What was that all about? The travel restriction?”
Volo smiled and continued to watch his feet as he walked down the steps, not wanting to trip. “I’m good at math, but so are the auditors.”
“That doesn’t really answer my question.”
“I’ll tell you about it someday, but it’s a long story. The good news is that even though I got caught, I still got what I wanted.”
They reached the landing and walked through an archway to the boarding platform. Everywhere else on Orris, rail systems were a paid service, but on the Command cylinder, the central rail lines that ran the circumference were public access. There were two rail lines, the commuter and the express. One hundred and seventy-four trains made up the commuter line, eighty-seven each on two sets of rails that ran in opposite directions. Each of the commuter trains stopped at every station as they encircled the Command cylinder. The express trains were vastly different. Set deeper in the cylinder, the express line had only six trains in total, three for each direction, and they stopped at only three major stations. They were smaller and much faster than the commuter lines, traveling between each stop in just over an hour, a distance of over twelve thousand miles.
As Volo and Jerrick stood waiting for their commuter train, the bright white overhead lights faded and pulsing red lights replaced them, warning the travelers that an express train was about to pass beneath them. A booming synthetic voice came over the loudspeakers, “Express Train inbound. Twenty seconds. Please brace your person and any children in your care. Sixteen seconds. Cover your ears and ensure the ears of the children in your care are properly covered. Ten seconds. Express train pass-through is imminent. Brace yourselves. Brace yourselves. Brace yourselves.” Everyone present on the platform backed up to a wall or pillar to lean against it and placed their hands over their ears. Only thirty seconds after the lights had indicated the event, a crippling roar shook through the space and the platform floor vibrated to the point of discomfort. The entire episode was over in under three seconds, but faces had paled for those who were new to the experience. Volo and Jerrick were not novices, and they were both back at the platform making light conversation and waiting for their train again only a moment after the express train had rocketed beneath their feet.
9
The second time Garrett woke up on Orris was far different from the first. He felt very ill, like he had a virus or food poisoning, but the pain was gone. He wanted to get through the illness, but he was no longer panicked and suicidal.
He remembered who he was and expected he knew where he was. If he were not on Orris, he would not be awake; he would not be alive.
His fresh awakening was not a recovery from Sterilex, so he had all of his senses instantly. He was badly nauseated, and although the pain had abated in large part, his neck was stiff and moving it was painful. He inhaled deeply, careful not to move his head. He opened his eyes.
Three silhouettes loomed above him, and he blinked several times to get his eyes into focus. Two youngish women in lab coats and an older man in a dark blue suit with “OC” embroidered above his right breast pocket looked down at him.
“Is he with us?” the man asked in crystal clear Osan.
“Envoy Rhodes? Can you hear me?” the blonde-haired doctor asked. She was young, pretty in a bookish way, and had an air of confidence about her that he found comforting. The part that stirred him the most was the combination of his title and his surname. To his recollection, he had never heard them used that way before, though if he’d had to guess how he might be addressed once setting foot on Orris, that would have been his first. “Envoy?” she said again, this time gripping his unbound hand firmly in her own.
Garrett managed only an unintelligible whisper at first, more of a scratchy grunt. He inhaled, cleared his throat, and tried again. “Yes,” he said in a barely audible whisper.
“Envoy, are you still in pain? I can help with the pain if you can tell me where,” the blonde doctor said.
“Neck… just my neck.” Garrett had graduated from the whisper and was speaking more clearly. The blonde doctor placed both of her hands gently on either side of his neck and pressed her fingertips into the ropes of muscle adjacent to his spine.
“Canda, please get a neck brace and prepare to move him to the bed. Call Edgar, too, to help us.”
The brunette doctor nodded and disappeared.
“I can help, too. Just tell me what to do. I am perfectly capable,” the man said, though Garrett suspected he may have been much more capable twenty years earlier. He turned his attention to Garrett, looking both nervous and excited at the same time. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, son; an absolute pleasure.”
Garrett closed his eyes and exhaled deeply. The blonde doctor continued kneading the tight muscles in his neck, and he noticed them loosening. “Names,” he asked. “What are your names?”
The blonde doctor glanced at the man across from her before returning to Garrett. “My name is Dr. Nia Keel. I run this facility. We do a few things here, but it’s the only place on Orris that can manage Sterilex poisoning.”
That’s it, he thought, Orris confirmed. The next thought he had was about the combination of the words Sterilex and poison. He had never considered it a poison. “Spilled it,” he said, still struggling to achieve any real volume with his voice. “I spilled it all over my lap when I left Earth.”
“We know,” Nia said. “We figured it out after recovering your… after we admitted you.” Nia looked a little uncomfortable with her phrasing.
“Envoy Rhodes, my name is Len Bellinger. I am the current commander of Orris.”
“Wow,” Garrett said. “It’s an honor to meet you.”
“Trust me, Envoy, the honor is mine, and mine alone. My accomplishments are nothing compared to yours. Even among the other Envoys, you were the only one to return four Lances. Four civilizations; the latest is going through orientation up front as we speak. Earth.”
Garrett closed his eyes and relaxed. “They all made it.” A shadow of a smile appeared on his face.
“With all due respect, Envoy, was there a fifth?” Len asked.
“Earth was the fifth. I lost the third. The third was a disaster, Commander. Someday, I’ll tell you the whole story. It’s a long, awful story.”
“I can’t bear to have you call me Commander, Envoy. Please, just call me Len. And I think I would like to hear every story you have to tell, no matter how wonderful or awful.”
“I’ll agree to that if you will call me Garrett. I’m not an Envoy anymore – I’m retired.” Garrett laughed, which resulted in a fresh bolt of pain stabbing through his neck, but it did not completely remove the smile from his face.
“Maybe it’s best we get you well again before any more activity?” Nia said.
“Yes, doctor. Garrett? We’ll resume this conversation when you feel better. Until then, welcome to Orris. Welcome home, Garrett Rhodes.” Len shook his head briefly, as if still in amazement that he was in the presence of such a great man, a true master of the universe.
Chapter 4
Compliance
1
Ander arrived at meeting room 16C about ten minutes after the scheduled start time. Reggie stood before the group and stopped talking as the door opened. Ander walked to Reggie and scanned the group of attendees.
“How many?” he asked in a low tone.
“Forty-nine, not including you or me,” Reggie said.
Ander nodded. “Okay, you’re all done, Reggie. You can sit.”
Reggie scurried off to a seat about halfway back and on the hallway side of the conference room, which had been set up as a classroom.
