Expendable - James Alan Gardner [16]
Yarrun and I exchanged glances at the door of the infirmary. We hadn’t said a word since we left to get the weapons. Now he smiled…a hideous sight. I nodded and palmed the ENTER plate.
Inside, the air smelled of disinfectant. Dr. Veresian had drawn Harque and Prope into his office, and was talking to them in a low voice. The admiral sat without pants in an examination chair, drumming his fingers on the arm-rests.
Prope turned at the sound of our entrance and saw the stunners. “Is there some problem, Explorers?”
“In a manner of speaking,” I said. “We’re unhappy with this mission.”
“That’s understandable,” she replied. “It’s an open secret that Explorers have been Lost on Melaquin. But the order came directly from the High Council.”
“It seems foolish to throw away our lives for no reason.” I raised the stunner. “What would you do in our position?”
Prope calmly lifted a hand. The ghost of a smile played about her lips; maybe all her life she had been waiting for a chance to show how relaxed she could be at gunpoint. She turned to Harque as if there were no weapon trained on her. “Lieutenant, what’s the punishment for a primary offense?”
Harque quoted the regulation with a smirk. “The offender shall be set down on an approved exile world with no less than three days food and water rations, two changes of suitable clothing, and a knife whose blade does not exceed twenty centimeters in length.”
“And what is the nearest exile world, lieutenant?”
“I imagine it would be Mootikki.”
“But suppose I were shot by a stunner and was unconscious for a few hours. Another hour to convene a court martial, perhaps two hours to go through the formalities…. Where would we be then, lieutenant?”
“Not far off Melaquin.”
“And Melaquin,” Prope said, turning back to us, “is also an approved exile world.”
“That’s not in the registration catalogue,” I objected.
“There’s a lot that isn’t in the registration catalogue.” Harque grinned nastily.
I tried to keep my face steady, but my stomach had been carved hollow with one sweep of an invisible scythe. The captain put on the look of a big sister who’s caught you playing with yourself. “My orders from the Council mentioned that some Explorers try to…waive this sort of mission in various ways; but all the loopholes have been plugged, believe me. You two can choose to be banished to Melaquin as criminals with little more than the clothes on your back, or you can land as Explorers with all the preparation and equipment the Jacaranda can muster. Now if you want to fire, go ahead. It’s five o’clock in the morning, and I could use the sleep.”
Yarrun’s hand touched my wrist, lowering the stunner for me. In a moment, he took my arm and nudged me out the door. As it closed behind us, I could hear Harque snicker.
Yarrun said, “I’ll take the stunners back and lock them up.”
I put an arm around his shoulder and squeezed lightly. “It was a childish plan anyway.”
He slipped away and walked off slowly, tapping the guns against his thigh with every step. I slumped back against the bulkhead and tried not to think of how good it would feel to plunge my fist into someone’s face.
Admiral’s Escort
Admiral Chee poked his head out the infirmary door. He still had no pants on, just blue boxer briefs.
“Are you a guard?” he asked.
“No.”
He slipped into the corridor with an ostentatious attempt at stealth. It was unnecessary—I could see that the people in Veresian’s office had closed the door, leaving the admiral unattended.
“I’m not supposed to be out here,” Chee said with great satisfaction. “They thought they could stop me by stealing my pants.” He raised a hand to his mouth and blew a raspberry salute back toward the infirmary. “It didn’t work, did it? And do you know why? Because I’m an admiral and people are more embarrassed seeing my ass than I am showing it. Watch.”
He spun around and hiked