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  There was a moment when no one moved. All eyes were on the gorilla, laid out prone on the floor. Muscles tensed, ready to spring into action at the slightest quiver of fur, they all waited anxiously. When a large snore finally escaped from the gorilla, everyone else took a breath. With the next rumbling snort, the other soldiers all gratefully collapsed to the ground in exhaustion and relief. They all just lay on the Receiving Bay floor for a few minutes, inhaling deep, gulping breaths.

  Grace finally was able to inhale a deep breath and thought she might break into tears of joy. She was bruised, lacerated, abraded and sore, but she was alive!

  “Fucking ‘A’, Lieutenant,” someone panted. That was followed by a series of acknowledging grunts and nods.

  “Apologies, Lieutenant,” the grizzly bear rumbled, his basso voice vibrating from deep within his enormous chest. “We should have been able to handle that guy better than that, even if we are all recovering from surgery.”

  “He was pumped up on Tri-FQ,” Grace said to the air above her, as she lay on her back and stared up at the distant grey ceiling. “It gives the person the strength of ten men . . . or, in this case, the strength of ten gorilla-modified combat soldiers. You guys were amazing! You saved that gorilla soldier’s life, and mine as well. You also protected this space station’s Receiving Bay and everyone in it. Thank you so much.”

  “Glad to be of service, Lieutenant,” the orangutan said, with a huge grin. He helped Grace up off of the Receiving Bay floor. “Looks like you may be hurting for a few days.”

  “A few weeks is more like it,” Grace muttered, rubbing her back. “Thank you, soldier.”

  “My pleasure, Lieutenant. Private Haywood, at your service. That was quite the display of courage you showed there,” the orangutan soldier said, with a solemn nod of respect.

  “Just doing my job,” Grace mumbled, her face heating up. She did not meet the orangutan soldier’s eyes because she did not feel she deserved any praise. They were the heroes.

  She limped over to check that the gorilla was still breathing. She had given him enough Stilzine to stop an army in its tracks . . . or so she thought. The man’s breathing was deep and regular, and his pulse was steady and bounding. All good signs, she decided. She raised one of his black eyelids. The redness of his sclera was already starting to fade back to a pinkish hue. A very good indication that the antidote had still been administered in time.

  “Don’t know too many lieutenants who would have jumped on a raging berserker like that, male or female, ma’am,” one of the tigers offered.

  “Yes, well, I’m a surgeon and it’s my duty to care for the sick and battle-wounded. Unfortunately for this soldier, he is both. Thank you all for not harming him.” The little voice in Grace’s head made gagging noises and asked her if she could be any more nauseating.

  “He could have easily been one of us, Doc. We look after our own. I am sure we’ve all seen the effects of Tri-FQ before. Some of us have likely experienced it, too,” the grizzly sergeant grumbled. There were a couple of furry heads nodding. “We will look after him and make sure he gets put on a pallet and off to Triage, Doc.”

  “Oh, no. That should be my job,” Grace protested. “Aren’t you soldiers supposed to be getting on that shuttle?”

  Already, Grace could see androids approaching with an anti-grav pallet. A pinch-faced man, whom Grace assumed was one of the medical station’s doctors, stalked towards them, his shoulders back, a prim expression on his face. When he got within hearing range, he demanded, in a very condescending tone, “Who stuck that syringe in this soldier’s neck?”

  “I did,” Grace said, coming forward to speak to the doctor. She took a step backwards, when she found herself confronted by a mask of outrage.

  “And who are you?” the pinch-faced man demanded, looking at Grace as if she were some vile contagion that had somehow sneaked on board the space station.

  “Doctor Grace Alexandra Lord, surgical fellow to Dr. Hiro Al-Fadi,” she said. Curiously, she noted everyone’s head slowly swivel towards her. She was sure they all then cautiously moved back from her a step, the doctor included.

  Her interrogator sniffed, cleared his throat, looked down at the tablet he was carrying, and then glanced up at her with a suspicious glare. Pettiness apparent in his high voice, he said, “I have never heard of you. You are not on our doctors’ roster. You are not even registered here on the station’s manifest as ‘arrived.’ You are not authorized to give any medication aboard this station until you have been registered and admitted to Staff. This is a flagrant breech of medical station policy! I am going to file an incident report about this!”

  “She may have saved a lot of lives, Doc, by treating this berserker gorilla soldier,” the grizzly bear sergeant said. “The soldier was hopped up on Tri-FQ.”

  “Oh? . . . And you are a doctor, too?” the man said, in a tone that dripped sarcasm.

  Grace frowned. She began to wonder if this man was truly a physician. Any doctor would not have questioned her actions, nor reprimanded her for immediately treating a Tri-FQ-gassed soldier.

  “And you are . . .?” Grace asked, politely.

  “Tristan Pflug, Chief Ward Clerk of Receiving Bay Five,” he replied, with his receding chin in the air and a haughty stare for Grace and the other animal-adapted soldiers.

  “Well, Chief Ward Clerk Pflug,” Grace said, “in the case of a medical emergency, a doctor is allowed to offer whatever assistance he or she can give, in order to protect the patient and any other individuals at risk. Being a lieutenant, I ordered these men to assist me, as I endeavored to treat this patient. I will be happy to defend my actions to the upper echelon, if it comes to that.”

  “Oh, it will. Believe me, it will. Because I am reporting this. You had better have made no mistakes, whatsoever, on what you injected this soldier with, Doctor Lord,” Pflug sneered.

  “If I had made any mistakes, this Receiving Bay would have been trashed by now and a lot of people injured, Clerk Pflug” Grace sighed.

  “Chief Ward Clerk Pflug! Well, we shall see about that, Dr. Lord,” the officious man said, with a sniff, his slit-like nostrils flaring in the air. He spun around and stalked off, to take charge of the gorilla and to order the attendant androids around.

  “That is one uptight and annoying human,” one of the tigers drawled. Grace’s eyebrows rose. The voice was female.

  “Like to Tri-FQ him,” someone muttered. This was followed by some snorts and hoots.

  “We will all file a report, Lieutenant, before we leave, commending your actions,” the grizzly bear offered. “We are all from different squads and regiments, but I am sure I speak for all of us, when I say that we will back your actions one hundred per cent. The truth will be told.”

  “Thank you all. I appreciate your support and your bravery. I don’t think I would still be in one piece were it not for all of you,” Grace said, her cheeks feeling very flushed.

  “We look after our medics, Doc. After all, you guys have to look after us,” the wolf said, with a very toothy grin.

  “We try,” Grace said, trying to ignore the sight of those long, sharp fangs. “But I think your job is a far tougher one than mine. Thank you all again, gentlemen and lady, for saving my life and for helping me get the antidote into that poor soldier.”

  Grace saluted them all. She then hobbled over to her dropped duffel bag and gingerly picked it up. She hoped they were not all staring at her butt. She spun back to face five pairs of intense animal eyes.

  “I suppose I had better report in and announce that I have arrived,” Grace said, with a shaky laugh. “I suspect they know I’m here.”

  “Can we help you with that bag, Lieutenant? You look pretty banged up,” the orangutan soldier asked, grinning.

  “Absolutely not,” Grace snapped, with a mock frown. “I’m fine.”

  The little voice in the back of her head whimpered, ‘No, we’re not.’

  “By the way, none of you were re-inju
red in the skirmish, were you?”

  They all shook their heads.

  “Good. You soldiers put on a terrific show here and I have the bruises to show for it. That gorilla is one lucky man,” Grace said. She drew herself up straight and saluted them, formally. “Fly safe.”

  The five soldiers all lined up and crisply saluted her in return.

  Grace tried to walk away from the group without limping or wincing with each step, although her entire body was throbbing. Pride was the only thing that kept her strides smooth and confident. She knew they were watching her, so she felt she had to put up a brave front. It was a little difficult, when she felt like she had been hit by a comet. With what she was sure was a bruised hip, a twisted back, a swollen right knee, abraded hands, a bruised right cheek, and definite whiplash, it was no easy task faking non-injury, especially when the little voice in her head was screaming: ‘I need drugs. I want drugs. Now!’

  Grace told the little voice to stop whining.

  Overall, Grace was pretty happy with herself. She had tried her best to appear professional and relaxed, as if she ran into walking, talking bears, tigers, wolves and apes every day. In the heat of battle, she had got a close-up view of how effective these animal adaptations had performed. These men and women were mightier, faster, more agile, and much more aware of their environment than a normal human. They were built to be swift, powerful, efficient killing machines, but their minds were still human and their decisions were compassionate and caring. Grace could not help but be very, very impressed.

  The heavy duffel bag made her right shoulder ache and, as she looked around the Receiving Bay, her neck cried out in pain. She noticed that the anti-grav pallet carrying the gorilla soldier had already disappeared. She had not even gotten the patient’s name!

  Limping towards the nearest exit, Grace realized that she had left her space helmet somewhere behind. Scanning the ground around the space shuttle, she spotted it beneath a large vehicle. She almost wailed at the thought of getting down onto her bruised hands and knees and crawling under the cargo truck to collect it. If it were not for the fact that the cost of replacing it would have been exorbitant, she was sorely tempted to just leave it.

  As she was about to drop the duffel bag and lower her aching body to the floor, a little, round, turtle-shaped robot scooted out from under the cargo truck with her helmet balanced on its back. The tiny, cleaning robot ratcheted up its carapace until it was level with Grace’s hands and then it extruded small appendages, which picked the helmet up off of its back and offered the helmet to her.

  Grace smiled in astonishment and thanked the robot, as she gratefully accepted her misplaced space helmet. The robot bobbed a little curtsey, then it ratcheted back down to its original height, and skittered off.

  Just shifting the large, round space helmet under her left arm sent needles shooting up into her left shoulder. Grace started moving towards the medical space station entrance again, but slowly. She forced herself to walk erect and told herself to show a little dignity. With that thought, a large flap on the front of her spacesuit flopped forward and a piece of hardware fell off of her right boot. Grace belatedly noted that the right sleeve of her space suit was torn, from her shoulder right down to her elbow, exposing the shredded sleeve of her underlying absorbwear. The damaged sleeve dangled as she limped. She had no memory of when that tear to her suit had occurred. She thought these suits were supposed to be indestructible.

  ‘Oh well,’ Grace thought. ‘Far from auspicious, this first day on the Nelson Mandela, but things can only get better from this point onwards, right?’

  Now, if she could just get some painkillers—‘Drugs!’ the little voice in her head screamed—she could, hopefully, get through the rest of the day.

  Chapter Two: Nelson Mandela

  With her straight, long, blonde hair tied back in a tail that, at the moment, sat far askew on her head, and her disheveled, limping appearance, Grace received a lot of measured stares. Tall and slim, with pale blue eyes and caramel skin, she was unusual to look at. She had grown up her entire life under curious gazes. Lithe of build and combat fit, she worked very hard on her fitness, to maintain her muscularity and bone density; no easy feat in zero gravity or low-gravity conditions. She had completed her medical training, planet-side, on her home world of Nova Alta, four years ago, and had then joined the Conglomerate’s Medical Corps, to complete a residency in surgery, specializing in combat medicine. She had earned her officer’s commission out in the field, treating and stabilizing battle wounded on a planet called Talisman, and had seen her fair share of battle trauma.

  It had always been her dream to be a surgeon and travel in space to different planets and places, yet Grace was not a supporter of warfare. She did not believe war was the solution to any conflict. Nevertheless, through the Conglomerate’s Medical Corps, she had been able to attain her dream of being a surgeon and was now getting a chance to apply her skills.

  By some miraculous good fortune, a surgical fellowship had suddenly become available on the Conglomerate’s Premier Medical Space Station, the Nelson Mandela, just when she was looking for a position. Grace had leaped at the chance to learn from the great, galaxy-renowned Dr. Hiro Al-Fadi. Luck had been with her, as she had received the acceptance almost the moment she had applied.

  Gargantuan in size and roiling in orderly bustle, Receiving Bay Five made Grace feel as if she had been swallowed up by some great leviathan of deep space, with its distant, smoky grey ceiling, lined with ducts, pipes, fans, cables, scaffolding, ladders, distant lighting, and great spanning arches. The outer surface of the colossal medical space station looked like five glistening, silver, concentric rings, with a multitude of silver spokes connecting the inner rings to the outer ones. Space-faring transport vessels, carrying incoming wounded and patients from all over the Union of Solar Systems, would dock at the outermost ring, like bees swarming a great ring-shaped hive. From the outer ring’s hull, patients, visitors, and medical supplies would be taxied around on internal shuttles and monorails, to one of the numerous Receiving Bays, situated at the many spokes of the rings.

  Humming, buzzing, and teeming with anti-grav trucks, workers, robots, and machinery, it seemed that most of the occupants of Receiving Bay Five had been completely oblivious to Grace’s unorthodox welcome to the station. She decided this was probably a very good thing. She hated being the centre of attention.

  Androids, humanoid-shaped, synthetic beings of various sizes and hues, and robots, mechanical automatons of every shape, size, height, color, and dimension, swarmed everywhere in the Receiving Bay, directing antigrav trolleys, loading or off-loading cargo, transporting supplies, connecting huge tubing up to pipes that would carry fuel or water to the space-faring ships, and directing arriving and departing personnel and traffic. One tall, bronze, statuesque android, of the customary androgynous features, saluted and waved Grace towards the nearest airlock entrance to the space station proper.

  Grace was familiar with the routines and regimentation of a low-gravity medical space station, however she had never been to a space station the size of the Nelson Mandela. Adorned in her damaged Conglomerate spacesuit, Grace was sure she looked more like one of the casualties who had just come from a war zone, rather than the new surgeon. She tried not to drag her left leg, as she joined a line of arriving visitors, who were making their way to the passenger airlock.

  The medical space station’s airlocks—airtight chambers with massive, shielded sliding doors—varied in size. The smaller chambers were for human personnel. The vast cavernous ones were for cargo, equipment, machinery, trolleys, as well as the androids and robots. The airlocks were critical for emergencies, in case of damage to the outer hull of the space station or Receiving Bays. A breech in the outer hull, from a meteor or a missile, would result in a catastrophic drop in air pressure, as the station’s atmosphere escaped violently through the rent. The airlocks would automatically shut, at the first sign of a pressure drop, preservin
g as much atmosphere as possible. The airlocks were also there as a first line of defense, in the event of a hostile boarding of the station. Individual sections of the space station could be cordoned off by these great lockdown doors, that were placed at regular intervals.

  At the moment, the air pressure of the Receiving Bay was equal to that of the inner station, so there was no need to wait for any equalization of pressure between the Receiving Bay, the airlock, and the inner sanctum of the medical station itself. The grey, heavy, outer airlock doors slid silently closed behind Grace. Not long afterwards, the white inner airlock doors opened up and Grace finally entered the inner environment of the Nelson Mandela Premier Medical Space Station. Her heart began to pound, as she followed everyone down a long, brightly lit corridor and exited through an open hatchway door.

  Waiting on the other side of the airlock, within a large, beautifully furnished reception area, was a tall, redheaded corporal in the dark blue military uniform of the Conglomerate. When he spotted the stripes and insignia on Grace’s space suit, he grinned and saluted.

  “Welcome aboard, Lieutenant. I am Corporal Alan Mc. . . Mull . . . en.”

  The young man’s enthusiastic voice trailed off, as he gaped at Grace, unable to disguise his shock at her appearance. His huge green eyes widened, as they took in Grace’s torn spacesuit and bruised face. For the briefest of moments, he hesitated, looking as if he did not quite know what to do, but then he recovered his poise. He beamed a welcoming smile, as if he were the sun itself, and he bowed with a polished grace, as if he greeted grimy, disheveled officers on a daily basis.