Kat entered the hospital twenty minutes later and suffered through a thorough battery of physical exams. She was given pain medication and told to wait in a private room for thirty minutes to allow it to take effect. Dull aches remained as a female nurse helped Kat clean herself. Kat had insisted she could manage but her caregiver wouldn’t relent. Even with help, the process was slow.
Two hours after entering the hospital, Kat rested comfortably in the same room. The doctor interpreting her test results had insisted that she stay for observation for at least another hour before he would even consider releasing her.
During the wait, she wanted to fall asleep in the luxurious bed but her apprehension prevented it. There had been no news from the mine and no more arrivals to the hospital. Her concern for Deke and Reece and her anxiety for Sadler and the rescue party turned the minutes into hours. It was pointless worry, she realized. Even if she had the strength to return to the mine, which she didn’t, she lacked the means. The mag-rail only traveled to the mine twice each day, during the shift change.
A knock on the door rocked Kat from her thoughts.
“Ms. Smith?” asked the doctor from the open doorway. He entered the room with a slim handheld in his left hand. “I’ve finished reviewing your exams,” he stated while gesturing to a glass screen inlaid into the wall across from her bed. With a series of sweeps and taps on his handheld, the wall flared to life. The doctor moved to the larger screen that showed the generic outline of a female body. Three flashing, red circles highlighted different parts of the diagram.
“I think you’re going to recover just fine,” the doctor opened. “Overall, you’ve suffered a good number of minor contusions consistent with trauma expected in a coal mine collapse.” He tapped the large screen at the first circle on the left side of the silhouette. The view zoomed and transitioned to show a resonance image of Kat’s left ribcage. “You’ve suffered moderate bruising of your fourth, fifth and sixth ribs along the left side of your body. I suspect this was sustained when you struck the wall. They’ll heal over the next three to four weeks although you’ll experience pain and some difficulty breathing, especially early, during the recovery. I’m going to recommend to Porter Mining that you’re placed on light duty during that timeframe.”
The doctor reset the silhouette and pressed a finger near the right hand. Again, the screen shifted to Kat’s imaging results. “There is moderate swelling along your MCP joints and associated phalanges. Nothing’s broken and the swelling will disappear in a few days.”
The image returned to the silhouette once more before the doctor tapped the final flashing circle. The displayed results panned upward, to the right side of Kat’s head. The resonance image showed a detailed right-side view of her brain. “You have a concussion. There’s some swelling but nothing dangerous. Your hardhat saved your life, Ms. Smith. I understand it was cracked.” He drew a line over the front of the image. “You can see some damage along the parietal lobe. It’s recent trauma although it appears to already be healing. I was confounded at first because this honestly looks like damage from an older event. Have you suffered a head injury in the last month?”
Kat shook her head while staring at the image.
“You can see how the synapses inside your parietal lobe have suffered some kind of distress. I really can’t identify the nature of the trauma but it seems obvious that it would be from the accident. The synaptic pathways almost seem suppressed in some way.” The doctor smiled and assured, “Like I said though, your brain is already recovering. The synapses and neurons are awakening. I want you to come back at the end of the week and we’ll conduct another exam so I can compare the progress between today and Friday. Porter Mining covers the first week of your medical expenses so there will be no cost to you.”
Kat continued to gape at the screen. “What does that part of the brain do, Doctor?”
“It’s responsible for touch sensation, visual perception, information processing, cognition.” He paused briefly in consideration. “Uh, reading comprehension, math computation… head injuries aren’t really my specialty. Waytown is too small to have a dedicated neurologist.” He pressed his fingers to the screen and twisted the image. “You can see the impairment penetrated deeply into the brain, all the way to the hippocampus. That’s responsible for long term memory processing and emotional responses.” He raised an eyebrow upward. “Have you had any memory loss since the accident?”
“No, I haven’t had any memory loss since the accident,” Kat replied.
“Good,” the doctor said with a smile. “You really are a lucky, young woman. Without that hardhat, you easily would have suffered acute skull fractures that could have proved fatal. If you don’t have any more questions, I’ll write up a pain management prescription and have the nurse bring it to you with further instructions.” He deactivated the screen.
Kat thanked the doctor, who excused himself. She closed her eyes and tried to process the new information that seemed to both confirm and contradict her present condition. At least he says I’m healing, she told herself. Maybe my memories will return.
“Ms. Smith?” The nurse who had helped her clean up stood at the door. “You’re free to go now.” She handed Kat two small packets and a piece of paper. “Take the capsules inside the packets at bedtime and when you wake up. When you arrive at the mine tomorrow, one of their safety technicians will look you over. These pills will cause drowsiness so don’t mix them with alcohol.” She pointed at the paper in Kat’s hands. “Those instructions explain all this. Be sure to try to take a deep breath every ten minutes. It will help your recovery. You should also try to lay on your injured side when you go to bed. I know it’s counterintuitive but it will actually help you breathe easier.”
Kat sat up slowly in the bed and rocked her feet gingerly to one side. “Thank you.” She pushed herself off the bed and landed on her feet. The pain was bearable. She out-processed, doing little more than waving her wristwrap over several scanners. As promised, Porter Mining covered the medical expenses. Her last stop was at the front lobby to obtain an emergency two-hour visa that would permit her to walk to Eastpoint legally. The receptionist stressed that she should start toward Eastpoint immediately since it might take her longer than usual to cover the distance in her condition. Leaving the hospital, Kat briefly considered catching the mag-rail to the mine with the night shift workers but she was exhausted. She would have to find out about Deke and Reece in the morning. With no other real options, Kat headed directly for the gate and home.
By the time she entered Shantytown, the sun had set. As she walked down the Strip, she casually confirmed her bag still held the polymer hunting knife. Even medicated, she walked gingerly and at a pace that allowed her to breathe as shallow as possible. At least the heat of the evening had given way to the cool, night air.
The trip through Shantytown was its usual mixture of paranoia and depression. An endless stream of hungry hopeless traveled alongside Kat. Mixed within the pathetic spectrum of mendicants were carefully concealed wolves seeking worthwhile prey. Despite her injuries, Kat maintained her vigilance.
She began to relax as she turned the final corner to her street. The mouth of her alley was just a half block away and Kat was looking forward to a night’s rest. She had already set her watch’s alarm and her medicine had fully kicked in. Her eyelids and her satchel felt heavy and she longed to put the day behind her.
Kat rounded the corner, stepped into her alley and immediately froze.
Two of the three figures invading her home were dressed in grey and black clothing that resembled a cross between a corp-sec officer’s uniform and an executive’s attire. The black body armor covering their chests and holstered pistols on their hips made it clear that these were not representatives of either ilk. Kat’s eyes swept over the man and woman and her thoughts screamed out an instinctual warning: Disposal Team.
They were standing on Rat’s side of the alley, less than a meter from his body. The poor man’s chest had been ripped apart at its center. He had fallen into his now bloody water reservoir and Kat could dimly see the blue tarp under him through the gaping hole in his torso.
The third intruder in the alley lacked the military-style clothing of the other two. He was a middle-aged man with greying hair near his temples, standing directly in Kat’s bed space. Her second hunting knife lay at his feet. His hands held Kat’s pressboard carton and he spoke even as his eyes were closed. “She’s walked a long way with this. I can feel sand inside my shoes.” The handsome man cocked his head toward the mouth of the alley as if sensing Kat’s presence. He opened his eyes and turned to her, smiling. “Why hello, Cat. We’ve been looking for you.”
The two agents reached to their holsters and withdrew imposing pistols. The muzzles of each handgun ended not with a single, wide barrel but a cluster of nine, distinctly miniature versions.
“Don’t shoot her!” the man cried immediately. “Maybe she’ll be reasonable.” He looked down at his feet and kicked the knife behind him. It spun under the edge of the trash wall. He made a beckoning gesture and said politely, “Please, come sit down and have a conversation.”
Kat took a slow step back. A pair of index fingers moved in unison from the sides of the pistols to their triggers. I’ll never make it, she judged.
The man waved lackadaisically toward his armed companions. “I’ll just have them shoot you now, Cat, if you don’t obey. The Society wants you dead and I’m more than happy to comply.”
Kat glanced at Rat’s cratered chest and slowly moved into the alley. Her eyes skimmed over a figure on the trash wall before returning to the handsome man. He seemed completely unarmed. “Who are you people?” she asked.
The man’s eyebrows arched. “I was just going to ask how much you remembered. They said a scorch causes catastrophic memory loss based on the test subjects’ results but there was uncertainty about the effects on a real target.” He shook his head once. “Do you remember anything at all?”
Kat casually placed her right hand on top of her satchel. “Why should I bother answering you if you’re just going to kill me when we’re finished?”
“An excellent ques—”
“You murderin’ sumbitches! You killed my man!”
Starlet shrieked a banshee’s cry as she leapt from the top of the trash wall. She collided into the backs of both of the armed agents. Between heartbeats, the handsome man turned wildly to his right and reflexively cringed in response to the naked aggression of the attack. Starlet pounded maniacally on the back and neck of the female agent.
Kat thrust her hand into her satchel and wrapped her fingers around the handle of her knife. She bolted forward while withdrawing the blade and sank it into the side of the handsome man’s chest. She felt the blade deflect off ribs and drive deeply into his body. The gruesome sensation made Kat gag but she pushed with all her adrenalin-addled might. The knife sank to its handle.
The man’s natural reaction was to attempt to twist away while rising to his toes. It was a futile effort and his piercing scream was punctuated by deafening roars from an agent’s pistol.
A fine spray of gore splattered both Kat and her victim as pieces of Starlet splashed the alley’s side wall. Kat felt her knife slide free when the man beside her collapsed in a heap. She spun to find the female agent beginning to rise over a sundered Starlet. The male agent trained his weapon on Kat.
Kat pushed out frantically with her mind while focusing on the pistols. Pressure exploded inside her head and the pistols exited reality in an eye-blink. Both agents stared at their empty hands.
“How?” gasped the female agent, defiant in her utter disbelief. “You were scorched!”
Kat answered with a wild knife swing. The woman’s partner easily danced away to recover near the trash wall while the female agent ducked under the blade and rose quickly to grab Kat’s right wrist with both hands. Kat pushed forward still clutching the knife but quickly realized the woman was gaining control. It’s either release the knife or end up in a wristlock, her instincts told her. She shoved her hand forward to launch the knife several meters down the alley. At the weapon’s release, the female agent relinquished her grip and dove for the blade.
The male casually rotated his shoulders as if stretching before raising his hands to a martial arts guard. Across the alley, the woman recovered the hunting knife, spun in a low crouch and faced Kat with angry, brown eyes. Caught between two adversaries, Kat bent to her knees but offered a wicked smile.
Her ears popped and the pistols fell to her feet. An instant later, nimble hands scooped both up. Jamison Flechette Series D handguns. Outlawed twenty-two years ago. She could tell by the competing weights that the pistol in her right hand held a larger amount of plastisteel pack in its magazine. Kat raised both pistols. Her left hand fired blindly at the agent near the trash wall while her vision condensed to nothing more than the front sight of the Jamison in her right hand. Trigger press, not pull, she instructed calmly between heartbeats. The gun barked twice and a blurry, red spray appeared beyond the crystal-clear image of her front sight.
Without pause, she jerked her head to the left. The male agent was already down, though not finished. She pointed her weapon at the man and looked away to Rat’s torn body. His green bottle of tonic lay smashed near his outstretched hand. Kat’s pistol boomed again in the alley.
Over the ringing in her ears, she could hear the wail of corp-sec enforcement vehicles. She stepped over the body of the female agent. A blast had unhinged the woman’s right arm at the shoulder although her battered chest armor had prevented penetrations to her torso. Kat’s second, devastating salvo had nearly decapitated her. The sheer destructive power of the flechette rounds made Kat retch. Grimacing, she bent over the torn form. She tried not to inhale the smell of death as she struggled to pick up her knife with a gun already in each hand. After collecting it, she ran for the alley’s exit.
A crowd was already gawking at the carnage in her wake. She turned the corner but not before looking behind her. The curled fingers of Rat’s bloodless hand became the last image she saw of home.