If anyone had asked, Ekatya Serrado would have said it was impossible to fall asleep after fighting a major space battle, crashing her ship, and dealing with a potentially fatal first contact situation that wasn’t predicted to happen for another century. But whatever Lancer Tal had injected her with must have been one Hades of a drug. It had magically erased the pain from her leg, and she’d given in to Commander Baldassar’s insistence that she lie down for just a few minutes. Now she looked up at a moon that was hanging above the horizon, huge and brilliant. It had been higher when she’d closed her eyes.
“You’re awake,” Baldassar said.
“Barely. How long have I been out?”
“Not too long. Forty-five minutes.”
“Forty-five minutes!” She put her hands in the dirt to shove herself upright, stopping in confusion when they sank into soft material. A bed? No, it was some sort of cot, set in a flattened part of the field. She’d been moved to the port side of the ship and there were two large shuttles parked nearby, their external lights illuminating a beehive of activity. There were Alseans everywhere, carrying boxes, poles, packs, and straps, and trampling even more of the grain. The farmer who owned this field was not going to recover much of the crop.
“One thing I’ll say for these Alseans, their doctors are efficient,” Baldassar said. “They got here five minutes ago, but look at that.” He nodded toward the ladder, and she looked over to see ten bodies swarming up the rungs, all laden with gear.
“They’ve been here five minutes, yet they already managed to treat me and get halfway up the skirt?”
“Oh, they didn’t treat you. That one did.” He pointed discreetly to the side, where she saw a man in dark civilian clothing speaking to the one Alsean she could recognize. As if aware of her gaze, they turned their heads simultaneously and met her eyes. After a pause, the doctor said something else while Lancer Tal nodded.
“Lancer Tal and some of her staff got you onto that cot after they brought their shuttle around,” Baldassar continued. “They wanted to carry you inside, but I made them understand that you’d rather stay here where you could see.”
“Thank you. That couldn’t have been easy.”
“Actually, it was. They seem to just…know, somehow.”
“Any word from Lieutenant Candini? Is she able to communicate through their radio system?” The failure of their communications grid had been one of the worst aspects of the crash. She knew nothing of her crew’s fate, but the ship’s computer had reported severe structural damage in every area where her remaining crew had been.
“Yes, one of their military people was here just before the doctors arrived and let me use his wrist radio. They’ve gotten into engineering. Commander Kameha and Trooper Xi need treatment but will be fine. Lieutenant Hmongyon is in serious condition, and they’re still looking for Troopers Shelley, Cuthbroad, and Mauji Mauji.”
“And Ensign O’Sullivan?”
“I’m sorry, Captain. He didn’t make it.”
She nodded tightly. “If that’s our only fatality, we’ll have beaten all the odds.”
“We already beat the odds just landing her mostly intact,” he said. “Thank the Seeders for Lieutenant Candini.”
Seeders my ass, she thought. If we have to thank the Seeders for our pilot’s skill, shouldn’t we be cursing them for cutting short a promising young life? O’Sullivan deserved so much more.
She wouldn’t let herself think about the others. Not the four-person weapons team that had saved this planet from a holocaust, and certainly not the one person who should not have been on her ship, who was deep in the habitat ring and would probably be the last person found. No, she would not think about it.
A nearby movement startled her, and she hoped her little jump hadn’t been visible when Lancer Tal crouched down beside her. The Alsean said something, but it was her expression that drew Ekatya in. Whatever differences they might have in language and culture, this was a leader who understood how she felt. There was sympathy in her eyes as she spoke again and slowly held out a hand. Ekatya hesitated, then reached out. The moment their hands touched she felt calmer, more hopeful. Perhaps she’d just needed to know that she wasn’t alone in this. O’Sullivan was dead, and others might be, but Lancer Tal knew what it meant to lose people in her command.
I am responsible for a ship, she thought. This woman is responsible for an entire world. She’s just found out that aliens exist, and she’s taking the time to hold my hand so I don’t crack up and completely lose it here in the middle of a damned field, in front of my executive officer.
How did you know? she wanted to ask, but Lieutenant Candini had their only translator and she had never felt so powerless.
Lancer Tal smiled at her, squeezed her hand, and let go. When she rose and walked toward another group of waiting Alseans, Ekatya let herself relax onto the pillow, feeling sleepy again.
“What was that all about?” Baldassar asked.
“I have no idea,” Ekatya said, closing her eyes.