Planet Broker Book 2, page 20
Za’ec stood there and panted in what I realized was fear-fueled anger. He was afraid for the life of his son, that was why he was behaving so hostile. Strangely, it made me respect the chieftain more.
When the Desert Tribe chieftain still hadn’t answered, the smaller Almort male beside him hesitantly cleared his throat. When his chief whirled on him, the male squeaked out, “Her skill would be valuable, sir. Kot’ep only trains the most prestigious students.”
Za’ec flared his gills, but another bout of wet coughing from the back of the room killed any argument before it could form. The Desert Tribe chieftain’s face tightened, but he finally acquiesced with a dip of his chin.
“Thank you,” Sef’sla told the chieftain as she walked further into the room. She looked between Chief Za’ec and the other Almort beside him. “Now, what has befallen your son?”
Suddenly, the coughing grew worse. The Desert Tribe chieftain spun on his heel and strode over to his son’s bedside without another word. Sef’sla looked to the remaining Almort for her answer.
“It is lung mites,” the Almort male sighed, his eyes downcast in defeat. Sef’sla inhaled sharply, and her face paled.
“What? What are those?” I asked. Just the words ‘lung mites’ made my skin crawl, and I didn’t like the expressions Sef’sla and U’eh now wore.
The Almort princess turned to me, and her face was pinched. “There are mites, small insects, that live deep down in the sands of the desert. They typically survive on the other creatures that live beneath the desert unless there is a sandstorm. The high winds lift the mites into the air where they can be breathed in. The mites then bury themselves in the lungs and destroy what they can find. The cloth the Desert Tribe wear over their faces keep out the sand but do little to stop the mites. Am I correct in assuming Z’oke encountered a sandstorm recently?”
She directed this question to the Almort male again, who nodded sadly. “Three days past. The boy is nearly of age and so has been seeking to prove himself. He went out into the desert without informing anyone to tame his own Vac’lek but became trapped in a sandstorm instead. We found him yesterday, but he was already dehydrated and weak. The small dose of Pa’ke we gave him has only made him worse.”
Sef’sla’s head drooped, and even U’eh clicked in sympathy. I glanced between the three Almort, who seemed suddenly defeated.
“Does that mean nothing can be done?” I questioned. My eyes darted to the bed at the back of the room. The Desert Tribe chieftain stood to the side, and he held his son’s hand in his own. The coughing had turned to deep, waterlogged wheezing.
Sef’sla put a hand to her forehead and closed her eyes. “Pa’ke is the medicine we use to kill most of our lethal parasites,” she explained, “We cut the leaves from the plant and feed them to the patient. However, it is a poison in and of itself. It only works if the mites are caught early and if the patient is strong enough to survive the effects of the Pa’ke.”
“Like the old chemotherapy they used in ancient times to treat cancer with,” Akela mused, but the words meant nothing to the Almort.
We stood silently in a huddled circle, the only sound in the room the boy’s death rattle and his father’s soothing hisses. I racked my brain for a solution, any solution, but as the seconds ticked by, nothing came to me.
However, a moment later, Neka gasped at my side and spun to face me.
“I-I think I have an idea,” she stuttered over herself, her yellow eyes wide and dilated. We all turned our attention to the cat-girl.
“Go on,” Sef’sla said, her face a mix of curious and hopeful.
Neka grew suddenly shy, her ears and tail flicking back and forth anxiously. “I don’t know if it will work,” she began hesitantly.
I shook my head. “We’re open to any idea right now, Neka,” I reassured her. “Please, tell us what you’re thinking.”
My assistant smiled softly at me in gratitude and took a deep breath. “Okay,” she went on. “So when I was young, I was always sick. My Makers created me to be pretty and appealing. They didn’t care if I was healthy or strong, so I had breathing problems as a child. I would have attacks where I couldn’t catch my breath, couldn’t inhale or exhale properly. It became such a problem that my Makers realized they had to do something. They could have fixed my lungs directly, but that would have cost money they didn’t want to spend. So, instead, they got me an inhaler, that way I would always be dependent on them for medicine. I eventually outgrew it, but that’s not the point. My idea was maybe there’s a way to turn the cure into something the boy can inhale?”
Sef’sla looked confused and lost, but Akela had begun to nod enthusiastically, her eyes bright.
“Yeah, yeah,” the mechanic agreed before she began to ramble. “If we can liquefy the cure, I can aerosolize it for inhalation. That way, Za’ec’s son receives a lower dose, but it goes directly into the lungs. It should kill the mites on contact.”
Adrenaline and hope began to spiral through my blood, making my pulse race. I looked to Sef’sla. “Could you liquefy the Pa’ke?” I asked her.
The Almort princess looked like she still didn’t completely understand what my mechanic and assistant had described, but she nodded all the same.
“Y-yes,” she replied. “I can, but I don’t understand how that will help. Drinking the Pa’ke would be just as dangerous.”
Neka shook her head adamantly. “No, he wouldn’t drink it,” she explained. “He’d breath it in. It would come out like a mist.”
Sef’sla’s brow furrowed, and she turned to Akela. “You can… mist the cure?” she questioned incredulously.
Akela rubbed at the shorn part of her skull and thought about it for a moment. “I’d need to grab a few things from the ship first,” she said. “An air compressor for one, and I don’t think we have any inhalers in med-bay, but we have oxygen masks.” Her mind turned over the details rapidly and then she gave a firm nod. “Yeah, yeah I can do it.”
“Then go,” I said immediately before turning to Sef’sla and the Almort male who stood behind her, looking completely and utterly lost. “Do you have a dose of the Pa’ke readily available?”
The Almort male hesitated but then dipped his chin. “Yes,” he replied before he walked over to one of the tables that had been shoved against the wall. He picked up a bowl made of orange stone and brought it over to us. In the shallow curve of the bowl, a pale, yellow flower rested, dried and withered. The Almort male offered it to Sef’sla, who took it gently in her hands.
“Go with Akela and Neka to the ship,” I instructed the Almort princess. “You can vaporize the Pa’ke more quickly there.”
A burst of static crackled in my ear, and Omni replied, “I can have the drones set everything up in the cargo bay. Simply tell me what you need, Akela.”
The mechanic nodded immediately, but Neka looked hesitant.
“I want to stay here,” the cat-girl argued, but I shook my head.
“Help Akela and Sef’sla however you can,” I responded but, truthfully, I wanted Neka with the other women together and out of the building as we put this plan into motion. If something went wrong, if the boy died before the cure was made, I didn’t want Neka or Akela to be in any danger. U’eh and I would be fine. We could handle Za’ec if it came to that.
Akela seemed to realize my motivations because she gently took Neka’s arm and steered her toward the door. “Come on,” she whispered. “We don’t have any time to waste.”
I turned to Sef’sla. “Will you be able to make it to the ship?” I asked and, as if in response, the boy began to cough again, loud and unforgiving.
Sef’sla gaze turned steely and resolved. “We’ll steal a Vac’lek if we must,” she said. Her gaze flickered over to the Desert Tribe chieftain, but I reached out and touched her arm.
“Go,” I encouraged her. “I will speak to Za’ec.”
The princess dipped her chin. “We will return quickly,” she promised, and then she, Neka, and Akela swept out the door. I could hear their running footsteps recede down the hall.
I took a deep breath and looked to U’eh, who looked equally concerned.
“They’ll make it,” I said, but I wasn’t sure if it was to reassure the Almort chief or myself.
I took a deep breath and slowly walked across the room. U’eh strode beside me, and the other Almort male, who I guessed was something like a nurse, trailed behind us fearfully.
I stopped a few meters away from the end of the bed. The other Almort glanced between me and the Desert Tribe chieftain in fright and took a few steps back, fading to the peripherals of the room. The chieftain didn’t even glance up at my approach. His attention was solely focused on the small youth in the bed. Z’oke wheezed pitifully as he lay there, his closed eyes sunken into his face, his scales and skin lackluster and sallow. He was half the size of his father, and he seemed to shrink even further with each labored breath.
“What?” Za’ec hissed softly but sharply at me, his eyes trained on his dying son’s face.
I swallowed tightly and kept my voice low. “Sef’sla and my crew have returned to our ship,” I informed him. “We believe we have found a way to save your son, but there are supplies we require that they must first obtain.”
The Desert Tribe chieftain’s mouth twisted in a sneer, but I could see the sadness and devastation behind it. Hope had abandoned the Desert chieftain. He believed his son was going to die, and there was nothing we could do to stop it.
“You speak of things you do not understand,” Za’ec snarled under his breath.
I opened my mouth to argue, gently, but U’eh beat me to it.
“You are the one who does not understand, Za’ec,” U’eh hissed and, finally, the Desert chief lifted his eyes, anger chasing away the shadows of grief.
“You insult me as my son lies dying,” Za’ec clicked in rage and disgust. “It seems any manners you once had decayed along with your beloved mate.”
My eyes went wide and darted back to U’eh. The Almort chief scowled and flared his gills, but he checked his rage.
“My mate is dead and gone,” U’eh hissed as he took a threatening step closer to the bed, “but if a starman like this had fallen from the skies and offered to save her, I would have jumped at the chance. I would have given anything.”
Doubt flickered across the Desert chieftain’s face, but he didn’t back down.
“How can you defend this outsider so?” he demanded, his voice harsh, but his hand still gently cradling his son’s.
“Because I have seen what he and his tribe can do,” U’eh replied simply, but firmly. “I have witnessed first hand their might and skill. They slew the Opalks and rescued my own son.
He gestured to me, his voice strengthening with resolve. “This starman became the first outsider to complete an Akornath, and after that, he set out with a plan to save our world. Already, he has saved more than one tribe. In the mountains, an accident occurred within Soh’e’s refinery, caused by an avalanche. We were trapped beneath snow, with a forge ready to explode, but the starman and his machine-healer were able to stop it. Then, in the hills, they battled a group of sky-machines and defeated them, saving Cex’ath and his people. If they say they have discovered a way to help your son, I believe them because they are both honest and honorable.”
Too many emotions flickered across the Desert Tribe chieftain’s face for me to track. He dropped his eyes again and gazed at the prone figure of his son.
“He is my only child,” the chieftain finally admitted quietly. He reached out tentatively and ran his fingers down the side of his son’s cheek. “My mate cannot have another. She’s sedated in the next room because she cannot bear to face this fate.”
For the first time since I’d met him, something like sympathy crossed U’eh’s face. He lifted his arm, hesitated, but set his hand gently atop Za’ec’s shoulder.
“Nothing is decided,” U’eh said, uncharacteristically soft. He withdrew his hand and touched his mate’s bracelet that encircled his wrist. “My daughter takes strongly after her mother. She will put everything she is into this cure for your son.”
“Then let us hope it will be enough,” Za’ec whispered, all the fight and rage had gone out of him. He turned back to his son more fully and bent down to speak to him softly. After a moment, I realized the chieftain was singing. The melody was soft and sad and so full of grief that I withdrew from the boy’s bedside, fearful that I was intruding on something too private. U’eh followed after me, and the two of us hovered near the door, the only sounds in the room The Desert Tribe chieftain’s song and his son’s fading wheezes.
Time passed slowly, and each lost second made my chest feel incrementally tighter as if my lungs were failing as well. I considered stepping out into the hall and checking in with Omni and the women, but a part of me was afraid of what they would tell me.
Outside the city, when the Desert Tribe chieftain first mentioned his son was ill, all I could think about was how if the boy died, so would our coalition. However, Warrick and the war with Terra-Nebula seemed like a universe away now, something that was happening somewhere and to someone else. In this hospital room, the boy’s declining condition seemed to take up the whole world. I could think of nothing else. Grief began to creep into my heart. I wanted to save every single last one of the Almort, but if I couldn’t even help to save this child, what did that say about me? Even more importantly, if my crew and I failed, Chief Za’ec would lose his only child. I had been on the other side of this scenario, and as an only child who lost his parents, I wouldn’t wish that kind of pain and sorrow on my worst enemy. Not even Warrick.
When an hour had slipped by, and I still had heard nothing from my crew, I began to fear the worst. Za’ec’s son’s breath came intermittently now, and each inhale sounded like a lungful of water. The Desert Tribe chieftain had slid to his knees at his son’s bedside, his eyes trained on Z’oke’s face, his hand numbly holding the boy’s.
Suddenly, like the crack of gunfire, static burst in my ear.
“We’re on our way back,” Akela panted, and I could hear the rhythmic thumping of the running Vac’lek they rode.
I held my breath and quickly walked to the doorway.
“Did it work?” I whispered urgently.
“We got it aerosolized,” Akela responded. “We’ll see if it works when we get there. How is Z’oke doing?”
I looked back to the boy’s bed and lowered my voice even farther. “I would push that lizard as fast as I could,” I encouraged her. “I’m not sure how much longer he has.”
There was a moment’s paused, and then the mechanic replied, “We’ll be there soon. Get everything ready.”
Then the transmission cut out, and I was left with only the sound of my pounding heart.
I walked quickly back to U’eh’s side. “They’re on their way back,” I told him, and a spark of hope flared in the chief’s eyes.
“Good,” he said, his voice relieved, and then we turned as one to face the Desert Tribe chieftain.
I took a deep breath and approached the kneeling chieftain.
“Sef’sla and my crew are returning as we speak,” I informed him. “They have a treatment ready.”
Za’ec looked up and there was the same flash of hope in his eyes that had been in U’eh’s. “They succeeded?” he asked in disbelief.
I gave him a small smile. “They have done what they can,” I amended. “We shall see if it works soon.”
The Desert Tribe chieftain turned back to his son with a short dip of his chin. “We shall see,” he echoed and clenched his finger’s around his son’s.
Fifteen minutes later, I heard a commotion down the hall. We all spun toward the doorway, and after a moment, Sef’sla skidded into the threshold, Neka and Akela fast on her heels.
“Does he still breathe?” the princess panted, her eyes wide and intense.
“Just barely,” U’eh replied to his daughter.
Akela pushed herself forward and strode across the room to join us at Z’oke’s bedside. In her hands she cradled an oxygen mask hooked up to a small, silver container. It was cylindrical with a valve at one end to control the flow of gas.
“What is that?” Za’ec asked as he rose to his feet. Hope and fear warred behind his eyes.
Sef’sla stepped forward. “It is a dose of Pa’ke,” she explained, “that I have turned to liquid and the machine-healer has turned to mist.” She gestured at the oxygen mask. “Z’oke will breathe the mixture in. It is a lower dose, which will not affect him so harshly, but since it will be administered directly into the lungs, it should kill the mites on contact.”
Then, Neka slid closer, and I realized the slight cat-girl had a large bag strapped to her back. “We also brought an in-field tissue replicator,” she added, slightly out of breath.
The Almort in the room looked to me in confusion. I rubbed at the back of my neck as I tried to think of a way to explain the machine. “It’s something used in dire situations, like combat or an emergency. It can scan and reproduce healthy tissue to replace damaged ones.”
The Desert chieftain still didn’t understand, and neither did the other Almort in the room. Akela sighed heavily and said, “It will fix the damage in his lungs once we kill the mites. But first, we need to do that, so…”
The mechanic trailed off as she stepped forward, closer to Za’ec and his son. Intense emotion passed over the chieftain’s face, and for one irrational second, I feared he would suddenly refuse, but at last, he nodded to the silver-haired woman.
Akela immediately rounded the bed to stand across from the Desert Tribe chieftain and beside his son. She looked hesitantly down at the boy, a flash of fear and doubt in her eye. I could tell she didn’t want to be the one to administer the medicine, and Sef’sla noticed too because the princess stepped up and held out her hand.
“I will do it,” she said kindly, and Akela passed the mask and container to her.
“Place the mask over his face and turn the valve slowly,” the mechanic instructed softly before she stepped away and joined me at the foot of the bed.
