Read Online Infinite Day by Chris Walley - Free Book Online

happened there. We all do.”
    â€œWell, I hope we will see some justice done there; but that’s not our business. Not yet.”
    â€œOkay, I’ll pack.” Then, with a happy-go-lucky salute, she left.
    As he watched Laura walk swiftly away, Merral uttered a silent prayer. Lord, may she, at least, come home safely.

    Merral returned to the office, which seemed to have become even more crowded. He noticed again how everyone looked at him with respect or anticipation. They expect me to know all the answers. Over the next hour, as he was measured for a space suit, suffered a dozen inoculations, and snatched some lunch, he found that the thought troubled him . It’s an impossible expectation.
    Just after two, Merral met Dr. Abilana Ghosn, the woman proposed as ship’s doctor. She was tall, tanned, and good-looking in a rather delicate way, and Merral’s first thought was that she would have trouble from Azeras. Then, as she described how she had worked with Space Affairs and had trained on Earth for vacuum injuries, he felt she could look after herself.
    â€œSo what problems do you foresee on the trip?” Merral asked.
    â€œProblems? Let me see. Oh, thirty active people cooped up in an enclosed space for weeks, with no color vision, awaiting a battle, and afflicted by supernatural visitations?” Abilana adopted a blank face. “Nothing much comes to mind. Shipboard romances, perhaps?”
    Merral found himself laughing. “Have you suffered from irony very long, Doctor?”
    â€œNow that’s an interesting point. I always had irony—it’s congenital in our family—but it’s only really flared up in the last few months. I worry in case it develops into a full-blown case of sarcasm. Or even cynicism.”
    â€œCould be awkward.”
    â€œIt’s a way of handling nastiness.”
    The humor vanished. “I fear we shall have a lot of that. Look, Abilana, if I said you were going on this trip, what would you do?”
    â€œI’ve done some preparations. I’ve got a ten-page shopping list. Ransack the shelves of the Isterrane psychological wards for every tranquilizer and antipsychotic known. Upload the latest training software on space injuries. Load up with enough syn-plasma to swim in. Get two of the robo-surgeons. Get the med and coroner reports on every wound and death from Tezekal and Ynysmant . . . How long have we got on the ship?”
    â€œSay five weeks out, same back.”
    â€œOkay. I’d get training resources to give everyone on the ship basic nursing and wound management. And . . .” She paused and glanced around, but they were out of earshot.
    â€œAnd . . . ?”
    â€œA crate of body bags.”
    â€œYou are a realist, aren’t you?”
    â€œI always think it’s a good idea to be prepared. I lost my naiveté when Tantaravekat became dust. I did a six-month placement there as a trainee doctor. Hey, it wasn’t the nicest spot, but nowhere deserves that.”
    â€œThat’s why you want to come?”
    â€œIn part. They killed some of my patients. No doctor likes that.”
    â€œSo you want the job?”
    â€œYeah. I always liked challenges and good causes, and this is both.”
    â€œAnd you can do all that has to be done in the time we have?”
    â€œSecond ship takes off in twenty-six hours. I’ll pass on sleeping.”
    â€œYou get the job.”
    â€œThanks. You realize that if we pull this off, the rest of my professional career is going to be an anticlimax?”
    â€œAbilana, if we pull this off, you’ll spend the rest of your professional career lecturing to awestruck students. All being well, we’ll meet in space.”

    An hour or so later, Merral was working through a pile of forms when, over the half dozen urgent discussions in the room, he heard a series of precise knocks at the door.
    â€œCome in!” he yelled without looking up