you’ll regret it.”
“Finally,” he continued, “Until further notice power to your cabin will be turned off at 2200 hours ship time, and not restored until 0600. I intend that you have no choice but to get some sleep.”
Ro-Lecton leaped to his feet. “You don’t understand, Commodore! They’ve almost got the bio lab operational! Within a day or two, we’ll be ready for autopsies and post-mortems. By then I have to know…”
His voice trailed off as he saw Kas’ head shaking. “No, doctor. No one expects miracles, including me. This isn’t a single-handed research project, and this plague eluded a top-flight medical staff aboard the Rekesh. Overnight results are not expected. In fact, I’ll be more impressed with thoroughness than speed. Do I make myself clear?”
Ro-Lecton’s shoulders slumped in defeat. “As you wish, Commodore. But we’ll be losing valuable time…”
Kas’ head was shaking again. “Not at all, Doctor. Your team consists of what, fifteen? People…”
“Fourteen, sir.” Kor-Nashta corrected.
“Fourteen, then. Only about half of them have been awakened, I believe.”
“Eight, sir.” Kor Nashta put in.
“All right. Eight have been awakened so far, and five, including doctor Kor-Nashta, here, have completed suit qualifications. It will be at least several days before your team is complete.”
Kor-Nashta snorted. “More like a week. You haven’t seen a klutz until you’ve seen a field biologist who’s never been in space try to walk in a suit!”
Kas grinned. “There you are, Doctor. You have plenty of time.” His grin faded.
“Look, Doctor,” he continued earnestly, “Our best hope of beating this thing quickly lies with you finding something in those crystals that everyone else missed. I need you to take care of yourself. We can’t even begin trying to salvage the Rekesh until you succeed. Sheol! Until you complete your work, we won’t even know if we can salvage her!”
Ro-Lecton sighed. “Very well, Commodore. I really have no choice but to agree to your requirements.” He sounded unconvinced by Kas’ statements.
Kas grinned. “Nope. You don’t.” He passed the reader over to the little scientist. “Here you are, Doctor. Now that you’ve eaten, I’ll let you get back to work. But don’t forget. Your cabin will go dark at 2200 hours.”
Ro-Lecton grimaced in annoyance. “Thank you, Commodore. If thanks are appropriate.”
Kas’ grin widened. “I suspect that thanks don’t really express your sentiments, but I’ll accept them anyway. Now get out of here and get to work.”
Ro-Lecton sniffed and slipped out the cabin door. Kor-Nashta started to follow, but was stopped by Kas.
“What do you really think, Doctor? Don’t worry, I won’t hold your opinions against you, or betray your confidence.”
She frowned, and paused to push an errant strand of hair from her angular face. “I don’t know what to tell you, Commodore. Are you asking my opinion of Doctor Ro-Lecton? Or my estimate of our chances for success?”
Kas returned her frown. “Both, I guess. Look, Doctor. Despite the fact that I think he’s a pompous ass, my opinion of Ro-Lecton is largely favorable. I suspect he’s a top scientist that got shanghaied into management and away from his science. But I am concerned that his technical knowledge may be out of date, or his instincts dulled.”
She shrugged. “Commodore, you know I’d be out of line to discuss my team leader with an outsider, even a Fleet Commodore.” Kas started to reply, but she continued, “But I like the way you dealt with him — firm but gentle. All right. Ver Ro-Lecton is probably the best scientific mind in the Empire. Certainly the best in the medical field. He single-handedly isolated and analyzed the plague on Acqueon. I’ve worked with a member of his team there. There was none of this nonsense of grabbing credit for his team’s accomplishments, either. The word is that Ro-Lecton deserved every bit of the credit he got.”
She sighed. “But, as you saw, in many ways he acts like a child. Oh, he’s not intentionally difficult, but he’s been away from lab work for so long that he’d almost forgotten how much he loves it. He thinks that being supercilious and demanding is the way to get things done, because it works on Prime.
“As you’ve seen, though, put him in a lab, and he’s a totally different person. He becomes so engrossed in his work that he fails to note that there’s a world, or other people, around him. I understand that on several occasions on Acqueon, he came into the lab naked under his isolation suit, or forgot to put on a shirt, or pants, or some other article of clothing. His team got into the habit of forcing him out of the lab and putting a sandwich in his hand once in a while. The way I heard it, if you put it in his hand, he’d eat it; if you set it down, he’d ignore it.
“He was kind of a joke, if you know what I mean. The classic absent-minded professor. But then, he was appointed Director of Epidemiology at the ECDC. I used to feel kind of sorry for him. He was just a figurehead, a trophy for the bureaucrats to show off to help draw grants. I don’t think he’s been very happy. But you’ve awakened the scientist in him. I think you’ve got the best man in the universe for this job, and I’m honored to be on his team.”
She shrugged. “As far as our chances for success are concerned I couldn’t hazard a guess. I doubt it’ll be easy. From what I understand, that ship had a medical staff of twenty-six. Now, none of them were epidemiologists, but the Fleet medical personnel I’ve met have been very competent. And they certainly didn’t lack motivation — their own lives were at stake.
“Of course, we’ve a hundred years’ more experience. If we’re lucky it’ll turn out to be something that’s been identified and beaten during the last century. But to be honest, our techniques and equipment haven’t changed that much.”
She shrugged again. “I honestly don’t know, Commodore. But I’ll admit that I’m relieved to have Ro-Lecton in charge. If anyone can beat this thing, it’ll be him. By the way,” she added, “I’d like to mention that I approve of your precautions. Evacuating that hold and isolating the bio lab with vacuum may turn out to be the smartest thing you’ve done.”
Kas grinned. “It’s not that I’m smart. I’m just scared spitless by that damned bug!”
She nodded. “Me, too.”
The first few ship ‘nights’, Ro-Lecton made it a point to seek Kas out every evening at 2200, to complain about having his cabin’s power shut off and stopping his work. He was also surly and distracted at the evening meal. On several occasions it was necessary for Kas to send someone to drag him to dinner. Luckily, Kor-Nashta seemed to have adopted the little scientist, and usually volunteered to fetch him.
After a week, Ro-Lecton appeared at Kas’ cabin door.
“Commodore,” he began, “I’ve completed my review of the memory crystals. It should no longer be necessary to shut off my power at 2200. Nearly all my work now will be in the bio lab. Nila has it quite well set up, and it seems to be well equipped. And all but three of my team have completed their suit training. Within a day or so I’ll probably need one or more cadavers.”
Kas nodded. “Did you learn anything useful from the crystals, Doctor?”
Ro-Lecton shrugged. “Well, they kept us from having to go over ground they’d already covered, for one thing. They had one med tech, a Lieutenant named Kranit that had a fine mind. He missed hardly a trick. He was the one that most exhaustively tracked the disease’s progression, and he did an outstanding job.”
He sighed. “But if you mean did they give me the answer, I’m afraid not. They did give me some excellent leads, however. The disease displays some of the symptoms and pathologies of Reiber’s Fever, but there are inconsistencies.”
“Do you think you’ll be able to isolate it and devise a cure?”
The chubby little man smiled gently. “That’s the billion-crown question, isn’t it, Commodore? I’m confident that it can be isolated and cured. I’m not as confident that we’ll be able to do it.” He shrugged. “Any pathogen that evolves to occupy carbon-based, oxygen-breathing life forms must be of one of a comparatively few types. And there are only a finite number of ways in which they can affect the functioning of that organism so as to cause death. Eventually, this one will be identified and defenses will be devised. But even assuming that it’s caused by a single organism, and not a synergistic partnership, it could take centuries to isolate it.”
Kas frowned. “We don’t have centuries. We don’t even have years. What we have is months or weeks or days, and damned few of them.”
Ro-Lecton looked puzzled. “What’s the problem, Commodore? I know we were in a race to get here first, but
