as another bit of space debris on other ships’ sensors.
Space debris.
Yu shook his head and opened his eyes. Then he stood on tiptoe and peered through the window into the bay.
No body lay on the floor.
Nafti was gone as if he had never been.
The medical base Yu’s sensors had found doubled as a spaceport. The base had been built by one of the corporations as it expanded throughout the known universe, but that corporation had long ago sold it to a medical company that specialized in delicate procedures.
People came from all over to receive new limbs or to get high-end augmentations. The enhancements that were standard on places like Earth were discouraged here. If someone wanted a prettier face, they could go to some medical base in Earth’s solar system.
If they wanted to upgrade their hand or augment their sense of smell to equal that of a dog’s, they came here. This base improved on the human condition; it didn’t repair the human condition.
Normally, Yu would have gone somewhere that specialized in repair. He didn’t need a high-end hand. But this was the most reputable medical base the farthest from Earth, and it would be hard to track him here.
In fact, the base’s information stressed privacy. No one would ever know if a piano player improved his dexterity or a chef upgraded his sense of taste.
Or if a Recovery Man who—by this point—was probably running from authorities got a new and better hand, replacing the one he’d damaged delivering a kidnapped woman to the Gyonnese.
The medical facilities were stunning—a luxury in and of themselves. He felt like he was going into a spa instead of an examination room. Everything was calibrated to his tastes—the spicy scented air, the goldish-brown lighting, the subtle reds and oranges on the walls. The medical personnel spoke in hushed tones, probably because someone had noted the Gyonnese influence on his ship, and they treated the wounds as if they were fresh instead of days old.
After intensive examinations and a lot of consultations, the surgeons here told him that medical avatar had been right; his hand could not be saved. He would receive an artificial hand that was, as Shindo had so snidely observed, much better than his own.
He received medication, instructions, and a helper who would see him through the latter stages of the procedure. At the moment, all he had to do was choose the make and model of the hand he wanted. He was stunned to realize he could afford several hundred of the high-end models, not because they were cheap, but because the Gyonnese had paid the first half of the last quoted price—the one that he had inflated beyond measure. He figured they would pay half of the first quoted price and cheat him of the rest.
They were being fairer than he expected.
So he ordered the most expensive hand. It looked like all the others to him, but it had features that the others didn’t have, from various external chips that worked with his links to internal mechanisms that allowed him to set the hand’s strength depending on the task before him. He could push a finger-sized hole in the hull of his ship if he wanted to, or touch a goblet without shattering the crystal.
They offered to replace both hands so that his strengths would balance. He knew that a lot of clients did such things, but he wasn’t going to replace body parts unless he needed it.
Part of him was appalled he had to replace this one.
The doctors had him start the procedure immediately. They were afraid of infection in the damaged hand. So they unceremoniously cut it off.
He felt no pain—the initial injury had been a lot more painful than the loss of the hand—but it shocked him to look at the stump. They had sealed the skin, but they wanted him in the most sterile parts of the medical wing.
The risk of infection was too great to have him go to the recreation area or back to his ship.
So he had to find a way to pass the time.
Drinking was out. He didn’t want to view the entertainment holos, and the live entertainments in the medical unit didn’t interest him. His external links had been disconnected—too many false emergency calls from links happened during surgery—and he had shut off many of the other links.
He didn’t want to be traceable.
But before he went completely off the grid, he had to check his messages. He wanted that final payment from the Gyonnese.
The message center of the medical wing looked oddly alien. Each message unit had its own privacy booth that rose around the equipment like a pointed egg. The booths were opaque, but transparent enough so that medical personnel could see if the person inside was in some sort of distress.
As he went inside, he felt like he was going into some kind of cocoon.
The privacy booth didn’t seem that sterile. The opaque interior light made him nervous and exposed. All he could see through the walls were moving shadows.
He cradled his right arm to his chest, wishing he already had the new hand.
Once he settled inside, he ran his own diagnostic, checking for tracers that attached themselves to messages and stole the information.
Just as he finished, he’d gotten an urgent notice on his own links. The notice had come from the message center, saying he had a communication waiting.
He used his personal code to call up the message.
One of the Gyonnese filled the screen in front of him. Its whiskers moved, then an automated voice with a flat tone said, “You have cheated us. We tried to stop the original payment and could not. You will not get your second payment.”
“What?” Yu said, but Gyonnese did not respond. The message was as automated as the translator’s voice.
“The woman is dead.”
Dead? Yu blinked in astonishment. There was no way she could be dead. She wasn’t that badly injured.
He wondered if the Gyonnese were trying to cheat him. But cheating wasn’t something they usually did.
Had she played a trick on them?
The message continued. “The medical program you sent confirms it,” the Gyonnese said. “You told us she lived and took our money. You will get no more from us. You will never work for the Gyonnese again. Do not appeal this decision. The woman’s employer has placed notification all over the Alliance that she has been kidnapped. If you appeal, we will prove that you acted alone. Do not contact us again.”
And with that, the image winked out.
Yu ran his remaining hand over his face. Maybe the Gyonnese had killed her. Or maybe she had died from the contamination.
The contamination. Something niggled at his brain.
He ran the message again. The automatic voice was flat, but the Gyonnese was angry. Its eyes widened and its whiskers moved rapidly as it spoke.
They hadn’t killed her—or if they had, they had done so accidentally.
He hadn’t realized she was so sick. If he’d known, he would have sent the good medical program, not the cheap one.
And he had given her the pills.
The pills.
Cydoleen.
He closed his eyes, trying to remember how many were in that bottle. He remembered the weight of it, the way it felt solid in his hand.
There had been more than enough cydoleen to kill her if she took it all at once.
She must have poisoned herself.
He wondered: was that an admission of guilt on her part? Or was it fear of facing the courts alone, without
