Frontiers Saga 10: Liberation by Ryk Brown

The Corinairans are supposed to be more medically advanced than us…”
    “The who? You’re not making any sense,” Synda insisted. She cringed again.
    Doctor Galloway stepped through the gap in the curtain. “You are awake,” she said with her usual Corinairan brogue.
    “She’s in pain,” Tony told the doctor. “I think it’s the nanites.”
    “I will increase the dosage of the pain medication,” the doctor said as she moved around to the opposite side of the bed.
    “Will that do it?” Tony wondered.
    “It will not get rid of the pain altogether,” she warned as she made adjustments to the intravenous therapy systems mounted on the cart alongside Synda’s bed. “It should make the pain more tolerable.”
    “Can’t you just get rid of the pain?” Tony asked.
    “I am afraid pain is inevitable,” the doctor answered. She turned back to Synda. “You were badly injured by a Jung energy weapon. Much of your nervous system, both local to the point of injury as well as other places in your body, were overloaded by that energy. The nanites must repair the damage, or you will not regain full sensation throughout your body.”
    “Just make the pain go away, please,” Synda begged.
    “I will do what I can,” Doctor Galloway promised. She finished changing the dosage on the control panel. “You should feel some relief in a few moments. We will adjust it incrementally until you are comfortable.”
    “Can’t you just give her the max dose?” Tony begged.
    “Too much pain medication is a dangerous thing,” the doctor warned. “Be patient; relief will come.” The doctor moved back around the bed. “I will be back to check on you shortly,” she announced as she disappeared through the curtain.
    “Whose idea was it to inject those things in me?” Synda wondered as she tried unsuccessfully to ignore the pain.
    “I’m pretty sure you would have died if they hadn’t, Synda.”
    Synda closed her eyes for a moment as a new sensation hit her. Her head became light, and her arms and legs felt lighter. “I think it’s starting to work.”
    “The pain medication? Already?”
    Synda opened her eyes again. “Yeah.”
    “Is the pain gone?”
    “No, it’s still there. But it just feels more like those things are tugging at my insides instead of stabbing me with needles.” She smiled. “It’s actually kind of nice.”
    “Having thousands of nanites tugging at your insides?” Tony wondered.
    “No, the medication.” She smiled even wider. “It’s very relaxing.” She turned her head and looked at him. “It’s like I drank a lot of beer but without getting all bloated and needing to pee.”
    “You’re drunk.”
    “Yup.” She looked at him again. “So we’re on the Aurora? How great is that?”
    “Yeah, it’s pretty cool,” Tony admitted.
    * * *
    Jessica entered the captain’s ready room unannounced and proceeded to her usual spot.
    Nathan followed her with his eyes, his head unmoving as she plopped down on the couch under the large view screen on the compartment’s forward bulkhead. Nathan looked back at Cameron.
    “So I guess you told her,” Cameron surmised.
    “I suppose they’ve been on board since we left Takara?” Jessica asked, exhibiting uncharacteristic control of her anger.
    “Of course.”
    “So you’ve had one hundred super soldiers of questionable loyalties hidden in the bowels of the ship for over a month now?” She looked at Cameron. “What part of this doesn’t fall under the purview of the ship’s security?”
    “There were questions of ethics involved,” Nathan defended. “I didn’t want to involve anyone else if I could avoid it.”
    “Cameron knew, right?”
    “She’s the one who found them,” Nathan said.
    “What?” Jessica said, looking somewhat confused. “What were they, stowaways?”
    “They were in stasis,” Nathan explained, “in a big shipping container. Tug told me he was giving me a parting gift. I swear I thought he was talking about