Angles of Attack (Frontlines #3)(49)

“Not bad, huh? Modern pharmaceutics are magic in a syringe.”

“Dark, delicious magic,” I murmur, and she laughs.

“I’m going to immobilize your left arm for a bit and clean up this mess. Try not to look at it. Take a nap if you want. I don’t mind.”

“Not really in the mood for a nap,” I say, but my eyelids are getting heavy as I say it. Whatever she put into my bloodstream not only took away all the pain, it also put me into a very relaxed mood. I could almost forget the fact that I am on a damaged warship in the middle of what is now a three-front war. Compared to the way I’ve been feeling since we left Earth to be stranded in the Fomalhaut system, this is damn near euphoria. I close my eyes and listen to the ever-present humming of the ship’s environmental and life-support systems.

“How did you end up on Indy?” Randall asks. “I’ve seen you around since New Svalbard, but I never asked.”

“I’m a combat controller,” I mumble. “I’m babysitting the Russian sergeant who has the access codes to the SRA Alcubierre node. Which is a tightly guarded secret, by the way.”

“I won’t tell,” she says.

My left arm is numb now, and I only feel anything from that part of my body when Corpsman Randall tugs on my hand hard enough to move the arm in its shoulder joint. I remember her advice and keep my eyes closed and away from whatever mess she’s stitching up.

“I served under the skipper once,” I say. “Five years ago, on Versailles. At first contact with the Lankies.”

“You were there, huh? I was just out of boot when that happened.”

“Where’d you go to boot?” I ask.

“NACRD Orem. January to March ’08.”

“No shit? Me, too. Which platoon?”

“1068.”

“I was 1066,” I say. “Corpsman Randall, it looks like our boots churned some of the same dust.”

“At the same time,” she says. “Small world.”

“Getting smaller all the time,” I say. I wonder how many graduates of our respective boot camp platoons have been killed in action. There were a whole lot of destroyed hulls in orbit around Mars—dozens of ships, thousands of sailors.

“You made staff sergeant pretty fast,” I say. “I thought I got to E-6 quickly.”

“Yeah, well. Corpsman billet means you’re always in demand. Same as you, I imagine. You’re doing good, by the way, all things considered. This shouldn’t be too much of a bother.”

“Whatever you gave me, I’m not sure I’d mind if you started sawing that arm off.”

“I don’t think it’s going to come to that,” she says. “Although you got yourself pretty mangled, Staff Sergeant.”

“Andrew,” I say. “We’re the same rank. Same time in service.”

“Nancy,” she says. “Now use this opportunity to take a nap while I stitch you up and fix that broken nose. We may be the same rank, but you’re in my sick bay, and you will follow the orders of your medical professional.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

I do as ordered and let the medication and the ambient noise of Indy’s distant business lull me into a warm and easy sleep.



When Corpsman Randall wakes me up again, the warm and pleasant feeling from the medication is mostly gone. My left arm is still numb, but my brain is no longer fuzzy, and even if there had been any of the slight euphoria left, it would have dissipated the moment I opened my eyes and looked down at my hand. It looks asymmetrical, off balance, more like a claw than the appendage I’ve been using to manipulate my environment for the last quarter century. Where before the edge of my hand flared out into a slight fleshy curve, now there’s a straight line going from my wrist to the base of my middle finger, which is now the outmost digit. The wound is dressed in new adhesive bandage, so I can’t see what the damage looks like after the corpsman’s cleanup job, but it looks like there’s an awful lot of substance gone.

“How are you feeling?” she asks.

“Like I had too much lousy soy beer last night,” I reply without taking my eyes off the bandage. “What’s the verdict on the hand?”

“The bad news is that your guitar-playing days are over.”

“I never learned to play an instrument. Guess I won’t be starting, either.”

“They’ll fit you for new fingers at Great Lakes,” Randall says. “We’ve come a long way in the medical cybernetics field. Won’t be your old fingers, but they’ll work just as well.”

“Yeah, they can do magic now,” I say. “Friend of mine has a new lower leg courtesy of the Medical Corps. She says it’s much better than the old one. Says she wouldn’t mind having another to match the set.”

“I cleaned everything up and removed all the bone shards. Whatever hit your hand pulverized both your MCP joints on the outer two fingers.”

“The what?”

“Metacarpophalangeal joints,” she says, and holds up her hand. She taps the knuckle joints at the base of her fingers. “Those right there. That’s going to be a bitch to fix. And they’ll need to do it soon if they want to reconnect those nerve endings.”

“How soon?”