"How long ago was I hit?"
"Time is something mortals measure better than I, Little One, and it does not exist where you and I have been, but three days have passed since they brought you to this place."
"'Where you and I have been'?"
"You were dying, and I am not what once I was. My power has waned with the passing of my other selves, and I was ever more apt to wound than heal. Since I could not make you whole, I took you to a place where time has no business until the searchers came to find you."
"Would you care to explain that a bit better?"
"Would you care to explain blue to a man born blind?"
"You sound like one of those assholes from Intelligence."
"No. They lied to you; I know what I did and would tell you if you could grasp my meaning."
Alicia pursed her lips, surprised by Tisiphone's quick understanding.
"How should I not understand? I have spent days examining your memories, Little One. I know of your Colonel Watts."
"Not my Colonel Watts." Alicia's voice was suddenly cold, and a spurt of rage took Tisiphone by surprise, squirting past the clear shield, as Alicia remembered the utter chaos of the Shallingsport Raid. She shook it away, suppressing it with a skill the Fury could not have bettered.
"All right, you're here. Why? What are you going to do?"
"You asked for vengeance, and you shall have it. We will find your enemies, you and I, and destroy them." "Just the two of us? When the entire Empire can't?" Alicia's laugh was not pleasant. "What makes you think we can do that?"
"This," the voice said softly, and Alicia's head snapped up. Her lips drew back from locked teeth, and a direcat's snarl caught at her throat. Rage flooded her veins, loosed from beyond the shield within her, distilled and pure and hotter than a star's heart. Loss and grief were in that rage, but they were only its fuel, not its heat. Its ferocity wrenched at her like fists of fire, and panic touched her as her augmentation began to respond.
But then it vanished, and she slumped back, panting and beaded with sweat. Her heart raced, and she was weak and drained, like a chemist's flask emptied of acid. Yet something quivered within her, pacing her pulse like an echo of her rage. Determination-no, more than determination. Purpose which went beyond the implacable to the inevitable, ridiculing the very thought that any power in the universe might deflect it.
"You begin to see, Little One, yet that was but your anger; you have not yet tasted mine. I am rage-your rage, and my own, and all the rage that ever was or will be-and skilled in its use. We will find them. On that you have my word, which has never been broken. And when we find them, you will have the strength of my arm, which has never failed. If I am less than once I was, I remain more than you can imagine; you will have your vengeance."
"God," Alicia whispered, pressing trembling hands to her temples once more. An icicle of terror shivered through her-not of Tisiphone, but of herself. Of the limitless capacity for destruction she had tasted within her fury. Or-she swallowed-was it within her Fury?
"I-" she began, and chopped off as a man in nursing whites charged through the door and skidded to a stop when he saw her sitting up in bed. His eyes widened, then dropped to the bedside monitors, and he lifted a neural lead from the central console. He pressed it to the terminal on his temple, and Alicia hid a twisted smile of sudden understanding. Her vital signs must have gone off the scale when that bolt of distilled rage ripped through her.
The nurse lowered the lead and regarded her with puzzlement. And with something else. There were questions in his eyes, fusing with sympathy into a peculiar tension his professional facade couldn't quite hide. He glanced away from her, eyes darting for just a moment to the intercom panel, and Alicia swallowed a groan. Idiot! Of course they'd left the com open! What must he think after hearing her half of the insane conversation with Tisiphone?
"Shall I take the memory of it from him?"
"Can you?" Alicia spoke aloud out of sheer reflex, then cursed herself as the nurse took an involuntary half-step away from her.
"Can I what, Captain DeVries?"
"Uh … can you tell me how long I've been here?" she improvised frantically.
"Three days, ma'am," he said.
"You need not speak aloud for me to hear you, Little One," Tisiphone said at the same instant, and Alicia wanted to tear her hair and scream at both of them. The concerned caution in the nurse's voice vibrated bizarrely in her ears, cut through with the amusement in that silent mental whisper.
"Thank you," she said aloud, and "Could you do that? Make him forget?"
"Once, certainly. Now …" She felt the strong impression of a mental shrug. "I could try, if you can touch him."
Alicia glanced at the wary nurse and smothered a totally inappropriate giggle. "No way! The poor guy's convinced I'm out of my mind, and he called me by my rank, so they must know I'm a drop commando. I'm surprised he's still here, and he'll jump out of his skin if I try to grab him. Talk about a dangerous lunatic-! Besides, they probably had a recorder on it."
"Recorder?" Mental fingers plucked the concept from her mind. "Ah. It seems I have much yet to learn about this "technology." Will it matter?"
"How do I know? It depends on just how balmy they think I am. Now be quiet a minute."
A sense of someone else's surprise echoed within her, as if Tisiphone were unused to hearing orders from a mere mortal, and she suppressed another manic grin in favor of a reassuring smile.
"Thank you," she repeated aloud. "I wonder … I can see it's the middle of the night, but could I see the duty doctor?"
"Captain Okanami is on his way here right now, ma'am. In fact, I was waiting for him when- that is …" His voice trailed off, and Alicia smiled again. Poor guy. No wonder he'd already called in the big guns. There he was, listening to the prize booby blathering away to herself, and then her vitals went crazy. Too.
"I see. Well, in that case-"
The opening door cut her off in mid-inanity. A Fleet captain came through it, his stride brisk but measured, though something suggested he found it difficult to keep it that way. His Medical Branch caduceus glittered in the dim light, and he paused as if surprised to see her sitting up. No, not to see her sitting up; to see her looking rational. Odd, she didn't feel as if she looked rational One of his hands made a tiny shooing motion, and the nurse tried to hide his relief as he vanished like smoke.
"Well, now," Captain Okanami said, folding his arms across his chest as the door closed, "I'm glad to see you with us again, Captain DeVries."
Yeah, and surprised as hell. She hid the thought behind a smile and nodded back, watching him while she wondered what he was really thinking.
"You're lucky to be alive," he went on gently, "but I'm afraid-"
"I know." She cut him off before he could complete the sentence. "I know," she repeated more softly.
"Yes, well." Okanami looked at the floor and unfolded his left arm to tug at an earlobe. "I'm not very good at expressing my condolences, Captain. Never have been- a failing in a physician, I suppose-but if there's anything I can do, please tell me."
"I will." She looked down at her own hands and cleared her throat again. "I take it you've figured out I'm a Cadrewoman?"
"Yes. It came as quite a surprise, but, yes, we figured it out. It leaves us with a bit of a problem, too, medically speaking."
"I can imagine. I'm just glad you didn't hit any landmines."
"Actually, we did." Her eyes flicked up, and he shrugged. "Nothing we couldn't handle-" she had the definite impression that remark was sliding over slippery ground "-and we've got partial specs on your augmentation. I don't anticipate any more problems before the Cadre med team gets here."