Abandoned by W. Michael Gear

Author:W. Michael Gear
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: DAW
Published: 2018-11-26T16:00:00+00:00

37

Talina yawned, stretched, and ambled down the hospital hall toward the main entrance. The fact that Rocket hadn’t eaten anyone to date had gone a long way toward decreasing tensions. At least inside the hospital. Just outside the hospital’s doors, a collection of locals waited, all of them itching to plug the beast. One thing was sure: Talina wasn’t leaving the hospital for a while.

Not fifteen minutes ago, Felicity had given Talina a smile and said, “I have to stop by home and make sure that Shan and the kids are all right. Then I’ll drop by your place and pick up some extra clothes for you. It’s no problem.”

“Know my door code?” Talina had asked.

“Five. Five. Four. Two.” Felicity had told her with a wink. “Or just climb through the plastic like those Turalon crew did.”

Good woman, Felicity. She was even getting over her bone-deep fear of Rocket, having worked in proximity to the predator for most of the day without so much as a bite taken out of her. Additionally, Talina suspected that Felicity felt guilty about her role in getting Talbot shot, and the overreaction to Rocket’s arrival.

She shouldn’t. We’ve never had a “pet” quetzal inside the compound before.

Just inside the main entrance, Private Tompzen stood at attention, dressed in combat armor, his rifle at his side.

“How’s the little girl?” he asked.

“Raya’s monitoring her. She thinks the surgery is a success. The bones are all back where they belong. Now it’s just a matter of seeing if there are any complications from infection. After that it’s a slow transition to physical therapy, electrostim, and giving the cartilage in the hip socket time to heal.”

Talina glanced out at the night beyond the window. In the hospital lights a collection of armed men and a couple of women bearing rifles loitered about, all nervous as hell about the quetzal in their hospital. God help the little creature if it set so much as a foot outside.

The aircar remained where it had landed that afternoon. Trish had already gone over it, trying to figure where it had come from. Someone had removed all markings and vehicle ID. And done it recently, as the sialon where the ID strip had been was remarkably clean in comparison to the rest of the car.

Dya had carried the two crates in, and they now lived in Mark Talbot’s room. Kylee—and her quetzal—were in the post-op, the little girl hooked up to every kind of monitor.

“What a day, huh?” Tal remarked.

“That really is Talbot down there?” Tompzen asked.

“In the flesh.”

“He say where Garcia and Shin are?”

“Not to me. Simonov and the Supervisor have been pretty chummy all afternoon, though. She might know.”

“Thought her name was Dya.”

Talina gave one last look through the window; the collection of locals loitering around the peripheries seemed wary but not panicked. Others were coming and going. Everyone in town was curious about the little girl and her alleged “pet.” Half the town had already tried to get in to see it, shoot it, or take a holo.

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