Shockwave by Lindsay Buroker

Author:Lindsay Buroker [Buroker, Lindsay]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2019-05-07T16:00:00+00:00

Yas walked past the bridge and toward the captain’s briefing room and quarters, glancing out a porthole that he passed. The ship had undocked from the refinery, but Rache hadn’t yet given the order to blow it up. Maybe he was waiting for the autopsy results. Yas wished he had found more.

He looked down at the small opaque capsule that he’d cleaned off assiduously before heading up here and hoped it contained something that would distract Rache from the fact that Yas had no idea what had killed those people.

The double doors opened as he approached, and he found Rache standing in the briefing room, his hands clasped behind his back as he gazed at news footage on a screen. When Yas walked in, Rache paused the playback, the display freezing on the face of a man with shaggy brown hair, a lazy eye, and a grin that didn’t seem appropriate for the headline flashing over his head.

Odin robotics professor chased by military robots, almost killed in explosion.

“What did you find?” Rache looked at Yas’s hand.

“As I told Corporal Chains before he would let me back on the ship, the body had no sign of a viral infection, no hint that the immune system had sensed a threat and responded, and nothing to suggest poisoning.” Yas had checked and rechecked for symptoms of toxic exposure, since poisoning would have explained deaths without outward signs of violence or illness. “There was a great deal of cellular damage throughout the body, and I believe that’s what killed them. Just looking at the cells, I would have assumed they belonged to very old individuals who died from the deteriorative diseases of age.”

“They didn’t look that old.”

“No. I believe this may have happened quickly. I might have thought acute radiation exposure, but I’ve seen plenty of that when dealing with space-faring peoples, and this wasn’t the same. Usually, acute radiation exposure causes outward signs such as bruising, bleeding from the orifices, hair loss, ulcers, etc. But you saw these bodies. They were unblemished. Further, we should have been able to detect radiation on their suits, and I tested the bodies and also the refinery for exposure. The refinery isn’t particularly well-insulated from cosmic radiation, which isn’t surprising since no humans work there, but that’s not what killed those people.” Yas spread his hands. “I’m sorry I don’t know what did.”

“I see.” Rache didn’t sound pleased.

Yas didn’t know if it was with him or with the situation. Even though Rache’s features were hidden behind that mask, Yas suspected the captain didn’t like excuses—and wasn’t hiding the fact.

“I did find something else that may be useful.” Yas held up the capsule between his thumb and forefinger. “It was strategically hidden inside the body of the man I autopsied. I almost missed it.”

“Strategically hidden? What does that mean? He shoved it up his ass?”

“Close. He swallowed it. It was on its way through his gastrointestinal system, the protective shell keeping it intact.”

Rache didn’t speak for several long moments.

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