Tissaurd took Brim's arm. "In that case, Skipper..." she Started.
"In that case what. Number One?" Brim asked suspiciously.
"In that case," she repeated, "it is my studied suggestion that you command every officer who has no immediate duty— including yourself—to stand down till morning when we have a better idea of how bad things really are."
"Good idea," Brim admitted. "Put those orders on the blower, if it's still operational, and I'll run over to headquarters and get us set up for the repair effort."
" Skipper," Tissaurd said with her hands on her hips, "you didn't hear what I said. You need rest as much as anybody. Doesn't he, Chief?" she asked, turning to Barbousse.
The big rating raised his eyes to the overhead Hyperscreens. "Um... beggin' the Cap'm's pardon," he stammered, "but... um... that sounds like good advice to me. Most of us in the Petty Officers Mess are... um... headin' for our bunks as soon as we can. It's been a long day."
"There, Skipper," the tiny officer declared as Barbousse lumbered off toward the companionway.
"And you certainly won't be much help to anybody tomorrow if you can't think straight."
Brim nodded. "Thanks, Number One," he said. "That makes sense. I guess I could stand some R and R, couldn't I?"
"More than anybody else I know, right now," she said. "And who knows, maybe after the hospital tour tomorrow, this green-eyed 'Consort' can get your mind off that LaKarn woman."
Brim smiled sadly and took a deep breath. "Somehow," be sighed, "I doubt if that will happen."
"It certainly won't if you don't let it," she stated firmly, "or if you fall asleep while you're trying to...
Well, you get my point."
"Yeah," Brim chuckled, as if she were making a joke, but somehow he knew she meant every word she said. He retired to his cabin shortly afterward.
When a COMM rating woke him before dawn the next morning with a high-priority message, Brim couldn't even remember crawling into his bunk. Clearly, he had slept like a burned-out star, for he felt unusually refreshed—as he often did after pushing himself nearly to the brink of exhaustion.
He spent most of his day inspecting damage and frantically swapping messages with Varnholm—especially Calhoun—and it was late afternoon before he was finally able to leave word for Raddisma that he would meet her in the lobby of the Station hospital at Aftemoon:3:00, early enough that they would have time for both a meaningful tour and an appearance later at Atcherly's reception.
Following that, he hurried to his cabin where Barbousse had already laid out a fresh uniform.
In the hospital lobby, Mustafa's Consort was even more alluring than Brim recalled. She entered wearing her same black woolen cape with the fir-trimmed hood; white, high-heeled, ophet-leather boots; and matching gloves. The Carescrian shook his head in admiration. Even largely covered up she was beautiful. No wonder the Nabob—who clearly enjoyed his pick of Fluvanna's courtiers (as well as courtesans)—had chosen her above all others! He smiled while two ladies-in-waiting helped her slip out of her cape. Instead of the flowing robes he anticipated, she had dressed in contemporary Imperial style, wearing a silky gold crepe cocktail suit (whose backless jacket opened all the way to her slim waist) and a short, shaped skirt that revealed long, very shapely slim legs. "Madame Raddisma," he said, "how good of you to come."
She drew off a glove and presented her hand. "It is my pleasure. Captain Brim," she said in a dusky, modulated voice, her lips forming a little smile as she nodded to the small coterie of physicians gathered nervously at the entrance to the wards. With her hair pulled back from her face and tied in a loose knot at the back of her head, she was more than just stunning. Huge golden rings dangled from her earlobes and she wore an enormous sapphire ring on her left hand. She had that enigmatic brand of natural assurance that goes hand in hand with influence. Brim surmised she would have an intelligence as sharp as anyone he had ever encountered. She'd need it to merely survive the cutthroat machinations that he understood characterized the inner circles of Mustafa's court.
He bowed and kissed the soft, warm tips of her fingers. "If I may be so bold," he said, straightening, "you look magnificent this afternoon."
She smiled, obviously pleased. "You may always be so bold, Captain," she answered. Her gaze was like an inspection: outwardly cool and composed—but absolutely complete.
Brim nodded to the physicians, then turned to Raddisma. "Shall we begin, then, madame?" he asked, offering his arm.
Nodding to dismiss her maidservants, she grasped his elbow and they proceeded on to the wards. In the cycles since Starfury had landed, three of the most gravely wounded Bears and seven humans had already died; however, healing machines were steadily working their magic on other casualties. Six of the throbbing cylinders had opened, and their occupants were even now in various stages of rousing. Raddisma immediately captivated a Sodeskayan Chief who had been working only a few irals from the point of detonation, yet had been miraculously saved by the chance deflection of a falling control panel, in the machine beside him was a pretty electronics technician whose left arm and leg were being regenerated beneath pulsating layers of healing plastic tissue. Saved by her imperial battlesuit, she had been blown through three vaporized hullmetal bulkheads and remembered nothing of the disaster—which she laughingly agreed was probably the best thing that could have happened under the circumstances. Two machines farther along was a quartermaster's mate who had been attached to a damage-control unit stationed in the power chamber itself. He had actually missed the main force of the hit, but had been caught in the outer margin of a secondary explosion when one of the big plasma generators blew up. The healing machine was rebuilding the top half of his face—but be considered himself lucky. The other nine members of his crew were dead—vaporized. A number of generator technicians in adjoining chambers had been burned through their battlesuits, but were still ambulatory and undergoing antiradiation treatments. Many of them would be available for duty in the morning. All in all, twenty-four of Starfury's crew had been killed or wounded as a result of the hit.
As always, the hospital tour was a sobering experience for Brim. He had been wounded a number of times himself, both in war and in peace—and seriously enough that he could appreciate what it was like to be on the other end of his visit. But Raddisma completely astounded him. Throughout the grisly tour, she acquitted herself like a veteran, as if she encountered such wounds as an everyday occurrence. Moreover, she was witty when she could be, sympathetic when necessary, and even coquettish with some of the wounded crew members. More than once, Brim stood back and marveled at the woman's aplomb. Doubtlessly, she had experienced nothing to match the horror of these hideously wounded individuals. Yet she made each of them feel special in her eyes—as if she personally appreciated the sacrifice they had made for her and her domain. When the tour finally ground to a halt, she showed little more wear than if she had just spent an afternoon entertaining at the royal palace at Magor.
In Brim's view, whatever else Raddisma happened to be, she was also a trooper, pure and simple.
"Might I offer a lift to the reception, Captain?" she asked in the lobby while her handmaids placed the cloak around her shoulders. "When Mustafa bids me tour in his place, he invariably includes a small fleet of cars."
"I should be honored to ride with you, Madame Raddisma," he replied, shrugging into his Fleet Cloak. The evening was still his to enjoy—he had just finished talking to Chief Baranev, and as predicted, there was still no complete estimate of Starfury's damage—except "bad." At the door, he offered Raddisma his arm and they stepped out into a clear, wintery evening agleam with starlight. As the cold air nipped his cheeks, he felt her grip tighten.