it,” Romano said before Kim could answer.
As the two soldiers stepped toward her and Kim tensed, torn between trying to defend herself—getting herself stunned—and accepting her fate, the door to sickbay opened again. Casmir’s voice floated in ahead of him, though it didn’t sound like he was charging in to the rescue.
“I’m fine,” he said as Ishii and a sturdy young soldier escorted him into sickbay. “Really, I’m fine. I don’t need an escort. Or to inconvenience anyone. I’m sorry.”
Despite his protestations of fineness, his words had a postictal slur to them, and Kim realized it had probably been a bad seizure. Maybe he hadn’t seen her message yet, or grasped it, even if it had floated down his contact.
Ishii’s eyebrows rose when he saw Romano, Meister, and the rest, and surprise flickered across his face. At first, Kim thought he might be unaware of this and would try to put a stop to it, but realization replaced the surprise, and he didn’t comment other than to point Casmir toward a bed.
But Casmir stopped and looked at Kim. His eyes were bleary and tight with the pain of a headache, but they weren’t confused.
“What’s going on?” he asked.
Meister ignored him. “Grab her and inject the drug,” he told his minions.
A crusher walked in, and the soldiers hesitated to obey. More crushers followed him—was that Zee in the lead?—and sickbay was abruptly much more crowded.
Ishii gripped Casmir’s forearm. “Don’t make trouble. You know who she’s been talking to. And who you’ve been talking to, I’m sure. If not for your drug allergy, you’d be getting an injection too.”
“I am a Z-6000,” several crushers spoke at once, “programmed to protect Kim Sato and Casmir Dabrowski.”
“Can’t all this wait until after we rescue Bonita and Qin?” Casmir lifted a placating hand, though whether it was for the now-nervous soldiers or his crushers, it wasn’t clear. “And Jorg? Sora, you know our friends are on that ship. If we knew how to stop whoever’s attacking them, we would.”
Have you talked to Asger recently? Casmir messaged Kim without looking at her. His pleading eyes were toward Ishii.
If he ordered the crushers to attack, they could overpower the soldiers in sickbay, but it wasn’t as if they could fight off the entire crew of hundreds. And if they hurt anyone… Kim and Casmir would never be able to go home.
But maybe that point had already come and gone. And all they could do now was make it worse. A lot worse.
Yes, Kim replied silently. We were supposed to meet him at the Dragon ten minutes ago, but it doesn’t look like that’s going to happen now.
“It’s all right, Casmir,” she said aloud, lifting a hand toward the crushers, as if she could halt them. “I’ll let them learn whatever they want to learn.”
His eyes grew a little wild, and she realized he might act to protect her, even against her wishes.
Asger and Bjarke are already on the Dragon. Casmir must have sent a message to Asger and received an update. They got permission to take it before this started. If we can get out of this mess and run down there… maybe we can leave before that permission gets revoked.
You can barely walk right now.
I’ll be fine.
Meister stepped forward—nobody else was moving—and reached for Kim’s arm. She reacted on reflex rather than conscious thought and jumped back, avoiding his grasp.
Either Casmir messaged the crushers to attack, or they interpreted Meister as a threat and acted on their own. They surged forward to place themselves between her and the soldiers.
“Dabrowski, damn it.” Ishii tightened his grip on Casmir’s forearm and reached for his shoulder—or maybe his neck—with his other hand.
Kim jumped toward them, afraid Casmir would be used as a shield—or a hostage in negotiations with the crushers—but Zee reached him first.
“Don’t hurt anyone!” Casmir blurted as Zee shoved Ishii, sending him spinning away. He struck a sickbay bed and went down.
A stunner fired. It was meant for Kim, but two crushers blocked it, and the weapon was useless on them. The rest of the crushers surged toward targets, disarming soldiers and capturing everyone else.
Kim reached Casmir’s side, and he grabbed her arm. Airlock Five! he messaged and stumbled toward the door.
She gripped him, helping him stay upright when he wobbled. Despite his words, he was not fine.
An alarm wailed from the speaker, and dread thudded into Kim’s stomach. They would have to deal with more than the soldiers in sickbay.
“If you run,” Romano cried from where