Chapter 1: 1. Goodwill

"So you're our new doc," the captain said as he looked me up and down. He added, "At ease son. This isn't an inspection."

I tried not to flinch too hard at that word. I hated being called 'son' as much as I hated being called 'sir'. Sometimes I really regretted joining the Navy.

As for the captain, I'd only just met the man and he'd said all of two sentences to me, but I already had an idea what sort of person he was. That 'son' thing, along with the friendly approachable attitude told me he saw himself as a father-figure to his crew.

"Thank you sir," I stated as I shifted from attention to at-ease. I added, "I'm not actually a doctor yet. I need one more year at the academy to earn that title. Until then, I'm rated as a field medic and emergency medical technician."

My new commanding officer smiled, "You're the only medic assigned to us son, that makes you the ship's doc."

The captain was in his late fifties, he was clean-shaved and his dark hair was in a short regulation trim. His uniform was immaculate. Tall and slim with an earnest honest face, he could almost be the poster-boy for Imperium Navy recruitment.

The man standing next to him was the ship's XO, and he looked a little rougher around the edges. His hair was in the same regulation trim but his uniform looked a little more well-worn. Where the captain was tall and slim, the XO was a little more bulky. Together they gave the impression of the tall friendly affable man in charge, and the tough rough and ready man who'd make sure everyone followed the captain's orders.

The XO was looking down at the datapad in his hand as he reviewed my file. He'd been quiet so far, but he commented "Age twenty-four, three years medical training, graduated top of the class. One year service aboard the hospital ship ISS Hippocrates, and a commendation from your superior officer. Not too bad."

He finally looked up at me and asked, "You're on an educational enlistment?"

"Yes sir," I nodded. I wondered if he was going to give me a hard time about that.

I wasn't here for the career, and I didn't want to be. For a poor kid who grew up on an agricultural world, there weren't a lot of opportunities. And we didn't get the latest medical tech out our way. The best way to get off-world and earn some useful skills and get paid to do it was join the Navy.

My grand scheme was to sign up on an educational enlistment, get an education in something with high demand, save every single credit I earned, then when my term was up I'd quit the service and be somewhere nearer the core worlds where they had the highest-level medical tech. Then with all my saved earnings, I'd be able to afford the best transition credits could buy.

That was the plan.

It started out ok too. I aced the aptitude tests, I scored high enough to take my pick of the educational programs. My highest grade was in astro-navigation but I was almost as good in medicine. I picked medicine, I figured that might help more down the road. I thought after my transition perhaps I could get a high-paying job as a doctor.

The first three years of my six-year term were spent at the academy, doing officer training and med-school. The Navy wasn't stupid though, they knew better than to let non-lifers like me get all our education up front. They wanted to get some service out of me first.

So my fourth year was spent as an intern on a hospital ship. I thought my fifth year would see me back at the academy, but the Navy had other plans. And their plans were pretty far from my own.

Now I was assigned to the ISS Hammersmith. She was an older ship, past her eighth decade of active service and probably approaching the end of her useful life. Just walking from the main airlock to the captain's wardroom I could spot a dozen places where the interior panels had been patched up and painted over. The ship had probably been through a dozen major overhauls and upgrades.

And instead of getting me closer to the core worlds and their advanced medical technology, my tour aboard the Hammersmith would take me in exactly the opposite direction. We were heading out of Imperium space, to spend a year on the frontier.

The brief was all propaganda. A 'goodwill' mission. We'd be cruising around visiting inhabited worlds that hadn't yet joined the Imperium. We'd follow local shipping lanes, lending assistance to any vessels in need. We'd be demonstrating that the Imperium was a big friendly collection of aligned planets, where everyone was helpful and we all got along.

The idea was those unaligned worlds would happily accept Imperium assistance, and eventually join up.

The reality was most of the people who lived on the frontier did so because they didn't want to be part of an empire. They didn't want to be ruled by folks who lived a thousand systems away.

And I had no doubt that in a couple decades the Imperium would get bored of goodwill missions in that sector. Ships like the Hammersmith would move on, while a few full-scale battlegroups took their place. And those unaligned worlds would become part of the Imperium whether they liked it or not.

At least, that's what happened to my home-world a hundred years back, if you believed the stories they didn't teach you in the Imperium-run schools.

The bottom line was, instead of getting closer to my goal of a perfect transition at a top-of-the-line core-world medical facility, I was being shipped as far from that as possible. I could only hope that after a year on the frontier, I'd be sent back to the academy to finish the training I was promised. Then I'd be released from my term. I'd be twenty-six years old, and I'd finally be free to get the body I needed.

The captain's voice pulled me out of my thoughts. He held out his hand to shake mine as he smiled, "Welcome aboard the ISS Hammersmith, Lieutenant Voss. The XO will give you a quick tour."

• • • • •

"Medical emergency, engineering. Medical emergency, engineering."

The emotionless vaguely feminine voice jarred me out of my daydreams, and I knew exactly what it meant. Somebody hit the emergency call button on their comms panel.

I let out a long deep sigh as I got to my feet. I picked up my portable med-kit and slung the strap over my left shoulder then made my way out of the ship's small infirmary. Engineering was almost at the opposite end of the vessel, and a couple decks down from my station.

I set off at a jog, but I could already imagine what I'd find when I got there.

About two-thirds of a year had passed since I arrived on board the Hammersmith, and in that time I'd responded to forty-seven emergency medical calls. Twenty-nine of them had been false alarms. Either someone had 'accidentally' hit the red button with the medical symbol on it, or someone hit the button on purpose because they thought a stubbed toe or indigestion was a life-or-death crisis.

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Another six of them had been drills, I'd race to answer an emergency call in some remote corner of the ship only to find the XO there timing my arrival while a crew member lay on the deck with a note pinned to their uniform describing their injuries. I was expected to go through the motions of assessing the situation and dealing with their make-believe problem.

The rest of them were broken noses, broken fists, and the occasional lost tooth or cracked jaw. We had a contingent of marines on the ship, and they were as bored as the rest of us. But their way of dealing with that boredom apparently involved picking fights with each other. Or occasionally with some of the ship's crew.

It would have been faster for me to take a lift, but regulations said in emergencies we had to stick to stairwells and ladderways. So as I neared the stern of the ship I descended down one of the ladders, letting the ship's artificial gravity do most of the work for me.

With my destination being engineering, I was fairly confident this was another drill. The chief engineer was an older fellow, he was a career man and a no-nonsense kind of guy when it came to his engines. He wouldn't stand for any fighting in his domain, and I was pretty sure he wouldn't let any of the marines even set foot on the engineering deck.

When I reached engineering, the bulkhead doors didn't automatically open for me and I very nearly ran straight into them. Instead I had to stop and tap in my medical override code on the panel next to the heavy doors. That was probably part of the drill, in an actual emergency or combat situation bulkheads would seal automatically. That way if one section of the ship was compromised it wouldn't decompress the rest of the vessel.

As I was punching in my code the XO came racing up behind me. The look on his face and the fact that he wasn't already in engineering waiting for me with a stopwatch made me second-guess myself about this being a drill. A second later the heavy doors slid open and removed all doubt.

There were people shouting, some of them were panicking, and the smell of burnt flesh permeated the air.

A shock of adrenaline went through me but my training kicked in. At a glance I could see there was only one casualty. The chief engineer was on his back near some damaged equipment. Two of his assistants were with him, the other three were standing around freaking out.

The XO immediately took charge of the panicking crew, while I pointed at a young ensign and ordered him, "You're assisting me!"

He nodded and stayed with me as I took my place kneeling next to the injured man.

At a glance I knew it was bad. Life-threatening bad, unless I could stabilize him. Then perhaps it'd only be career-ending. There were plasma burns across his chest and abdomen, both legs, and his right arm. The fabric of his uniform was scorched and melted into the wounds. He was drifting in and out of consciousness and delirious from the pain.

"Hang in there sir," I told him. "I've got you."

My hands moved almost automatically as all my training came to bear on the situation. My med-kit was open on the deck next to me and without looking I loaded a hypospray and administered it to the stricken engineer. It was a standard trauma shot, a blend of drugs which would dull the pain and strengthen his heart and respiration. Next I cleared as much of his uniform away from the injuries as I could, and applied a spray-on wound sealant. The chemicals in the aerosol would clean and sterilize the damaged flesh, while at the same time sealing the injuries with a temporary artificial skin. That would stop any bleeding and prevent infection.

My temporary assistant stood by watching wide-eyed. With the first steps to stabilizing my patient out of the way I glanced at the ensign next to me and ordered, "Grab a stretcher. It'll be in the emergency locker!"

He nodded and hurried off, while my attention returned to the chief engineer. I pulled my portable medical scanner out of the pack and had a quick look at the man's vitals. The shot I gave him was doing its thing, I was confident I wasn't going to lose my patient just yet. All this was temporary though, and treating his injuries was well beyond both my own training and skills and the capability of our little infirmary. As it was, he'd be lucky not to lose his arm and both legs. I wasn't even a hundred percent sure he'd survive at all, unless we could get him to a hospital ship.

Although I remained focused on my patient I could hear the XO's voice behind me, relaying information to the bridge. "We've got a ruptured plasma conduit down here," he stated into the intercom. "That's what took the jump drive offline. Our chief engineer's injured, Doc is working on him now. Ensign Ivashi estimates an hour to repair the conduit. Till then we won't even have Jump-0."

My assistant was back and fumbling to assemble the stretcher. I took it from him and quickly folded it out to full size and locked it in place. It took four of us to get the engineer onto the stretcher, unfortunately he was a fairly substantial man. I double-checked his vitals once he was in place, then gently secured him with the straps so he couldn't fall off.

"Doc," the XO's voice asked from behind me. "What's his status?"

Regulations said I should stand, turn, salute, then report. I ignored all of that as I remained focused on my patient. Without looking I responded, "He's stable but he needs a hospital and a real doctor, and he needs them immediately."

The other engineering crew all went quiet. They knew as well as I did how far away we were from any other Imperium ships or worlds. We'd spent the last two hundred and fifty days out on the fringes. Our last contact with another Navy vessel was forty-three days ago, and that was a supply ship.

It only took the XO a second or two to process what I told him. He ordered, "Get him to the infirmary. Do what you can for him, I'll notify the captain."

"Yes sir," I replied.

He went back to the intercom to relay my report to the captain, and it sounded like the XO was going to stay in engineering for now.

Meanwhile I quickly packed my gear back into my med-kit then slung it over my shoulder. I motioned to my temporary assistant to take the other end of the stretcher. With the wounded man secured, I activated the grav-assist in the stretcher and that cut the effective weight by about ninety percent. We still had the same amount of mass to contend with, but it was like manoeuvring him in microgravity so it only took the two of us to carry him.

I led the way, and I had to punch in my medical override to open the bulkhead doors again. As we left engineering, I could hear the XO barking orders to the remaining crew in there before the bulkhead sealed again behind us.

There was a lift immediately to our right, and I hesitated a moment. Regulations said no, but it would be a hell of a lot quicker than walking half the length of the ship to get to a stairway that was wide enough to manoeuvre the stretcher up.

A moment later the decision was made for me. The ship's lighting flickered from bright white to dull red and an emergency klaxon sounded. All the lifts shut down and all internal bulkheads sealed as the captain's voice echoed through the corridors.

"Red alert! This is not -"

The entire deck lurched hard. I slammed into the bulkhead and everything went black.