Calculated Risk Ch. 02

"Skaun, do you have that which you went for?" his mother asked him, touching his shoulder.

He nodded. "I do. Does Srill live?"

"Yes. You've arrived by shuttle. Did it work, then, did the message reach you?"

"Yes, but...not ideally."

His father was watching the shuttle door close behind them as they moved away. "Where is the researcher who was supposed to escort you?"

Skaun shook his head. "In Ta'Ralor. She decided not to observe us this year. I will tell you the whole of it later, if I may, Father."

"Of course. We will wait."

His parents slowed some, letting Skaun move ahead toward their home; their healer was waiting just outside the door. They watched him and then looked at each other.

"I didn't sense any imbalance in him," the mother said to the father. "Either it has not yet begun, or he found a solution."

Skaun's father nodded solemnly. "He was guarding his thoughts. We will simply have to wait for him to speak, my wife."

As Skaun entered out of the sun and into the dimmer hut, he saw the unfortunately familiar scene of Srill trying to sleep between racking cough fits. His younger brother's eyes were closed at the moment. He dug into Madeleine's small pack and pulled out the padded package, handing it to the healer, who got to work immediately.

"He's been holding mostly steady the last eleven nights," the healer told him. "He is not much below twenty-five percent, and he kept saying you were coming quickly as you could."

"He was correct," Skaun said and gently took his brother's cool hand to hold as he watched the healer perform two different intravenous injections, then mix up a solution that he would feed the ailing boy more slowly, in a very similar way to the way the medics had fed water into Madeleine at the hospital.

Srill flinched during the injections and his breathing jerked and rattled in his chest.

The healer smiled. "There. We will wait, much as we have been." He looked at Skaun. "And you? Has Pon Farr come yet?"

The young Vulcan nodded. "I found a release for it. I will be okay."

The healer's sharp eyes skimmed over his form, unwashed but uninjured. "I deduce it was not a fight."

"No. I found a solution from Ta'Ralor."

"A few days meditating in the city?"

"No. I'm not that skilled yet. Too many distractions."

Again the healer eyed him, forming a conclusion from the process of elimination. "Fortunate timing. Unmarried, I trust?"

Skaun nodded but otherwise made no reply. He let him assume that the unmarried one had been another Vulcan.

Srill squeezed his hand then and drew his attention immediately. The adolescent smiled weakly, dull blue eyes barely open but looking at him. It was a welcome sight.

*I will meet Madeleine one day,* he said with astonishing certainty inside Skaun's mind.

After a moment of hesitation, a ghost of a smile twitched at the corners of the Vulcan runner's mouth.

*Become well, young brother, and I will see it happen.*

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Much thanks to wellmet for the request and the inspiration for this story. --Etaski