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As a fun benefit, being focused on work kept her from noticing how her body felt like a lump of tenderized meat, mostly because she had been tenderized. Her ankle burned, which would be a problem if she didn’t get off her feet soon, and her upper back ached.
When the last person had been released, Lenore dragged her tired ass back to her room on the station. She collapsed on the bed fully clothed, not having the energy to undress.
Now that she was awake, every part of her ached, and there was nothing to distract her from the stiffness in her upper back and the worries playing on repeat in her mind. She wondered about Baris’ symptoms that morning, if he felt as stiff and sore as she did, but he had a personal physician. He wasn’t her patient, and one didn’t drop by unannounced to see the king—you requested an audience.
A shower helped revive her, but she soon realized she had no clean clothes. She’d lost her backpack, which contained literally all her possessions. Presumably, it was still in the hangar. She vaguely recalled setting the backpack on the ground. After that, the rest of the day blurred together.
Okay, first order of business: find her clothes.
Her stomach growled, reminding her that she hadn’t eaten anything since yesterday morning.
Correction: find breakfast, then clothes. Wearing yesterday’s outfit, she ventured out for food. With a full belly and a mug of coffee—it was amazing that every planet she visited had a version of hot bean juice—her mind settled and her body began to feel somewhat human again. Much better than being a lump of tenderized meat.
Yes, she was still worried. Her entire world was upended yesterday. She was going home, and now…probably not. The portal failure seemed pretty final. That was her one ticket home, and the ticket blew itself up, metaphorically. The ticket actually folded in on itself.
She was stuck here. Not here specifically, here currently being a food court on a space station. Here in the this side of the galaxy sense. She needed to figure out some stuff.
Two years ago, the princess told Lenore that she didn’t understand how the alien’s money worked. At the time, Lenore thought Sarah was a bit flaky, but she got it now. She had credits in an account. The princess had paid her a salary. Her expenses had been nonexistent since room and board had been included while working for Sarah. When she needed supplies, she simply told the ship’s computer her order, and the packages were waiting when the ship arrived at the next destination. She had enough credit to buy herself coffee and whatever street food smelled amazing. Fried foods were especially difficult to resist.
Lenore pulled out her tablet from her pocket. The screen had cracked during yesterday’s excitement, but the device functioned well enough to check her account. She stared at the number, frustrated it couldn’t tell her what she needed to know. Was that a lot of money? Was it enough to live on? Pay rent? What was the cost of living in this galactic neighborhood? She had no idea.
Maybe the princess would hire her back. Lenore technically never quit, but she had packed up her stuff from Prince Vekele’s ship and moved onto the station. That felt like giving her two weeks’ notice. The search and rescue for stranded humans was over, but surely Sarah would want a doctor who specialized in human medicine. The focus of her work would switch from patching together the refugees to…being little more than decoration in an automated sick bay that ran itself.
How tedious, even theoretically.
Practicing human medicine was obviously a very small niche. Forty-five humans elected to remain, plus the three that missed the portal, making the grand total of humans in this neck of the proverbial woods forty-eight.
Forty-eight humans and one human doctor. Even with that ratio, Lenore wasn’t sure how in-demand her skills would be. Human biology was similar enough to Arcosian that any Arcosian medic could confidently treat a human without accidentally killing them because they didn’t know what a spleen was. Spoiler: Arcosians had spleens in roughly the same spot.
She could study Arcosian medicine. That appealed to her. This was a society with interstellar travel; surely, it had higher education and medical schools. She’d need to research what options were available and the cost. Again, she didn’t know if the money she had was close to covering tuition.
Yes, this is what she wanted. She’d find a way to make it happen.
“You are not answering your comm band.” An Arcosian man with a young face stood in front of her table. Lenore recognized the king’s aide, Des.
“It broke.” She held up her wrist, devoid of the band she normally wore but sporting the first blooms of a purple and green bruise.
Des shook his head, fixing his gaze on his tablet. “A replacement is being delivered to your room.”
“I also lost my backpack.”
“And the hangar is being searched for your possessions. Now,” the man said, finally looking from the screen, “the king requests your presence.”
Her gut fluttered. It shouldn’t. She wasn’t a starry-eyed teen, enamored with her first crush, but there she was, fluttering.
“I’ll find a med kit.” Somewhere. She ran through possible diagnoses. Inflammation often caused more pain on the second day after a trauma, and Baris had a lot of trauma.
“That is not necessary. He wishes to speak with you. Now.”
Lenore really wished she had fresh clothes for a royal audience and wasn’t so clearly just out of a shower, but sure. The king gets what the king demands.
Des escorted her to an empty docking bay save for one sleek and elegant ship with the royal crest painted on the side. Outside the ship, guards waved a wand over her person, presumably searching for weapons, and deemed her safe enough to board. She recognized the ship’s interior. This was the ship that rescued her two years ago.
Before she could worry about her still damp hair pulled back in a ponytail or the way she splashed coffee on her shirt that morning, she was pulled through a cabin door and announced, just like a debutante at a ball. Des cleared his throat, stood a little taller, and said, “Dr. Kelley, Your Majesty.”
With a bow, he left Lenore alone with Baris.
Lenore recognized the cabin as the one she inadvertently wandered into the day she had been rescued. This time, however, she had time to get a proper look. The interior cabin was spacious by ship standards, with a sitting area and a bedroom to one side, separated by a paper screen door. Two chairs flanked a large window. The surfaces were uncluttered and polished to a sheen. The carpet was thick enough that her shoes sank into it.
