Mercy 6

Cabral had not even been transferred to a gurney. Someone had spun his bed into the bay. The brakes were still set on one of the wheels, and so his bed angled in throwaway position, his body uncovered. His hands were clasped beneath his chin as he curled on his side, a child saying bedtime prayers. His eyes were open. She could tell from across the bay. The curtains and rods of his stall lay collapsed, ruined by panic.

Mendenhall spied the nurse who must have found him. She was slouched in the third layer, peeking around Dmir. At least have the courage to run, thought Mendenhall; at least have the decency.

Mendenhall shifted into another crease, maintaining the same distance. Pao Pao checked her.

Mendenhall sensed her about to move in. None of the purples from ID advanced. Once a man had been thrown into the bay, a drunk who had fallen asleep hitchhiking in the middle of a night highway, had gotten caught beneath a speeding semi and been filed down by the friction of the asphalt, the half of him that remained still somehow alive, the one arm pumping, the one eye looking in wonder. No one had moved to him. Mendenhall had to break from a patient to go to him, to get to his last breath, such as it was. Never bring your fury with you, her mentor had advised.

She measured the distance to Cabral. She took a breath, the filling kind right before a run, getting oxygen to the muscles, relaxing nerves into readiness. She donned gloves, the snap turning heads. She stepped out of hiding and cut through the circles. She took the opportunity to hard-shoulder someone from ID as she passed, digging her forearm into the purple garb.

Pao Pao waited until Mendenhall had driven through the final circle, then moved with her. The nurse pulled up her mask, offered a fresh one to Mendenhall. Mendenhall let her tie it as she bent toward Cabral.

She pressed her fingers to Cabral’s carotid, knowing there’d be nothing. “Temp,” she ordered.

Pao Pao slipped a disposable thermometer into Cabral’s mouth. It rattled on his teeth, the nurse’s jab kind and relentless.

Mendenhall called time of death and pointed to three ID people.

“You, you, and you, get him on a gurney and get him to Path. Warn them.”

As they moved, Mendenhall crouched closer to Cabral, rested a hand on his shoulder. She looked at his face. His expression was in a dream, a knowing dream. From behind, she heard Dmir clearing his throat, popping forward.

“I—”

“You,” she said turning to Dmir, catching him directly with the first shot of her glance. “Take it to Thorpe.”

She had very little hope of keeping Cabral with Claiborne. But maybe for a few minutes she could get him there, in that right place for him, in that decent and distilled air. What he deserved.

If it was airborne, they were all as safe as was possible; Cabral had stopped breathing long ago. If it was fluids, there was no added risk. No one was touching him. But she knew that it was neither of these. She could put her tongue to Cabral’s tongue. She could drink his blood. That was how strongly Mendenhall knew what she knew at this moment. She brushed the young man’s thinning hair across his temple and around his ear, then stood back. She eyed his whole form and tried to gauge where the pattern of occlusion would be, where it had slanted through muscle and capillary, roiled through nerves.

She took two steps back and gave herself to ID, to whatever would take her. She bowed her head and shook her arms, elbows loose, run finished. Dream over.

27

Nothing and no one took her. She made one more backstep, anticipated a hand on her shoulder. There was nothing, and she swayed. The ID people were following her orders, though Dmir now stood in charge. He was on his cell, not looking her way.

If Cabral was to make it down to Path, it would only be for a quick pass. She had very little time. And Thorpe could still send her to Q. She had messed up with Meeks and in an even bigger way, it seemed, with Cabral. Her position was extremely weak. Thorpe might have liked it that way; better having her loose rather than sealed.

She looked for the nurse who had found Cabral. She scanned the creases in the bay, the first blind spots nearest the station. She moved to cut off the nurse in the path toward the elevators. How smart could she be? How frightened?

Mendenhall would have liked nothing better than to have her sequestered and taken to Q, pushed behind glass and strapped to a bed. She could picture the nurse finding Cabral, her silent scream within the curtains, the panic that had made her shove the bed through the stall, one brake still locked, the bed spiraling away from her, twisting her wrists. Abandoning him to another’s scream.

She closed her eyes and inhaled. The nurse stopped when Mendenhall appeared, took one sidestep. Mendenhall eyed her name tag, raised her hands.

“Nurse Amihan. Get us some coffee. My desk. One minute.”