“You miss him, Katherine Megrath. Admit it.”
“I’m better off this way, dammit!” Katherine exclaimed, sitting up in her bed and hurling a pillow at the wall. “I don’t have time for any of that love nonsense.”
Ricki looked at Katherine from her bed with sad amusement. “Is it really nonsense, Katherine?” she asked softly. “I had never seen you happier in all the time I’ve known you than when you were spending time with Zachary – and I’ve known you a long time.” She noted Katherine’s hollow cheeks and the dark pouches under her eyes. “And I’ve never seen you looking quite so rotten than the way you look now either.”
Katherine shoulders slumped and she sighed heavily. “He shouldn’t have ruined everything by telling me he loved me,” she muttered.
Ricki laughed. “Listen to yourself, Megrath!” Ricki said, shaking her head. “Stubborn, that’s what you are – stubborn and absolutely nuts. He did tell you he was willing to wait for you, so you can stop using the excuse about this not being a convenient time for you. This is about something else entirely and you know it.”
Katherine said nothing for a long while. Finally, she spoke, tears clogging her voice. “I wanted to call him back that night,” she said softly, so softly that Ricki almost couldn’t hear. “I wanted to tell him that I was willing to give it a chance if he was willing to wait.” She remembered his slumped shoulders and scuffling walk and he walked away, so different from his usual confident stride. “But I found that – I couldn’t.” She looked up at Ricki. “Oh, Ricki, I’ve been alone most of my life. What do I know about loving anyone? He deserves better that what I have to offer.”
“Ah, the truth comes out at last,” Ricki said, moving to Katherine’s bed and cradling her comfortingly in her arms. “Oh, Katherine – you know tons about loving other people, I can vouch for that first hand. You just have to stop thinking there’s a right or wrong way to go about things and go with what you feel. As for Zachary’s deserving better, Katherine, honey, there isn’t any better cause you’re already the best.” Ricki wiped away Katherine’s tears with a gentle hand. “Except for myself, of course,” she added as an afterthought, getting a watery giggle from Katherine.
“But he hasn’t even tried to talk to me for the past month,” Katherine said, sitting up. “For all I know, he’s found someone else while I was doing my wimpy vacillating.”
Ricki smiled. “Somehow, I seriously doubt that
it’s the reason why he’s been so silent,” she said wryly. “What do you
say we find out what is?”
Anthony Hawke treated Katherine with a coolly reserved air when she asked him about Zach, prompting her to believe that he knew their whole story and didn’t exactly approve of her part in it. Finally, after much wheedling, she managed to weasel the story out from him, although he was reluctant to share it with her.
“ Zach’s gone on a mission with the Stealth Corps again,” he explained to her, leaning against the doorjamb of their room as he did so, as she stood outside listening. “Somewhere at the far end of the galaxy, although he wasn’t at liberty to tell me what it was about. He was due back a couple of days ago, so he’ll probably be back in school any day now.”
Her eyes widened at that. “Are you saying that he’s gone on a real mission?” she choked out, realizing the full import of Hawke’s words.
He nodded. “Zach’s already so advanced that waiting for graduation next June is just a formality for him. He’s already completed all of his credits.” Hawke told her wryly. “But I’m sure you already know that.” Hawke gave her another searching glance. “He cares about you very much, you know.”
She hesitated, then nodded. “Yes, I know.” She paused. “ I – I care for him, too,” she admitted, then felt stunned at what she had just said, to Zach’s best friend no less.
At her words, Hawke finally grinned. “You’re okay,” he said, nodding approvingly. “If I didn’t know Zach would kill me, I would –“
Hawke’s statement was interrupted by one of their classmates running towards them and halting beside Katherine, breathing heavily with exhaustion. The expression on his face indicated that he was not the bearer of good news. “Hawke,” he gasped out. “You Montgomery’s roommate?”
Hawke raised himself from the doorjamb, his stance alert. “Yeah, I am,” he snapped. “Why?”
“Dean Yarrick’s sending for you. Evidently, Montgomery’s listed you as next of kin to be notified in case of an emergency,” the runner said between gasps. “Montgomery’s fighting off a massive case of pneumonia at the base hospital, they just admitted him today. He was also shot on the side. Wants to see you. Man, what did he get himself into?”
Katherine paled at that and felt he knees grow weak. Hawke, seeing her ashen face, caught her elbow in his strong grip in an offer of support. He looked down at Katherine with a pained look on his face, worry etched there as plainly as it was etched in hers. “Would you like to come with me or would you rather hear the news when I get back?” he asked gently.
Katherine swallowed her tears back audibly, fighting back her panic, but not being able to stop herself from trembling. “I have to see him. I have to tell him –“
“If you’re both going to stand around here
much longer, you might not even find him there to tell,” the student said
impatiently. Hawke shot him a scathing glance after seeing Katherine’s
already pale face whiten even more at that. The student backed down at
his Hawke’s fierce expression. He beckoned to the two of them to follow
him, and all three of them broke into a run, Katherine murmuring prayers
she hadn’t said in a long while to keep him safe and alive – even just
long enough for her to tell him what was in her heart.
Hawke stopped pacing abruptly and turned to Dean Yarrick. “What happened?” he asked harshly, the muscles working at his throat convulsively.
Dean Yarrick sighed heavily. “He was invited to be a part of the Galactic Stealth Corps team sent to the ice planet Khylo, a few hundred thousand miles beyond Pluto, as part of a scout mission to confirm if the Drules are really setting up base in the Near Galaxy there,” he said softly. “ It turned out that it was actually a gang of intergalactic pirates setting up base there.”
The older man ran a hand through his shock of silver hair before she continued. “Commander Montgomery was with the team deployed on the planet surface and due to some unfortunate circumstance was captured,” he explained sadly. “They were going to be sold as laves at an auction in a nearby planet, but Montgomery and his partner Captain Seigler managed to escape. Commander Winston, their other companion, was killed in the attempt. Seigler says Montgomery was wounded in the side when he threw himself at Seigler to get him out of the way of a fatal laser beam. Seigler was already wounded on his upper thigh when Montgomery saved him, and both of them fell to the snow. Probably thinking that they were dead, the bandits went back to their camp, and Montgomery managed to help Seigler into a nearby cave and tended to his wounds.”
“What happened to the rest of the team?” Hawke asked through gritted teeth. “Why didn’t they go after them?”
“The plan maintained that the back-up team would not be sent unless there was a distress signal from the team already deployed or after the passage of more than forty-eight hours. Furthermore, radio silence was to be upheld for the forty-eight hours except in the case of an emergency,” Yarrick said in a heavy voice. “All their transmitters had been broken by the bandits to keep them from calling for help, of course. The back-up team found Montgomery and Seigler almost twelve hours after their escape, Seigler already unconscious and Montgomery almost so. Montgomery had bundled Seigler in his cloak in an attempt to warm him, and, thanks to this, his condition is not quite as severe as Montgomery’s.”
“Damn that man,” Hawke muttered. ”Why did he have to be so damned selfless?”
The doctor’s entry into the anteroom cut off Yarrick’s reply was even before it began. Katherine and Hawke both shot to their feet and met the doctor halfway, followed closely by Yarrick.
“It doesn’t look very good, Lieutenant Hawke, Megrath, Dean Yarrick,” the doctor said gravely. “We’ve managed to treat the mild infection in the wound on his side, but it’s the pneumonia we’re worried about – the only reason he’s still alive at this point is because he was physically fit and was very strong to begin with.” The doctor took a look at the notes on Zach’s clipboard. “We haven’t been able to bring the fever down and he’s having extreme difficulty breathing. So far, we’ve had no time to isolate which bacteria has infected his lungs, and even if we do, it may have already infected his lungs so severely that an antibiotic treatment may not take into effect.”
Katherine began to cry, silent tears running down her face. Hawke himself was having a hard time keeping back the tears. “What else can you do?” Hawke asked, grief making his voice harsh.
The doctor pulled off his mask, and his lips were pursed in an expression of weariness. “All we can do now is wait, and hope that his body is still strong enough to fight the infection on its own," he said, shaking his head sadly. “Other than that, there’s nothing else we can do.”
“Is he awake? May I see him?” Katherine rasped,
wiping away her tears and setting her jaw in determination, not about to
take no for an answer.
The doctor studied Katherine’s anguished yet
belligerent face then transferred his gaze to Hawke’s drawn one. “As a
matter of fact, he is awake – but not entirely lucid because of the fever.
But he has been asking for both of you.” He hesitated. “Under normal circumstances,
only those who are next of kin are allowed –“
“She can come with me,” Hawke interrupted softly, holding out his hand to Katherine, who took it gratefully.
The doctor nodded. “Very well then,” he said,
nodding to Dean Yarrick, who waved them off and took his seat back on the
couch. “Please follow me.”
Zachary was lying still on the hospital bed, an IV running into his arm and his torso swathed in a large, white bandage. A grayish pallor ran under his vital tan, the well-defined muscles of his chest rising and falling rapidly because of his harsh, labored breathing. The lower half of his face was covered by an oxygen mask, his cheeks were flushed with fever, but his eyes were wide-awake, although also fever bright.
The sight of him this way tugged at Katherine’s heart, and the tears she had bravely stopped fell down her cheeks again, unheeded. She fell back and allowed Hawke to approach him first, hiding in the shadows just past the door of the room and taking in the sight of him.
“Hey, man, what kind of mess did you get yourself into this time?” Hawke asked Zach gruffly, tears brightening his eyes as he stood beside his injured friend. “I let you go off on your own for a month and you come home bringing bacteria in your lungs.”
“Nice… to… see you… too,” Zach replied, his soft voice made even more muffled by the mask. “Thanks… for… being… here. How’s… Seigel?”
“He’s in a better condition than you are, that’s for sure,” Hawke retorted dryly. He glared down at Zachary. “Why did you have to be so damned noble anyway?”
Zach’s eyes drifted closed for a moment, then sprang open again. “Seigel… has a… wife and… daughter. More… at stake… for him. Couldn’t… let… him die.” A racking cough shook him, and Katherine saw his brow furrow in pain. “Hey… in… case anything… happens to me… please take… care… of Kat… for me. Let… her know… I… love her…”
Unable to stand anymore, Katherine stepped out of the shadows and approached the bed, emerald eyes streaming with tears and filled with love. “You take care of me yourself, Zachary Montgomery, or I’ll never speak to you again,” she said huskily, raising her hand to brush a lock of his hair off his moist brow. Hawke squeezed her arm to let her know he was going, then silently walked away. Katherine nodded, but her eyes never left Zachary’s disbelieving ones.
“Kat?” he asked, stopping as another racking cough shuddered through him. She soothed him with her hands, one gently stroking his forehead, the other tapping his chest lightly until the painful coughing spell had played itself out. “Kat?” His voice was hoarse. “I… think… it’s… the fever…right? You’re… not… really… here – but I… don’t… mind… if I… never… get… well… if I… can… keep you... just a little... longer.”
She laughed through her tears, bending down to gently kiss his forehead. “But I AM here. And you can keep me for as long as you want me,” she said, keeping one hand on his. There was a chair beside his bed, and she pulled it behind her with one hand and sat down, leaning forward against the hospital bed. His head followed her motion, and his eyes continued to look as though he doubted what he was seeing.
“You… can’t… be… my Kat.”
“Why not?” she asked him, smiling gently.
“Because… because… you’re… not… screaming… at me… like some…demented termagant.”
She swallowed an indignant giggle. “I’ll give you a screaming termagant if you don’t stop insisting that I don’t exist!” she exclaimed softly, then saw the twinkle in his eyes and realized he was teasing her. She lay her cheek upon his hand, making him feel her tears. “Oh, Zach, I’m so sorry.”
“For… what?” She felt the weight of his other
hand upon her hair, feebly stroking her comfortingly.
She raised her head and stared deep into his
eyes, wanting to see him. “For waiting so long to admit you were right,”
she whispered simply. One hand came to cup his cheek in a gentle caress,
and her heart almost ached with a mix of happiness and the fear of losing
him even more at the intense emotion she saw in his eyes. “For waiting
for so long to admit that I love you.”
“And… I… love… you… Kat Megrath,” he told her, smiling at her through his facemask. “I… love… you.”
“I won’t lose you now, Montgomery. If you don’t
get well soon enough to prove that I’m right in believing you, you’re going
to be stuck with the screaming termagant for the rest of your life,” she
admonished him softly, watching through her tears as his eyes slowly closed
and willing him to sleep the deep sleep of healing.