Deathbed
2003 short story by Jonathan
Hicks Fifteen years after Episode IV – A New Hope
The head snapped back and the eyes flew open, the
shortness of breath and the fleeting thought that she didn’t know where she
was… Luschia Arkensaw looked around and saw the blinking
lights and toned-down light of the medical suite about him, then she realised
that the seat she had teetered on the edge of sleep on didn’t have a headrest
and her neck was aching with every movement she made. She rubbed it with a
grimace and her eyes scanned the room, the white walls, white plastic drapes
surrounding different types of equipment, the wide oval window looking out
onto the wet surface of Abrogard, the wires and tubes and optical beams
falling from the ceiling. The room appeared to be a wild mess of cables
snaking across the floor and in and out of the bulky outdated medical
systems, and they all seemed to wind towards a single figure lying on the rooms only bed. Luschia stood up and stretched, her arms twisting and
bending like the wires as she tried to get some feeling back into them, and
she walked slowly and quietly to the bed. The figure lay
still, the reptilian features and long beak-like mouth covered in a thin
layer of Bacta spray, the wires inserted into the mouth, small vascular
inputs in the skin, giving the impression that the figure was the nexus of
every piece of equipment that lined the wall, floor and ceiling. The figure shifted slightly and a monitoring drone
hovering above the bed bleeped twice and instructed the medicinal unit at the
bedside to feed more drugs into an intravenous tube. Luschia watched as the
clear liquid in the tube slowly turned blue and flowed into the inside thigh
of the reptile. She shook her head sadly and ran her fingers through her blue
hair. Blue, because this colour was the fashion on Abrogard at the moment.
Blue, because the law were looking for a blonde-haired female human. “Broo…?” the figure murmured and the head shifted to one
side. The coloured liquid in the tube deepened in colour at the behest of the
drone. “Broo!” the lizard gasped, and the drone bleeped twice.
Another unit began to pump a red liquid into its tube and the scarlet colour
headed for the mouth. As the fluid entered the mouth the lizard gasped and
choked, gurgling on the fluid and coughing harshly. Luschia reached over and
pulled the tube from his mouth. The drone honked. “Please replace
the medicine insertion tube,” it said with a firm if tinny voice. “He was
choking,” Luschia said calmly. “The medicine
will calm his condition.” “And keep him
under until he dies. I don’t think he wants that.” “Unless you have
medical training, you are in no position to make that kind of judgement.” “And unless
you’ve had combat training, you’re in no position to freck me off.” A pause from the medical
drone. “Point conceded.” Luschia nodded and patted the
dome of the unit. “Good boy.” The reptilian figure slowly
opened his eyes, one intact and the other covered with a Bacta-based gel,
covered as they were by self-polarising glasses that hovered a three
centimetres from his brow. The lizard turned his head, let his eyes drift
about the room as he tried to ascertain where he was, and when he saw the
hovering drone and the whiteness of the room, he smiled ever so slightly.
Then the slitted iris of his good eye fell on Luschia and the smile
disappeared like frost in morning sun. “Get lost,” he said with a croak. “That’s no way to speak to your one and
only visitor,” Luschia said with a smile, her red lips covered in the latest
Luronsa IV glitter-smear lip stain fashion. “I’m dying,” the reptile said. “I know.” “And the last thing I want to see in this
life is someone I hate.” “Aahh…” Luschia
feigned a hurtful look. “You don’t hate me. I kept you fit.” “That’s only because I’ve been chasing you
for so long, I had no choice. Now get lost.” “Oh, don’t… I only came here to pay my
respects to a worthy adversary…” “Get the freck out
of here, you came to make sure I died and wouldn’t give you any more grief.”
The reptile lifted his head, an obvious strain as his eye bulged and the
heavily blistered surface scales about his neck ruptured. “Don’t kid
yourself, Luschia, or me. Once I’m dead your life will be that much easier…”
and the head fell back, the strain too much. Miniature attendance ‘bots
scuttled across the pillow to mop up the fluid escaping the wounds, but the
reptile shooed them away with a limp hand. Luschia stared long and hard
into the eye of the reptile and smiled slightly. “Okay, so maybe I am here for selfish
reasons.” She sat on the bed, making sure there were no stains first. “But
even I’m not going to smile and dance over the body of a being, even an S.J.D
lawman.” She reached out and lightly touched the Setnin Justice Department
badge that lay on the low table next to the bed with a nail covered in holopaint in the latest Wennicas craze, not wanting to
pick it up. It was as if the badge had some kind of holy spell cast into it,
and her touching it would result in a burn or, at the very worst, banishment
to a hell she didn’t even know existed. She withdrew her hand. “I’m surprised
that there’s no others here. Family, that kind of
stuff.” “No family. No friends.” “Get out of here. No one? No one at all?
You’re a scaly – you’ve probably got about a hundred brothers and sisters, or
something.” “Parents killed in a gang shootout on
A-Desando. Siblings died during a starship jacking just off the Soluman Delta
Gulf. Ever wondered why I became an S.J.D lawman?” “No,” Luschia shrugged. “But I guess
that’s as good a reason as any.” The reptile’s eyes narrowed
and his gaze burned into Luschia's. She sighed theatrically. “What about friends?” “No time for friends. Doing the job.” “So what does that tell you? The only
person to come and see you is your hated enemy. Spit on a post, friend,
you’ve had a dumb luck life.” Luschia straightened her jacket, pink and red
in the latest Trefnare fashion. “What that tells me is that my life had a
purpose. An aim. I had a job and an identity. I was an S.J.D lawman and proud
of it. I didn’t live my life day to day, wondering where the next meal or
credit was coming from…” “No time to have fun…” “Not having to worry about so-called
friends shooting me in the back…” “Pay for nothing, no money for danger…” “An honest living, knowing that my actions
didn’t harm or destroy lives…” “No friends, no freedom, having to work
within rules…” “No conflicts of morals or conscience…” “No fun…” “For frecks sake, Luschia, I’m on my death bed! Let
me make a point, willya?” “I’m making a point too, moron!” Luschia
said with more venom than she intended. “You lying there acting all high and
mighty, looking for something from me to make your life worthwhile just
because you’re about to die! What makes this any different from me shooting
back at you, or trying to ditch your ship? What if you had totalled your ship
when you were chasing me through the Cawbate Planetoid Field, eh? Why should
I feel any different between you dying slowly and dying quickly? There is
nothing I can say, pal, that’s going to make any difference. You chose your
life, I chose mine. And, yes…”she sighed, “I’m here to make sure you die, you
annoying bastard.” The reptile stared at her, and
then laughed with a strange gurgling sound. Another sore on his neck split
open. “At least I could always rely on honesty
from you,” he said. Luschia allowed her face to
fall into a sombre expression. “It’s not what you want to hear, at a time
like this, though, eh?” “It doesn’t matter,” the reptile said with
an almost imperceptible shake of his head. “I’ve had my fair share. I’ve had
every major gang lord in the sector after me. I’ve had assassins wanting my
hide – not your two-cred gun for hire types; I’m talking about the
professional guys…” he bit back a wave of pain. “But the thing I never could
stomach – I never caught you. I never bought you in, had you tried, put you away. Dammit, I couldn’t even just shoot you.” “You were a lousy shot,” Luschia said. “I was...” he thought about it for a
second. “I really was, wasn’t I?” Luschia smiled and shook out
her pleated trousers, dark green cloth in the latest Afagard design. “Why me, officer?” “What?” “Out of all the criminals in the sector,
why did you only ever come after me?” The reptile thought about if
for a few moments and then sighed. He bit back another wave of pain and tried
to relax. Luschia noticed his voice becoming weaker and harsher, as if it was
taking a lot of his energy just to talk. “Because I hate what you are. I hate what
you stand for. You fly about the sector, the galaxy, feeding on the
unfortunate and making good from other people’s misfortune, or getting rich
on causing other people’s misery. You don’t care what kind of trail of
destruction and pain you leave behind as long as you get what you want when
you want it. You ignore the results of the your efforts and console your
conscience by telling yourself that whatever happens to the things you
smuggle or ship or destroy is none of your business, even though those things
directly kill people, or ruin their lives, or destroy the lives of those
about them. You’re all the same, killing and conniving under a banner of an
ideology that no normal person would even admit to, yet you do it with pride.
The ‘Setnin Way’. The way of murderers, cowards and thieves.” Luschia held his gaze as he
spoke. “So why me?” she asked again. “Because you’re good at what you do. And I
wanted to be better than you.” The reptile grimaced in pain and
his back arched. His breath came short and sharp, and the monitors bleeped
for attention. “You’re holding on to a dream,” Luschia
said. “A dream that at sometime the galaxy will be a place of peace and quiet
where everyone holds each other in respect. Do me a favour, friend, and get
down off your high Tauntaun. Your dream is sound but you need to wake up. Do
you honestly think that all the sectors galaxy-wide will suddenly see that
what you’re doing is the right way to go, and we’ll suddenly put flowers in
our hair and hold hands and chant peace songs? Dream on, bozo. This is the
reality we live in, and we all have to make do. Make the most of the
gangsters and the criminals and put them to use, that’s what I say. I feel
sorry for the man who thinks it can be otherwise.” The reptile smiled. “And I pity the being who can only regard
their criminals as their heroes.” Luschia leaned forward as the
voice of the S.J.D Officer became fainter. Slowly, the hand of the reptile
lifted and he held it out to her. Luschia looked at it, then at the reptile,
then back at the hand. “At least… at least we have our honesty…”
the reptile hissed. Luschia grasped the hand and
was surprised at the strength in the grip for such a weak-looking creature.
The monitors glared warning information. The drone tried to pump more
coloured fluids into the body but all the arteries were flooded with drugs
already. “Goodbye, Luschia,” the reptile whispered. Luschia gripped the hand with
both of hers. “Goodbye,” she whispered back. The reptile closed his eyes. The monitors bleeped once, then stopped. “Time of death logged and filed,” the
drone reported. “Are you friend or family?” “I knew him.” “Will you be responsible for funeral rites
funding?” “Gods, no,” Luschia laid the limp hand
gently on the bed. “I don’t want to offend his ghost as well as his faith.” Arach Raynor turned from view
from the long window that circumnavigated the upper floors of the cone-shaped
medical facility as Luschia exited the medical suite. Droplets of rain
hurried down the window to the ground, and she felt as though she wanted to
join them. “So who was he?” Arach asked, twirling his
long hair around one finger. “Hm?” “Who was he? The scaly with the ferdali infection?” Luschia thought about it for a
moment and then smiled. “You know… I haven’t the slightest idea.” Arach shrugged. “Well, can we go, please? I’m getting the
jitters, and I want to be off this wet-ball before the storm really kicks in.
Do you think I should get my hair cut?” “What?” “I might not have enough time. No, I’ll go
and get a haircut and buy a new coat, before we leave, I mean. Are you
listening?” “Am I what?” “Are you okay?” “Yes… look, why don’t you go and do what
you need to do and I’ll meet you by the ship later.” Arach appeared a little
confused but he shrugged and let it go. “Well, hurry, we don’t want to be undercut
for the Leogard run. What are you going to do?” Luschia sighed. “Just watched a man die, Arach. Like to be
alone for a bit.” “Oh… oh, okay, I’ll meet you later.” He
turned and headed for the anti-grav lift down, glancing back over his
shoulder with a worried expression. Luschia stared out of the huge
window, the falling rain and dark skies mirroring her heart. She could see a
faint reflection of herself in the glass and she stared at it intently. I pity the being
who can only regard their criminals as their heroes. She watched as the rain beat
against the window with futility. Deathbed
2003 short story by Jonathan
Hicks Fifteen years after Episode IV – A New Hope
Histories – A tale of Luschia
Arkensaw, finally catching up with a Setnin Justice Department officer who had chased her
around the sector for years. Not even
knowing his name, she is there as he breathes his last. An insight into the minds of law and order
and crime and disorder, Deathbed shows that the two aren’t so very far
apart after all. Cast of Characters Luschia Arkensaw Arach Raynor Xxizz Xxozz |