The data Commander Korta had sent down was interesting, if largely over her head—what the hell did the transfer of spectral line radiation have to do with space madness?—and she appreciated that he’d thought of her, or that Sage had. However, what she really needed was to look at the brains of some of the affected people.

Assuming she, Juanita, and Angela were already being affected, she moved around the giant svenkar standing in front of the sickbay door to rummage in drawers for the device she’d learned could do more thorough scans than anything she’d seen from a CT or MRI.

“Need help with anything, Tala?” Juanita asked.

Tala thought about pointing out that the drool puddle on the deck could use wiping up, but she didn’t want to sound ungrateful for her guard svenkar.

“I’m going to need your brain in a moment,” Tala said.

“To pluck useful information out in regard to that Star Trek episode?” Juanita grinned at Angela, as if this were some fun escapade rather than a very serious trip that could get them all killed.

“To scan it for science.”

“Er, I guess I’m okay with that.”

A thump sounded in the corridor outside, and Tala jumped. It sounded like someone had been thrown against the door.

“We locked that, right?” she asked.

“Treyjon did on his way out,” Angela said. “But, uhm, if people get hurt, don’t we need to let them in so we can help them?”

Lulu growled deep in her throat. As she faced the door, her tigress-like tail swished behind her. Not a very inviting receptionist for a walk-in clinic.

“Eridanus?” Juanita asked. “Are you there?”

“Naturally,” came the AI’s dry reply.

“Is there a way for us to see what’s going on out in the corridor? And all over the ship?”

Tala glanced at the logostec Sage had given her early on. She could comm him easily enough, but he was probably busy and wouldn’t appreciate an interruption. Angela and Juanita didn’t have such devices, nor had they been given to any of the other women, and Tala assumed there was a limited supply on the ship. She wasn’t sure if they could communicate with Treyjon or Orion through the intercom.

“I have eyes all over the ship,” Eridanus said.

“I’m now feeling a little uncomfortable about showering,” Angela whispered.

“I assure you, a fire falcon 8800-XR artificial intelligence is not interested in peeping at human females when they are unclothed. Please step to a convenient view screen or holographic display, and I can show you several camera feeds at once. I will screen them to only share areas that are occupied by humans.”

Another thump sounded in the corridor near the door.

“Such as that hallway?” Juanita asked.

“Correct.”

“You can use the screen in the office,” Tala said, then uttered a triumphant “hah” when she found the scanner. Someone had moved it since she’d last used it and left it on a counter. Were the medical robots like busy nurses, cleaning and organizing behind her back?

“I’ll stay here with Lulu,” Angela said. “If someone comes through the door and is being aggressive, I need to be here to make sure she doesn’t get overly aggressive in return.” Her face grew uncharacteristically bleak for some reason.

“I’ll just scan Juanita’s brain,” Tala said, following her into the office. “And my own. Damn, I should have thought to do this before we went through that gate. What point is looking now, without a baseline for comparison? Eridanus, do you have brain scans of the crew?”

“Yes, Doctor.”

“Can you pull them up on—” Tala considered the view screen on the wall, which had shifted from displaying the nebula outside to four camera feeds from within the ship. “My wrist computer?”

“Sending the data to your logostec now,” Eridanus said.

“Good.”

“You’re welcome,” Eridanus said dryly.

“Thank you,” Tala added belatedly. Here she’d pestered Sage about not using please and thank you with her, and the ship’s AI was taking her to task for doing the same. Who would have thought computers wanted courtesy?

“He’s not quite like Siri, is he?” Juanita smirked, but didn’t look away from the view screen.

Tala sifted through the files, looking first for Treyjon—she assumed the ship’s tracker and svenkar trainer wouldn’t be overly busy while they flew through the nebula. Meanwhile, Juanita watched the four camera feeds. One was of the rec room, where the women sat or paced, occasionally looking toward the door. Was someone making noises in their corridor too? A stoic woman in a Star Guardian uniform stood guard by the door with a stunner held loosely in her hand.

Another feed—the one of the corridor outside of sickbay—showed Treyjon helping another man to his feet. Was that the end of the skirmish they’d heard?

The man—Ensign Jarok, who’d made a pass at Angela not that long ago—took a swing at Treyjon. The video didn’t include sound, but Treyjon’s lips reared back in a snarl, and he said something as he blocked the punch and drove one of his own into Jarok’s stomach. The man rolled away and jumped up again, reaching for a knife on his belt. Treyjon was faster and yanked out a stunner. He said something and fired.

The ensign dropped to the deck. Treyjon propped him against the wall with another man Tala hadn’t noticed. Treyjon may have been told that the women were to be isolated during this jaunt through the nebula, but he clearly intended to stand guard.

That was probably a good thing, and not only because it would be easy to find him for a brain scan. Tala doubted Lulu knew how to stun people, and she didn’t want to have to do surgery on crewmen torn open by svenkar claws.

“Let’s do a comparison on Treyjon,” Tala said, examining a brain scan that had been done on him from a routine physical six months earlier. “Will you go invite him in?”

“You’ve got legs, don’t you?” Juanita snapped, startling Tala. “Eridanus, where’s Orion? Why aren’t you showing me Orion?”

He wasn’t in either of the two other video feeds on display, one of engineering and one of a room full of computers that Tala hadn’t seen before. There looked to be arguments going on with the Star Guardians in those rooms, but none of the exchanges had descended to blows yet.

“You did not request to see him,” Eridanus said blandly.

“Is he in trouble? I want to see him now.”

Tala eyed Juanita. That cranky, demanding tone was definitely uncharacteristic of her. Sage had said the women were affected less but not that they were immune.

As if to prove the point, a fight broke out among the women in the rec room. Katie shoved Bethany, a tall aggressive woman who had no trouble taking what she wanted. Someone else came up from behind Katie and shoved her. That was Jas, one of the NAU girls, a tall, broad-shouldered woman who’d said she was on the basketball team.

“Interesting,” Tala said. “And unsurprising, I suppose. Though it’s hard to imagine some celestial space dust or radiation affecting hormones.”

“Eridanus,” Juanita said. “Orion?”

“Yes, I have located him. He is entering engineering.”

Juanita leaned forward, watching the feed intently.

“I’m going to get Treyjon,” Tala said. “With the legs I do indeed have.”

Juanita didn’t say anything as she walked out.

“Everything all right?” Angela asked, pointing at the door—Lulu still faced it. “I heard some more noises from out there.”

“It’s Treyjon. We’re going to invite him in, but…” Thinking of Treyjon’s big, muscular arms, Tala veered toward the injectors full of sedative she had laid out. A stun gun might be easier to wield, but nobody had thought to give the women one. Maybe because they were supposed to stay safe behind locked doors rather than venturing out to collect specimens. “He’ll likely be snippy too.”

“Snippy?” Angela asked.

She appeared the same as usual, her eyes curious and friendly rather than belligerent.

Tala had a hard time assessing how she felt. Maybe a little on edge?

“Orion, don’t be an idiot,” came Juanita’s voice from the office. “What are you doing?”

“Snippy,” Tala repeated. “No data to back it up yet, but it may be that those with more testosterone are being affected to a greater extent. The men, of course, but some of our burlier women too.”

Angela looked at her slender arms and made a face. Burly wasn’t the precise word Tala wanted—Katie was a tough cookie, but not a power lifter, by any means—but she didn’t want to take the time to explain the various pathways affected by higher testosterone levels in women.

“I need to scan Treyjon’s brain.” Tala nodded to the door. “Juanita, is it clear out there?” she called.

“Orion’s in a fight,” came the reply. “I’m going to punch him if he gets hurt.”

Tala sighed and tapped the panel that unlocked the door. As it slid open, someone tumbled through, nearly squashing her.

She stumbled back, aware of a snarl behind her from the svenkar.

“No, girl,” Angela ordered, stepping in front of Lulu even as Treyjon and another man crashed into sickbay in the middle of a fight.

The men hit the deck, a tangle of limbs as they writhed and kicked and punched. Tala glimpsed green hair. Was that Ensign Bystrom? Their former guard?

Blood spattered the deck. Lulu tensed, looking like she meant to spring into the fight and end it with those long fangs of hers.

After finding her balance, Tala darted in and pressed the injector to Treyjon’s tattooed arm. He was too busy rearing back to punch the ensign to notice. She thumbed in another dose and leaned down to jab Bystrom in the shoulder.

He roared, flinging an elbow backward. It caught her in the thigh with the force of a sledgehammer, and she stumbled back, bumping into an exam table and falling to the deck.

“Doctor,” Bystrom blurted, seeming to see her for the first time. There was a cut in the side of his uniform, and blood soaked the material around it.

Not sure how quickly the sedative would kick in, or what he had in mind, Tala hurried to her feet.

Bystrom did the same, shedding Treyjon, who was starting to look groggy.

“Doc, I got stabbed,” Bystrom said, gripping his side and staggering toward her. “Can you—”

His eyes rolled back into his head, and he collapsed before finishing the question.

“Hell,” Tala said, looking at all the blood on the deck.

Lulu growled, muscles bunching to spring toward the still-open door.

“Hold,” Angela commanded.

The svenkar obeyed, but she didn’t relax.

Gasps and grunts came from the corridor, and another man appeared in the doorway, gripping the jamb with a bloody hand. Orion, his tangled brown hair torn down from his bun and draped around his shoulders. A knife hilt stuck out of his thigh. God, how had he walked here?

“This is ridiculous,” Tala said, rushing forward to help him. “Sage should have sedated everyone, enemies be damned.”

Orion stumbled toward her, and she gripped his arm, hoping he could get onto a table by himself. She had no idea how she would get Bystrom off the deck. Hopefully, the medical robots could bend enough to lift people. Treyjon, the only one who didn’t appear injured and could have helped, was unconscious on his back.

“Orion,” Juanita cried, rushing out of the office. She shoved Angela to the side to reach him and hugged him protectively. Or maybe possessively. She shouldered Tala away and tossed a glare over her shoulder at her.

“Get him on the table,” Tala said. “Eridanus, I need—”

Sickbay’s two medical robots rolled into view, and she stopped. The wheeled metal constructs had blocky heads with scanners and speakers, and their articulating arms had more versatility than a human arm, with extendable tools as well as finger-like appendages for gripping. One lowered its bulk with a hydraulic hiss and picked up Bystrom.

“I have anticipated your needs, Doctor,” Eridanus informed her.

“Thank you. Get everyone on a table, and disinfect those cuts. I’ll be right back to suture them up.”

“Suture?”

“Bind them together with that grafter thingie,” she corrected. Of course, they didn’t have a need for anything as primitive as sutures.

“The thingie. Indeed.”

Tala bent to run the scanner around Treyjon’s head before one of the robots lifted him off the deck. Having him unconscious wasn’t ideal, since he’d presumably been awake and alert for the original scan, but she had no other choice. There wasn’t time to wait for him to wake up. As it was, she doubted she would have time to do any research—she had a feeling these were the first of what would be many patients—but maybe a quick look would give her something to mull over while she operated.

She ran into the office and, not sure how to transfer everything to the holographic display, said, “Eridanus, can you—”

“Of course I can, Doctor.”

The camera feeds disappeared, and Treyjon’s old brain scan appeared on the holographic display in three dimensions next to the one she’d just taken.

“Highlight the prefrontal cortex, amygdala, hypothalamus, and the pituitary gland, please,” Tala said.

Her logostec beeped, and she jumped. Now what?

“Dr. Tala?” a woman asked.

Tala didn’t recognize the voice. “What?” she asked as she scrutinized the two brains displayed side by side. They rotated slowly in sync, the regions she’d asked be highlighted now illuminated for clarity.

“The captain said to comm you if any of the bridge crew were behaving irrationally.” The woman spoke softly, as if she didn’t want to be overheard. Was this the Lieutenant Coric that Sage had mentioned?

“Yes?” Tala asked, now worried that Sage was in trouble. Or was making trouble. She barely noticed the brain imagery.

“I think it might be a good idea to relieve the captain of duty,” Coric whispered. “He keeps talking about slaying those bastards, and I have no idea who he’s talking about, but all we’re dealing with is some mines. He also just got in a fight with Killer.”

“Killer?”

“That’s a nickname. Lieutenant Killer Ku. They’re both pretty torn up now, and Zakota is acting tough too. He tried to jump in. I’d like to take over the helm from him, but he almost bit my head off at the suggestion.”

“It sounds like the whole bridge crew needs to be relieved of duty.”

“Well, yes, but—”

“Who are you talking to?” came Sage’s voice in the distance. “Focus, Coric. We need to focus now. The Zi’i could jump out at any moment.”

“Yes, sir,” Coric called, then rushed to whisper, “There are no Zi’i in the system, Doctor. We’re all alone here.”

The comm channel closed, leaving Tala frowning down at her logostec.

“I always wanted to be alone in a solar system full of crazy people,” she muttered.