Page 2 of Seduction

Selena snatched the wrinkled paper from him. She could barely make out the handwritten message.

This is Haldor, Viking warrior from Gadolinium. The planet has been attacked by the Tabun. We’ve managed to repel the invaders, but this man was almost killed saving the life of King Sigrun. We don’t have the technology here to heal him, so I’m sending him to Earth.

I’ll file a full report soon. Right now, there are other wounded to tend to.

Ambassador Talia Anderson, Interstellar Federation

The ambassador had added a hastily scrawled line at the bottom.

I vouch for him. He’s a good man. A hero. Save his life. I know you can do it.

Dabbing gently at the dried blood, Selena assessed the extent of her patient’s injuries. He’d sustained numerous slash wounds. One vicious stab had penetrated deep into his chest below the rib cage.

She ran the scanner over his body, starting at his head. Brain intact. Functions impaired due to reduced blood flow. That came as no surprise. His body was drenched with it. She’d never seen a being so badly wounded yet still breathing. He must have had an incredible will to live.

Next, she scanned his torso. Just as she’d feared. His liver and spleen had been damaged beyond repair. She sealed the stab wound with her laser wand. He’d need new organs, but their functions could be taken over temporarily with her lab equipment. Growing replacements would take a few months. Until then, he’d be best off in sleep mode.

Selena continued, the scanner beeping ominously over and over, alerting her that other organs were nearing failure. She shooed away the chatty guards, stripped off the tattered remnants of his clothing, and issued an urgent summons to her best lab techs.

James and Mindy arrived at almost the same time. Both of them stopped dead at the entrance to the lab. Mindy let out a startled shriek at the sight of the massive blood-soaked body lying on a table in the center of the room. Selena masked her own fears with the take-charge demeanor befitting her position as director of medical services. Her mentor, Luther, had recently retired after appointing her to his position. High time, since he was nearly 130. But, today, she missed him. Missed his wealth of knowledge, his acerbic wit. No doubt he’d have had some choice comments on the sight of her hands trembling as they roamed the body of a naked man for the first time in her life.

“An impressively well-endowed man,” he’d have pointed out, lessening the tension in the room. Then he’d have grinned at the blush he’d raised on her cheeks.

Selena shook her head, trying to drive out the frivolous thoughts flooding her mind, the paralyzing fear making her heart pound. You can do this. You’ve never seen anyone hurt so badly but remember – you’ve had years of training to prepare you for a moment like this. Your people need you to guide them. They’re frightened, too. So step up and do your job.

“This man is from Gadolinium, sent here through the portal,” she began. “He’s been seriously wounded in some primitive form of battle – likely a swordfight, from the looks of him. James, we need to replace the blood he’s lost. Use the synthetic fluid for now. Once he’s stabilized, I want you to begin replicating his blood. We’ll need to replace all of it with a fresh supply. Goddess only knows what contaminants are flowing through him after getting slashed with an unsanitary blade.”

She turned to the young woman cowering in the doorway. “Mindy, prepare a pod for him. I’m going to keep him in sleep mode as long as possible. He’ll need an increased flow of oxygen, along with a gravitational adapter. His body is much larger than that of our typical male patient, and I want to lessen the strain on his damaged organs. Set it at 60 percent for now and we’ll reevaluate in six hours.”

“Yes, Doctor Reston.”

Well-trained, her assistants did as they were told. But they gave the table a wide berth, as though the unconscious barbarian might rise up and attack them at any moment.

As she busied herself with familiar tasks, Selena’s pulse returned to normal. She reminded herself it was her duty to stay calm. It wouldn’t do for the director of the East Metropolis Medical Center to collapse into a wailing heap on the floor, hands stained red like some modern-day Lady MacBeth.

Who’d have thought the old man had so much blood in him? The line from the play she’d read as an undergrad popped unbidden into her mind. One of those useless bits of information stored there. They made her a formidable Trivialities opponent but weren’t of much use as she dabbed at the pools of blood welling from her patient.

Hours later, after her assistants had been dismissed for a much-needed break, she allowed herself a few minutes to unwind. She’d had James drag a chair next to the glass pod in one of the recovery rooms off the main lab. Sinking down wearily, Selena stared at her patient. For the first time, she studied the man in front of her as a whole, instead of taking stock of injured body parts.

Haldor the Viking. From Gadolinium. She knew very little about his home, other than the fact that it was bitterly cold most of the time. Nearly twenty years ago, explorers had ventured into the first of three recently rediscovered star portals. Over the last two decades, they’d traveled through the other two portals as well. Each led to one of a trio of planets settled by ancient tribes from Earth over two millennia ago. Planets where the inhabitants knew nothing of modern technology.

They lived as their ancestors had, in pristine worlds untouched by the havoc that warfare waged with superweapons, combined with reckless pollution and overpopulation, had ravaged on Earth. Rich in rare minerals, the planets were immediately placed under the protection of the Interstellar Federation. Access to them was closely guarded to avoid the plundering that Earth’s natural resources had suffered.

She fingered the scrap of paper. A rarity, seen only in museum collections. So fragile. Yet it had survived transport through the portal, a journey that destroyed the functions of all modern devices. Selena was no physicist, but she’d been taught it had to do with the electromagnetic anomaly that created the portals. Ancient writing instruments making marks on flattened and dried wood pulp had proven to be the only reliable means of communication between her world and that of her patient.

Mindy had overcome her fear of the huge man enough to wipe the blood from a wound in his scalp and rinse his long locks clean. His damp hair was splayed out around his head on the pillow, shoulder-length wavy strands of warm deep brown shot through with a few streaks of gray at the temples. Odd. She’d always pictured the ancient Vikings as blond and blue-eyed.

She studied him clinically. Slightly taller than average by Earthly standards, around six feet ten inches, but with an impressive body mass and well-defined musculature. Probably from all that unregulated testosterone. She shook her head. The dangerous hormone had led primitive males like this one to solve even minor conflicts with mortal combat.

With that chest, those arms, he’d obviously spent his days in hard labor. Civilized males didn’t have muscles like that. It was one of those archaic physical traits men no longer needed, now that they spent their days doing nothing more taxing than manipulating holographic screens.

Despite the streaks of gray in his hair, Selena realized the man was younger than she’d first thought. Though she found it hard to estimate the age of humans from other worlds who hadn’t had the advantage of rejuvenating therapies, she guessed his age at around forty. Just a kid by Earthly standards, where most of the population lived to one 170 or more.

Strong jawline, covered with several days’ growth of dark stubble. Another result of all that testosterone. Chiseled cheekbones in a face bronzed by long periods outdoors with direct exposure to the twin suns of his galaxy. He had a few wrinkles at the corners of his eyes, but the rest of his face was unlined and peaceful. The deep furrows on his brow that had made him look old and worn when he arrived had disappeared as pain medication flooded his system.

But his body certainly didn’t look old and worn. Although he didn’t need clothing in the temperature-controlled pod, she’d insisted Mindy cover him with a sheet, at least from the waist down. Despite her medical training, she’d been both shocked and secretly fascinated by the sight of a completely naked male. She guessed Mindy would be affected as well. Selena couldn’t risk having her assistant distracted from her duties every time she came in to check on him.

They’d all had classes featuring holographic males and females, both with and without skin covering the muscles and organs, as part of their medical training. But with current surgical techniques, she’d never found a need to have a patient disrobe. Illness was virtually unheard of. Routine organ replacements required only a tiny patch of skin to be uncovered. Baring one’s entire body in front of another person for any reason was looked upon as a barbaric practice.

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