The Janus Syndrome | Page 4

her teeth were clenched together.
I stripped her jacket off carefully and laid it aside; I was going to need it in a minute. Then I unbuttoned her blouse.
"You know something, honey," I said, as I pulled it away from her shoulder.
"Here we are, everybody's getting shot at, and all I'm doing is undressing you."
I bit a wince in half, clamping my teeth together as I peeled the cloth away from the wound; sympathy or empathy. I'm lousy with it, most times. I start feeling like it's me who's been shot.
Kerry's face twisted; it was worse for her. I could have used a telepath to bleed off the sensations. I still had to get at the entrance wound.
"Better grid your teeth, lady," I said.
And ripped the blouse from the burn-holes all the way around.
"That's gonna go first --" I picked a section of bra strap off her shoulder; it had been cut neatly at both ends, leaving a short white piece and two tags -- "on your expense account, I guess." I dropped the piece in Kerry's lap as I picked up her jacket.
"I spend months trying to charm you out of this rig, and when I finally get started, I have to turn --" ripped the lining from the jacket with a grunt, checking the contents, -- "nurse and doctor. Kept telling you about how you were so attractive. And you get shot."
The beam had cut through the top of a strip of explosive F, but nothing else had been touched. And the explosive was useless without the detonators.
I stripped out the flat medipak and depressed the function key at the bottom, stretching the 'pak out to enough length to fit over Kerry's double wound. I bent back to her and applied it to her shoulder like a giant white Band-Aid, pressing it down gently.
As I set the last edge into place, a blue strip lit across the middle of the 'pak; treatment had started. Kerry relaxed with a sigh while I unclipped a medical transponder from the jacket and clipped it to her bra.
I sat back on my heels and looked at her. "How do you feel now? "I feel incredibly good," she said, in a weak voice. "I've just been shot, and I obviously feel wonderful."
I laughed, and she smiled, wanly. "You're coming back to normal."
She sat up and got into a more comfortable position; the 'pak would have administered painkillers and stimulants.
She said, "Uh-huh. I wouldn't mind so much if you didn't chatter while doctoring me."
"That's to stop me from fainting," I said. Not quite true, but my nerves always managed to let me down when forced into things like this. If I didn't talk to myself, I'd probably slip up.
Kerry said, "No wonder, is it, that I ignore you in favor of stronger men?" She grinned. "Tomari, you're a fake. What's happening with the guy that shot me?"
"Just a minute." I crept around to a window, getting street mud on my hands; the knees of my pants were finished already, and my knees sore from crawling on the sidewalk.
I wiped my hands down the sides of my pants and looked through the glass, watching for a moment. The cops weren't doing too well; a couple of them were stretched out, and the rest were simply blasting away with no hope of hitting him.
They needed a tactical squad, and, if my guess was good, one might even be gearing up now. They didn't know what they were up against.
I did.
I dropped down and crept back to Kerry, passing on the situation as I settled down. I added, "He's going to massacre those cops unless somebody takes a bomb to him."
She looked at me. "You're offering?"
"Well, you aren't." I picked up her jacket and ripped out two Bullets, passed one to her. "There's your ticket home."
"Hoo-ha, Area Fourteen is going to have words with me." She took the Bullet, held it up to look at it. "I wasn't supposed to have that needle-spitter, you know."
"Those Enemy cats weren't supposed to have those lasers either," I said, as I stripped out the explosive F strips from her jacket.
"You've hit the same point as me, you horrible black bastard, you."
"You've been reading Richard Prather again."
I turned her jacket over, pulled the buttons off, collecting them in one hand.
When I had them all, I dropped them into my pocket, handed her jacket to her, and dropped the needlegun into her lap.
She folded the jacket, clumsily, and dropped it into her lap, over the gun.
"That goes on the expense account as well."
"Uh-huh. I'll see you when I get upstairs. Then we can match accounts. That damn computer owes me for --" I started wadding the explosive, with the buttons inside -- "a complete outfit." The explosive was as soft as molding wax