Rene flopped bonelessly onto the mattress, only to grunt in surprise as it nearly swallowed him. The mattress was a large bag of cotton fabric, judging from the unexpected give it was packed with some sort of loose cushioning, perhaps leaves or wool. He blinked for a moment in stunned surprise, it reminded him of an underfilled waterbed he had once played on as a child.

“Well,” he said in an ironically voice, “I suppose it has less in the way of interesting pharmaceuticals.” It wasn’t much of a joke but they both laughed relieved to be alone and alive. Rene struggled to the edge of the bed with some difficulty and stripped off his boot. Lasha had bathed Solae while she had been unconscious and Rene, waiting anxiously without other options, had sponged the worst of the dirt off himself. His hands were pitted with small red dots where he had scoured away the metal that muzzle blasts had redeposited on his skin.

Solae stripped down to her under clothes, an act which commanded Rene’s full and immediate attention. She let them fall to the ground, the faint hint of a wicked grin on her full beautiful lips. Without warning she leaped onto the bed, landing on it with her full weight. The counterforce flipped Rene out of the bed with a whoosh of escaping air, depositing him on his back on the floor with a crunch. He groaned in surprise and was rewarded with her silvery laughter.

“Is that anyway for a lady to behave?” he asked and dived (more carefully) back into the bed.

They found each other in the night, the natural impulse of the bed drawing them together as both of their bodies sought the lowest point.  It was less frantic than it had been in the Park’s spare bedroom, enthusiasm trumped by the pain and fatigue of wounds and the exhaustion of battle. Still hunger for each other overcame natural caution and more than once the ecstasy of togetherness mingled with the pain of an awkwardly place leg or hand. Rene didn’t care for his own pain eager to feel Solae against him even if it came at a price. He wanted to explore every inch of her, eager to prove she was still alive after the scare her capture had given him. Sleep found him with an arm around her and her golden hair spilling over his torso, her head resting on his chest.

The Syshin had different biological rhythms than humans. Triurnal by nature, they tended to view the day as split into three segments. An early morning, a full sun period, and an evening night. The arrangement suited their social structure allowing both bonded pairs and twins a period of communion without depriving them of rest. There was no day and night in Amber Horizons in any case, the hull of the ship effectively cutting off all natural light. Inspite of that Rene was already beginning to stir when a polite but insistant knock sounded at the door. Groaning he slid out of bed, careful but unable to avoid Solae who was also rousing to the noise. He picked up his trousers and awkwardly tugged them on before opening the door a crack. Enro stood in the hallway beyond his face unreadable to Rene.

“We need to speak of the prisoner,” he said, with more urgency than the statement should have required. Rene’s lips compressed into a frown. Solae was moving behind him, he could hear her pulling on her own clothing, gifts from Oanh he supposed. Briefly he regretted not finding spare gear at the Rat Trap, but the only real choice would have been to strip the dead.

“Now?” Rene ask musily trying to kick his brain into action. The effects of his wounds and his exertions were clearly catching up to him. The backs of his hands burned and it was painful, and he was stiff besides, muscles protesting the abuse he was putting them through. Enro nodded in an exaggerated manner that Rene was coming to associate with the Syshin. Florid gestures seemed to be the norm among the creatures, he wondered if they found humans boring and restrained in their speech.

“Yeah… yeah ok give us a minute will you?” he asked, closing the door before the alien could reply. Solae was already dressed so Rene quickly pulled on a fresh shirt and a socks before snapping the battered plastic closures of his combat boots. He took Solae’s hand and squeezed it.

“Lets find out what this is about,” she said with a smile that held a slight unreadable quality to it.

When they arrived at the cell, it was immediately obvious that the prisoner was much worse off than he had been the night before. A sheen of sweat coated the man's cruely pinched face and he appeared to be shaking despite being wrapped in a warm cloth blanket, much like the one Rene and Solae had used last night. Rene reflected that it had been a mistake for the Shyshin to give him that. A dedicated man might have used it to fashion a noose.

“What is wrong with him?” Enro asked. Rene thought about the bridge, the plasma bolt, fragment bursting up from the bridge and spattering the fellow legs before pitching him back into the creek.

“He is septic,” Rene said in a voice too low to carry to the miserable prisoner.

“The wounds in his legs, Lasha treated them, but either she missed something or you don’t have antibiotics appropriate for humans,” he concluded. Even a skilled surgeon was likely to miss something and this wretch wasn’t even the same species as the healer. Rene couldn’t find any mercy in his heart for someone who was willing to buy and sell sentient beings so that they could be raped and tortured, but without antibiotics, the man was going to die a slow and agonized death.