Earth Awakens (The First Formic War 3)

He hardly knew her. He had never even seen her face. She had helped him perform the surgery on Mazer, and he had learned afterward that she and Mazer had been ... what? Not husband and wife yet, but whatever came before that. A couple? And yet despite this brief tenuous connection she and Bingwen had shared, he felt as if he did know her, that she was someone special to him. A friend, yes, and maybe even more than that. Not a mother, no. But like a mother. A half-mother. A woman who knew him and valued him and worried over him. He would never say as much to her, of course, and he had never even thought such a thing prior to this moment. But it felt so wonderful to be fretted over, thought about, remembered, that he found himself smiling.

"I'm safe," he said. He told her everything then, all of it spilling out of him. About the base, the conditions, Mama Goshi and Pipo and Niro and Hun, the fourteen-year-old driver. He told her about the cocky Lieutenant Li and the sick people in Claw and Fire and the other barracks. He wasn't sure why he was divulging every detail, but it felt like such a release to talk to someone. Mazer was fine, by the way, he told her. He had healed. He was healthy. He could run and move. It was as if he had never been hurt.

She broke down at that point. At first Bingwen didn't realize she was crying. There was only silence on her end, and for a moment he thought he had lost the connection.

"Dr. Arnsbrach?" he said.

"I'm here," she said, her voice shaky.

He felt like an idiot then. Mazer was her first concern. He had lost the connection with her shortly after Mazer's surgery when the device's battery had depleted, and Kim had not yet heard how Mazer had recovered. She had been sick with worry all this time, and Bingwen had just yammered on and on about trivial things when it was Mazer she wanted to know about.

When she collected herself, she apologized and blamed her emotions on the lack of sleep and told him more than once that under no circumstances was he to tell Mazer that she had cried. "Promise me, Bingwen."

He promised.

She asked him where Mazer was now.

"He's here at this underground facility. He's helping to lead the soldiers from here. It's some big operation. I don't think they're sending him out to fight. I think he'll stay here where it's safe."

The line went quiet again.

"Are you still there?" he asked.

She sniffed. "Yes, I'm just ... relieved."

Bingwen was suddenly angry. "He should have called you and told you all this himself."

"It's complicated, Bingwen."

"No, it isn't. It's good manners."

She laughed. "Oh Bingwen. I hope you and I can meet in person someday."

He remembered why he had called. "I need your help. We need doctors. There are thousands of people here and hardly any medical staff. I know you can't send doctors. This is a war zone. The skies aren't safe. But would you or any doctors you know be willing to see patients via the nets? Through holos? You can't treat them obviously. At best you could partially examine them and diagnose them. People here could conduct whatever tests you needed, assuming we have the equipment for it. We'd be your hands. None of us have any medical training, so we wouldn't conduct any procedures or surgeries if they were needed. We would leave that to the real doctors here. That would be their focus. Instead of spending time examining patients, they could dedicate all their time to performing procedures only they can do. So we identify the emergencies, they address them. More people could be seen that way, and we could hopefully avoid what almost happened with Niro."

When she spoke again, the worry in her voice was gone, replaced with steel-hard confidence. "Bingwen, I'm going to my office right now. There are several nonprofits that do this sort of thing. I'll get our people on it immediately."

"What's a nonprofit?"

"A charity. A group of people who help for free. In this case, doctors. There are some charities in the U.S., Europe, South America, two in Africa. Give me a few hours to contact them. We can probably find several who speak Chinese. In the meantime, we need equipment for the transmissions and numbers for the uplinks."

"I've seen some holo equipment here on site," said Bingwen. "I'll work on that."

"Should I speak to someone in charge?" asked Kim. "A commanding officer? Get the military's help?"

"I don't even know who that is. I'll ask around. If we can't find out who to ask, I say we do it without permission and ask for forgiveness later."

He could hear the smile in her voice. "Bucking authority for the good of the people? I think Mazer is starting to rub off on you, Bingwen."

Bingwen beamed. It was the greatest compliment anyone had ever given him.

CHAPTER 15

Reunion

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