Katya's World Read Online Free Page B

powers of the FMA around with him like a bad smell, it was impossible. Katya and her uncle were reduced to reading checklists off to one another until that got boring. Then they lapsed into an uncomfortable silence. The trip to the Deeps couldn’t be over fast enough for either of them.
    The prisoner, on the other hand, kept trying to start conversations with everybody. He asked Lukyan how long he’d owned the Baby . He asked Katya what her favourite subject had been at school and why she’d liked it. He even asked the Fed what the interview for the FMA officer’s job had been like as he was considering applying himself.
    “ Shut up, ” said the Fed.
    “ Just wondering. Once all this misunderstanding is sorted out, I was wondering what I might do for a job and then I thought, don’t just go for a job, go for a career. It’s a man’s life in the FMA . Since you and I have been acquainted, Officer Suhkalev, I’ve become very impressed with the FMA. Specifically its low standards. I thought to myself, well, if he can get in… ”
    He stopped suddenly with a cough of pain. Katya looked back to see him doubling up; Suhkalev had elbowed him hard by the look of it. “ Hey! ” she called back. “ Cut that out! ”
    “ Don’t tell me my business, girl, ” the officer snapped.
    “ How about I do? ” said Lukyan. The officer was silent, his expression resentful. “ You’ve got your gun on your right hip. You’re sitting to the left of your prisoner. Did it ever cross your mind that he can reach your gun at least as easily as you can? ”
    Suhkalev glared at Lukyan, but he drew his gun and put it to his left all the same.
    “ Damn, ” said the prisoner, “ I was looking forward to getting that. Oh, ” he added in a different tone, “ I’m very sorry but I seem to be bleeding on your deck. ”
    “ Hell, that head wound has opened again, ” growled Lukyan. “ Katya, could… ”
    But Katya was already out of her seat and taking down the first aid kit from its locker. She looked around for somewhere to rest it while she opened it and the prisoner indicated his lap. “ Put it here, it’ll be handy. ”
    “ I didn’t say he could be treated, ” said Suhkalev.
    “ You don’t need to, ” replied the prisoner. “ It’s in FMA regs on the treatment of and conditions for prisoners. You ought to read it sometime. ”
    Katya rested the box on the prisoner’s lap and opened it. “ How do you do? ” he said, peering over the raised lip of the lid as she pulled on surgical gloves and located the necessary medications. “ We haven’t been introduced. I’m Havilland Kane. ”
    Katya looked up sharply. Had he just said… “ Havilland Kane? ”
    He smiled, amused. “ My infamy precedes me. ”
    “ You’re the… pirate? ” It couldn’t be? This bedraggled, painfully polite man couldn’t be Kane.
    His eyebrows rose. “ Am I? Perhaps I am. I’ve been accused of so many nonsensical charges it becomes difficult to keep track. ” His smile broadened but – and perhaps it was just Katya’s imagination – seemed to grow colder. “ And your name is? ”
    She didn’t answer, instead busying herself with a swab. She cleaned his wound quickly but carefully. He barely winced though the cut was deep and was already showing some signs of a mild infection. “ I’m going to close it up now. I’ve put in some antibiotic matrix, ” she said, carefully neutral, “ but it needs seeing to properly. Make sure the medics at the Deeps know about it. ”
    “ You’re an angel, ” he said, but so quietly that she doubted anyone else heard it. Then he hissed slightly with discomfort as she used the suture pen to bind the edges of the cut together.
    “ Have you finished? ” muttered Suhkalev. Katya didn’t even look at him. She closed up the kit and stowed it in its place before returning to her seat.
    As she strapped herself in, she thought she heard Kane say, “ Thank you, Katya Kuriakova, ” but it was hard