Free Victory Conditions by Elizabeth Moon Page A

had captured him might have captured her, and Stella wouldn’t be as concerned about Zori. He had to get free and make sure Zori was safe.
    Meanwhile the light boring into his helpless eyes hurt, hurt more and more with every boring minute. So did the tube in his throat.
    Maybe his implant could at least fox the medical pad? His implant told him that the medpad’s data report function was hard-cabled to some external location, with safeguard functions to detect RF interference in the usual ranges. Yet the data collection function needed RF sensitivity to the electrical emissions of his own body. He could interfere there, at the source, at least as long as his implant’s transmissions matched the parameters the medpad had been programmed to pick up. He queried…feeding the merest trickle of power to the external channel…and the pad responded, reporting a fictional heartbeat. That worked; excitement made his heart speed up. He hoped his captors would think it was from fear and pain.
    The light boring into his eyes, the choking feel of the tube in his throat, had to be fixed next. He had access to his implant’s biocontrols. That meant access to conditioned sleep, pain management for both acute and chronic pain, even complete sensory decoupling. That came with major warning flags: not a good idea.
    But interfering with pain signals from his eyes and throat seemed safe enough. Immediate relief. Toby felt a burst of confidence. Now what? Control the entire medpad output. If he could do that, then he could deconstruct the paralyzing drug most of the way without revealing changes in metabolism.
    Toby defined the parameters and instructed his implant to insert them into the datastream. Then he damped his throat’s sensitivity to the tube even further. If he could break down the paralyzing chemical, the first natural movement would be a gag reflex and a blink, something the video surveillance would pick up. He had to appear to be paralyzed right up to the moment he was ready to take on whatever came next.
    Then he set to work on the chemical problem. Could the reaction products from breaking down the paralyzing drug counteract the effects of hours of immobilization? Strength, agility, what else? Zori, his emotions said.
     
    “You what!” Stella felt a wash of icy terror and white-hot rage meet in the middle of her head; she wanted to fly into pieces. And she must not.
    “He was abducted,” the escort said. His voice was strained; he was a mass of bruises, scrapes, cuts. “And yes, sera, I know we have given you ample cause for anger; Duirman is dead, died in his defense, I hope you will remember—”
    “When I have time to remember,” Stella said, “I will honor his sacrifice. Right now Toby is in danger—”
    “We are searching for him,” the Station Security officer said. “We have a good description of the abductors and the vehicle from Zori Louarri—”
    “Her!” Stella said. “I knew there was something—”
    “Sera, she has been most helpful. She told us to contact you at once; she has refused to return to her parents’ home and wishes to see you.”
    The last thing Stella wanted to see was a hysterical teenage girl in love, whether she was guilty of anything else or not. “I don’t have time—” she said, but the man was already nodding at the door.
    Zori rushed in. “I have to see you,” she said to Stella. “You have his dog. You have to get his dog.”
    “Rascal? Why?”
    Zori nodded. “He told me about it, about his dog at home, where he came from. It could follow scent; it could find anyone it knew. Rascal can follow his trail and find him. They won’t think of that; we don’t have any other dogs on the station.”
    Stella wondered for a moment if it could work, and then shook her head. “Zori, not all dogs can track. I don’t think Rascal’s that kind of dog—dogs bred to follow scent are a different breed.”
    “But Rascal loves him!” Tears glittered in Zori’s eyes, and