Traken today.Traken today." "Chelsea..." "No, Shardik. You listen to me, and you listen carefully. Right now that young lady is throwing her life away over at Michael's, and if you have any interest at all in saving one of your Tleil Centuries, you'd better get over there right now!" I sat up and said, rather dumbly, "What?" "Ken, as far as anyone can tell, Dr. Traken is trying to drink herself into a drug-induced coma. Mike's being careful and keeping her on the edge of consciousness, but she could go over any second and she's a doctor! She's got access to plenty of things she could use, some of them a lot more unpleasant than just plain alcohol. Get up and get over there." I blinked. "Chelsea. If she wants to kill herself, that's her perogative. But I can't have her as a lab partner, and I don't think there's much chance of my going back on my word." "Listen to you. Do I have to get Miss Flanders in here?" The mention of Brieanna got my attention. "No, Chelsea. Okay, I'll go get her." I sighed and rose. Chelsea followed me as I walked quickly to the internal SDisk and teleported over the Michael's. I walked in to find the place nearly empty. Empty that is, except for Mike, tending bar, Rhys, who stood at the far edge of the bar with his arms folded and his equine bulk leaning up against the railing, and Dr. Traken, who was sitting at a booth with eight or nine empty beer glasses sitting around her, all of them with a slight white residue. Milk laden with some sort of heavy sedative or depressent, I'd wager. Apparently, nobody wanted to watch someone else's self-destruction. |