All Rocs Wise & Wonderful: The Portal Storms, #1

1

The zap lizards were at it again.

Two little orange heads peered down at me from their wobbly nest atop the security camera at the side of the veterinary hospital. Between the poor base and a nest building style rivaled only by pigeons, there was a two out of three chance any babies hatched would plummet to the ground before they were old enough to fly. I knew this because this zap lizard pair had tried this same spot three times in the four years since the first portals had opened.

I was not going to interfere. Absolutely not. They were wild animals, not even native to earth, and it was not my problem if they couldn't make better nest building choices. I, Dr. Vanessa Cunningham, was not responsible for every animal on the planet, even if they were ridiculously cute. Not my circus, not my monkeys, I sang to myself as I rounded the corner. Somehow, the species had survived without me before they had come through the portals — they could figure it out on their own.

Yanking my scarf tighter, I unlocked the back door and slipped inside, pulling it firmly closed behind me. For a moment, I reveled in the peace of the nearly empty building. Everything in the treatment room was orderly and gave off a faint whiff of the bleach used by the overnight cleaners. No fluid pumps beeped, no dogs barked from the wall of cages, and no phones rang.

Within the hour, it would be chaos. Patients would transfer in from the overnight emergency clinic. Other patients that should have been seen earlier would come in crashing. My carefully planned schedule, with slots left open for urgent cases, would be double-booked. I was one of the few doctors in the area who saw xenotics, so it was hard to turn patients away.

But until the phone lines switched over in twenty minutes, I could still pretend.

The coffee in the break room smelled of hazelnut and burnt grounds, but it was either that or nothing at all. I took my mug up to the reception area. Rochelle glanced up, phone headset blinking, and finished writing on a pink message slip before hanging up. Some days I coveted her curly red hair that always seemed one hairpin away from springing into life on its own. But most days I had enough sense to realize my morning routine would leave it looking like I'd stuck my finger in an electrical socket and remained content with my own straight brown hair, chopped off at shoulder length to keep it from tangling.

Good morning, Dr. C. Did you see the zap lizards nesting on the security camera again? She bit her cheek to hide her smile.

Not my problem, dammit.

Rochelle nodded, the grin peeking out. Nothing too urgent from the weekend. She handed me a stack of message slips and mail. There's also a consult request for Sac Emergency, but it's from Saturday night.

About the pigamus? I talked to them. After hours calls from other veterinarians were a constant in my life. I dug through the stack of messages and discarded the request.

Rochelle tapped one perfectly manicured fingernail against the thickest envelope. They really want you, don't they?

They were the Chevalier Foundation, a billionaire-funded group with a nebulous mission — something about harnessing the potential of the portals for the benefit of all mankind. It felt like a vanity project to me. Immo Ring, the billionaire in question, was one of those irritating guys who yo-yoed between showy philanthropy and public rage at anyone who didn't show gratitude. If a billionaire really wanted to improve everyone's lives, they could do so without bringing portals into it.

For the last few weeks, they'd been trying to recruit me to a position at a research facility in Maine. As tempting as not having clients might be, I knew it would just be exchanging one headache for another.

Besides, I'd lost my husband when the portals showed up four years ago. I wasn't about to work for an organization that tried to capitalize on them.

They're barking up the wrong tree. You know I would never leave you guys. I lifted the stack. Thanks. Pushing open the swinging door into the treatment room with my back, I looked through the messages. As Rochelle had said, nothing was particularly urgent.

Back in the tiny doctors' office, I tore open the envelope from the Chevalier Foundation. Dear Dr. Cunningham, This week, Chevalier Foundation creator Immo Ring is in talks with the Governor of California to strategize ways to minimize disruption should the state need to be evacuated. We would like to talk to you about a position in the research wing of the foundation, where your work would directly impact the lives of your fellow citizens.... It ended with a handwritten note from Kirk Mullins, the technical director of the research wing, claiming to be excited about working with me and asking me to call him at any time.

The first offer had stressed the salary and relocation benefits, the second had promised I'd be able to hire anyone I wanted, and the third had extolled the virtues of working for a foundation whose goal was to make life better for everyone. Now it appeared we had moved from the carrot to the stick — work for us now or you might get stuck in the chaos if the portal instability worsened.

I sat down, intending to work my way through the pathology reports that had come in since Friday. Then I groaned and stood up again. Stupid zap lizards.

If they couldn't build a safe nest, they really shouldn't reproduce. By helping them, I was degrading their gene pool. And yet...

With the step stool in one hand, and a stapler and a flimsy box that had once held syringes in the other, I shouldered my way out the rear door, just in time to see my office manager, Moira, get out of her car.

I held the door open for her as she raised her brows at my supplies. Not a word.

Everything about her proclaimed her no-nonsense attitude, from her unfashionably bobbed prematurely gray hair to her plain white tennis shoes worn with purple scrubs.I didn't see a thing. She maneuvered inside with the canvas bags slung over her shoulders. The smell of crushed mint accompanied her.

The instant the door clicked shut, her laughter rang out.

At least my practice co-owner had already taken the work truck out on farm calls and wasn't here to see this. Not that John would miss the results, but if he'd been there, he would have given a running critique of my nest repair job and encouraged the other employees to watch as well.

The step stool crushed what was left of the daffodils. Something had been eating them — possibly native fauna, but I suspected a xenotic. Before the first portals had appeared, nothing had bothered any of the bulbs. Now it looked like I'd have to replace them with something hardier. My mother-in-law swore by rosemary bushes. Maybe I'd try that.

Then again, they were talking about evacuating the entire state. If that happened, I wouldn't have to worry about the afflicted daffodils or zap lizard nests.

By the second step, the stool wobbled so much that I kept my balance by gripping the wood siding with my fingertips. Stupid zap lizards.

The zap lizards in question hissed at me from their terrible nest and a tiny electrical arc jumped from the male's wing to the pole holding the security camera. As defenses went, it was useless against someone my size. I'd been zapped more times than I could count and never felt anything other than a tingle. Likewise with the hissing — their teeth weren't long enough to break my skin, though one had pinched me enough to leave a cute little bruise once.

Yes, you, I replied, glancing up. They were still too far away. I was going to have to go up to the third step. Hanging on to the wall as much as I could, I shifted up another rung.

One zap lizard launched itself toward my face and I ducked. The step stool dipped sideways. Oh shit...

Suddenly, it righted itself and stabilized. Dr. C! Moira chided. Why didn't you wait until I could help?

I let out a shaky breath. Yeah. That might have been a good idea. Now that the step stool had stopped wobbling, it was easier to reach above my head to prod the second inhabitant out of the nest. They would come back after I was done — I'd moved enough nests away from the anesthesia scavenging system outflow to know. Why go to the trouble of building another nest if the first was still around? Which led to another thought... Remind me to check the roof this week.

Will do.

This nest comprised three twigs, a plastic drink lid, and a broken fan belt. No eggs yet. I transferred it all to the box and then stapled the box to the wood siding. The staples were meant for paper, but with the added support of the security camera underneath, the improved nest would last until the next high winds. The zap lizards had already returned by the time I climbed down to the ground.

Moira and I admired my handiwork. It looked... Okay, it looked terrible, like a flimsy cardboard box stapled to the side of a building. But at least it was more stable than what had been there before. Maybe the zap lizards had evolved in a place where another species fixed their nests for them. Despite nearly killing myself on the ladder, I felt a sense of satisfaction. Ridiculous.

Rochelle rounded the corner. Dr. C, animal control called to say they're on their way with a hit-by-car.

Reality always intruded. I lifted and kicked the step stool to collapse it. Did they happen to say what they were bringing?

The dispatcher said a verdiran, but... that can't be right, can it?

In this area? Since the first portals had opened, we'd only met — or recognized — one other sentient species. Verdirans looked almost human, albeit hairless with green skin. They had an embassy on the opposite coast where they retained an air of mystery, rarely leaving the building.

They didn't go out by themselves, and they didn't show up in California. Except I was pretty sure I'd seen one a few weeks ago, during a hike gone wrong. Christopher and I had fled through a portal to another world in order to escape the huge beast hunting us. In the last seconds before we'd returned, I'd thought I'd seen a verdiran. Call them back and tell them if it is a verdiran, it needs to go to the human hospital.

We definitely weren't set up to treat humans or verdirans. Aside from the legal issues, none of our treatment tables were long enough. Any equipment big enough to use on a human was on the truck with John.

Plus, if it got out that an injured verdiran had been sent to an animal hospital... Even I could see how bad that would look.

I followed Rochelle inside, dumping my nest stabilizing supplies against the wall. While she made calls, I pulled up the XISIS database on the computer, just in case. Surprisingly, there were electrolyte normals listed for verdirans, though it was based on two samples, making it unreliable at best. If I believed the database, LRS ought to be close enough for fluid resuscitation. At least I could pass that along to the human ER.

I heard the back door open and Moira called out, Dr. C, animal control is here with your hit-by-car.

There was no way they'd be able to fit a verdiran in the animal services truck. I was both relieved and disappointed. It would have been interesting to see another humanoid species up close.

Then I went out back and saw the animal services truck... and an ambulance.

2

Two EMTs stood arguing near the front of the rig. Jeanette Dyer, the animal control officer whom I had last seen on Saturday night drinking margaritas and flirting with the woman tending bar at the Stag, ignored them and opened the back of the ambulance.

Good morning, Dr. Cunningham.

Good morning, Officer Dyer. She called me Vanessa or Nessa after hours, but almost always used my title at work, so I did the same. Your dispatcher claimed you had a verdiran...

Happy Monday! She pulled on the gurney.

Wait! I put a hand on the frame to stop her. They need to go to the human hospital. I looked at the patient. On first glance, one might be forgiven for mistaking him for a bald man, especially with the plaid shirt and board shorts, but the more I looked, the more the differences stood out. His cobbled skin had a green hue, and his features weren't right, though blood and dirt obscured his face. But what I really noticed was the rapid, shallow breathing. Oh f..., let's get inside. I'll try to stabilize him before transport. Do we know what happened?

Jeanette helped me roll the gurney through the door Moira held open. "The driver said this guy just appeared out of nowhere in the middle of the road and fell over. The driver claims he didn't hit him, but our guy has tire tracks on his leg. She gave a half shrug. You know how people drive out on the county roads. Drinking coffee with one hand and texting on their phone with the other. This guy was still conscious and moving around when I got there."

I pulled my stethoscope out of my coat pocket, pushed the verdiran's shirt up, and listened in the places I thought his lungs should be. For all I knew, verdirans had just one lung like a snake, and the total absence of breath sounds in the lower left thorax was normal. But a pneumothorax would explain the breathing problems, as free air in the chest cavity collapsed his lung. X-rays would help with the diagnosis, but I didn't think he was stable enough to wait that long.

I reached over to the wall, turned on the oxygen, and handed the attached tube to Jeanette. Hold this near his nose. Seven fifteen, no technician, and an unstable patient of a species I knew nothing about. What could possibly go wrong? Moira, can you get some stuff out for me?

While Moira was gathering supplies, I cut the verdiran's shirt off and cleaned a patch of skin. This wouldn't be a completely sterile procedure, but there was no point in allowing more contamination than necessary.

Resting the side of one hand against the verdiran's ribs, I stretched his skin to keep it from moving and pushed an IV catheter in. The skin was tougher than expected, and the metal stilette bent under the pressure. Just when I was about to stop and nick the skin with a scalpel blade, the catheter went through. I kept pushing until I felt a second pop, which — hopefully — was the pleural wall.

When it came down to it, nearly everything that came through the portals shared common DNA with us. That didn't mean there weren't major differences — convergent and divergent evolution was a bitch — but with nothing else to go on, I had to make a few assumptions. In this case, do no harm meant assuming verdirans and humans shared similar anatomy, since doing nothing would leave him gasping for air.

The good news was that it looked like verdirans had the anatomy I'd expected. After I'd sucked half a liter of free air out of his chest, I could finally feel the edge of the re-inflated lung rubbing against the end of the catheter. The verdiran's breathing slowed and deepened. His color went from greenish-grey to a brighter green, which I took as a good sign. When I listened to the lungs again, I heard the expected sounds in all areas, plus a few crackles. I slid the catheter out and tossed it onto the Mayo stand. If the pneumothorax came back, I'd have to consider putting in a chest tube.

Before I started fluids to treat him for shock, I wanted to get baseline bloodwork. I examined his arms, looking for veins. Okay, Jeanette, now tell me why you brought this guy here.

Come on, Nessa, you know how bent out of shape they get even thinking about xenos at the human hospitals. They wouldn't have let us past the front doors.

I grabbed her free hand and positioned it to hold off a vein. Keep pressure there until I say stop.

Jeanette lowered her voice. And the EMTs told me the ER doctor on duty right now is one of those 'humans first' whack jobs, so I thought things would go better here.

As I pulled blood and distributed it into multiple vials, I thought about that. There was only one human hospital always accessible from here; anywhere else required travel over roads often blocked by portals. Depending on how the ER doctor felt about verdirans, they might refuse to admit this man after stabilizing him, or just refuse