Totaikona 3 (Patreon)

Totaikona 1 

Totaikona 2 

I know this is probably a surprise, but while I was reviewing the audiobook for Tales of Hayven Celestia (out soon!) I had a few more thoughts concerning krakun society, which ignited a need to write a bit more about this sleazeball. Comments appreciated!

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“No, no…” Totaikona sighed heavily, looking at the camera feed on his mobile com. “No, it’s all wrong. It’s the right size but it’s not going to fly by the end of the week.”

He was lumped over an overly-sanitized hospital bed with fitted sheets and several plastic cushions, keeping him in almost zero-gravity suspension, making him feel as lightweight as one of his slaves—though that may also have been the copious amount of drugs they pumped him up with. They were supposed to put him to sleep, but there was no way he was going to let the grogginess overtake him.

He hated having to do business in such a public area. The hospital slaves were standing right on the other side of the glass, and they could technically hear everything he was saying if they wished. This was supposed to be an under-the-table contract, and at this point he wouldn’t be surprised if the news reached Liotec by the next morning.

He had managed, at least, to get a privacy clip that hooked to his tympanum, so what Aendi reported, he could say privately.

“That’s the best we have in the logs,” the anup said. “Everything else is too small or torn to pieces.”

“Then look for something else that we don’t have in the logs,” Totaikona growled, trying to keep his voice low as he spoke through his teeth.

It was then that the doctor entered into the observation area just behind the glass. Totaikona quickly shoved his mobile com underneath the pillow he laid upon.

“Keeping up with your business prospects?” The white krakun asked.

Totaikona snapped his head toward her defensively, his eyes casting toward the observation cameras in the corners of the room. “What’s it to you?”

“Oh, just an observation concerning your lucidity,” she seemed to say entirely honestly. “Really you should be out cold.”

“I don’t have time for sleep.”

“Yes, yes. Well, I will let you get back to it, but I’m sure you want to hear your test results. You have apparently contracted Kax Fever.”

Totaikona blinked. It was hard to take in the news with the gravity it entailed, but the drugs in his system blunted it all to a detached curiosity. “…how? I thought that’d been eradicated two thousand years ago.”

“Oh, we still get cases from time to time—the virus still lays dormant in many older krakun systems and can re-activate in an under-vaccinated krakun, especially if you have had an open wound making contact with water contaminated with krakun fecal matter. Have you had any such exposure in the last six months?”

Totaikona’s eyes suddenly darted to the scar on his inside elbow, where he’d torn it open digging through the garbage dumpsters outside a fancy hotel nearly a month prior. He had not reported it, because for one, it was incredibly illegal, and two, that would have also just caused his premiums to go up.

“No,” he said, lying.

“Interesting,” the doctor said, glancing aside at her notes populating the board.

“Give it to me straight, doc,” Totaikona whined. “How long do I have to live?”

“Oh, you’re going to be fine!” The white krakun laughed.

Totaikona lifted his head eagerly. “So I can go back to work?”

“Yes, in about two weeks.”

“Wh-th-two weeks!?” Totaikona roared, the walls of the clean room shaking.

The doctor didn’t seem to give his outburst much thought. “Yes, Kax Fever no longer carries a fatal risk, but we need to ensure that the fever doesn’t create a breakout mutation inside of your body. So we will need to monitor its progression until it’s completed its course.”

“But I need to be out of here this weekend!”

“Oh? What for?”

Totaikona opened his mouth to respond, but again… all this business was under the table. Besides, how was he going to get a doctor to let him go to space while he had Kax Fever? The Health Authority was never going to allow it.

“I have… an important meeting,” he said, weakly.

“Well, we do have telecommuting options inside this facility,” the doctor assured him. “Nearly everything can be done remotely nowadays. Holographic projection is quite popular and nearly seamless.”

Totaikona briefly considered projecting his holographic image into space, but realized that wasn’t going to work. Any barest hint of inspection would reveal such a ruse for what it was. He had to be there in person in order to fulfill the contract.

“I’ll give it consideration,” Totaikona lied. “But, you know, this is very important to me. I could make it very important to you, too.”

The doctor stared at him with a flat expression.

“I have friends in high places!”

The doctor looked like she was waiting for him to finish. Was he supposed to increase the deal in these cases?

“How much do you make in a week?” He asked.

Still nothing.

“Or if not you… look, I’m not thinking straight at the moment, just tell me who I gotta bribe to get out of here sooner.”

“There’s no bribing out of this one,” the doctor said. “The Health Authority is extremely strict about cases of Kax Fever. You are not to leave the facility until we are done.”

That probably meant that there were health officials looking through the security camera right then.

“Uh, yeah of course,” Totaikona said, laughing mirthlessly. “Just testing you. Of course I wouldn’t do anything to jeopardize the health of the workers of our beloved empire. That would be an incredibly expensive thing to do. But can’t I pay for a nurse and home treatment?”

“Possibly,” the doctor said. “If you’re also willing to pay for the installation of a secure monitoring chamber, and also twenty-four hour surveillance by in-person Health Authority officials.”

Totaikona was about to ask how much that would cost, but even his lowest rough estimate was well into the stratosphere. He decided to just pointedly snap his mouth closed.

“Good,” The doctor replied, finally relaxing her posture. “In the meantime, get some rest. If you wish to use any of our patient facilities, you will need to schedule an appointment on the board there, so that we can employ proper decontamination procedures before and after you.”

Totaikona gave the doctor what he hoped was a warm smile rather than a pained grimace, and she left. Once he was certain that the Health Authority wasn’t about to walk in after her, he quickly checked the facility schedule, and found that most of the interesting ones—business-class quiet rooms, in-person meetings, physical therapy, and every single spa unit was booked through the next four months.

“What the hell, what the hell,” he mumbled to himself. “If you want to actually get what you’re paying for with a hospital stay, you apparently have to know you’re getting sick a year in advance.”

“You can always book a room appointment on contingency,” a little geroo orderly said, her finger on a button to talk through a large speaker in the adjoined habitat. “We have cancellations all the time.”

Totaikona checked the waiting list. It was also as long as his forearm. He sighed, and just booked everything, if only to have an opportunity to be somewhere other than this tight monitoring room sometime in the next few days. He wondered if that’s what everyone else in the hospital was doing, too.

Though most of the krakun here probably weren’t planning on escaping the moment they had an opportunity to get out.

Oh who am I kidding, Totaikona thought to himself. If I’m gonna escape under the nose of the Health Authority, I’m gonna need to figure out something a little more devious.