Page 27 of Midnight

‘The medical centre isn’t far. I want to make sure you didn’t do any real harm.’

She leaned on his arm and he led her down the stairs to the medical bay on the lower deck. She found it hard to open her eyes fully due to the pain. ‘What were you doing up and about the ship so late?’ he asked.

‘Actually I was aiming for the medical bay. I was hoping to get some seasickness pills.’

‘Dr Ranjeed can get you those. You’ll be right. Remember, you’ve got to have one hand on the ship at all times.’

He knocked on the door for her, waiting a few seconds until it opened.

The doctor looked frazzled, his dark hair askew. He had the kind of deep brown skin that even a season in Antarctica couldn’t shake the vibrancy from, with warm creases around his eyes. She wondered what his story was, how he came to find himself on a boat to Antarctica.

He muttered at her to come in and gestured for her to hop up on the bed. ‘What’s the problem?’

‘She took a fall down the stairs,’ said Liam. ‘Hit her head. Might need stitches.’

The doctor nodded. ‘I’ll get some Steri-Strips.’

‘I’d better continue my rounds or elseI’llbe the one experiencing Captain Enzo’s wrath. I’ll see you in the morning, yeah?’ Liam said to Olivia. She gave him a small wave as she gingerly clambered up on to the examination-room bed. What must he think of her? This was the second time that day he’d had to come to her rescue.

Maybe she could convince the doctor there was a medically necessary reason for her to be flown back to Ushuaia. She stared at the doctor’s back as he rooted around one of the cupboards. What would it take? Severe concussion? A broken limb? Maybe a psychotic break?

Before she could formulate a plan, the doctor turned back with a bandage and some antiseptic wipes. He wiped away the blood from her forehead and examined her wound, doing a few checks of her brain function by asking her to follow his finger. He gave her a sharp nod. ‘It looks bad but you won’t need stitches. You’re lucky. This has been an unfortunate crossing.’

She frowned. ‘Have other people been hurt?’

‘Ranj?’ A woman’s voice came from the adjacent room. Olivia tried to turn her head to see who was speaking but a stab of pain stopped her.

‘Yes?’ He handed her an ice pack to put against her forehead, which she took gratefully.

‘I really need your help in here.’ The voice quivered with desperation. They must be overwhelmed with patients. Maybe that was no surprise. The ship was being battered by the storm, a rough introduction to cruise life. There was no porthole in the medical bay, but she could easily imagine the swell outside, thirty-foot waves slamming the side of the boat, tossing it around like a toy. She tried to pretend they were back on land and not surrounded by steel-grey ocean that could swallow them up whole, never to return.

‘I have to help my colleague. Don’t go anywhere,’ he said, pressing on her shoulders to guide her to a lying-down position on the bed.

She closed her eyes to try to manage the pain, resting the ice pack against her skull – and her entire body tensed as the ship rocked precariously once again. Would she ever get used to the motion? How long did the captain say the Drake Passage crossing could last? Two days? In bad weather, it could take much longer …

Voices drifted to her. Dr Ranjeed had left the door slightly ajar behind him, so although she couldn’t see them, she could overhear their conversation.

‘What are we going to do?’ the woman hissed. She had a slight Slavic accent that turned her Ws to Vs, intensified with panic. Another doctor? ‘We left port less than twenty-four hours ago,’ she continued. ‘We have to send them back on the chopper.’

‘In this storm? No way,’ replied Dr Ranjeed.

‘Then we need to turn the boat around! This is serious, Ranj.’

‘The captain will never allow it. Not with Mr Hughes on board.’

‘And if it really is poison? What do we do then?’

Olivia sat bolt upright in the bed. She couldn’t have heard properly.Poison?The ship rose up beneath her, and the door clicked shut.

The voices were cut off. Her entire body had gone cold. Surely if someone had been poisoned, they wouldn’t be continuing to sail. They would be turning the ship right now, heading back to port. She must have been confused by the woman’s strange accent, and the pounding in her head, distorting, distorting.

This has been an unfortunate crossing.Well, at least she now understood the doctor’s grim statement.

She was snapped out of her morbid thoughts by Dr Ranjeed’s return. The adrenaline rush from overhearing the conversation had pushed the headache to the back of her mind.

He blinked at her, and she forced a smile. He smiled back, but she thought it wavered at the edges ever so slightly.

‘What was that about?’ she asked.

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