He squinted. “You’re telling me the corpsman, theNavy corpsman, gets seasick?”
“I know, right? Doesn’t make a lick of sense,” I said with a snort. “It wasn’t too bad on bigger ships, barely noticeable and went away after a while. Smaller ones, though? Ugh, gotta pop something or I’m fighting throwing up the entire way through.”
“Lovely,” he said with a roll of his eyes. “C’mon.”
“Okay,” I said and had to fight back a smile when I heard him huff in annoyance. Apparently, whether I was being a smartass or cooperative, he was irritated by my very existence. It would probably get irritating at some point, but for now, I had the patience to find it amusing.
To my surprise, he took me down the path leading to the old Operations Center, and I could see it was maintained by more than just people trampling the brush. I wondered if there was a rotation schedule for that, too.
Rather than taking me straight, he stopped where the path split off to the right, and I followed him. It was only a little way before we came to a small clearing and another building. There was a tall piece of machinery on the roof, and I squinted to make out what it was. At best, I could only guess that it was some sort of…well, machinery.
“This is where the twin idiots do most of their work that isn’t saving people’s asses,” Xander told me as he nodded toward the building. “Don’t ask me what they do. I just know they send me what I need to know, and the rest is between them and whatever government handlers they deal with.”
“So, this is the smarty-pants part of the outpost,” I said as I realized Trevor was coming into view on the roof as he mountedthe machine and squinted at it. “I’m guessing that’s whatever Trevor said was damaged in the storm?”
“Apparently,” he said with a shake of his head. “Trevor does what Trevor does; you’ll get used to it.”
“Mmm, doesn’t sound like you’re all that used to it.”
“I’m used to it, just irritated.”
“The things you aren’t irritated by is probably a far easier list to compile.”
He snorted. “Probably. Come on.”
Xander took me around the science building, and I could see another, smaller one on the other side. It wasn’t much bigger than a single-room cabin, probably two rooms, three if one of them was small. Xander unlocked the door and pushed through with me hot on his heels. The lights flickered to life with an unpleasant buzz, and I realized I was looking at a small examination room.
There was the exam table, cabinets that held who knew what, a desk in one corner with a computer that looked like it was new a decade ago. There were two more doors, one of which was open, and through the light from the main room, I could see a small bathroom. The other door was closed, and it was the only door I’d seen on the property that was not only metal but had two locks.
“Here,” he said, reaching into his pockets and drawing out a ring of keys that he dropped into my palm, as if he were afraid to brush my skin with his. “Those are for this entire building, and the silver one with a green cover is for a storage room in the basement of the main building. That big golden one and the smaller silver one next to it are for this locked door. The records for everyone assigned here, even if they’re not working the current season, are in there as well as on the computer system. We haven’t got a login for you yet, so you’ll be paper-bound for a bit.”
“Figures,” I said with a sigh. “Thank God they offered for me to buy my own laptop; that thing looks as old as you.”
His eyes snapped to me with a growl. “I’m not old.”
I laughed. “But in computer years, you’re ancient.”
He rolled his eyes. “That door is where the controlled shit is. I hope you know how to handle that.”
“First time I’ve ever been the only person in control of it, but yeah, we’re on familiar terms,” I admitted, using the keys to open the door and flip on the light. There was a cabinet with another lock that I assumed was where the controlled meds were, a couple of filing cabinets and, to my amusement, a mini-fridge and an ancient-looking collection of snacks in a box.
“Right, well, this is your base of operations when necessary. You know the drill: basic exams, vaccinations or whatever when we need them, medical visits by us, triage…all that you’re allowed to do.”
“I got ya,” I said as I moved to the corner and eyed the stack of folders on the counter. The names on the tabs told me they were all for the men stationed at the outpost currently, including the two unknowns, whose names I could see were Maverick and Carter. There was Cait’s folder, but it was Xander’s folder I plucked from the pile and looked over. “Huh…interesting.”
He scowled when he saw what I was looking at. “You can do that on your own time; you need?—”
“To do a basic exam,” I said with a laugh, eyeing the date. “I’m dying to know how you got away with not one, not two, but four years of not having a physical. Pull some strings?”
He sighed. “Of course you’d notice that.”
“I also note that you’re on blood pressure medication that strangely doesn’t get filled as often as it should,” I said with a smirk, closing the folder. “Almost like it doesn’t need to be refilled all that often because someone isn’t taking their meds like they’re supposed to.”
“As I told Cait, you’re not my mother.”
“No, but right now? Here? I’m your medic.”
“And I’m your boss.”