Deathstalker 04 - Deathstalker Honor

“That’s a very striking outfit you’re wearing.” The nun stretched her green mouth in a disturbing smile that showed far too many teeth. “I dress like this to mess with people’s heads. And the makeup and gloves help hide the skin lesions. People here will tell you I’m an eccentric. Or a loony tune.
    Don’t listen to them. We all have our own ways of dealing with our condition. Mine is just a little more dramatic than most. Now get your asses in gear and follow me. Bea’s got dinner waiting, and there are things we need to discuss.”
    She turned around sharply, swayed for a moment, and then marched stiff-leggedly off without looking to see if anyone was following. Lepers scattered to get out of her way as she strode on, as implacable as a force of nature and twice as dangerous.
    “So that’s a Sister of Glory,” said Moon.
    “Yeah,” said Hazel. “I don’t know what the Hadenmen’ll make of her, but she scares the crap out of me. Did you notice she didn’t blink once the whole time she was talking to us? That nun is in serious need of psychotherapy. And possibly a hole in her head to let the devils out.” “You don’t get invited to be a Sister of Glory because of your even temperament,” said Owen. “Personally, I think she’s the most encouraging thing I’ve seen since I got here. Just pull her pin, throw her at the enemy, and stand well back.”
    “I just hope we can defuse her afterward,” said Hazel. “That is a very dangerous person.”
    “You should know,” said Owen.
    They set off after Sister Marion, and followed her back to the main building, maintaining a respectful distance at all times. They picked up Bonnie and Midnight along the way. Bonnie admired Sister Marion’s dress sense. Midnight managed a frosty greeting. A small crowd of colonists tried to follow them into the main building, not wanting to miss anything. The Sister explained it was a private meeting.
    One colonist made the mistake of objecting too loudly, and just a little too rudely, and Sister Marion head-butted him in the face. The other colonists discovered they had pressing business elsewhere and managed a semi-dignified retreat. Sister Marion led her guests inside, leaving the unconscious colonist to lie in the street outside until he remembered his manners. Or at least his name.
    To no one’s surprise, the meal turned out to be mostly vegetables, spiced up with flavored protein cubes and bottles of a vicious-looking blue wine distilled from local produce. Owen didn’t recognize anything on his plate, which given his previous experiments at finding something edible in the jungle reassured him somewhat. He made polite noises to Mother Beatrice and crunched his way determinedly through one unpleasant surprise after another, then washed everything down with lots of wine, which turned out to be fierce but surprisingly palatable. Everyone drank a lot of it, except Moon. Mother Beatrice in particular
    put the stuff away as though it were water. No one said anything, after a few guarded glares from Sister Marion. Presumably being a Saint was hard on the nerves. Owen watched Sister Marion stab her food with knife and fork as though it might try to escape at any moment, and cleaned his plate with a sense of accomplishment, hoping against hope for a decent dessert. Unfortunately, he must have overdone the polite appreciative noises, because Mother Beatrice immediately served him a second helping. Owen smiled bravely down at his heaped plate, chewed his way slowly through something very like scarlet seaweed, and listened to Mother Beatrice talk about the planet’s history so he wouldn’t have to think about what he was eating.
    The Mission had originally been nothing more than a very basic hospital and graveyard, in a clearing cut from the jungle with energy weapons and flamethrowers. It had to be renewed daily, or the jungle crept back. There was a landing pad just big enough for one ship to land and take off. A lot of the colonists had died at first. The shock of the disease, the diagnosis, and being dumped on Lachrymae Christi was simply too much for many people, and they just lay down and died.
    The lepers had to bury their own dead. No one but them ever touched foot on the leper planet. The graveyard quickly became overcrowded, so the colonists let the jungle take it back. The plants consumed the bodies overnight, so no one had to watch. There were still headstones, with names and dates. For the comfort