The balloon I'd been holding inside my chest suddenly lost all its air. I sank back down into my seat. "It's that red furry stuff, isn't it? I was afraid of this. I gave him terramycin, but I didn't know what else I could do-"
Danny Anderson sat down opposite me. He put his hand on my shoulder again. "Hey!" he interrupted. "I thought I told you to knock that off."
I gulped. "I'm sorry, sir. It's just-so damned frustrating! I mean-he's been like a dad to me, and-" I looked up at him. "Well-you know what he's like-"
"No," he said, coldly. "I don't."
"Huh-?"
"Don't worry about it, McCarthy." There was something hard in his voice. "That's not your concern."
"Oh. Uh-yes, sir. I-" shut up. And wondered.
"Listen to me," he said. "What's done is done. This is it. This is how it turned out. Like it or not.
"So stop arguing against me inside your head and let me congratulate you. The video that you and Colonel Tirelli brought back with you may be the most important recordings we've got. Those bunnydogs are incredible!"
I swallowed hard. I said, "I think they may be the next step of the invasion."
"I won't argue with you, Lieutenant. You had more opportunity to observe the creatures than anyone else."
"Yes sir.
"Now, I know you're tired and sore. I know you're probably hungry for a decent meal, a hot bath and a bed. We've got all of those waiting for you. But first-we want to debrief you while it's all still fresh in your memory. Can you manage that?"
I nodded. "Get me a pitcher of coffee and a straw, and I'm yours. No, better make that an IV bottle."
"Sorry, no coffee. We have tea and cocoa."
"No coffee?"
He shook his head. "Not at thirty caseys for a half-kilo of beans."
"The bean-rot?"
He nodded. "Congress closed the border. The only coffee you're going to get from now on will be greenhouse-bean. If you can afford it."
"I'll have the cocoa, thanks."
"Good. Now, we're going to set you up in one of the cabins with a standard ECO-6 debriefing program and two technicians. I'll try and stick my head in for a while too. Will that work for you?"
I nodded.
"Good." He clapped my shoulder. "Ready to go?"
"I'll need something for my cough. An 0-mask?"
"I'll have the doctor bring whatever you need."
"Thank you, sir." I stood up and followed him aft.
I made it almost three-quarters of the way through the debriefing before I started coughing and passed out.
THIRTY
I WOKE up again in the ambulance. We were slowing. There was something happening outside.
I could hear someone with a bullhorn trying to give instructions to a crowd. They weren't listening. Scattered voices were hollering their defiance. I wondered if they were turning into a mob.
I wondered where I was.
I was flat on my back, staring at a plastic ceiling. I turned my head. A curtained window. I raised a hand. My chest ached. I pushed the curtain open.
The day was still pink, the air, the sky-
There were frightened people everywhere. On the lawns, on the driveways, and most of all, crowded around the emergency entrance. Some of them had been waiting all night for treatment. They looked tired and drawn. Their eyes were red, their faces were puffy. Was this turning into another plague? Would this be the one that finally destroyed our ability to resist?
And then the ambulance was stopping and the orderlies slid me out like a side of beef and onto a cart. Somebody in white grabbed hold behind me, and then we were moving-quickly-through a sea of painful, anxious faces. Somebody else was parting the crowds ahead of us. I turned my head to look at them. The people were huddling in the entrance hall, five deep. They were lined up in ragged formations, waiting. I thought I saw military guards. Were we under attack? No, those were riot helmets.
The hospital was a nightmare.
It was a wall of noise-children crying, people arguing, somebody screaming. The sound pressed in like an assault; each component voice was edged with hysteria. A woman was shrieking with rage-
-the cart lurched. And nearly toppled. The shrieking woman had grabbed it. She was screaming in my face. She yanked the blanket off me- "See! Another goddamn soldier! I knew it! The military is getting preferential treatment! They're going to let the rest of us die-!" And then they were pulling her off me, and the cart was rolling again, faster than before.
I didn't see what happened to her.
I heard voices. They were arguing about me. We were stopped again.
"-I can't do anything more for him than's already been done. Give him a shot and an inhaler and send him home to rest-"
"With third-degree pink lung?"
"When it turns into dust poisoning bring him back-"
"I'm not paid to take them home. I only deliver the meat-and this one's already signed in. He's got an army A-plus priority, and your Chief of Surgery already accepted delivery."
"Did they also tell you where the hell we're going to put him? The halls are already full of air mattresses-"
"That's not my problem. Here, read his chart-"
"I can't do this! I'll have to pull the plug on someone else-"
"That's not my problem."
Suddenly, someone bent her face close to mine. She looked tired and angry. "Open your eyes!" she demanded. "Can you move?" I couldn't even speak. I made a noise-not even strong enough to be a moan. It turned into a cough. It came out pink.
I think I won the argument.
Now the cart was rolling again, this time faster than before-came awake again as they were sliding me onto a bed. I blinked through tears of pain, turned my head and squinted at the light.
This was a private room!
I tried to protest, but I didn't have even enough air to croak. I pointed toward the door, the unseen crowds, and waved my hand frantically-despite the pain it cost me.
The nurse just pushed me back down and said, "No, you don't. Your job is to be here now." He was a chubby little man with a well-scrubbed face. He could have been anywhere between thirty and fifty. He looked like someone's maiden aunt, but he had surprisingly strong arms. He held me down and pushed a breathing mask onto my nose and mouth. "Now, just relax-" he said. "I'll be right here the whole time."
I was dimly aware that something was happening. There were other people in the room now.
Something bit my arm. I let go and floated. And waited to see if I was going to die.
I watched from above while they poked, they prodded, and they scanned. They set me up for DX studies and the Kelley series of broad-band vaccines, processes and affirmations. Then they "vacuumed" my lungs-which turned out to be nowhere near as painful as it sounded-and put me in an oxygen-helium tent.
And then they left me alone. I floated and waited.
The reaction set in the next morning.
I woke up somewhere on the other side of death. I was trying to fight my way back, but I was smothering in marshmallow. I couldn't breathe.
There were alarm bells ringing all around me. Sometime in the night, my lungs had decided enough was enough and begun to inflame.
My chest was a balloon.
I was trying to breathe. Nothing was happening. I was trying to scream, but no noise was coming out of my throat either. There was no air to scream with. Even as I thrashed on the bed, I knew I was doing the wrong thing.
And then something cold touched my arm-and something bit me on the chest-and something wet was sliding down my throat-I faded out.
And in again.
I still couldn't breathe. I faded out again. And in. And out. I lost count.