Did I even have to ask?
Everything we were doing-it was only valuable if we could get safely back. Would we be able to do that? How thick was the dust outside? How fast would it congeal into goo? Would we be buried in it? Or just find ourselves so stuck that we couldn't get out? The vehicle might be glued to the landscape by tomorrow. Would they pick us up if we tried to call for a chopper?
More important, would anyone look at the data that we'd gathered?
Or was my name so poisoned now that they'd flush away our samples without looking at them, simply because my name was attached?
What was General Wainright doing? What did Dannenfelser have planned for me next? And what would Dr. Zymph have to say? Nothing printable, I'm sure.
Most important of all, what would Lizard do? What could I say to her? What could I do to make it better?
I'd gone too far three times in a row now. I had this dreadful feeling
I lay back down on the bunk again. I was buzzing more ferociously than ever. What had I done the last time I had felt this crazy? I didn't know. I couldn't remember ever having been this crazy-no, that wasn't right. I had been crazier than this. Much crazier. But this time, I wasn't enjoying it.
"I don't know," I said. "I just don't know."
And then I heard Foreman's voice in my head. "I got it. You don't know. But if you did know… what would you know?"
"No," I said. "I really don't know."
"I hear you," he replied, laughing. "But if you really did know… what would you know?"
Despite myself, I laughed. Last time, I'd felt so terribly trapped and desperate, I'd written over a hundred limericks, some of them so awful that even I was embarrassed to read them.
Writing limericks hadn't cured my craziness; it had only channeled it into a more socially acceptable behavior. That was the joke. Dr. Davidson once told me that there is no real sanity. All that anyone ever learns to do is fake it so well that other people don't find out the truth.
Limericks. Dumb idea. Still-it was something to do. Something to distract me.
What could I rhyme with Marano? Nothing. I'd have to try the first name.
Sex as performed at Miss Lydia's is usually quaint and fastidious, and even the price is said to be nice, except, of course, when it's hideous.
Sooner or later, I was going to have to find a second rhyme for Willig.
I fell asleep before I could think of one.
The stingfly is a perfect example of parallel evolution. The creature is the Chtorran equivalent of the anopheles mosquito. It is smaller, faster, and much more voracious, but it is the functional equivalent of its Terran counterpart.
The stingfly bites its victim, it injects an anticoagulant, it sucks blood (or whatever body fluid serves the purpose of blood in Chtorran organisms), it picks up bacteria and viruses, and it delivers them directly to its next target.
The stingfly has an extremely rapid metabolism. Because of its small size and rapid growth, it must feed again and again throughout the day. In a twenty-four-hour period, the stingfly is capable of biting and infecting as many as a hundred different individual animals, both Chtorran and Terran. The stingfly appears to be the primary mechanism for the spread of Chtorran microorganisms.
As a result, it is an extremely efficient vector of disease. At this writing, most scientists believe that the stingfly was the original agent by which the Chtorran plagues were introduced into the human population.
—The Red Book,
(Release 22.19A)
Chapter 21
Playback
"The trouble with picking up cats is that they always run to the bottom."
-SOLOMON SHORT
Willig, the unrhymable, shook me awake gently. "Captain McCarthy?"
"Huh-? What?" Trying to sit up, I banged my head on the upper bunk. I rolled out sideways, still rubbing my forehead. "What time is it?"
"It's seven-thirty. Nothing was happening, so we let you sleep."
"I wish you hadn't-"
"You needed the rest."
"'Scuse me? The army I'm in, captains get to give orders to corporals."
"Add it to the list of charges at my court-martial. I'd have let you sleep longer, but-"
"What happened?"
"Nothing yet. We got the prowler recharged and reloaded. I thought for sure the noise would have awakened you. We got it back down the hole at six-thirty in the ayem. The LI took it all the way down without any problem. We've already got half the wideband probes on-line. Siegel is placing the rest."
"But-?"
"We've got something moving topside. It's still below the horizon-"
"How's the dust?"
"It stopped coming down some time last night. The day is clear. Visibility out to the edge. The landscape looks so pink, you almost expect to see the Emerald City in the distance."
"And?" I prompted. I was already heading forward.
Willig followed. "We've got dust plumes in the distance. Analysis suggests three separate objects."
I tapped Locke out of the chair at my station. "Let's have a look."
Locke pointed from behind my left shoulder. "There, and there-"
"I see."
"Is that worms?"
"It's consistent with worms," I acknowledged. "But it could just as easily be jeeps or humvees. Or crazy bikers. Or bandits."
"Uh-uh," said Willig. "No sane person would go out in this shit."
"Well, that narrows it down to only two billion survivors. There aren't any sane people anymore."
"You know what I mean."
"Ever hear of renegades?" Willig stopped arguing.
"But," I added, "the odds do favor worms. This is a worm neighborhood, not a human one. Have you got a track on them?"
Locke reached past my shoulder and tapped a button. "Here's the map, here's the overlay. See? They're tacking back and forth, but always moving steadily northeast. They'll be here within the hour."
"Good," I said. "That gives me time for breakfast." I pushed away from the console and swiveled to look at Willig. "I'll have bacon and eggs, eggs over hard, bacon crisp, a large orange juice, white toast with soft cream cheese and strawberry jelly. Grapefruit sections in syrup. And peel me three grapes."
"You'll have what the enlisted men are eating," Willig said. "It's brown. It's gooey. And there's no shortage of it."
"Well, it was worth a try." I turned back to Locke. "How long have you been on shift?"
"Only an hour."
"Okay, you go topside and man the turret. If Reilly's awake, put him in the other bubble. Charge the weapons. We'll use cold rockets and tangle-sprays. Until it settles, the pink stuff is still fairly explosive."
"You want to put a spybird up?" Willig asked.
I thought about it. I scratched my head. I stuck a finger in my ear and wiggled it. I smoothed my hair. I scratched my cheek. I needed a shave. My butt itched. I wanted a shower. I looked up at her and said, "Nah. We'd probably lose it in the dust, and we may need it later. Let's just sit tight. Siegel? Anything happening in the nest?"
Siegel didn't answer immediately. He looked like he was searching for the right words-and failing.
"What?" I asked.
"Uh-something kinda weird. I don't know how to explain it."
"Don't panic. Everything's kinda weird. Let me see the playback-" I reached overhead and pulled the VR helmet down. I dropped back down into cyberspace with surprising ease. Today the Chtorran nest didn't seem quite so alien; I didn't know if that was good or bad.
The view was of the same nest of slugs, or maybe it was a different one. They still looked like hairless baby worms. But I'd seen a baby worm fresh out of its shell; it had been born-hatched?-with hair. So, whatever these were, they had to be embryonic or… something.