He paused, like a college lecturer who knows when to give his students time to absorb a nodal point in their instruction.
“I have informed your colleagues that only one course of action is available to you, and of course we will offer you a couple of hours to adjust your mind to these new realities. It boils down to this: We will send you back in there, loaded with contagions that we have prepared for just this purpose. Whereas the technology of the squatter community has not progressed beyond the primitive skin-puncture delivery systems of the mosquito, ours spreads through a modified rhinovirus via skin contact and then to the mucus membranes. Death follows in forty-eight hours as the lungs clog up with fluids. When the contagion spreads amongst the residents, they’ll have no option but to come streaming out of there like rats from a burning warehouse. We’ll have specially prepared containment hangars ready for them. Their bodies will be disposed of safely, with no risk of further contamination. It should take about a fortnight. From the very start, we shall announce the outbreak of an epidemic of catastrophic proportions and declare to the world that for the sake of the entire human species we will have no option but to raze and sterilize the entire area...”
Bureau Chief Mana raised her hand. “Excuse me, sir, but how will you defend this action in the eyes of the international community? Whatever justification you offer, however catastrophic the disease, human beings cannot be destroyed like poultry at the time of the avian flu epidemic! This action will be defined as a planned genocide, with severe economic sanctions to follow—”
“We shall refer to it as culling,” said the man, cutting in swiftly, before Mana could build up steam. “You are familiar with the term, no doubt? It belongs to the era of big game hunting, when licenses were issued for thinning out herds of animals whose populations were rising too steeply in game sanctuaries. But we shall redefine the word to mean, Removing a percentage of the human population so that the species as a whole might survive. It is a useful word. We hope to make it very popular.”
He turned back to Dome.
“You realize, I am sure, that you will be a martyr to our nation’s greater glory. Not that your role can ever be acknowledged: This entire operation, including your trip this morning to the Acres, has already been erased from the record. Even as we speak your copilot is having the memory of his flight flushed from his brain. You cannot have any contact with your parents before you vanish from their lives forever, apparently in a tragic encounter with enemy agents. However, your service record tells me that you are a model citizen, for which reason I do not doubt that in your final moments, you will find tremendous satisfaction in the knowledge that your name will be honored and that your family will benefit to the tune of...” He mentioned a very handsome sum.
The interior of Dome’s head had filled with a loud buzzing sound, but aside from that he felt very little. The initial shock he had experienced upon hearing the news had dissipated. He felt detached, as if he were listening to a recitation about someone else’s life, a stranger on the evening news, the synopsis of a tri-vid.
The man continued: “Of course, in case this option does not appeal to you, there is one other we can offer. You can choose to be extinguished immediately and painlessly.” He paused once more. “After which your body will replace the one you saw this morning.” He smiled mirthlessly.
When Dome woke again, he found that he had been sealed within a heavy sack. He was lying on his side. Naked. He could see nothing at all. He wondered whether he’d gone blind. He felt utterly limp; disinclined to engage with the hectic activity he could sense taking place around him, outside the bag.
He was being pulled this way and that, then hands were reaching around the bag, patting it down in order to determine his position within it. Many voices were speaking all at once, some giving instructions, some passing comments, some complaining. The complainers were louder, perhaps because they were not actively engaged in pulling.
“Leave it — leave it! Whatever’s in there, it can only be more trouble for us—”
“No. We take all the rest of their garbage. This is just another part of it—”
“How do we know it’s a living being? Maybe it’s just one of their new machines—”
“Maybe it’s a monster, come to eat all of us alive...”
In amongst all the hubbub and the tugging, some hands located Dome’s head and began to reposition him so that he was in a roughly seated position, on the ground.
“Knife — knife — who has a knife? We’ll have to cut the bag open.”
Children took up the cry, calling in piping voices, “Knife — knife — someone bring a knife...”
Inside the bag, Dome was experiencing the unfamiliar sensation of being drenched in sweat. He could not remember the last time he had ever felt so unbearably hot. And the air! Even through the sack he could taste its rasping texture.
Thick. Sulfurous. Gritty.
He used his hands to push the heavy material, a mixture of leather and plastic, away from his face. “Here!” he called.
His throat felt as if it had been scrubbed with sandpaper, producing only a shadowy whisper of sound. “I have a knife!”
His whisker had been left to him, looped around his wrist.
Releasing the slender, razor-sharp tip of the instrument, he sliced through the skin of his confining sack and wiggled his head through the resulting slit. Then he collapsed on his side, gasping painfully. The light from half-a-dozen hissing gas lanterns blinded him.
Arms and hands reached out to hold him up once more.
Tumblers of water were pushed toward his mouth. All around him were the faces of strangers, thrust toward him, their skin glistening with sweat, their eyes agog with a combination of concern and curiosity. He could smell their breath, their sweat, their unwashed clothes.
“Don’t—” gasped Dome, his voice hoarse, “Don’t get close to me. Mustn’t... mustn’t touch me... Stay back!”
But they misunderstood him.
“See! He’s afraid of us — us! What a chickenheart — what a dickhead...”
The language they used was similar to what the man beside the morning’s corpse had spoken, an amalgamation of many tongues. Dome could understand some words better than others. There were even a few Hinglish phrases woven in amongst the medley.
Raucous gusts of laughter rippled through the gathered crowd as they ridiculed him for his fears, and pitied him too. Here he was, abandoned to their care, a naked stranger and — trying to push them away! The glasses of water were shoved ever more insistently toward his mouth. Hands were reaching to pull away the bag in which he had come, to free him completely from its grip, even as another cry went out for cloth, a plastic sheet, anything to cover the stranger’s nakedness.
A fit of violent coughing convulsed him. His joints felt spongy with weakness.