Michaelson said, “Sir, I was on duty at Lab Dome vehicle bay airlock. Ms. Rhinehart and Dr. Glamever didn’t leave that way.”
Major Duncan said, “Sergeant Hillson led the hunting party, sir. He says that tracks indicate Rhinehart and Glamet^vor¡ left through the Enclave Dome southwest airlock.”
Out of sight of the main route between the domes and the Settler gardens. Jason said, “Who was patrolling the Enclave southwest airlock?”
A soldier spoke. “I was, sir.”
Private Perry. He’d screwed up before. Jason said, “Do the other three of you have any information to add about this?”
A chorus of “No, sirs.”
“Dismissed.”
They left. Jason said to Perry, “Well?”
“I’m sorry, sir, I don’t know how it happened but it won’t—”
“You don’t know how it happened? Where were you that you didn’t see them leave?”
“I… I did see them leave, sir. They said they were going to help the Settlers digging the vegetable garden around the other side of the dome and—”
“The vegetable garden? Was the prisoner-at-large there, as well?” Jason, who’d had to do something with the captured New America kid, Tommy Mills, had finally decided to label him a prisoner-at-large and set him to work with shovel and hoe under the watchful eyes of the perimeter patrol. But if Mills had somehow escaped and waited in ambush in the woods…
Perry said, “Yeah, Mills was there. Anyways, when those two said they were exiting the dome to go help dig some damn garden, I believed them. I mean, they believe in all that stuff, right? The Reddie’s a fucking Worlder!”
Jason stared at Perry, whose brief puff of self-justifying and racist bombast dissipated like dandelion fluff in a gale. Jason said, “Private, you are confined to quarters until further notice. Dismissed.”
“Yes, sir.” Perry slunk out.
Duncan said, “Sir, if you’ll permit me, they were only able to exit the airlock because Dr. Glamet^vor¡ was digitally and retinally approved for the bird lab, which shares the same security program. I have said before that we need tighter security.”
“Security is arranged to keep the enemy out, not our scientists in.” And doing anything else would be incredibly cumbersome. Some scientists and soldiers went between the domes half a dozen times each day. Half of Monterey Base’s inhabitants weren’t military, and that was before counting Colin’s Settlers. In such close quarters, it was impossible to physically separate facilities for Army and civilians, as would have been done on a pre-Collapse post, and how much martial law would the civilians tolerate before they rebelled? Especially since the arrival of Settlers who recognized no military necessities?
Jason hadn’t even been able to convince his own wife of military necessities.
He said to Duncan, “I’ll take it under advisement.”
“Yes, sir.”
Hillson’s voice sounded in his earplant. “Sir, permission to come up. I talked to more of the hunting party, and I think there’s something else you should hear.”
“Proceed to command post, Sergeant.”
Now what?
The lab tech had done a good job of staining the brain-tissue slides. The microglials were tiny round purple-and-pink balls packed between neurons. Astrocytes shaped like stars, oligodendrocytes with their spidery, irregular tendrils. All were glia cells, which played important roles in brain development, functioning, and recovery from injury.
There were too many of them. Way, way too many.
Toni said, “No signs of previous injury to either of their brains, before the bear.”
Brain injury caused a proliferation of some glials, which then carted away dead or injured neurons. Other types of glials released chemicals that “pruned” excess synapses to create more efficient communication among neurons. That happened primarily during embryonic development and again during adolescence, when the frontal cortex was rewiring itself for adult functioning. Too much pruning of synapses could lead to such brain diseases as Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s.
But neither Glamet^vor¡ nor Kayla Rhinehart were embryos, adolescents, or victims of neurological disorders. Although—
Toni said, “Kayla’s bipolar disorder may have been worsened by whatever is going on with all these glials, but Marianne said she was probably bipolar all along, even before the spore cloud hit World. And nobody ever said there was any anomaly in Glamet^vor¡’s thinking.”
“But we’ve had R. sporii here for over thirty years and nobody ever reported anything like this!”
“No. But World wasn’t exposed to only R. sporii.”
Then Zack saw it.
The virophage. Everyone on World had been exposed to the virophage, which killed R. sporii. But what else did it do in the bodies of its new hosts? Microbes that modified brain structure and functioning filled a long list: rabies, tertiary syphilis, toxoplasmosis, even Lyme disease. R. sporii itself had modified fetuses to produce enhanced auditory abilities in infants like Colin Jenner. But no one had ever seen a microbe that caused such unrestrained multiplication of glial cells, which could be as destructive to brain tissue as it could be useful.
He said, “Has anyone detected C1q or C4 or—”
“That’s the next step,” Marianne said. Her face looked gray. The lab techs stood awkwardly by their benches, listening but not saying anything.
Glial cells released complex cascades of a variety of proteins. Some signaled synapse pruning to begin; other molecules caused synapses to form. Zack wanted to know—and it seemed to him that he’d never wanted to know anything more in his life—what this promiscuous proliferation of glials was doing to brain neurons. Kayla and Glamet^vor¡ could not tell him. He would have to depend on the presence, absence, and amounts of the molecules that glials produced.
Then, all at once, he wanted to know something else even more.
“Marianne—was the virophage on World transmitted only by breathing it in? Is person-to-person transmission possible?” Are we all going to get it?
Marianne said, “I don’t know. We left World soon after the virophage was released. And for all these weeks, I didn’t know we… but everyone from the ship has been having headaches. I still do, but much fainter than before.”
“Any other symptoms?” Zack could barely get the words out.
“Well, I seem to sleep longer.”
Headaches.
Sleep.
The plasticity of developing brains, due in part to the presence of glial-produced molecules almost never found in healthy adult brains. But not just in fetuses, either.
Zack said slowly, “I think person-to-person transmission of the virophage may be possible. We need… we need to check out all the children in both domes. Ask their parents about headaches and oversleeping and any changes in behavior.
“Now. Right away. Now.”
Hoofbeats drummed across his brain. Zebra.
Hillson appeared in the command post with Private William Landry. A troublemaker, Landry was one of those who’d never gotten over the loss of what he referred to as “the real army,” in which he’d been a lifer. In his forties, he’d seen action in Brazil; he acquitted himself well in ground war but chafed under the off-again, on-again, mostly remote war with New America. Jason had inherited him along with the base, and neither liked nor trusted him. But Landry was the best shot on base and always included in the hunting parties.
Hillson said, “Sir, Private Landry was the first one to spot the bodies of Kayla Rhinehart and the Worlder scientist. He reports something strange.”