A tiny Gaea… a self-regulating ecosphere scaled in ice, revived when the sun’s licking warmth came to briefly banish the long night… and perhaps trillions of others, too, swooping in from the far dark… He would have to mull that one over, if he ever got a spare second…
“My, how serene.” Virginia’s lilting, affectionate sarcasm cut through his musing.
“Um? No, just my ritual worrying.” He sat up, feeling dull aches rearrange themselves in his legs and back, even in the faint gravity.
Virginia sat beside him on the narrow bench that was the only furniture in sleep slot 1’s observing room. In the pale enameled light he studied her with wonder. She was trim and sure, her milky green pullover covering but not concealing a flat stomach, breasts hard and high, a muscular calm. The septic certainty of the room numbed his senses, but she redeemed that with a soft warming presence, calling up memories of humid, spice-laden Hawaiian air. Yet she likens herself to her machines, cool and cyborg-certain. How wrong!
The quiet comfort of being with her reminded him of other days, of cramped apartments, gas flames licking the dark as friends talked far into the night, meals of peppery meats and crisp onions, an enfolding sense of an enduring natural order—
He cut off the thought. Nostalgia clutched him sweetly with hollow, fuzzy fingers whenever he let it, and this was most certainly not the time.
Virginia said lightly, “You look like something the cat dragged in.” She scratched the back of his neck.
“You can’t turn my head with mere compliments.” He rubbed his eyes. “Besides, we have no cat.”
“Lucky we didn’t thaw the pets right away. Or would they be susceptible?”
“Of course. These viroids love lung tissue—I suspect some spread through the air.”
“So Spot and Fluffy would buy the farm, too.”
“Definitely.”
He did not mention that he and Matsudo had thawed some rabbits and monkeys already—had to, for tests of new treatments. Of course the poor creatures had to be sacrificed. He had never been able to do that without a twinge of guilt. Yet you chose to be a biologist.
She looked out through the transparent wall, to where several suited figures labored over pale, waxy bodies. “If we could just stop the stuff from spreading! Particularly that green gunk climbing the walls—it gives me the shivers.”
“I suspect the algoids and lichenoids aren’t the true danger.”
“They’re spreading so fast!”
“There are so many variants, it’s difficult to control them even with the microwaves. But we’re making progress.”
She wrinkled her nose. “The stuff smells.”
An introspective, distant smile creased his leathery skin. “Aesthetics come later. If ever.”
Virginia frowned. “Do you think you’re learning… well… fast enough?”
“My father always said that life was like giving a violin concert while you are learning the instrument.”
She grinned. “And while everyone you care bout is watching.”
“Quite so.” He was aware that Virginia was trying to cheer him up, but a more sunny smile would not do it. He was familiar with his own moods, the fitful depressions that had come more regularly these last few years.
Not that he did not have ample cause now, of course. With more self-knowledge than he would have liked, he understood his own brooding as another evasion. Ever since the fall of Jerusalem, he had found it far easier to meditate, to pontificate, than to throw himself fully into the raw world, to feel all its stings and scrapes. He still needed the security of his emotional calluses.
Virginia had seen his mood. She put her hand in his and said softly, “I know…” He squeezed her hand. “If there’s anything—”
“Get this straightened out,” a thin man said loudly as he came into the room with Suleiman Ould-Harrad. “Damned if I’ll let them play the angles while we sit on our asses.”
Linbarger nodded toward them, his lean face self-involved. “I figure it’s obvious—we’ve got to keep normal people on top, where they can see everything’s run right. We can’t let the Percells move up! If the casualty rate keeps on this way, they’ll outnumber us, maybe even two to one. Unless we hold the commanding positions, they’ll make every decision, run right over our interests.”
Ould-Harrad looked embarrassed. “I will have to confer.”
“No conferring to it! This is an executive decision, you have to do it. Start taking a vote and we’ll be goners.”
Saul grimaced. “Is this what it sounds like?”
Linbarger turned, hands on hips. “I’m trying to make sure our people don’t lose control of the situatio.”
“Our people?”
“Right. You heard? Oakes has that sky-high fever, the one that fries the brain in a couple hours. She’s going into a slot right away.”
Saul said, “Oh damn,” and sat down. Maybe I should’ve spent more time in sick bay. I might’ve made a difference…
“Someone has to do the research,” Virginia whispered, as if reading his thoughts.
Bethany Oakes had been barely adequate in these last few days, but at least she had been the obvious successor to Miguel Cruz. Continuity was important.
After Major Lopez was slotted, skin half-gnawed away by some slimy fungus, Ould-Harrad had been pulled…and now dropped into a command position no one could envy. The tall, rangy black man had never been more than the nominally senior of the five section heads. He carried no cachet of command. Certainly the dour African had not been selected for his skill at balancing political forces and quieting clever loudmouths.
Linbarger nodded, licking his lips. “Pretty fine mess, huh? It’s either the fever or the chills with the blue spots all over you, or else that shaking thing—all of ’em fatal.”
“I believe I’ve isolated the agent that causes the chilling disease,” Saul said quietly. “A vaccine should take only a few days. The skin infections show signs of vulnerability to microwave.”
“But there’re eight or ten diseases already!” Linbarger shouted. “And that’s just the ones we know of. That we can spot easily.”
Saul looked into the man’s pinched, anxious face and read there something that felt like a cold draft let into the room.
“There are some promising measures for the rest. That’s all I can tell you right now.” He glanced at Ould-Harrad. Take the wind out of this fellow’s sails, Saul thought, as if to will the African into action. But Ould-Harrad remained impassive, eyes distant, his arms folded across his broad chest.
Linbarger seemed to feel he was gaining momentum, winning an argument. He looked at the two men, ignoring Virginia. “With Lominatze out there getting iced” —he pointed at the transparent wall— “and Byrnes and Matsudo headed there before long, that means Percells are going to be running both Power Systems and Tunnels and Gases.”
Saul said formally to Ould-Harrad, “May I ask why Dr. Linbarger is at this meeting?”
The tall black man’s face took on a wary, diplomatic cast. “I felt each, ah, faction in the crew should be represented in making slotting decisions.”
“Yeah,” Linbarger said. “That’s why she’s here.”
Saul looked at Virginia. “Oh? You came at Ould-Harrad’s request?”
She nodded. “I was free. Most Percells are either asleep or working in the tunnels. Or sick,” she added pointedly.
“I’m taking a risk just being in the same room with her,” Linbarger muttered.
“No one’s assigned vectors for most of the diseases,” Saul said carefully, restraining his rising irritation. “There’s no reason to believe the genetically augmented people carry anything.”