by Cat Rambo
“Hans were weecun seeum,” a familiar voice behind Sage commanded.
She raised her hands and turned to face the security guard who’d taken her DozAll.
Two people wearing cobalt blue staff attire stormed into Iris’s room. “Where the hell did she get a gun?” one asked.
“Better letum know,” the other said. The first speaker left.
“Sage Dottir.” The guard steepled their fingers in front of their face and tapped their index fingers together. “Did yew do this?”
Sage kept her eyes on the security guard. “No.”
“Doctor Claire to hospice, Doctor Claire to hospice,” came through the announcement system.
“Then whatcha doin heah?” security asked Sage.
Sage lowered her hands and pointed at Iris’s body. “Visiting my mother,” she said evenly. “She asked me to find Doctor Pahvray.” Dizziness hit and for a moment she was somewhere—anywhere—else.
“—ta quiz ya,” the security guard was saying.
“Doctor Poivre to hospice, Doctor Poivre to hospice,” was announced overhead.
“Doctor Pahvray is here, then?” Sage took a deep breath, steadying herself.
“Didja heah whadah sed?” the guard asked.
Sage shook her head.
An older, androgynous, mesendo wearing azure blue scrubs and using a forearm walking crutch limped into the room. “I’m Doctor Poivre,” they said to the staff.
“Ah’m takin this one inta custody fer suspicion ov bringin a weapon inta the hostibal,” the guard said.
“You’re Iris’s child?” Poivre asked Sage.
“Sage Dottir,” she confirmed. “You’re Doctor Pahvray?”
“Poivre. French for pepper. I’ll take it from here,” Poivre told the guard. “Sage Dottir is with me. I’ll need a team to bring the body to the morgue.”
“You ain got the thority, Doc,” the guard said as they placed themself between Poivre and Sage.
Poivre looked skyward and took a loud nasal breath. “Get me the authority,” they ordered the guard.
“Then ahma cuff huh while sheez inda hostibal,” the guard insisted. “Whatchew do with huh in the morgue is yoh bizniz.”
Sage stood, hands cuffed behind her, security’s hand gripping her arm. In the elevator, while Iris’s body was being transported, Sage pushed against the cuffs. If she pushed harder, she could free herself.
Doctor Poivre caught her eye and gave her a quizzical look.
Sage desisted.
The security guard escorted them to the hospital morgue and left Sage in the doctor’s custody. “I be back fo my cuffs an ass huh some questions.”
Signage near one inner morgue door read, “Air Quality Alert. Authorized Personnel Only.” Poivre donned breather and goggles, then wheeled the gurney with Iris’s body into that area. When they returned, they removed the safety equipment and dropped it on a counter. “What happened, Sage Dottir?”
Under other circumstances, Sage would have found the morgue oppressive. Now, though, she was too angry. “Why is my birth mother dead?” she asked in a strained voice.
Poivre limped over, stood straight, and leaned in close to Sage. “Because you left a desperate woman alone with a loaded gun,” they whispered. “Why?”
Sage almost retched at the smell of decay and chemicals on Poivre’s clothing. She stepped back so she could see their face. “She wasn’t desperate.” Sage clenched her jaw. “Iris heals fast—always has.”
“I know,” Poivre said. “I want you to see something.”
“Can you uncuff me first?” Sage tilted her head toward her shoulder and stretched out her bound hands as far as she could.
“I don’t have the key.” Poivre stepped away.
Sage pushed against the handcuffs hard enough to snap the chain that held them together.
Poivre’s eyebrows raised and his mouth fell open. “You’re like her.”
She brought her hands to the front and twisted the hinged metal cuffs until she broke them. Then she shook out her wrists. “What does this thing you want me to see have to do with my mother?”
A commotion broke out in the room Poivre had just left.
Sage ran to the door near the air quality warning. “Let me in there.” The door swung open into a short corridor that led to a second set of doors which only opened after the first shut. Inside, closed compartments housed the deceased. The pungent yet sweet smell of decaying bodies mixed with the odors of embalming chemicals and alcohol. Though her stomach felt queasy, she also felt stronger. Sage’s heads-up flashed purple. Her BauBax self-adjusted for the colder temperature. Iris’s body thrashed on the gurney. “I’m here, Mom!”
The doctor joined them a moment later, breather and goggles in place. They unzipped the body bag and uncovered Iris’s head. “This is Doctor Poivre. If you can hear me, stop moving so I can examine you.” They glanced at Sage. “Breather,” they noted.
Sage put her hand to her face to confirm Poivre’s reminder. The RespiMask™ was not made for the Unhealthy air. She took a deep breath and found it tart but tolerable.
Iris became still.
“Come look at this.” Poivre activated a light above their goggle lenses and shone it at the top of Iris’s head along the bullet’s exit path. Poivre brought their head close to Iris’s. They ran their hands over her scalp as if inspecting each of her hairs.
Sage removed her goggles and stared agape as the hole closed. She gulped.
“I’ve been working on something. Thanks to your mother, I’ve had a breakthrough. I gave her an injection earlier. If it works, she’ll come around in a while.”
“How long is ‘a while?’”
“An hour or so.”
“If it doesn’t work?”
Poivre turned off the head lamp. “I’ll have to do more research.”
“Anything I can do?” She replaced her goggles.
The doctor stood up and leaned on their crutch. “Iris told me a bit about her abilities. My specialties are pathology and genomics. I’d like to do some tests on you—”
“No!” Sage shook her head. “Until we have a resolution for Iris, nothing else.”
“Perhaps afterward?”
“First things first, Doc. Then we’ll see.”
Poivre shrugged. “I’d still like to show you something.” They gestured for Sage to precede them out of the cold room.
In the office-turned-wet-lab, glassware and scientific equipment covered a counter. Poivre took a vial of blood from their chest pocket and added a drop to a clear solution in a beaker. They stirred the mixture with a glass rod, then held it up to the light.
In a moment, the doctor grinned. “Did you see that?”
“See what, Doctor Poivre?”
Poivre poured a small amount of the clear liquid into another beaker. “Watch.” They added a single drop of blood from the vial. It became clear in the beaker.
“What is it?”
“The cure to all disease.” They poured the rest of the clear liquid into two brown bottles which they closed with eyedroppers. “Courtesy of your mother.”
“Great.” Sage headed back to the doors to the cold room. “I should be in there with her.”
The doors opened as she approached them.
Sage’s heads-up never left the purple range. After an hour, she sat on the floor near Iris’s gurney. This isn’t working. Still, she waited. Every now and then, Sage studied the shrinking hole in Iris’s skull. A small amount of bloody liquid oozed out. “I’m here with you, Mom.”
Around midnight Sage nodded off. She startled awake when she heard, “Kif?” Her heads-up read 4:20 a.m. “Mom?”
Iris shook the body bag off of her shoulders and sat up on the gurney. “Why is it so cold in here?”
Sage sprang to her feet. “Iris?�
�
“Am I alive, Kif?” Iris asked.
“DOCTOR POIVRE!” Sage crossed to Iris’s gurney. Astonished, she peered at her birth mother’s head and neck. Other than dried ooze, no signs remained of the recent violence her body had endured. There was nothing frail about the strong woman who sat before her now. Sage wrapped her arms around her birth mother to warm her.
“It stinks in here,” Iris said.
Sage took off her goggles and helped her birth mother put them on. “They don’t waste clean air on dead people, Iris.”
“Hell, child,” Iris said, returning the goggles, “This is Gary. They don’t waste clean air on the living.”
Mother and daughter chuckled.
Poivre joined them. “Here.” They put a small pile of things on the gurney. “Breather, goggles, and a thermal jumpsuit. I hope it’s a good fit.” They turned on their headlamp and examined Iris’s head and throat. Nodding to themself, they headed toward the exit. “Get dressed, then we’ll talk.”
Sage helped her mother out of the body bag and into the new outfit. Like Sage, Iris wore the breather but left it off.
She and Iris followed Poivre’s route out of the corpse room.
In their office, Poivre yawned and stretched their arms overhead. Bags around their eyes suggested they hadn’t slept in a while. They gestured for the women to seat themselves.
Iris sat on one of the two empty chairs close to Poivre. Sage remained standing near the office door.
“It worked, Iris. Those super-efficient healing cells of yours had gone awry. I fixed them.” Poivre reached out and patted Iris’s hand. “Your cancer is gone. For good. From now on, the cells will heal you without trying to kill you.”
“That’s great news,” Iris said. “Now what?”
Poivre grinned. “Now I capitalize on this. Think of it—a world without cancer or disease.” They lifted one of the brown bottles. “There’ll be clinical trials before it can go to market, of course. In the meanwhile, I’ll finesse the formula and get a patent.”
Iris stood and shook Poivre’s hand. “Congratulations, Doctor. And thank you.”
“Then you won’t be needing Iris anymore?” Sage checked her heads-up. 5:06 a.m.
“Oh, I will. Unfortunately, the solution only works for diseases right now. With additional research, I believe it can become a true cure-all. However, it has a shelf life.” They held on to Iris’s hand. “Your mother is a commodity. She’ll be well taken care of in a special program for women like her—and you, I imagine.”
“Let Iris go.” Sage took a step into the room.
A laser scalpel appeared in Poivre’s free hand. “I just need to remove her MEputer.”
The mesecto on Conspiracy Theories was right, Sage thought. “You don’t,” she told Poivre.
“Stay back unless you want me to cut off her hand!” They brought the laser scalpel near Iris’s flesh. “It might grow back; it might not.” They ran the scalpel across Iris’s wrist just enough to wound her.
“Ouch!” Iris flinched but didn’t struggle against Poivre.
Sage met Iris’s eyes. Iris gave a slight nod. Sage was across the room in an instant. She slammed her fist against the doctor’s hand, pulverizing their bones.
Poivre dropped the scalpel and released Iris. “You ignorant bitches!”
Iris moved away from Poivre while Sage picked up the scalpel. She turned it off and stashed it in one of her BauBax pockets.
“Now I know why you helped me so much, Doctor Pahvray,” Iris said. “I’m thankful for it, but I’m nobody’s commodity.”
The morgue doors opened.
“So we’ll be going now,” Iris said.
“You’re going nowhere!” Poivre hoisted themself up on their crutch.
As if to emphasize Poivre’s statement, the security guard who’d cuffed Sage entered. When they saw Iris, they whipped out their taser and shot her.
Iris fell to the ground in convulsions.
“Why the fuck did you do that?” Sage dropped to her knees and yanked the electrodes out of Iris as the guard gaped.
“They attacked me,” Poivre told the guard. “After I helped them, that one,” they pointed their crutch at Sage, “did this,” they lifted their ruined hand, “for no good reason.”
Sage helped her mother stand.
Iris took a moment before speaking slowly. “Doctor Pahvray was going to remove my MEputer so they could put me in some experiment. Called me a ‘commodity.’”
The guard placed themself between the two sides. “Ahma fine out who be tellin’ me true and who be lyin.”
“They threatened to cut off my hand with a laser scalpel if I didn’t cooperate.” Iris held out her wrist for the guard to examine.
“Poivre wanted to remove my mother’s MEputer so they could experiment on her—like they’re doing with other women. Claimed my mother was the key to their cure for cancer.” Sage pulled the laser scalpel from her BauBax and offered it to the guard. “You scanned me when I got here. Look at your records for my ’puter and you’ll see where I’ve been and when. Then you tell me where I got this.”
The guard reholstered their taser and took the laser scalpel.
“Did yew bring a gun inta ma hostibal, Sage Dottir?”
“Yes.”
“And I used it to blow out an inoperable brain tumor,” Iris said. “Sage did it at my request.”
“Didja fine the cure fer cancer, Doc?”
“I did what I did for the good of all humanity! And I’d do it again! Women like her, with their powers and abilities, owe it to the rest of us! My experiments would bring so much fame and fortune to this hospital—no more begging for grant monies or research dollars. That ungrateful bitch wouldn’t even be alive if it weren’t for me!”
“Yew can go,” the guard told Sage and Iris.
“Like hell they can!” Poivre argued.
“Iris, you go ahead. I have some unfinished business with Doctor Poivre.”
“I made the mistake of trusting Pahvray once,” Iris said. “I’m not leaving anyone I care about alone with them.”
Poivre launched themself out of their chair, swinging their crutch like a weapon.
The guard pulled their taser. Sage got to Poivre first. With one hand, she grabbed their crutch and used it to pull them toward her. Sage slammed her other hand, full force, into their face.
Poivre sputtered then crumpled on the floor.
When Sage checked, Poivre was dead.
The guard grunted. “I ain goan say it wurnt self-defense, Sage Dottir, but now we gotsa problum.”
“Will you call the leos?”
“Ah should. But ah got dawters. Speshul ones even.”
“Can you get us out of here without an exit scan?”
“Mebbe. Woan mattuh lesson ah chainja ’putuh map.”
Sage grabbed the two brown bottles from Poivre’s office. “Here.” She offered them to the guard. “This is part of Poivre’s cure. I don’t know how it works.”
The guard hesitated before accepting.
“Now open the doors,” Sage said, nodding toward the corpse room.
“What about me?” Iris asked.
“Whatever the guard needs.”
Sage slung the doctor over her shoulder as though they were little more than a child. She carried them into the cold room and stuffed them in a body fridge. After one last look around, she returned to Iris and the guard. “Ready?”
They exchanged glances, then nodded.
The guard grabbed both Sage’s arm and Iris’s as though escorting unruly people out of the hospital, pulling them along without speaking. After countless corridors, they found themselves amidst chaotic busyness in the emergency department. The guard released them, nodding toward the door.
“The time now is 6:00 a.m. Curfew
is ended,” loudspeakers announced.
The crowd swirled around them as Sage and Iris left the hospital. Adjusting their breathers, they drifted into the Gray morning.
About the Author
A pronoun-fluid, gay, sexagenarian POC, Cyd credits public libraries with introducing them to the worlds of speculative fiction. They are a University of California, San Diego (UCSD) certified copy editor, an associate member of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America (SFWA), a First Reader for Strange Horizons, an associate editor for the Unidentified Funny Objects (UFO) humorous science fiction and fantasy anthologies, and a former reviewer and assistant managing editor for Tangent Online. Originally from 45.5231° N, 122.6765° W, Cyd now resides in 49.2827° N, 123.1207° W. They live online at http://www.cydathens.net/ and on Twitter as @CydAthens. “Welcome to Gray” is Cyd’s first sale.
Editor’s Note
How far would you go to save a parent in danger? This story’s hopeful tinge delighted me. In editing this anthology, story after story insisted on that element of hope, a message that humans were more good than bad, which heartened me. I hope it does the same for you.
One small note: I can’t help but read Gray as Gary, having grown up in Indiana and passed through that heavily polluted town on more than one occasion as a child. Back then, you knew as soon as you were nearing Gary from the smell. Environmental regulations mitigated that, but as 45 continues dismantling those, I find myself wondering if that phenomenon will return.
In some ways, this is a classic superhero story. But the world in which clean water is currency and air levels are monitored for survivability seems plausible enough—as does the suggestion that the poor are being experimented on without their knowledge, research unbacked with empathy, a return to days like the Tuskegee Institute’s infamous experiment.
The Stranded Time Traveler Embraces the Inevitable
Scott Edelman
As soon as the stranded time traveler understands where and when he is, he mourns, accepting in a way he never truly had before, when listening back in the future as the scientists spouted their theories, that he will never see his time again.