Inside Out

by Thorne Moore

  Her breast rose and fell in rapid spasmodic heaves, and her colour drifted from bluish pallor to feverish flush and back in waves. Sweat gleamed on her brow and trickled from her hair.

  Maggy twittered plaintively. Over her head, Smith winced.

  ‘What’s that?’ Christie gestured to the tubes and wires slithering under the sheet. ‘Is she on life support?’

  ‘It’s just a monitor,’ said Merrit, glancing briefly at the medical equipment. McBride noticed that he stopped abruptly and blushed as if he’d made an embarrassing admission, but the others were too intent on Abigail to be aware.

  Smith studied her, head on one side. ‘She’s breathing on her own then?’

  ‘No worry there,’ insisted McBride.

  The movement of the sheet, jerking upwards and then collapsing in broken rhythm, didn’t seem like natural ventilation.

  The doctor hurried to the far side of the bed, to take charge. ‘As far as we can tell, there is no imminent threat of—’

  McBride interrupted, safely out of Selden’s reach. ‘Oh, she’s in no danger of dying, believe me. Just a high fever, isn’t that so, Doctor? Probably the excitement of—’

  ‘What is this?’ Commander Foxe had entered behind them.

  McBride hesitated.

  ‘They told me Miss Dieterman had fainted.’ Foxe assessed the patient’s condition with a deep frown. ‘Somewhat melodramatic for a faint, isn’t it, Sang?’

  ‘Just a fever,’ said McBride, deciding to make a bold stand. ‘Some virus or—’

  ‘Virus?’

  ‘When I say virus...’added McBride hastily, but Foxe waved him silent.

  David had settled down, in silent fascination, to watch the monitor recording Abigail’s struggle. Foxe firmly pushed him out of the way, so that he could see the screen for himself. Then he looked again at Abigail, his frown deepening. ‘I suspected she was sickening for something, but this is extreme. What is it, Sang?’

  McBride cursed silently. If Sang would just play a normal doctor for once and pretend infallibility – but no.

  ‘As I was saying, it’s too soon to say for certain, and initial tests have been inconclusive but—’

  ‘You don’t know what it is,’ said Foxe crisply.

  The doctor didn’t argue.

  ‘A virus? An infection? Food poisoning?’

  ‘It is possible that any one of these could be the cause. Or an allergy, or drug abuse. There are numerous possibilities.’

  Merrit drew back from the bed as if it had bitten him. McBride took note, but the Commander spared the boy only a distracted glare.

  ‘So we could have some unknown contagious disease on our hands?’

  The doctor spread his hands expansively. ‘That is always—’

  ‘No, it’s nothing like that,’ said McBride, panicked into action. ‘One isolated case? It’s nothing. She’s simply—’

  ‘Shut up, McBride,’ said Foxe.

  McBride gazed up at the ceiling in martyred silence. He would have to do something, but there were ways and ways of dealing with the commander.

  ‘Is it an isolated case?’ demanded Foxe.

  ‘I can’t be sure,’ said the Doctor. ‘We had a case two days ago. Mr Bignold? Suspected food poisoning.’

  ‘This had nothing to do with the catering,’ said McBride hastily. ‘Bignold kept some food in his cabin. He admitted as much.’

  ‘And the symptoms were the same?’

  ‘Fever, trembling, faintness,’ the doctor enumerated. ‘That far there are similarities, but in his case there was no rash.’

  ‘Rash?’

  The doctor drew back the sheet. A ferocious purple rash was spreading round Abigail’s neck and down her chest. His audience flinched.

  Foxe hissed between his teeth. ‘And you haven’t seen this before?’

  The doctor paused. ‘Not as such.’

  ‘As what, then, if not as such. Come on, man. Don’t prevaricate. I need to know!’

  ‘Mrs Vandeen had a rash. Not the same, but a rash. And the nurse reported some convulsions before she – er—’

  ‘Died.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘That was eight days ago. I don’t suppose you performed an autopsy, before she was put on ice?’

  ‘No, I’m not really equipped and as we were so close to port—’

  ‘Oh, come now, Tod.’ McBride intervened in desperation. ‘Mrs Vandeen was a hundred and six. She had the shakes from the moment she came aboard. It was old age, for God’s sake.’

  ‘Maybe, maybe not.’ Foxe stared down at Abigail, then turned decisively. ‘We must put the ship in quarantine.’

  ‘No!’ wailed McBride. ‘Have mercy on me! I’ll be lynched if the passengers are kept on this ship a moment longer than they were expecting. There’s no need for that, really.’

  ‘Until we know what Miss Dieterman has, we can’t take chances. You know the law, McBride. I’m obliged—’

  ‘We have two more days,’ pleaded McBride. ‘There haven’t been any other cases, not confirmed. Those others are just coincidence. Wait and see. Look how bad it’s got this young lady. If it’s something infectious, we’ll have more cases before the end of the day. We’ll be crawling with them by tomorrow. Let’s wait. If there are no other cases by the time we dock, we must be safe, surely. Hold Miss Dieterman in quarantine of course. I have no complaints against that, but let my passengers go.’

  ‘All right, Moses.’ Foxe half smiled. ‘I’ll wait before deciding. The rest of you will keep quiet about this. I don’t want nervous passengers hallucinating symptoms. And I don’t want panic at any hint of a potentially fatal disease on board. Could it be?’ He fixed the doctor with a cold stare. ‘Could she die?’

  ‘Her life signs are very erratic,’ conceded the doctor. ‘There are occasional convulsions. I couldn’t be sure that in one such convulsion…’

  ‘All right.’ Foxe looked again at the patient. ‘See to it that she doesn’t die, Sang.’

  ‘I’ll do my best, Commander.’

  Foxe ushered the others out into the corridor, a hand on David’s shoulder to guide him, since David, absorbed with the monitor, wasn’t responding. ‘Let her be. Back to your dinners. There’s nothing you can do. I’ll make sure the ship docks as quickly and smoothly as possible, so she can receive proper diagnosis and treatment. Until we know what’s wrong, all we can do is wait.’

  For two days McBride watched his passengers with eagle eyes, alert for the slightest hint of listlessness or heightened colour. Had he discovered any such symptoms he might have been driven to desperate measures. It would be possible, if he acted fast, to stow a sickening passenger away in some cupboard before Foxe had time to notice. Knock them on the head, drop them in the machinery if necessary, anything to avoid the horrifying prospect of having the ship and its passengers confined to quarantine docks for an unspecified period.

  Any symptoms would be mere coincidence, McBride was sure, and it was quite unreasonable to penalise passengers and crew because one of them fancied a headache or a sore throat. Recalling Merrit Burnand’s guilty start, he suspected that Abigail was suffering from some kind of drugs overdose, an allergic reaction to the boy’s fairy dust maybe. The idiot had probably obtained it from an uncertified source. A hint in the right ear about Burnand’s illegal trading could steer talk away from possible viruses or food contamination. Informing was a risky business for a man in his position, but it was an emergency strategy to hold in reserve.

  Fortunately, as time ticked past, there were no further suspect symptoms. Ganymede approached, spirits rose and everyone looked fit and chipper, if one excluded Abigail, still delirious in the infirmary, and Mrs Vandeen in the meat safe.

  Commander Foxe eyed the passengers on the monitors in McBride’s office and nodded consent.

  ‘Sang hasn’t reported any other cases. You’re in luck, Bridey. We’ll go for standard docking and disembarkation.’

  McBride breathed an enormous sigh of relief
.

  Arrival at Ganymede Alpha was so low key, passengers might have slept through it. Anyone hoping to check progress in the observation lounge was disappointed, because the projections of the ship’s course had been replaced by children’s cartoons, from which the soundtrack had inadvertently been removed. No one could remember when this had happened. No one had bothered to observe in the observation lounge for some weeks. They all knew precisely where they were, as the ship gathered itself to expel them all.

  Only when the Heloise had safely docked, was there a sudden flurry of belated excitement. Bosom friends hugged and kissed in relief at their parting. Others hurried to claim their purchases and valuables, and cash in their chips. Cupboards and drawers were searched one last time for lost socks and indiscreet billets-doux.

  Then the bustle of disembarkation began. McBride presided with gracious decorum, shaking hands, patting dogs, accepting large tips. He kept his cybercard on display for that very purpose. Some passengers swiped it discreetly; others made a meal of it. Few begrudged a little gratuity now that they were all, thankfully, parting company.

  It went without saying that B-Deck passengers were less generous. For them, after all, arrival meant only a ten day pause in a far longer voyage. Besides, they were always notoriously bad tippers.

  Merrit slouched past, refusing even to look up. Of course he wouldn’t be tipping McBride. He had nothing left to tip with.

  Selden stalked by with a curt nod.

  Christie stared at him vaguely. Nothing forthcoming there. She had seemed, on occasion, to be made of classier stuff. Still, he’d made a healthy fortune from her bar bill.

  The last passengers came through, and finally Maggy and Smith, arm in arm, he very solicitous, she very fussy. She smiled prettily at McBride, but a tip was out of the question. Smith, on the other hand, might be expected to do the gentlemanly thing. He beamed at the purser and shook his hand vigorously as he nonchalantly flashed his card across McBride’s. McBride matched his good manners by smiling and bowing and pretending not to notice. Very satisfactory.

  There would be nothing from Abigail, of course. She was still in the infirmary, awaiting inspection by doctors from Ganymede. They would remove her quietly some time later when no one was watching and when their own tests confirmed that nothing contagious was involved.

  And David... Where was David? He hadn’t disembarked. McBride hesitated. Should he go and chivvy him out, one last time? He shrugged. He’d done his stint as the boy’s nursemaid. As far as Ganymede, that was the agreement. Let someone else deal with him now. McBride gaily followed his passengers from the ship.

  In the Ragnox Travel offices at Ganymede Alpha, Commander Foxe was signing the last of the regulation forms before he and Ragnox Travel parted company. A glass of mineral water stood at his elbow.

  ‘You’ll not share the champagne?’ suggested McBride, topping up his own glass. ‘You can allow yourself a few days of relaxation, surely.’

  The commander smiled, signing another form. ‘Plenty to do before there’s any relaxation.’

  ‘Well not for me, thank God. Another successful voyage over and done.’

  Foxe handed back the stylus. ‘One passenger died, another seriously ill and a third broke your arm. Tell me, Bridey, what would make a voyage unsuccessful in your eyes?’

  ‘No profit,’ said McBride, patting his pocket. ‘And let’s not exaggerate a few little hiccups. Mrs Vandeen had been on borrowed time for twenty years and I didn’t hear her making any complaints before she died. As for the others, B-Deck. Your problem, Tod, not mine.’

  ‘If I’d insisted on full quarantine regulations, Abigail Dieterman would be very much your problem. Just remember you owe me for that.’

  ‘Noted, I promise you. When will they ship her out?’

  Foxe shook his head. ‘She’s on the mend, though she’s not conscious yet. A medical team’s on its way up. They’ll decide. There’s no rush. We won’t be moving on to Refit for a couple of days, so she might as well stay put until we do.’

  ‘Aye, best not to disturb her till you have to,’ said McBride complacently. The greater the gap between his own pigeons going home to roost and Abigail’s departure by ambulance the better. ‘Any ideas yet what it is?’

  ‘You know as well as I do, Bridey. It’s most likely drugs.’

  McBride tutted, wondering how long it had taken Foxe to reach that conclusion. He’d probably raised the spectre of quarantine just to alarm McBride. ‘Really? Silly girl. Not deliberate, I suppose.’

  ‘Miss Dieterman is not self-destructive,’ said Foxe drily.

  ‘Unlike some of your passengers. Miss Steen, for instance. There’s a lady determined to die soon. And Master Burnand, just asking to be knocked on the head.’ McBride fondly pictured them, trapped together on the Heloise for another eight months. ‘What about Miss Jole then?’ He chuckled. ‘There’s one who won’t have to look after herself. Got someone else to do it for her.’

  Foxe smiled. ‘Do you think that’s what Smith’s doing? Let’s hope so. No Triton Inn for them. He’s whisked her off for a pre-nuptial honeymoon in Xanadu, no less.’

  ‘Aha! Such romance, and escaping your eagle eye, into the bargain.’

  ‘The Hotel Salut, Suite 158,’ said Foxe. ‘They had champagne delivered to the room half an hour after arrival and tomorrow they’re taking a boat trip on the lake.’

  McBride laughed loudly.

  ‘I like to be well informed,’ said the Commander. ‘That’s how I stay ahead.’

  ‘Of course you do,’ purred McBride. ‘Now. Just this last formality. The Rabiotti prescription. I’ve signed it over to you. If you’d like to—’

  ‘The what?’

  ‘Prescription. For the Rabiotti boy. Special request by his father.’

  ‘What is this, McBride?’

  ‘Wee David. Not a well lad. Well we’ve all guessed that, haven’t we? He’s on medication, but he’s a bit too unaware to remember it himself, so I have to make sure he takes it. Or rather, you do from now on.’

  Foxe growled. ‘Why wasn’t I told about this?’

  McBride beamed. ‘I was handling it.’

  ‘You mean Rabiotti Senior is paying a generous retainer and you wanted it for yourself.’

  ‘You make it sound so unreasonable, Tod. You know you’d have insisted on taking control, and I don’t see why I shouldn’t be as entitled to any commission going as the next man.’

  ‘You’re a greedy little rat, Bridey. What is the commission?’

  ‘A thousand a month.’

  ‘A thousand!’

  ‘Money means nothing to Rabiotti, and he wants his lad taken care of.’

  ‘A thousand a month to slip him the occasional pill?’

  ‘One capsule a day.’

  ‘What’s wrong with him?’

  ‘No idea. What’s right with him? I wasn’t going to cross-examine Rabiotti, now was I? Apparently, the boy was born with some congenital defect. Spent half his life in hospital, in isolation for fear of infection. Something to do with the heart, I think. That’s probably why he’s so odd. Never had a proper childhood, poor thing. Never learned to communicate properly. His father wants him to receive all possible care and attention.’

  ‘And he thinks he’ll receive that on Triton? Where is he now?’

  ‘Ah. Not sure about that one. On the ship still, possibly. The security guards will chivvy him out, sooner or later.’

  ‘One of these days, McBride, someone will chivvy you out,’ said Foxe.

  McBride laughed, relieved to see the Commander stalk out, thin-lipped, too intent on finding David to wring the neck of his Passenger Welfare Co-ordinator.

  Ah well, there was always some little grievance to mar the end of every voyage. Foxe would calm down before they met again and, in the meantime, McBride could remind himself what it had all been about. With a grunt of satisfaction, he extracted his cybercard from his pocket, to relish the final reckoning. It would be good. On an
earlier furtive scrutiny, he had noted that at least one passenger had donated a hundred.

  He stared.

  He reset it.

  He looked again, not wanting to believe.

  His account was emptied. Worse than emptied. It was three and a half thousand overdrawn.

  Chapter 11

  Ganymede. Change. Restructuring. Soon the empty ship would be towed to the Refit docks, stripped of its Inner Circle fripperies and its tame guided navigation systems. It would be gutted and then intricately recreated for its far more demanding voyage into the Outer Circles.

  For David, the metamorphosis of his ship was the only significance of Ganymede. If he could hide away, in some corner, forgotten and overlooked, he could be a part of the regeneration. He really wouldn’t mind the loss of heat, of oxygen, of pressure. He could assume the endoskeleton of the ship.

  But those human bacteria would interfere. He tried to remain unseen, the sole survivor in the echoing steel cocoon, but at last a uniform appeared, to ferret him out, pack his bags, make him take his pills, sort out his documentation. It shooed him out into the Alpha transit lounge, where he stood forlorn, conscious only that he had been expelled.

  He watched the grey bulk of the Heloise on the monitor, as the uniform dragged him away towards the shuttles. ‘Commander Foxe told me to get you to Triton Inn.’

  He was prodded to the shuttle docks, staring blankly at the chattering faces, as they shuffled forward into the comforting womb of the shuttle, whose screens displayed calming images of waves breaking prettily on white sand and Earthly sun beams filtering through fluttering leaves.

  They were on their way down to the surface. The uniform spoke occasionally. David knew it wasn’t necessary to listen. He could distinguish between precise commands and inconsequential talk. Inconsequential talk meant he needn’t respond.

  The shuttle was packed with passengers from another flight. Those from the Heloise had long since gone down and Alpha Port had forgotten them. David had forgotten them too. The ship he had not forgotten. The uniform muttering beside him could have no idea how entirely David did not want to go down and taste the pleasures of Jupiter 1A Settlement and Service Station.