The Parasite

by Neal Asher

  Without comment Chris obliged, though it seemed to Jane that there was an expression almost of disapproval on his face. Not possible. She was anthropomorphising again.

  ‘Rather than bemoaning our inadequacies and what we don’t know, let’s look more closely at what we do know: at the behavioural aspects. It shouldn’t take long.’

  Chris watched her with mild interest, it seemed.

  ‘Those infected with the parasite show an inclination to be amongst crowds. This is probably something to do with how it is transmitted but doesn’t necessarily mean the host is at the infective stage. New hosts, after an initial immunological reaction, have their systems boosted; they are faster and stronger, their fight and flight reactions are stronger. This then is the parasite acting upon its host to increase its own survivability – a not uncommon occurrence. There’s that snail parasite that causes the snail to grow a thicker shell…’

  A hammering at the door to their hotel room cut Jane off in mid stride.

  ‘Who is it?’

  ‘You are needed at Central Hospital, Miss Ulreas.’

  Jane nodded to Chris, who stood and moved smoothly to the door. He opened it to a woman dressed in army fatigues, carrying a machine gun slung under her arm. She peremptorily pushed her way in.

  ‘I am Major Branson, you are to accompany me to the Hospital, Miss Ulreas. General Stark wishes a report on your work.’

  ‘And who the hell is General Stark?’ asked Jane, glancing nervously at the two soldiers standing outside the door.

  ‘General Stark is now in charge of the PV situation. As of ten o’clock this evening martial law was declared. This is a serious problem.’

  Jane felt a horrible sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach.

  Serious problem. Not half as serious as it was about to become, she thought, as she stood up and downed the last of her aquavit.

  ‘I’ll come, but I don’t know how I can help the General.’

  Branson said nothing, but the look she flicked over Jane showed her contempt. Dyke, thought Jane, as she followed her out, then wished she could control such New Puritan reactions. It was a comfort to have Chris at her side, and certainly the New Puritans would never have approved of him.

  They were taken to a personnel carrier with metal seats not designed for comfort. Jane noted how empty the streets were as they drove to hospital. Things had been getting ugly for some time, ever since the parasite victims had been dehumanised into PVs, yet she had stayed, against the advice of the embassy. The PV situation, as it seemed the military mind had come to call it, appeared to be the best of excuses to start killing people, just as the ‘AIDS VII situation’ in central Africa had been fifteen years back. She glanced at Chris and wondered what he thought; how his clear and painfully sharp mind perceived this situation.

  The personnel carrier passed through a newly erected barrier around the hospital and into the grounds, which now swarmed with troops like worshippers round armoured cars like altars. Directly in front of the hospital there now stood a row of sinister-looking matt green trucks. Major Branson led them inside then to the hospital director’s office, now being used as an operations room. General Stark looked up as they entered, acknowledged the Major’s salute, then studied Jane and Chris with the same contempt Jane had seen in the Major’s face. Oh God, another rigor mortis brain, she thought as she nodded and smiled. The General stood.

  ‘Please, have a seat Miss Ulreas. You too, Mr Golem.’

  Jane noted how the seats were well back from the desk and set well apart. Better to isolate you Grandma. Jane picked up her seat and moved it closer to the desk. Chris did likewise with his. The General seemed for a moment as if he was going to order them shot, then he grudgingly sat down.

  ‘Now, Miss Ulreas, this PV situation is really getting out of hand. Do you have a cure as yet?’

  Jane nearly burst out laughing. Military mind: it seemed a contradiction in terms.

  ‘There seems to be, as yet, no way of killing or flushing this parasite. We’ve tried all the usual drugs and even some of the old ones like the chloroethylenes. Surgery is out of the question as by the time the parasite is detected it’s too closely linked to the host to be removed.’

  ‘Is it sexually transmitted?’

  ‘Now there’s a question. We have seen no signs that it might be, though as yet we do not know how it is transmitted. This is always a complex problem with parasites. We cannot even be sure if what we have found is its infective stage.’

  She noticed how his eyes had seemed to glaze over when she said, ‘complex problem’. She knew that the military mind did not like complex problems.

  She said, ‘I think the only way forward now is for me take samples back to England for study. The facilities here are not ... quite what is required.’

  He seemed not to have heard her. ‘How best, would you suggest, might this parasite be exterminated.’

  Jane did not like that word and at that moment she remembered another word she had heard only recently: ‘relocation’. Two hundred parasite victims had been relocated. They had been relocated by the military. A trickle of sweat ran down her backbone as she thought about the trucks outside.

  ‘I do not think there is as yet any way to ... exterminate this parasite.’

  Stark stared at her for a long moment then turned to Chris. ‘Have you anything to add Mr Golem?’

  ‘I have nothing to add,’ said Chris mildly.

  Stark glanced towards Major Branson and nodded his head.

  Jane said, ‘I haven’t got enough—’ A hand grasped her round the upper arm and jerked her out of her seat. ‘What is this?’ She saw a soldier try to jerk Chris up out of his seat, fail to do so, then step back and draw his pistol. Chris stood and walked ahead of him to the door whilst Jane was hustled along after. She knew what this was now, all too clearly she saw the coming pattern of events. The ‘PV situation’ was the excuse to initiate a military take over, and the military might not want any inconvenient, expert, observers. The official at the embassy had warned her:

  ‘The situation is delicate here at the moment. I would suggest to you that when the biochemistry conference ends you leave Brazil at once.’

  Why hadn’t she listened?

  They were taken along a corridor to a lift, then down to another corridor that led to a dark room, cleared of beds and other inconvenient medical trivialities. Jane stared at the bullet holes in the walls. Chris is a comfort, she thought, but that is all. He was as incapable of action as a calculator. A gun clicked.

  Oh shit!

  Jane closed her eyes. There were two dull thuds then the shatteringly loud explosion of automatic fire. She was still alive. She opened her eyes to a scene she could hardly comprehend at first. The two soldiers lay on the floor, unconscious or dead. Major Branson was backed up against a wall, her face pale, terror etching her features. Chris stood before her holding her machine gun. Jane saw that he had been hit with the full clip; synthetic skin had been flayed from his chest by the bullets to expose gleaming ceramal underneath. None of them had known. None of them had known what Chris was. He dropped the machine gun, and then tapped the Major on the side of her head with perhaps one tenth of his strength. She slumped bonelessly to the floor.

  ‘You’re not supposed to harm anyone,’ Jane blurted. Their captors were only unconscious, but androids were just not supposed to hurt human beings. There were laws weren’t there?

  Chris turned to her with what could not be mistaken for anything other than a smile of satisfaction. ‘Whatever gave you that curious idea,’ he said.

  Peter Mendelssohn was scared, but that was nothing unusual; he had been scared for more than a year now, ever since he found out what his employer was really like. He controlled his fear and just got on with his job though. Today he would complete work on this little beauty then it would be back to his own project. He stood with his grip shoes holding the industrial carpet in his null gee lab and his bony hands in the pockets of his lab coa
t. With piercing blue eyes he studied the weapon, now held into a clamp and linked into all the test gear.

  ‘You cannot fire an anti-photon weapon in this laboratory,’ said Lilly, the station AI.

  ‘Obviously,’ he replied, ‘but this test will show if it’s working properly. What does Haven want it for?’

  There was no reply. He had expected none. His access to Lilly was limited, but substantially more than the Toad would have wanted. With his shoes making a scrunching sound on the carpet he walked over to a keyboard and quickly rattled over a few keys.

  PARAMETERS: SET ERSATZ BURST TO COMPLETE MOLECULAR DISRUPTION OF A HUMAN BEING.

  He should have known. He keyed in the instruction for the test then walked over to his bench, sat down, and continued to assemble something silvery and beautiful. One day soon he knew he would be summoned to a personal meeting with his boss. He had no intention of going.

  Chapter 4

  Armed police were everywhere, but none of them bothered Jack. It was surprising how a suit and a briefcase lent an air of respectability, and the mirrored sunglasses an air of menace. He had deliberately cultivated the look of a member of the secret police, who were never that secret. The woman at the HOTOL desk gazed at him warily and checked his passport before giving him his boarding card.

  ‘Gate seven at ten fifty. It will come up on the screens.’

  He nodded and smiled a polite thank-you and headed for the cafeteria. He had twenty minutes to wait. At the cafeteria he got himself a cup of coffee and sat down, removing his sunglasses as he did so. Then he looked around.

  There was a hint of hysteria in the air. The people here had an anxiety to be gone from this place sharper than that of homesick tourists. In a matter of days Sao Paulo had turned from a bustling centre of commerce to a city under siege. The streets were mostly empty, but for the armoured cars and squads of soldiers patrolling the pavements. A large percentage of the population was staying indoors, waiting, expectant. Jack thought that they might not have much longer to wait. Already there had been shootings after curfew and tell-tale stains on the pavements in the morning. With an air of casualness he opened his briefcase and took out a portable console. Across the other side of the airport foyer he saw that soldiers were checking people’s passports. He also noted the abruptly nervous air of the blond woman sitting only a table away from him.

  His passport was fine, Jack knew this, he was a British subject, but he wondered if his description had been circulated. There had been the encounter at the surgeon’s and that bloody encounter in the lower city. What could he do? The parasite shifted uneasily inside him. Run or fight. Run or fight. He tried to ignore it, but was finally driven to his feet. The soldiers, three of them, were heading in his direction. He glanced at them, picked up his briefcase, and headed at a forced leisurely pace for the toilets. He perfectly distinguished the sound of their footsteps from the riotous noise in the airport foyer, just as he had been able to with the killers Carlson had sent after him. They turned to follow him. In a moment he entered the toilets and moved to a sink to wash his hands. The door banged open and the three soldiers crowded through.

  ‘Passport,’ snapped one of them at Jack’s shoulder.

  ‘One moment please,’ said Jack and moved to dry his hands. Just then a man came out of one of the toilet booths, doing up his shirt as if perhaps he had just changed. Jack was struck by his almost flawless features. He looked like a Greek god. The man moved to pass the soldiers, but one of them turned on him.

  ‘You, wait!’

  Jack continued to dry his hands.

  ‘I said passport!’ snapped the soldier at Jack’s shoulder and caught hold of his upper arm.

  Nooo...

  It was too late. He reacted. He backhanded the soldier and sent him crashing into a condom machine. The second one began to raise his weapon. Jack shoved the weapon aside, drove a fist into his stomach instantly followed by an elbow to the temple, dropping him. However, his next move stalled. The other soldier was down. The blond god studied Jack with a mild curiosity.

  ‘You move very fast,’ he said.

  ‘You’re no slouch yourself,’ said Jack. ‘I take it you don’t want the military paying too much attention to you?’

  ‘You likewise?’

  Jack nodded and hauled one of the soldiers up by his belt and carried him to one of the toilet booths.

  ‘You are also very strong. May I know your name?’

  ‘Jack Smith.’

  ‘My name is Chris Golem.’

  Jack paused while seating the soldier on the toilet. ‘Would that be the Chris Golem who was working at Central Hospital with Professor Ulreas?’

  ‘The same.’

  Jack found plastic ties at the soldier’s belt and bound him in position. He then ripped the soldier’s shirt and gagged him with it. Leaning out of the booth he said, ‘I could do with some held here,’ and then fell silent. Chris held a soldier in each hand, up off the floor by their belts, their arms and legs trailing on the floor, and as casually as if he was carrying dustbin bags he hoisted each of them into a booth.

  The parasite? Possibly, yet he did not think so.

  ‘Are you augmented, Chris?’ he asked.

  ‘After a fashion,’ said Chris as he bound and gagged the two soldiers.

  They locked the doors to the booths, then climbed out again. Together they left the toilet, just as a man with a young boy entered. Chris smiled at them benevolently. Jack put on his sun glasses.

  The blond woman was searching through her handbag as they came to the cafeteria, a constable standing next to her. Jack made to turn away, then hesitated as Chris continued on. Professor Ulreas? It seemed strange to him that this voluptuous woman was a professor. She was a parasitologist, he knew this. Viewing the situation ahead of him he felt the urge to run, but it was not as strong as his urge to learn things about himself. He followed Chris and, by the time they reached the table, the constable was studying Jane’s passport.

  ‘Is there any problem, officer?’ asked Chris.

  The constable looked up. ‘Are you Chris Golem?’

  Chris smiled, then his hand snapped out so fast that Jack hardly saw it, and rapped the constable on his temple. The man slumped but the hand come down and caught hold of his collar and held him upright.

  ‘Now what?’ said Jack.

  Chris glanced around again then caught the constable’s belt and guided him to a seat. It was a feat of strength Jack doubted he could perform. It seemed as if the man had quite naturally taken a seat, with Chris’s hand on his back in a friendly fashion. Jack peered down at Jane.

  ‘Which flight are you taking?’ he asked.

  ‘The HOTOL to London,’ she replied after a momentary hesitation.

  ‘Now, might be a good time to try and board.’

  ‘Yes,’ she said, nodding vigorously.

  Chris’s hands were a blur by the constable, and they left him bound with plastic ties, leaning forwards over the table with his chin cupped in his hands.

  At passport control waited two more police officers and a soldier carrying a formidable looking assault rifle. As he and his new companions approached, Jack felt sure that this was the end of the line for them. Then came the muffled sound of gun shots from the foyer. Jack glanced round but could not locate the source, but guessed one of the soldiers in the toilet must have regained consciousness and got to his gun. The soldier and the two constables rushed out into the foyer, and the HOTOL steward took their boarding cards and ushered them quickly through, obviously as eager to be gone as they were.

  ‘Most fortuitous,’ said Chris, and Jack envied his calm. Only when he was seated with his case on his lap and the HOTOL screaming down the runway did the tension drain out of him.

  The HOTOL lifted into the stratosphere and was soon travelling at Mach ten. Jack had managed to get into one of the seats near Jane Ulreas, and was eager to initiate conversation.

  ‘What was the trouble for you back there?’ he a
sked, directing his question at Jane rather than her companion. He still did not know what to make of Chris. She studied him, then glanced at Chris as if seeking reassurance before replying.

  ‘I was there studying the ...’ her voice turned contemptuous, ‘parasite situation.’

  ‘Yes, I heard something about that,’ said Jack. He glanced aside, but Chris still wore the same mildly interested expression.

  Jane went on, ‘The military decided to use it as an excuse to step in. They didn’t want any witnesses to ... to what they intended to do.’

  ‘And that was?’

  ‘We believe they intended to kill all the PVs and institute an extermination program. Remember the AID VII thing in Central Africa?’

  ‘And they wanted to kill you as well?’ asked Jack, forcing disbelief into his voice.

  ‘Well,’ said Jane with a sneer, ‘that’s the way the military mind works.’

  ‘But you escaped,’ he glanced at Chris, ‘and I can guess how.’

  ‘What about you? Chris told me what you did.’

  ‘Sordid,’ said Jack. ‘I too ran afoul of the authorities. Tell me, this parasite, what do you know about it?’

  Jane did not seem as glad to discuss this subject as he had expected. ‘Too little,’ she began, but then went on in measured tones to tell Jack all she and Chris had learned or surmised, as if getting it all clear in her own mind.

  ‘It doesn’t sound like anything I know of, but then I know little about parasites. Do parasites cause these sorts of ... symptoms? Can they make people stronger, alter their behaviour?’

  ‘Parasites get into every possible niche,’ said Jane in her lecturer’s voice. ‘Multiceps, in its intermediate host, which is normally a sheep or some other ruminant, can lodge in the skull or spinal cord. In one side of the brain it causes the animal to pull its head right round and circle in that direction, and vice versa. I saw a horse once that had the worm in its head. The poor thing had its head down between its forelegs and kept walking into trees, then just standing still there. It didn’t last long. But then that’s the evolutionary vector of that parasite, considering that its next host is a carnivore.’