"Mmfl."
"Good. Open wide. So, compared to that, your problems are nothing, right?"
I didn't answer. My lungs hurt too much. Besides, Grant should have known from the beginning that T. J. couldn't risk having that robot's memory dumped.
"All right, one more slurp and we're done. There you go. Dr. Fletcher will be in to have a look at you in a little bit."
Dr. Fletcher was wearing gloves and a mask. All I could see were her eyes. They looked tired.
The first thing she said to me was, "Don't talk. You run the risk of destroying your vocal cords." She sat down on the edge of the bed and looked into my eyes, my ears, my nose. She studied the medi-console on her lap. Then, she looked at me and said, "Congratulations."
"Mm?"
"You'll live. We didn't expect you to. The tissues of your lungs were so swollen, there was no room for air. We had you on lung support for three days. You're one of the lucky ones. There were more than two thousand others who didn't make it-because we didn't have the machines for them."
I wanted to ask-but she put a finger across my mouth before I could speak.
"I said, don't talk." She hesitated, then added, "You had one of the worst cases of dust poisoning in the state, Lieutenant. We should have pulled the plug on you-we needed the bed space-but your commanding officer wouldn't allow it. She said you owed her a lobster dinner, and you weren't going to get out of your obligations that easy.
"Besides, we needed to discover something, and you helped us do it. We now know that dust poisoning is reversible in even the worst cases. If we can save you, then we can save anybody. We're already preparing for next year."
"Umf," I said. I held up a hand to stop her from going.
"You're going to be all right," she said. "Don't worry. The worst is over."
I grabbed her arm. "Mmf?"
"Colonel Tirelli is all right too."
"Dmk!"
"And Duke. He's in intensive care and his condition is stabilized. We're watching him closely. You did a good job on him, Lieutenant. You can be proud."
"MpP"
"I'm going to put you back to sleep now," she said. "And then I'm going to put you back on maintenance. It'll be easier for you." She touched a button on the medi-console.
And I went out again.
THIRTY-ONE
THE NEXT time Dr. Fletcher came in, I was more coherent. She picked up the console and studied it. Did all hospital personnel do that automatically?
"How am I?" I asked.
"You're fine," she said. "And I can say that with authority, because I am your personal physician. Only the president and movie stars get better treatment."
She sat down on the edge of the bed and put her hand on mine. "The truth is, all medical personnel in the science section were moved over to help with the emergency. But, even if that weren't the case, you'd still be under my care. You are not so much a medical case as a scientific one."
"Because I had the worst exposure to the dust?"
"You were one of the first," she said. "So if any weird effects were going to show up, we'd expect to see them in you first."
"And ... ?"
"And I am disappointed to tell you that the dust is about as benign as a Chtorran life-form can be. The death toll is expected to remain below three thousand."
"Disappointed?"
"Mm hm. I was hoping you'd be an interesting case. Too bad. I guess I'm just going to have to go back to my worms."
"Worms? Plural?"
"Uh huh. We've got two more live ones." "Dr. Fletcher?"
"Yes?"
"Have you ever put any of them together?"
"They're in the same tank, why?"
"Do they -I don't know how to phrase this-do they roll around together like they're making love?"
She looked surprised. "How do you know about that? We've only had them together for a few days. The whole thing is still very secret."
"You haven't seen the videos we brought-?"
She raised an eyebrow at me. "In all my spare time? In case you hadn't noticed-"
"Right. Sorry. Well, we saw the wrestling behavior when the blimp arrived. The worms got frantic. At first I thought they were attacking each other, but they weren't. They came back. They looked ... confused-but I wouldn't even begin to guess what was going on."
"Mm," she said. She looked like she was considering something.
"I want to see your worms," I said.
She nodded. "I want to see your videos. As soon as you're ambulatory again, okay? I'll set it up." She stood up to go. "There's a wheelchair in the closet if you want to get out of bed. Please ask a nurse to assist you. Don't be proud."
"Thanks. What room is Colonel Tirelli in?"
"She checked out three days ago. But Captain Anderson is upstairs and you can visit him any time." She remembered something. "Oh-you have messages, quite a stack of them. Please read the priority ones first. And I think your mother wants to visit you. Handle that, all right?" And then she was out the door.
After a while, I buzzed for assistance and got myself bathed, shaved and transferred to a wheelchair. I found my way up to the twelfth floor without too much trouble.
Duke was still in an oxygen tent.
He looked dreadful. He looked like the guest of honor at a Texas barbecue. I couldn't look and I couldn't look away. His face was swollen. His eyes were blistered shut. His skin was blackened and peeling. His arms looked wet and putrefying. And he smelled bad.
I almost fled in horror. Human beings should not look like this.
Human beings should not smell like this. But I didn't know how to put the wheelchair in reverse, and the little voice in my head was already bawling me out for being a coward. I steeled myself and stayed.
I rolled around to the foot of his bed and picked up the mediconsole.
Duke was on maintenance. He was beyond consciousness. For that I was grateful. There was not a lot to say. And I wasn't sure I could talk to him yet. Not with him looking like something out of a horror show. This wasn't Duke. I couldn't rectify this monstrous piece of meat with the man I had spent so much time with.
I didn't see how he could ever be human again. He might live. But his life was over. I don't know how I knew. I just knew it. My mind brought up memories. Duke had taught me almost everything I knew about how to be a military man. He'd made it very simple, he'd boiled it down to two words.
Be certain.
"Here's how to know if you're certain," he'd said. "Can I rip your arm off if you're wrong? If you can't give me an unqualified yes, then you're still not certain.
"That thing that you ignore-that thing that you let yourself be unaware of, or unconscious of, or uncertain about-that's the thing that's going to kill you. So your job, whatever it looks like, is really this: you have to know everything about everything that you have to deal with.
"There are no accidents, Jim. If you get killed, the game is over. You lost."
Simple.
Except... what would you call lying in a hospital bed looking like a bride's first roast?
Duke had screwed up somewhere. He'd trusted me. It didn't matter what Colonels Tirelli and Anderson said. This was my fault. I wished I could wake him up long enough to ask him to forgive me.
Except I knew he wouldn't.
THIRTY-TWO
TWO DAYS later, my chest scan came up clean and they checked me out of the hospital. They needed the bed space. "Go visit your mother," they told me. "She's been bugging us three times a day."
My mom was in Santa Cruz, doing something with maps-I wasn't sure what. She said she'd explain when I got there. I checked out a jeep from the motor pool and headed south on I-117.
It was over an hour's drive, but I barely noticed. The whole way there, all I could hear was the argument inside my head.
I was considering resigning my commission.
It was something that Dr. Fletcher had said; it still rankled. "You and I have two different jobs. Your job is to ki
ll worms. My job is to study them." I was looking at myself in a mirror and wondering how the hell I'd gotten here. This wasn't where I'd wanted to be.
What I really wanted to do was what Dr. Fletcher was doing-study the worms. But how could I do that with stripes on my sleeves? They kept putting weapons into my hands and that guaranteed that all I could do was kill worms. That was the thing about being in the army-there weren't a whole lot of options.
But killing the worms-at least the way we were doing it now-was not working.
The Chtorran ecology was eating us alive.
Its microorganisms alone had killed billions of people. Those of us who survived the plagues still had to deal with the sea sludge, the stingflies, the bladderbugs, the red kudzu, the oilworms, the "grabgrass," the binnies, the libbits, the meeps-and of course, always and inevitably, the worms.
Our ancestors had killed the dinosaurs. We'd sucked their eggs and eaten their children. We still ate their descendants today: chickens, ducks, and turkeys. If tyrannosaur and hadrosaur and deinonychus still walked the Earth, we'd find a way to eat them too. The Chtorrans would do the same to us. They couldn't see us as anything more than food. Do you talk with your sandwich?
And if this was only the first wave of the invasion-as Dr. Zymph kept saying-what horrors were still waiting to manifest themselves?
How long did it take to Chtorra-form a planet? How many waves of infestation?
There had to be an intelligence behind this madness-but it might not show up for centuries, perhaps not until long after the last human being was... what? In a zoo? In a museum? Did we figure at all in the equation?
I didn't think so.
But-
-if I really felt that way, then why did I bother to keep on fighting? If the situation was that hopeless, why not just lay down and die?
Because-I had to smile at myself-I still didn't really believe it. I knew it, but I didn't believe it.
But none of this had anything to do with the army anyway. The army was irrelevant. We were holding back the worms by sheer brute force because we couldn't think of anything else to do.
No, it wasn't the futility of the situation that was making me think about resigning. I'd fight the worms forever, no matter how ugly the odds.
No. This was really about Duke. I felt responsible.
Damn it anyway!
It was Shorty all over again, but with a vengeance. I'd burned Shorty-and the worm that came down on top of him. Shorty had been lucky; he'd died quick; but Duke might take years.
If I did resign, I could probably go to work immediately for Dr. Fletcher. I already had the security clearance.
It was very tempting. I even went so far as to unclip my phone from my belt.
But I didn't call. No. I might be able to resign from the army; I'd fulfilled the basic obligation over a year ago; but I'd never be able to resign from the pain.
And that was the real issue.
I pulled off the freeway in Santa Cruz, but inside my head I was still in the same place. Stuck.
And I wasn't looking forward to seeing my mother either. I knew what that was going to be like.
She had an office-apartment in a private (read fortress) community called Fantasy Valley Towers, a sprawling complex of bubbles, domes, and spires like something out of a Hollywood fairy tale. The style was called Apocalypse Baroque. Inside the walls, it was a maze of arches, terraces and balconies. Before the plagues, it must have been very expensive. Now it looked run down-and even a little wild.
The front doors of Mother's apartment were twice as tall as I was, and they looked like they were made out of crystal. But the effect was spoiled by the unswept leaves piled up against the portico.
Mother answered the door with a flourish and a wild laugh. She was wearing a gaudy concoction of bright silks and feathers; she was a cascade of pink and scarlet-and around her neck, she had a silver and turquoise Navajo squash blossom necklace, with twelve jeweled squashes on each side. It looked heavy. So did the rings on her fingers.
"Ahh-here's my baby now!" she cried. She presented her cheek for a kiss. It tasted of powder. She had a glass in her hand. "I'm sorry we didn't come and visit you in the hospital, but they wouldn't let us-"
"It's all right. I wouldn't have been very good company anyway-"
She took my wrist and led me out onto the terrace, calling loudly, "Alan-! Alan! Jim is here! Jim, you remember Alan, don't you?"
"The surfer-?"
"No, silly. That was Bobbie-" Bobbie had been only two years older than me; when I met him he still hadn't decided what he wanted to be when he grew up. "-This is Alan Wise. You remember, I told you about him-"
"No, you told me about Alan Plaskow."
"I did?"
"Uh huh. I don't think I know this Alan."
"Oh, well-"
This Alan was tall and blond and graying at the temples. When he smiled, his eyes crinkled. His handshake was just a little too hearty, and his chest was in the process of migrating south toward his stomach.
There was another man on the terrace too. He was short and dark and of Japanese descent. He wore thick glasses and a dark gray business suit. He looked like a lawyer. Alan introduced him as Shibumi Takahara. Mr. Takahara bowed politely. I bowed back.
Alan slapped me on the shoulder and said, "Well, son-it must feel good to get home for a little old-fashioned cooking, eh?"
"Uh-yes, sir. It does." Except this wasn't home and my mother hadn't cooked a meal herself since before the Hindenberg went down.
"What are you drinking?" he asked. He was already at the bar, dropping ice into a glass. "'Nita? Do you want a refill?"
"Do you know how to make a Sylvia Plath?" I asked.
"A what-?"
"Never mind. You probably don't have the ingredients anyway."
Mom was looking at me funny. "What's a Sylvia Plath, Jim?"
I shrugged. "It's not important. It was just a joke."
"No, tell us-" she insisted.
Mr. Takahara answered her. "It's a layer of mercury, a layer of salad oil, and a layer of creme de menthe. You drink only the top layer." I looked at him sharply. Behind his glasses, his eyes were twinkling.
Mom frowned. "I'm afraid I don't get the joke. Do you get it, Alan?"
"'Fraid it's a little too deep for me, hon. How's about a Crimson Death?"
"Uh, no thanks. I've had enough Crimson Death this month. I'll just have a beer, if you don't mind."
"Don't mind at all," he said. He ducked behind the bar, muttering to himself. "Beer, beer ... where's the beer-? Ah!" He came up with a slender green bottle. "Here we go-private stock. Imported especially for you from exotic, erotic, exciting... Topeka!" He poured with a flourish.
"Down the side, please-" I pointed.
"Eh?"
"You pour beer down the side of the glass, not the center-"
"Oh, well-it's too late now. Sorry." He handed me the glass of beer suds and the still half-full bottle. "I'll know for next time, right?"
"Yeah, right." There wasn't going to be a next time.
"I guess I'm just not used to pouring my own drinks," he said, sitting again. He patted the couch next to him and glanced toward my mother. She came over and sat down-a little too close. "I'm too used to being taken care of." He grinned and slid his arm around my mother's shoulders.
Mother said, "Alan-Jim's been off fighting those awful Chatorrans-."
"Oh? Really?" He looked interested. "Have you actually seen any-?"
"Uh-first of all, it's pronounced `Ktorran.' The `Ch' is silent. It's sort of a click before the `T.' Just say the word `victor' and leave off the 'vi-."'
"Oh, well-" my mother said, excusing herself with a wave. "I never watch the news. I only read about them in the morning papers.
"-And, yes," I said to Alan of the hearty handshake; I said it coldly, "I have seen a few. Quite a few, in fact."
"Really?" he asked. "They really exist?"
I nodded. I sipped at my beer. I wi
ped my mouth with the back of my hand. I was debating inside whether I should be polite or tell the truth. My mother had the "dance for Grandma" expression on her face, Alan Wise wore a big plastic smile, but Mr. Takahara was watching me quietly. The truth won out.
I looked across at Alan Wise and asked, "Where have you been that you don't know what's happening?"
He shrugged, "Right here. The good old U. S. of A. Where have you been?"
"Colorado. Wyoming. Northern California."
"You're kidding! We have-how do you say it?-Torrans right here in California?"
"One of the worst infestations I've ever seen. Just north of Clear Lake. "
"Well... I'll be damned." He looked at my mother and gave her a little squeeze. "I didn't know that. Maybe we should drive up some Sunday and have a look. What do you think, 'Nita?"
I blinked. He couldn't really have meant that! I put my glass down on the end table, and said quietly, "That area is sealed off. And even if it weren't, that wouldn't be a very good idea."
"Oh, come now-" He dismissed me as casually as if I'd just told him the sky was pink. This far south and this close to the coast, it wasn't. "I think you're exaggerating the case, son. It's just some more of that same military thinking that got us into Pakistan thirteen-fourteen years ago. Of course, you probably don't remember that. You were just a little tyke then-"
"I know about Pakistan," I said. I'd had time to do a lot of reading in the hospital.
"Well-let me tell you something, son. You're too close to the forest. You don't have the perspective. You don't have objectivity. Y'see, this thing with the Ch'torrans, K'torrans, whatever-it's overrated. Oh, now-'' he held up a hand to keep me from interrupting "-I'll grant that there's really something out there. I'm sure that some old lady somewhere was actually frightened out of her panties by a big pink caterpillar; but when you look at the whole picture-like I have-you'll see that a young man like yourself needs to be looking toward the future."
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