by Gen LaGreca
Her liquid eyes with their light, swirling hues seemed to become darker, almost black.
“On the other side of the coin was an imprint of a planet that looked like Earth, but it was no coin from here. There were words printed around the sphere, words that have haunted me ever since, along with the place they represent. You see, the coin said: One People, One Will. Asteron.”
Chapter 19
The sprawling carpet of lawn swept up to the flat-topped hedges and rounded shrubs in front of Steve Caldwell’s home. I walked toward the attractive wood-and-stone house. It was tucked on a hillside in a small community that contained the only expanse of vegetation in the parched landscape around it. Built at the base of a mountain, the small town of Clear Creek was an oasis in the desert, just as Planet Earth was an oasis in the lifeless void of space surrounding it.
The Earth was my oasis, my refuge, my home. What business did Feran have on a planet that had already banished his blight a century before? Was control over all of Asteron not enough to satisfy Feran? Why did he prey on a people whose way of life he denounced? The Earthlings considered Feran’s ways evil, so they sought nothing from him. Feran considered the Earthlings’ ways evil, yet he and his spies were here. Was it possible that Feran could not survive without the things he denounced as evil?
Kristin had seen something unavailable to Feran’s people: an Asteronian gold coin. Such coins were forbidden in my homeland because our leaders warned against what they called the idolatry of money. According to our rulers, money was evil. It drove us to accumulate more and more of it, and this led to wealth, which made some of us better off than others, which led to inequality, which everyone thought was immoral. Then why did Feran mint coins? And why did the things he considered good bring only starvation? I could clearly imagine his repulsive hand squeezing the life from Kristin’s mother, for surely that monstrous deed was the work of his spies. I swung my hand at a fly with the force of Alexander the ballplayer swinging his bat to make a home run. Feran was not going to get Kristin! And was Dr. Merrett in danger too?
I now knew that Feran was linked not only to Project Z through the flexite suit in his spaceship but also to the death of Mrs. Merrett through the Asteronian coin in her hand. Was Project Z linked to the laboratory accident whose report Mrs. Merrett had died trying to rescue? That was the question I hoped Steve Caldwell could help me answer.
I now also knew that, incredibly, Asteron’s ancestors were Earthlings. Did this mean that I was of their species? Did I possess the full range of their capacities? Was the Earthlings’ bright laughter cocooned somewhere inside me, waiting for its wings to form?
I had obtained Steve’s phone number and spoken to his wife, Kate, who was taking his calls. I explained that I was employed by MAS and asked if I could visit, because I wanted to ask Steve a few questions about his laboratory work. She eagerly invited me to their home, expressing her desire for Steve to have company. With a call to one of the pilots, who was heading east after the air show, I got a ride on his small plane, which dropped me off in Clear Creek early that Friday afternoon. My teammate also showed me where I could catch a branch of the Cheetah for my trip back.
A cheerful, young, blond-haired woman answered the door. She introduced herself as Kate Caldwell and promptly asked to see my MAS identification.
“We don’t talk to the media, only to relatives, friends, and co-workers, so I was just checking,” she explained, as she escorted me into a spacious living room with sun-dappled furniture and thriving plants the size of small trees. A leather couch and chairs along with a piano and a few tables were arranged on a shiny wooden floor, with a colorful rug defining the seating area. A normal, healthy-looking man about thirty years old smiled at me from the couch. Despite his handsome features, something about his smile seemed unusual.
“We have a visitor from MAS today, Steve. His name is Alexander,” said Kate.
“Hello, Steve,” I said.
“Hello, Alexander.”
I extended my hand, and Steve shook it. I realized that his grin was odd because the skin around his eyes did not crinkle. I was used to Earthlings putting the whole of their faces into their smiles, but Steve’s smile did not reach his eyes.
“It is kind of you to see me, Steve.”
“Oh, Steve sees everybody,” Kate said, gesturing for me to sit on a chair while she sat on the couch next to her husband. “You’re not from around here, are you, Alexander? You speak differently.”
“That is true, Kate.”
“And you have only one name?”
“That is also true.”
“So you work at MAS?”
“Yes.”
“I’m always glad when someone from the company comes over. I know Steve’s going to get better by seeing people he knew and talking about the work he did. Won’t you, honey?” She tapped his hand, and he looked at her obligingly. “In fact, the other day Dr. John Gordon came over. How’d you like seeing John again, dear?”
“It was nice,” said Steve indifferently.
“John was Steve’s best friend in medical school. Now John’s on the staff at the hospital near us.”
“Did Steve study to be a doctor?”
“Oh, yes,” said Kate.
I kept looking at Steve for a response, because it felt peculiar to discuss him in the third person with Kate, as if he were not there. But he seemed content to gaze at us blankly without volunteering to join our conversation.
“Steve was working his way through medical school. He used to work the night shift at MAS so that he could attend classes during the day.”
“I see.” I turned to Steve to engage him. “And do you work at the hospital too, like your friend John?”
“Yes,” said Steve.
“So you have finished your training?”
“Yes.”
“And you are a doctor?”
“I work in the laundry.”
I tried to hide my surprise.
“Steve isn’t ready to be a doctor, but he will be when he gets better,” said Kate, with a strained cheerfulness. “Since he had spent years studying for his exams when the accident happened, we decided he should take them. He scored very high on the knowledge section—that part tests how much you know about medicine. You see, my husband knows medicine inside out. And he also passed the skills and techniques section. That’s where the teachers direct you to perform certain tests and procedures on dummy patients that have elaborate computer mechanisms, so they react as if they’re real people.”
“So then Steve has passed his exams, no?”
“The section Steve failed was clinical judgment. There you get a set of conditions about a patient, and you have to decide how you’ll treat.”
“And could Steve not make the right decisions, based on his knowledge and skills?”
“No,” Kate said, her voice now tinged with sadness. “You see, Steve couldn’t decide.”
“Why not, Steve?”
“I don’t know,” Steve replied, his eyes vacant, his tone colorless.
“You have the knowledge?” I continued.
“Yes,” he said.
“And you have the skills and techniques, as you showed with the dummies?”
“Yes, I do.”
“Then you can treat, right?”
“No.”
“Right now Steve needs guidance,” Kate explained. “If only he could have a kind of cookbook that told him which procedures to use and when, then he would be okay. He flounders when he has to decide for himself. But the skills are there. Just the other day he got to practice them, and he remembered everything. When Steve reported to the hospital for his part-time job, someone was needed to wheel a patient into a room, and Steve was told to do it. While he was wheeling her stretcher, her heart stopped beating. And what do you think Steve did?”
“Did you restart her heart, Steve?”
“Yes, I did.”
“Then you can treat,” I concluded.
“No,” said Kate.
>
“How can that be?”
“It’s hard to explain, Alexander, but when her heart stopped and no one else was around at that moment, Steve at first just continued to wheel her into the room, until one of the orderlies who knew him before the accident screamed at him to save her. Then Steve did save her. But he himself couldn’t decide which was more important—to wheel her into the room or to save her life—until someone made the choice for him and ordered him to carry it out.”
My thoughts suddenly crossed the universe to an engineer at the locked door of a spacecraft who also could not decide what to do in an unexpected circumstance but could only follow orders. Troubled, I stared incredulously at Steve’s blank face.
“I keep hoping that being around the things he loved and the people he knew will help Steve get better. That’s why I thought it was a good idea for him to work in the hospital.”
“Do you like working in the hospital, Steve?” I asked.
“It’s nice.”
“Do you like medicine?”
“I used to.”
“And now?”
“It doesn’t matter.”
“Do you still want to be a doctor, or do you prefer to work in the laundry?”
“Doesn’t matter.”
“This isn’t my Steve talking! He had a passion for medicine, didn’t you, dear? Now, tell Alexander the truth.”
“All those ideas I had. How did I get them, anyway?” Steve replied tonelessly, looking at neither me nor Kate but gazing blankly out the window.
“Maybe you’ll feel differently, honey, when you get better in other areas first. Maybe that’s what needs to happen!” Kate said wishfully. “We have to work up to medicine with gradual improvements in other areas. You know, I think we should take that vacation abroad that we’ve always talked about.”
She picked up a large book from the coffee table, one filled with colored pictures of distant places. She placed the book in Steve’s hands, thumbing through the pages.
“Here’s the cathedral you always wanted to see. And the art museum. And look at the statues in the old town square. And here’s the ancient palace you mentioned so many times. Remember how you always wanted to visit it, dear, but we could never afford to go? Well, now we can. And look at the beaches.” She paused on pages of interest to her, pointing them out to Steve. “When we get tired of sight-seeing, we can rent a house by the sea. We’ll travel for my birthday. Remember how you always loved to take me to romantic places on my birthday? You’ll have your chance again, honey, and it’ll all come back to you. I know it will!” She turned to me. “Steve loves history and art. He always wanted to make a trip abroad to visit historic sites.”
When Kate released the pages of the book, they fell to one side of the binder. Steve had looked at the pages when Kate pointed them out but showed no curiosity to explore the book on his own.
“Do you like history and art, Steve?” I asked.
“It’s good,” he said without inflection, as the book dropped to the side of the couch.
“And romance?”
“It’s nice.”
I pointed to the long, sleek piano in the room. “Do you like music?”
“It’s okay.”
“Steve plays the piano. It’s always been a hobby of his since he was a kid. We have home movies of him playing.”
“May I see one?”
“Why not? What do you say, honey? Shall we play a home movie for Alexander?”
“Why not?” echoed Steve.
Using a remote control on the coffee table, Kate drew the curtains, then activated a holographic image in the air before us. The lively scene she chose suddenly stirred the room with a whirl of music, voices, and laughter.
“This is from a party we gave just before Steve’s accident.”
The scene showed a more modest room with a smaller piano. A group of people flanked the instrument, singing and swaying to a robust song played by a lively man. His hands raced along the keyboard in a blur of motion. The tune was a vibrant melody that made me think of Earthlings I had seen leaping into the ocean and laughing as the waves broke against them because the people at the piano sang with the same elation. In the scene, Kate’s bright hair swirled out from behind the piano player, and she placed a drink on the instrument for him. As she moved toward him, his face stretched up high to catch her mouth in a kiss as ardent as the music he played. Then he laughed as the others sang, throwing his head back in total surrender to the moment.
I gaped at the scene in amazement because the animated face at the piano belonged to a man with a mind that encompassed so much, from music to medicine, from art to science, from the mastery of a skill to the arousing execution of it. I could not believe that the energetic man in the hologram was the same as the subdued one before me, but the features were unmistakably Steve’s. Then Kate tapped a button on the remote control, and the music stopped, the animated scene disappeared, the curtains reopened, and the room became still again. What force had removed the music and spirit from Steve Caldwell’s life? I wondered.
“Steve, can you play that same joyful tune now?” I asked.
“Yes.”
“Would you like to play music now, Steve?” Kate asked.
“Whatever you’d like.”
“But what would you like?” I asked.
“Doesn’t matter.” Steve looked at Kate for guidance.
“Honey, why don’t you play for Alexander?”
Steve sat at the piano and played the same tune from the home movie. That is, the notes were the same, but there was no variation in volume, no mood created, no vitality in the performance. What I heard was a normally rousing song played monotonously. Steve’s music had notes but no spirit. It took me back across the galaxy to a place where people devoid of their own desires and intentions performed acts they were instructed to do.
After the one song, Kate seemed as eager to proceed with another activity as I was. She suggested that Steve return to the couch, which he did dutifully. Then she invited me to stay for lunch.
“That is kind of you, but I am not hungry, Kate.”
“Steve, do you want lunch?”
“I am not hungry, Kate.” Steve was looking at me and seemed to be echoing my words and inflection.
“But it’s two o’clock, dear. You should eat now.”
“All right.”
“This morning I prepared something you love, poached salmon with fresh dill! And I made your favorite pâté.”
“That’s nice,” said Steve in a tone that made me think he could just as easily have eaten the dried nutrient cakes from my previous diet.
“I like to cook,” Kate explained to me. “And Steve was always an appreciative subject to cook for because he has such a discriminating taste for fine food and wine.”
“I see.”
“You might change your mind about lunch when you see my food, Alexander. Why don’t I set places for all of us on the patio while you and Steve talk about MAS?”
When Kate left, I leaned forward in my chair toward Steve, my eyes staring into his, trying to reach him. “Steve, what happened to you the night of the accident?”
“I don’t really know.”
“There was an unusual rock, a new material from another planet in the galaxy?”
“That’s right.”
“And you were experimenting on it?”
“I did some routine analyses that I was instructed to do.”
“And then what?”
“Then I knew I had something there.”
“What did you have?”
“Something I’d never seen before. Something no one had ever seen before.”
“What was it?”
“A new kind of matter.”
“What kind of matter?”
“Something we don’t have anywhere on Earth. Something that reacted in a new way.”
“What way?”
“I never really found out. I only had a hunch.”
“
What did you do about your hunch?”
“I got excited about it.”
“What do you mean you got excited, Steve?”
“I used to want to know about everything. I was curious.”
“So what did you do?”
“More tests.”
“What kind of tests?”
“Tests I did on my own.”
“Did a supervisor have to authorize a technician’s tests on an unknown material?”
“Oh, yeah. There were strict rules. But my boss worked days, so he had gone home for the night, and I felt too excited to wait until the next day to talk to him. I used to be that way, inquisitive about everything.”
“Did you try to call your boss by phone?”
“No. I think I just forgot about him, about everything except the new matter. I did more tests, wondering what I had.”
“And what did you have?”
“Matter that behaved in a new kind of way.”
“What way?”
“When I accelerated a small amount of it, a new kind of energetic particle appeared, one I had never seen before.”
“So what did you do, Steve?”
“I introduced matter from Earth. When I collided the new alien particles with Earth’s matter, there was a further interaction. Then, a most amazing thing happened.”
“What happened?”
“The particles annihilated each other completely. Not even a trace of ash remained, and no gas or liquid was formed, either. Nothing on Earth behaves like that.”
“Then what happened?”
“I couldn’t believe what I saw. So I took a larger microscopic sample of the alien matter and began to repeat the experiments.”
“And?”
“That’s all I remember.”
“Did you black out?”
Steve nodded. “The other technicians found me on the floor. I woke up, feeling sleepy for a few days.”
“Then what?”
“Then nothing.”
“Then you became the way you are now?”
“Yes.”
“Do you like the way you are now?”
“It’s okay.”
“Are you happy?”
“I don’t know.”
“Do you miss the way you used to be?”