by D. F. Jones
Mark’s face remained impassive. “We’ll know more later,” he said. “I’ll tell the hospital to call you when the ambulance is coming.” He shut his case. “Don’t worry — just let her sleep.”
The aunt looked at her niece doubtfully. “Well, I guess a good sleep never done anybody no harm.” Her practical female mind asserted itself. “Maybe the hospital’s the best place. I can’t go runnin’ up and down stairs, not at my age.” They left her packing an overnight bag for Shane.
Once clear of the house, Scott turned to Freedman. “Mark, this is it! What can we do?”
Freedman turned on him fiercely. “We don’t panic!”
“But the time scale! Tatyana figured we had months — ”
Again Mark cut him short. “Never mind what she said. Tatyana was wrong!” He got in his car. “Get back to the office — and don’t drive fast.”
Freedman called the hospital and arranged for the ambulance, then spoke to the head of surgery, an old friend. “Slim? This is Mark. Look, I can’t say much right now, but I suspect you’re going to get a lot of business from me in the very near future … No, I can’t explain — just take my word. Stop all non-urgent admissions, and if you can discharge any patients, do it … No … No … I can’t tell, there could be twenty admissions from me in the next two or three days … No, not full emergency procedure, not yet. I’ll call you later. I’ve just arranged the admission of the first one — ”
By the time he had finished, two patients had already left the office, annoyed by the brusque attention Scott had given them. He was desperate to talk with Freedman. He almost ran down the corridor to his senior’s office, arriving at the same time as Malin.
Freedman surveyed his two visitors: both looked haggard and eager to talk. With a sharp glance at Jaimie, he gave priority to Malin.
Malin plunged into the presidential directive to set up an ICARUS hospital. When he got to the target date, Freedman stopped him.
“Won’t do, Malin — not now.” Quickly he told him of Shane de Byl.
“But Marinskiya said — ”
“Yes,” Scott interrupted. “Why this time difference? And why Shane?”
Mark’s hand, half raised from the desk, silenced them. “The Soviets had only two cases — insufficient evidence.” He spoke quickly, urgency forcing him into verbal shorthand. “The difference in climate and sunlight may be significant. Vorkuta is above the Arctic Circle; intense cold, six months of semidarkness.” He concentrated on Jaimie. “Shane is the youngest and therefore perhaps the best host.” He shrugged. “All that is beside the point. Xeno is here now, never mind why.” He turned to Malin. “Forget your Army hospital; the action is going to be here, in Nash County Hospital.” Again his raised hand stopped Malin. “Security’s your problem. Other doctors — and surgeons — must be involved.”
“No!” Scott said decisively. “Not Shane — not surgery!”
“No, not Shane,” agreed Mark quietly. “She’s our first case, the first chance to discover what we’re up against. That’s vital.”
Scott hated him at that moment and his expression showed it.
“And you know it.” Freedman was unmoved as he returned Scott’s stare. “Get over to the hospital, Jaimie. Full intensive care facilities at immediate standby. Keep as complete a record as you can of her condition, but no medication or X rays. Set up a camera; shots every half hour — more if you think it’s necessary. I’ll be over as soon as I can. I don’t think it’s likely, but if the cyst ruptures before I arrive — get that specimen!”
Scott left without a word.
Malin had been doing some fast thinking. “You think this girl’s first because she’s the youngest?”
Freedman nodded. “Very possibly.”
“How old is she?”
“Twenty-one — why?”
“Well,” said Malin slowly, “I’m thinking of the other folks on the plane. Certainly there were two or three kids and a couple of stewardesses of about your girl’s age.”
Freedman tossed his glasses on the desk in a gesture of hopelessness. “It’s no good — you’ll never keep this quiet! Everyone that was in that plane is in danger, especially the young. The situation here is bad enough, but the others must be held under observation and the doctors told what little we know.”
“That does it,” said Malin. “Nash County becomes the ICARUS hospital center. It’s not a perfect answer — there isn’t one — but it’s the best we can do for the patients and security. It’s a tricky proposition, setting up a federal operation that fast, but that’s a headache for the President. I’m putting you in charge of this thing, Mark.”
“Me?” Freedman looked up sharply. “I’m in this by accident. I’ll do all I can, but I’m only a GP!”
“True,” agreed Malin, not prepared to argue, “but you know a hell of a lot more than anybody else, and there’s no time.” He looked directly at Freedman. “Mark, I’m not asking. I’m telling you you have the job.”
Mark felt neither pleased nor sorry. His mind was struggling with the problems of his patients. Shane’s aunt, for example, could well be on the threshold of the acute phase. She was alone now, and if she passed out, how would he or anyone else know?
“Can I use your phone?” Malin asked.
“Go ahead,” said Mark absently.
Within two minutes Malin had the New York FBI office buzzing like an overturned beehive. He wanted a mobile field HQ unit in Abdera that night; New York had better not be late.
Then he called Washington. “Frank? Alvin. This is an open line. That scheme is a dead duck. Forget the three-month deadline — it’s now. I’m lining up a local non-Army facility and I want you to clear it with the big man. Tell him … Malin was dimly aware of another phone ringing, of Freedman talking. But he went on rapidly, suggesting the selective releases of ICARUS letters. “ … And all those other folk we met back in Denver, especially those under twenty-five — the committee had better think of some way to get them here … yes, all of them … I’m staying here. By midnight I’ll have a proper communication link. You’ll get all the dope then.” He hung up.
Freedman was staring at him. “If it’s any comfort,” he said, getting up, “you haven’t jumped the gun. There are two more cases — and one’s the second youngest on my list!”
*
Having driven like a lunatic to the hospital, Jaimie had plenty of time to prepare for Shane’s arrival. His nervous state raised a good deal of curiosity, and caused a hostile confrontation between him and administration. The battle-ax at the desk retreated before his determination to get what he wanted, but she told him that she would report his disgraceful conduct to Freedman, the control committee, and anyone else who’d listen. Jaimie could not have cared less.
Once Shane was safely in the first-floor room assigned to her, he slowed down. She lay still, her breathing barely noticeable, yet she looked so healthy, so beautiful. Jaimie pulled himself together and, assisted by a nurse, took an EKG reading. He also checked Shane’s temperature, pulse rate, and respiration. All were subnormal, but not enough to worry him. He concentrated on the cyst, his hands trembling. This lump, already more than two centimeters in diameter, brought on by something hideous, something completely alien to her world, was nonetheless a part of Shane.
He sent the nurse for the photographer, glad to have a few moments alone. In an attempt to blot out the fear and anguish he was feeling, he dictated his findings into his recorder.
Freedman arrived and found no fault with Jaimie’s preparations. Shane lay on her side, her strapped right arm clearly visible, the bed flanked by all the daunting paraphernalia of modern medicine. To one side stood a camera, mounted on a tripod clamped in position. The overhead light had been dimmed, the curtains drawn; a single spotlight illuminated the target area on the girl’s arm and the shallow dish beneath it.
Satisfied, Freedman hurried off to the emergency meeting of the hospital control board, picking up Malin in the reception
area en route.
During the ten-minute drive to the hospital, Malin had made up his mind. A decision had to be made without referring back to Washington, and he was the one to make it.
After an introduction by Freedman, he informed the board that the passengers and crew of the Papa Kilo flight had contracted an unidentified sickness during the course of their flight. How many would be affected could not be known, but the bulk of the passengers hailed from Abdera, and — subject to presidential approval- — he was putting the hospital under federal control. Dr. Freedman, who had the twin advantages of knowing most of the patients professionally and knowing more about this sickness that anyone else, would assume operational control of the hospital on behalf of the United States Government.
The doctors and senior nurses absorbed this in shocked silence. One or two looked at Malin as if he’d suddenly grown an extra head. Freedman’s speech was terse. This was an emergency. The drastic action was justified. The patients would be his personal responsibility. Any questions?
Staggered by the speed of the takeover, no one spoke.
“Okay,” Freedman continued, “we have one hundred and ten beds. Sheila,” he addressed the head nurse, “how many vacancies do we have right now?”
“As of half an hour ago, thirty-nine.”
“Make it thirty-seven — there are two more on the way. There may be a dozen or more before morning.” Freedman looked at Dr. Lewis, the head of surgery and the hospital’s senior physician. “Slim?”
Slim understood the unspoken question. “There’s no time to stand around. I fully support this action, and Mark’s in control” — he went on, half joking — “so long as he doesn’t see himself with a knife in my operating rooms! I’ve already stopped all nonurgent admissions and ten patients will be discharged tomorrow. That gives us forty-seven beds. What is the potential figure, Mark?”
Freedman looked at Malin.
“As a rough guess, I’d say Papa Kilo had between eighty and ninety on board.”
Malin got up. “By midnight there’ll be an FBI guard on this place — not to get in your hair but to keep intruders off your backs. Thank you.”
As Malin left, Freedman was launching into a description of the Xeno cycle.
*
By 11:00 P.M. five calls for help had reached Freedman via his answering service. Four times an ambulance made the run to Abdera, lights flashing, but sirens silent on his orders. Within the hospital everyone worked feverishly, all differences and rivalries forgotten. Patients were moved to clear wards and groups of rooms. Slim and Mark examined the first two cases after Shane. One of them was her aunt. The cyst, located on her neck, presented no problems for the surgeon. Freedman made the decision: Operate.
*
The frenetic activity in Nash County Hospital was reflected clear across the States. Washington hastily approved Malin’s action and the President phoned the governor. Four Army doctors, two of them parasitologists, were dispatched to the hospital at once, and the FBI got down to locating and bringing in the eighteen non-Abderan passengers and the crew of Papa Kilo.
Ten of the passengers and one crew member were found within an hour. Ten were induced by a mixture of threats and hints of even larger federal compensation to make the trip to Abdera — by service transportation. The stewardess could not be moved. She already lay in an Atlanta hospital, a sore puzzle to the doctors.
The missing seven worried Washington. Five were in one family. Neighbors in Lafayette, Louisiana, said they’d gone on a short vacation in their camper, destination unknown. That was bad enough. But what made the ICARUS group really sweat were the other two, the pilot and copilot. The pilot — on his first operational flight since Papa Kilo — was driving a Jumbo over the Atlantic, bound for Europe, and the FBI located the copilot on a stopover in Bombay.
Freedman knew nothing of these latest developments and would have paid small attention if he had. His slight figure was seen everywhere in the hospital, arranging, ordering, helping — and, above all, steadying others with his calmness.
At midnight he took over from Scott, ordering him back to Abdera. To save time, an ambulance would be stationed at their office. Scott would guard the telephone throughout the night. At first light he was to start checking all Specials.
Jaimie did not want to leave Shane; but the silent, tense hours he’d passed in her room had given him time to adjust. Secretly he felt relieved that Mark was taking over, doubting his own ability to remain calm and objective in dealing with Shane’s inevitable crisis. He had no such doubts about Mark.
Alone, Freedman settled down to his vigil, half his mind busy with other problems, reviewing decisions already made, evaluating new ones. Slim had the first of his two surgical cases on the table. Seven other admissions were being treated like Shane; three had to be put in one room, under the supervision of a senior nurse. This was all the overstretched staff could provide. In an adjoining room the hospital’s only other camera was rigged over the cyst on the collarbone of a sixty-nine year old widow.
Mark doubted if any further cases would be found before morning. Most Specials would be in bed anyway, with no one to tell the difference between sleep and coma. A message from Malin told of forthcoming reinforcement by U.S. Government personnel and material, but tonight’s battle had to be fought with what they had.
Freedman turned off the overhead light to see the EKG scan more clearly, relying on it to alert him of any change in his patient’s condition. He sat on a high stool, watching her arm under the cold, bright spotlight, the silence broken only by the audio blips of the EKG machine. Now and then he gently felt the lump with a gloved hand, estimating the size of this alien life that grew almost visibly, draining the resources of its victim for its own unknown purpose. As a human being Mark fought against horror; as a doctor, wonder and fascination held him.
*
Around two A.M. the head nurse dropped by with coffee. Angrily he waved her away. She put the cup on the cart beside him and left only too gladly. She was not a fanciful woman, but the darkened room, with Freedman bowed over his work like a vulture over its prey, chilled her.
Freedman ignored the coffee. He dictated notes rapidly in a low voice, and, with the cyst growing at an ever-increasing rate, took photographs every ten minutes. All the while he listened to the steady blipping of the machine. With infinite care he laid his hand lightly on the cyst’s domed top, which had now changed color from healthy pink to dirty yellow. Gently his sensitive fingers explored the periphery, recognizing the growing hardness, just as Tatyana had described.
And then —
It took all his training, all his personal discipline not to snatch his hand away. Beneath his probing fingertips, something moved: a slow, writhing movement.
Carefully he withdrew his hand, his heart pounding. He paused, wiped his brow with his arm, picked up the recorder, and spoke, grasping the camera cable in his other hand. He waited, excited and apprehensive. Soon he would know.
XXI.
Freedman could not be certain of the exact moment of rupture. Perhaps his gaze lingered a fraction too long on the EKG scan, but when he looked again the cyst had changed.
The stretched skin still gleamed in the cold light. But in the very center of the swelling, a brighter reflection, a pinhead of fluid, lay on the skin — and as he watched, it grew.
Instantly he pressed the camera switch, filling the room for a microsecond with blinding electronic light, the silence broken only by the click and whirr of shutter and film-shift. He switched on the microphone, spoke softly, and left the recorder running: from here on he would need a free hand.
The pool of fluid increased in size, losing its sharp convexity. Now the size of a match head, a trace of blood discolored its edge. Freedman took another shot, tightening his eyes against the flash. The fluid had now formed an irregular patch as big as a bean. Light danced on its trembling surface. He guessed the surface tension would soon fail — or was the movement due to something e
lse?
The process speeded up. For some reason, the patch broke. A thin trickle of blood-streaked fluid coursed slowly down the girl’s arm, revealing a cavity.
Unconsciously, Freedman held his breath. Serous fluid welled out of the cavity in small, irregular pulses. Breathlessly he described the change, his mouth dry with excitement and barely contained fear.
The domed top of the cyst lost shape: faint wrinkles appeared in the satiny skin, its color changing from putrescent yellow to dirty, lifeless white.
And through the yellow fluid, hesitantly, a head — triangular, alien …
Again the lightning flash. The head pulled back momentarily, then reappeared.
No bigger than an ear of corn, with two small black eyes, set well apart, it stared with frightening sentience at a strange world. Once more the camera flash, but this time the head did not recoil.
Freedman reached for a pair of forceps. With his attention focused on the alien, his hand fumbled. The forceps slipped, clattering on the table-top.
The head tilted sharply, aware of the noise.
Great God! The thing could hear.
He had the forceps now, and their cold, familiar shape gave comfort. Not yet; wait …
The head moved forward in a smooth, serpentine action. Behind the head, a short neck of equal width, and behind that the first suggestion of a wider, thicker body, straining to free itself from the surrounding flesh.
Taking another shot, Freedman felt a new rush of fear. The alien not only saw and heard, it had the ability to learn, to understand that the bright blink of light posed no threat, for its struggle to emerge did not stop.
Two clawlike black pincers appeared, grasping the edge of the cavity to gain purchase. The head bent downwards and the back was suddenly visible, arched. With one swift, flipping action the rest of the body and tail emerged, whipping upwards, falling with a faint, nauseating splat on the girl’s arm.