Alan E. Nourse - The Bladerunner

by Alan E Nourse

  It was cold outside, with a biting wind that chewed through the light sweater and made his chest tighten all the more. It seemed to Billy that there was more street traffic than usual, with cars and trucks jamming up the narrow streets and people crowding the sidewalks and doorways. Hie place he had looked for Roberts the night before was miles to the southeast, but he started walking, bending against the wind. Within a block his teeth were chattering uncontrollably and the cough became so painful he had to lean against a lamppost until it eased. He watched three empty ground-cabs creep by before it dawned on him that he still had money in his pockets and could ride.

  From that point on the day degenerated into nightmare. The tavern, when he reached it, was crowded, but Roberts was nowhere to be seen. At first the hard-eyed bartender denied having heard of any Roberts, but then he looked more closely at Billy, shivering uncontrollably on the bar stool, and frowned. "What's the matter, you sick? You a patient or something?"

  "Yeah, I'm a patient. I gotta see Roberts."

  "You're too early, he never gets here till almost midnight Come on back then; he'll take care of you."

  Nodding dazedly, Billy stumbled out of the place. Back in the cab he dug in his pockets, spilling the bundle of Viricidin injection kits Parrot had given him onto the seat, and came up with Parrot's list of contacts he had picked up last night. Only a few were checked off —he must have given up early. But there were more than six hours before midnight, plenty of time to contact some of them.

  He gave the cabbie an address and plunged in. Where he went, exactly, he never could have said. Half the time he was in a stupor, with stairways, alleys, and crowded streets flashing by in blurred succession. At one point he was asking someone—a bartender?—for aspirin, gulping down the white pills with water, inhaling some and coughing until his sides ached to clear his chest again. Later he was facing a chubby, dough-faced youth with a badly scarred cheek across a table, talking, pleading, urging the boy to contact other bladerunners he knew, yet sensing from the fish-eyed stare that what he was saying was making no sense. At another place someone hurled him down a flight of stairs and he remembered thinking, like a drunken man, how lightly and gracefully he was falling, pirouetting in dreamlike slow motion until he thudded to a stop on the landing below. And later still, someone was feeding him something somewhere, a warm, watery soup that made him gag and cough, yet introduced a spot of warmth that did wonders for his chill.

  And finally, miraculously, seven hours and a half a dozen calls later, he was back at the tavern where Roberts was due, the bundle of Viricidin kits still stuffed in his pants pocket. The place, a combination of tavern, restaurant, and pool hall, was crowded and noisy now; a jukebox screamed, and people were packed in three deep at the bar. Near the door Billy saw a group of Naturist men, heads and beards half shaven, clustered together in deep conversation. Billy slipped past them, then paused to peer back into the bluish gloom of the place, almost gagging at the combined stench of beer, wet clothes, and acrid smoke. He had met Roberts only once before, remembered only vaguely the long, dirty-blond hair and the hatchet face, but he was sure that if he saw him he would recognize him. Moving past the bar and pool tables, Billy searched the tables and booths toward the rear.

  Roberts was sitting with two others in the farthest booth, eating in sullen silence. As Billy approached he put his fork down and sat up straight. "Roberts?" Billy said, hesitating.

  "Who wants him?" one of the others said.

  "I'm Billy Gimp. I work out of Parrot's shop. He wanted me to see you."

  Roberts motioned him to sit down. "Parrot threw me out on my can three years ago. Said he was tired of my face. What does he want now?"

  "It's about this flu that's around, it's bad news and the word's gotta be spread." Fumbling for words, Billy told the story as clearly as he could remember it "They figure people are going to be dying in flocks if we don't move," he concluded, "and that means seeing patients and making other contacts, both."

  "There's been some meningitis around," Roberts conceded, "but I haven't seen anybody dying."

  "You will. It's the same thing as the flu, a late complication. People got to be protected. Viricidin if they're sick, immune globulin if they've been exposed, polyvalent vaccine for everybody who hasn't gotten the flu yet They can get it at any Hospital or Clinic."

  Roberts shook his head suspiciously. "Who put yon onto this? You sound like a shill for Health Control to me."

  "Not so, but the word is getting around."

  "I haven't heard anything from my doc."

  "Maybe he just hasn't heard yet. We're trying to spread this as far and fast as possible. I've got some injection kits for you to start with." Billy hauled the bundle of supplies out of his pocket and set it on the table. "There's no cost; we're moving these things free before we have a full-scale epidemic going out of control."

  "I don't like it," Roberts said. "I've been hearing a thousand rumors, all different. Why should I believe you?"

  "Don't believe me. Call Parrot."

  "I don't mess around with Parrot."

  "Then call your own supplier."

  Roberts came to his feet. "I'll do that, right now." He looked at his two companions. "Keep this gimpy one here till I get back."

  Billy sat at the table, still shivering, as the youth crossed the room to a telephone booth. Roberts was gone so long Billy was almost dozing when he came back, looking sobered and shaken.

  "Big John says it's on the level," Roberts said. "He's been trying to reach me and so has my doc." He looked at Billy. "Big John says that underground supplies are very scarce; we should be sending people to the Hospitals. That straight?"

  "That's straight," Billy said.

  "No questions asked, no qualifications?"

  "Not for that."

  "Well, we'd better move." Roberts motioned to his two companions. "We'll take these supplies."

  "Okay, but only use them for people that won't go in to a Hospital for anything."

  Roberts picked up the brown-wrapped packet and started toward the door. They had not noticed, as they talked, that the place, previously noisy, had become ominously quiet, and the group of Naturists had moved down the bar to stare at them fixedly. Now a huge half-shaven man stepped out in front of Roberts, flanked by two others. "Hold it, Bud," he rumbled. "What's in the package?"

  "That's my business," Roberts said.

  "And any lousy bladerunner with bootleg medical supplies is my business," the big man said. "Hand it over."

  Somewhere a glass crashed on the floor. Roberts moved like lightning, driving straight into the big man's midriff with his fist, then turning aside and bringing a fist down on his neck. As the big man went reeling into his cohorts, Roberts' companions headed for the door on Roberts' heels. Billy was on his feet now, sidestepping one of the big man's friends and catching another with a sharp chop across the nose as he moved in. Three other Naturists loomed up in the narrow alley between the bar and the door, and a knife appeared from somewhere. His head swimming, Billy deftly tripped the first man, used a bar stool for a pivot to swing past the other two, tripped himself on somebody's leg and landed with a thud by the door. Somebody caught at his arm as he scrambled to his feet, but Billy twisted loose as he crashed through the door, leaving his sweater behind.

  Bedlam broke loose in the tavern as people poured out the door after him. Roberts and his friends were scattering in three directions; Billy headed across the street and down a darkened alley, moving as swiftly as he could on his poor foot. There was shouting and he heard footfalls behind him as two of the Naturists took pursuit. Frantically Billy searched for a doorway, a fire escape, a cul-de-sac, anyplace to get out of full view, but nothing presented itself. Then up ahead he saw traffic on a cross street, and a darkened warehouse building with a door hanging loose on its hinges. Ducking between two cars, he scrambled to the far side of the street as his pursuers paused, trying to dodge traffic. Then, almost to the warehouse door, he misstepped
and sprawled. Before he could recover himself, the two were on him. He struck out viciously as one tried to drag him to his feet by the collar; the other moved in to pin his arms. Desperate now, Billy fought with fists, elbows, knees and head, wriggling out of one's grip only to be seized by the other. A heavy blow caught the side of his head and he reeled back against the building as the two closed in on him, panting.

  Suddenly the three of them were bathed with bright light and a siren screamed as a hovercraft moved down between the buildings, blowing up clouds of dust and grit, its floodlights streaming downward. The two Naturists broke and ran in opposite directions, cursing. Billy, still groggy from the blow, hauled himself to his feet. Somebody aboard the "craft was bawling something from a loudspeaker, but he ducked his head and ran for the warehouse door even as the craft settled down to the street.

  Inside the warehouse, darkness enveloped Billy like a blanket. More than anything, then, he wanted darkness and rest. His head was reeling and the strength seemed drained from his legs as he moved ahead into blackness. Then light from the floodlights streamed in the doorway, and he saw a set of rotten stairs ahead. He plunged down them into a dank, wet corridor that smelled like mold. Boxes and crates were stacked to the ceiling, and he hobbled down the hallway, searching for some place to hide. Then he saw a door, wrenched it open, and collapsed to the floor in a small storage room. Creeping to a corner behind a packing case, he huddled, panting, trying to stifle his coughing and to listen at the same time.

  There were hesitant footfalls on the floor above, and he heard men's voices. "Jesus, this floor's rotten, Pete. Watch your step there!"

  "Okay, I'll cover this end, you check that side. Hold it, there's a stairway going down."

  "Give me a light, I'll check down there." Even as he huddled in the room below, it seemed to Billy that there was a familiar ring to that third voice. He heard steps on the stairs, a pause, then footfalls in the corridor, and a flashlight beam struck the half-open door of the side room. "Billy? Billy, are you down there?"

  Billy couldn't believe his ears. He struggled to his feet, and his attempt to answer was blocked by a paroxysm of coughing. The steps quickened as he struggled for the door. "Doc! Is that you?"

  The flashlight caught him as he emerged, and then he heard Doc's unmistakable voice, saying "Billy, for God's sake, Billy, what are you doing in this place, you damned fool?"

  "I had to ... I had to get to Roberts—" Billy broke off, coughing again. "I lost my list, must have left it in my room, got a lot more people to contact."

  "No, Billy, no more, forget it. I should never have sent you out in the first place. Why didn't you have sense enough to quit?" Billy felt Doc's arm under his, holding him up as his knees buckled, and Doc was still talking, half laughing, half hysterical, as he tried to help him back down the corridor and up the stairs, shouting for help above. And then, for an instant, it hit Billy that it really was Doc there, trying to help him, and there was so much to say, and then the darkness closed in for real and Billy slumped onto the stairs in Doc's arms.

  Later, Billy recalled, there were a confusion of images and impressions as he had drifted in and out of consciousness. He remembered vaguely being half led, half carried, up the stairs, a hard stretcher under him, then a siren that seemed to go on and on as he drifted back into blackness. Later he became half aware of a cool, white room and white-gowned figures moving about him, talking quietly but incomprehensibly. Still later it was night and a single bed-lamp threw grotesque shadows on a white wall, then darkness again.

  There were dreams, gray featureless dreams that terrified him without focusing on any specific reason for terror. Once he was being chased down endless dark corridors, fighting to draw his crippled foot along with him, repeatedly falling as he tried to run, and he jerked wide awake, soaked with sweat and icy cold at the same time. Later on—how much later?—he awoke in darkness, certain that he had to leave, get away from that place, wherever it was, get back to his room and the false transmitter before they raided him and found it. He stumbled weakly out of bed, groping in the darkness for clothes that weren't there, crashing into the wall as he tripped across the cord to a respirator sitting idly by the bedside. And almost immediately there were people there, talking to him calmly, easing him back into the bed again. Still later he was certain that Molly Barret was there speaking very gently to him, urging him to respond, but his voice caught in a throat as dry as leather and he could only croak helplessly, and then when she was gone he could not be certain whether this had been dream or reality.

  At length, of course, he woke up with finality, raised up on an elbow and peered around him. He was in a white-painted room in a hospital bed, an oxygen tent still rigged at its head but pushed back out of the way. Pale morning sunlight was coming in a single window, and outside he could see patches of blue sky and the tops of high-rise dwellings. He was caught with a paroxysm of coughing, and suddenly realized that he had been coughing continuously for days, but this time he did not feel so weak or breathless as before. More than anything, he felt a dull inquiring ache in his abdomen, and realized that he was fiercely hungry.

  A nurse came in the door, looked at him and smiled. "Well, you're finally awake. That's good news."

  "Where am I?"

  "Hospital Number Seven Isolation."

  "How long have I been here? And where's Doc? I've got work to do."

  He started to climb out of bed, but the nurse restrained him. "Wait for Dr. Long to get here. He wanted to be called as soon as you were awake. It's been a long time, more than a week."

  Billy sank back in the bed, confused and alarmed. He had no business in a Hospital, he knew that, and the time lapse was staggering. A week? Wearily he stared up at the ceiling, dozed a bit, then woke again as a hand touched his forehead. Doc was there and Molly Barret too. "It's about time you were coming to," Doc said. "You had us worried for a while."

  "Doc, what am I doing here?"

  "A good, ripe lobar pneumonia, mostly. Plus exhaustion and exposure and a few other things. Apparently the Viricidin shots we gave you stopped the flu virus, all right, but not before your resistance was hammered down to the point that you were a sitting duck for pneumonia. As it is, you're lucky to be around. Pneumonia kills people too."

  "But what about the epidemic?" Billy said. "There were a dozen people on Parrot's list that I didn't reach, Doc. I've got to get out of here—"

  "Relax, your part's over with. By now we're just wrapping up."

  "But even so, this is the Hospital, isn't it? I'm not qualified to be here. If Health Control finds out—"

  "—they couldn't do a thing. It's all out in the open, Billy, they couldn't keep it quiet, and right now Health Control couldn't touch you with a ten-foot pole. You or any other bladerunner. Public opinion wouldn't stand for it—you're the Boy Heroes of the Plague City, and Health Control knows it." He tossed a pile of newspapers on the bed. "Take a look."

  Billy blinked at the banner headlines. ILLEGAL

  MEDICS HEROES IN FLU CRISIS, one paper proclaimed. 1NFECTON CONTROLLED, SOURCES SAY. SENATE TO STUDY HEALTH CONTROL POLICIES. Billy shook his head, incredulous, and looked up at Doc. "Then it really is out in the open."

  "Wide open. It was a dangerous crisis, and Health Control was completely out of its depth. Things are going to have to change, maybe more swiftly than anybody thought. Nobody can risk such a thing happening again, least of all Health Control."

  "But it'll haul the undergrounders out into the open, too."

  "Where they ought to be. Where they should have been all along. But in the crunch it was you and the other bladerunners that mobilized the fight in this epidemic. You spread the word and got people in for protection." Doc shrugged. "It isn't all over yet, but the computer projection shows that the epidemic has crested. There'll be fewer and fewer showing up with the meningitis, and fewer and fewer deaths. And you guys can take a lot of credit."

  "That's great," Billy said sourly. "But where does
it leave me? I'm still sneaking around with a bracelet on my wrist."

  "Maybe you'd better look again."

  Startled, Billy looked at his wrist. It was bare. Then he saw the transponder lying on the bedside stand, with the muffler net beside it. "I persuaded Health Control to persuade the court that you could probably manage without that," Doc said wryly. "They had to clear it through the Secretary himself, but they saw the light when I pointed out to them how eager the newspapers were to know just how all you bladerunners happened to cooperate so splendidly with the health authorities. Anyway, you're completely legal right now—for once. All you have to do now is get your strength back, and heal up your chest."

  From the other side of the bed Molly Barret cleared her throat. "Wasn't there something else you were going to get arranged?"

  "What do you mean?" Doc said.

  "Seems to me I remember a promise you were tossing around the last time we were all together."

  "Oh, that." Doc coughed. "Well, sure, but he can't be undergoing surgery in the shape he's in now. He'll need a couple of months to get up and around, get strong again—"

  "Doc, you promised," Molly said hotly. "And doctor or no doctor, you're not going to wiggle out this time, if I have to go to Dr. Durham herself to make you come across!"

  "—'and the orthopedic surgeon I talked to this morning refused to schedule Billy sooner than the first week in March, if his chest X-ray is clear. So we have a tentative date for March eighth. If you still want it done."

  "You mean here? In the Hospital?"

  "Right here, and one of the best bone surgeons in the city."

  Billy sat looking at his foot for a long moment. "I suppose in a way I'll kind of miss it," he said finally. "But not too much. It's like getting rid of that transponder."