Ghost Planet

by Sharon Lynn Fisher

  “Don’t let me interrupt you, Cooper,” she said. “I thought I’d listen in for a while.”

  Poor Cooper. The sudden arrival of his boss seemed to ruffle him as much as me.

  “You wanted to ask me about my time in New Seattle?” I prompted.

  Cooper proceeded to ask me a number of questions about the first memories I had of New Seattle, and how and when I’d learned I was a ghost. From there the interview moved on to Murphy’s behavior toward me. These questions were more personal and made me uncomfortable. I didn’t want to revisit those last couple of days in New Seattle. Especially not now, with Mitchell watching me.

  “Was Dr. Murphy attracted to you?”

  I raised my head from the couch. “I’m sorry?”

  Cooper cleared his throat. “Do you believe Dr. Murphy was sexually attracted to you?”

  I gave him a hard frown. “I really couldn’t say.”

  “Elizabeth,” Mitchell called from her perch, “I need you to be honest. You have to help us if you expect us to help you.”

  Detachment. I’d let her see how important it was to me, and now she was going to use it to control me.

  I closed my eyes. Tried to speak evenly past the constriction in my throat. “Yes. I believe he was attracted to me.” You’re lovely, Elizabeth.

  “And were you attracted to him?” Cooper continued.

  “Yes.”

  “Did the two of you have sex?”

  “No.”

  “Any physical intimacy? Embracing, touching, kissing—”

  “Once or twice.”

  “Which, Elizabeth?” Mitchell inserted. “Once, or twice?”

  I glared death rays at her. “Is this relevant in any way, Dr. Mitchell, beyond your own amusement?”

  “When our leading psychologist suddenly stops following a protocol he developed—a protocol meant to protect us from a hostile species—I’d say any information that helps us understand why it happened is relevant.”

  There was no arguing with this. Certainly I disagreed with the “hostile species” designation, but in the absence of proof to the contrary, it was only my opinion.

  “Twice,” I said coldly.

  “And how did you feel during physical interaction with Dr. Murphy?”

  I turned my death rays on Cooper. They were more effective on him, but for good measure I replied, “How do you feel during physical interaction with someone you’re attracted to?”

  “Cooper is asking whether you felt anything unusual or unexpected, Elizabeth,” said Mitchell.

  I studied the White Witch, wondering if she’d ever fallen in love. Was there any part of it that wasn’t unusual or unexpected?

  Leaning my head back against the couch, I closed my eyes. “Nothing that I remember.”

  Mitchell left soon after that, and the interview continued in a different vein. It was tempting to believe she had dropped by just to observe my discomfort. But I couldn’t afford to underestimate her.

  After her departure I switched to autopilot and tried to push Murphy from my thoughts. The questions about him had left me with freshly opened wounds. I found it hard to accept that he had gone with no final word, no explanation. Perhaps our separation had fulfilled its purpose—had given him enough space to question what he was doing. To regret his lapse.

  In all honesty I couldn’t blame him for the choice he’d made. But I did wonder if he thought of me, wherever he was now.

  I wondered if they’d notify him when I was dead.

  Detachment

  I cooperated with nearly a week of interviews and tests before panic began to set in. This was all a waste of my very limited time. There’d been no more visits from Mitchell, and no more talk of detachment. I’d begun to suspect she was playing with me.

  “How much longer do you think I have?” I asked Sarah, the next time she came for me.

  “What do you mean?” she replied, wary.

  “I mean to live. Mitchell said a couple of weeks. How long does it usually take? Will it happen suddenly, or gradually?”

  How many people had such a clear idea of when they were going to die? Suicide victims? Death row inmates?

  “Elizabeth—” Sarah broke off, shaking her head. “Dr. Mitchell knows more about it than I do.”

  “I’m sure she does. But I don’t trust her.”

  Sarah looked at me square, giving an infinitesimal nod. Not the answer I’d asked her for, but it was something.

  Matching her level gaze, I said, “I want you to give her a message. Tell her I’m finished with these tests. This next week is mine. Tell her I want to try detachment.”

  Sarah’s expression hardened. “They don’t know how to do it—you understand that? You’ll probably die.”

  I raised my eyebrows, staring at her in disbelief. “You want to tell me what fucking difference it makes?”

  She studied my face, and then stalked out of the room without replying. I sank down on the bed, letting my head drop into my hands.

  I thought about my mother. Despite my compassion for her sadness—despite understanding it from a clinical point of view—I knew I’d always viewed her suicidal impulses as weakness. Embracing defeat rather than facing her problems. But dying was better than some things. Maybe for her, it was better than those powerless, hopeless feelings that came as part of the depression package.

  Sarah thought detachment was suicide, that was clear enough. Maybe she’d turn out to be right, but I wasn’t going to wait in this cell for death to come for me.

  * * *

  I’d gotten the sense Sarah would do what she could for me, though I didn’t understand why. Maybe she liked me. Maybe she pitied me. Whatever the reason, my hunch was confirmed when Mitchell showed up right after lunch.

  “I understand you want to try detachment,” she said, dragging the visitor chair over to the bed.

  “I don’t have time for games, Dr. Mitchell. I’m pretty sure you had me slated for detachment anyway. What are we waiting for?”

  Mitchell gave me another of her icicle smiles. “I don’t have time for games either, Elizabeth. You’re different from the other subjects we’ve studied. I’m sure you’ve caught on to that by now. These tests and interviews are just as important to us, and detachment may kill you. So it’s really just a matter of ordering things logically.”

  I hated that so much of what she said made sense—or at least I could see how it made sense to her.

  “What is it you’re doing that’s killing symbionts?”

  She sat back in the chair, folding her arms. “We’ve experimented with a number of approaches. We’ve tried gradual distancing of the host from the symbiont.”

  “I don’t understand … I’m about as distant as I can get from Dr. Murphy.”

  “Yes, but you’re medicated. We conducted these experiments without medication.”

  I swallowed. “I see. What happened?”

  “Intensifying pain ending in death.”

  Even through the medication I felt a sympathetic stab in my gut.

  “What else have you tried?”

  “You’re aware that the areas of the brain that differ in symbionts are the areas involved in functions like emotional response, and addiction?”

  “Yes.”

  “We tried addicting symbionts to strong narcotics, like heroin, to see if that would replace the need for the host. We succeeded in addicting them, but still failed to detach them. Several of them died from complications related to withdrawal. We tried surgical interference with the anomalous areas of the brain. We tried frontal lobe lobotomies. All surgical methods resulted in fatalities.”

  I shuddered. Lobotomies were barbaric, but I’d never heard of them resulting in a high number of deaths. Still—I’d rather be a ghost, even a dead one, than a zombie.

  I let my head tip back against the wall, studying the ceiling while I thought about this. “Could be your surgical procedures succeeded in severing the bond, but the symbiont couldn’t survive without
it.”

  “That’s what we concluded. In addition to these more extreme trials, we’ve experimented with a whole host of relatively benign therapies, including altering levels of various neurochemicals, with no significant results.”

  “So has it ever happened, to your knowledge? A symbiont detaching?”

  I watched her closely, waiting to see whether she’d lie to me, and more importantly, if anything in her face would betray her when she did.

  But I misjudged her. “We know of it happening once. Shortly after the symbionts appeared. A microbiologist’s ghost—his wife. Unfortunately she was killed by planet security, and he committed suicide, so we have no details.”

  All of these tragedies. In a grim way it was comforting, reminding me my death would be part of a larger history. It made the whole ordeal seem less personal, less unfair. And it gave me a feeling I wasn’t alone.

  But I had confirmation of Sarah’s story now, and I wasn’t ready to give up.

  “Detachment happened spontaneously in that case?”

  “We assume so. But there’s no way to confirm.”

  So was it a fluke, or was it possible for all of us? What had triggered it? I recalled what I’d read about symbiogenesis, and how the idea of being absorbed by a host had disturbed me. But now a startling possibility occurred to me, an idea so tempting I had to be careful. Fixing on a theory for emotional reasons led to bad science.

  I let go of the lock of hair I’d been twisting and looked at Mitchell, flinching at the intensity of her gaze. I swallowed the idea that had been forming, afraid those predatory senses would sniff it out.

  “I wonder if it’s possible dependence is only a first phase,” I said vaguely. “Maybe we’re all supposed to detach.”

  Mitchell broke her stare, glancing at her watch as she rose from the chair. “Sounds like a logical conclusion. But you’ll have to excuse me, Elizabeth—I have a meeting. We can talk more tomorrow. Until then, why don’t you spend some time thinking about this? As both a scientist and a symbiont, you bring a unique perspective to the question. Maybe you can help us.” She smiled at me, and I shivered. “Unless any of these other options I’ve mentioned appeal to you?”

  I couldn’t derive even a moment’s satisfaction out of the fact she wanted my help. My life meant nothing to her. I was going to die, but before I did she intended to wring every last bit of usefulness out of me. And I had no choice about helping her, because it was the only way I could help myself.

  “Tell me one thing,” I said. “Why are you so interested in detachment? What’s the benefit to ERP?”

  “I would think the benefit of separating symbionts from hosts would be obvious. It could save the project.”

  “I thought Dr. Murphy’s protocol had already achieved that.” This was mostly intended as a swipe at her arrogance.

  “You’re not wrong. But no one views that as an optimal or a final solution. Not even Dr. Murphy did. It’s also only one facet of the larger problem.”

  I blinked at her. “What larger problem?”

  Mitchell folded her arms, increasing the overall impression of smugness. “There’s evidence the planet is beginning to destabilize.”

  “Dr. Murphy mentioned something about that, but I don’t understand—”

  “Biotransports have arrived on Earth with holds full of rotting plants. Field scientists have disappeared without a trace. Ardagh himself had to be fished out of a swamp after his shuttle went down in a storm. Now a whole transport of corpses has been sent back to Earth.”

  Again I shivered. “What does this have to do with symbionts?”

  “The planet had three years of stability. There were hints of change as early as a month after the arrival of the symbionts. It’s reasonable to speculate there’s a connection. If we can detach and isolate them, we can begin to test that theory.”

  And if there is a connection? I wondered. But I couldn’t bring myself to ask.

  Then I realized she’d overlooked a possible complication. “What if detachment triggers a replacement, just like when a ghost dies? Won’t this all turn out to have been a waste of time?”

  “Not exactly.” The reply and the tight smile made it clear Mitchell hadn’t told me everything, and didn’t intend to.

  She crossed to the door saying, “I’m giving you the day off, Elizabeth. Rest, and think more about your hypothesis.”

  * * *

  I had clung to a cloak of clinical reserve during the conversation with Mitchell, but as soon as she left, the full weight of it came down on me. The trials she’d described were almost enough to make me rethink my obsession with detachment.

  And what if she was right about the connection between the problems on the planet and the ghosts? Humanity had wiped out whole populations for lesser offenses.

  Alone in my room with nothing else to do, I spent longer than I should have turning it all over in my mind. Despair had gotten a firm foothold by the time I managed to steer myself toward the only positive outcome of our meeting.

  Reverse symbiogenesis. This was my unscientific label for the idea that had occurred to me when Mitchell confirmed detachment was possible. Maybe instead of hosts absorbing symbionts, symbionts could absorb something from their hosts and detach as whole, independent organisms.

  I itched for Net access. It was how I worked—I couldn’t sit quietly pondering, I needed to be doing something. Surfing academic resources, scribbling notes, bouncing ideas off colleagues. I played around with the display in my room and discovered it was Net-capable, but locked. When an orderly came with my dinner, I asked him to request that I be given access.

  After pacing back and forth the rest of the long evening, I concluded that scans and interviews were preferable to fidgeting alone in my room. I was heading for the shower to settle my nerves when Sarah came in.

  “Come with me,” she said.

  I looked at the clock on the display. “It’s after ten. Where are we going?”

  “You’ll see. Let’s go.”

  I studied her face, and was not encouraged by the depth of her frown lines. “Sarah, please tell me what’s going on.”

  She walked out into the corridor and stood waiting for me. What choice did I have?

  Baseboard lights cast spooky, elongated shadows in the hallway. Except for Sarah and her ghost, no one else was around. I could hear low murmurs at the nurses’ station down the hall. There were eight other doors on this wing, and I only knew what was behind three of them. I never saw other inmates on my trips back and forth to the labs, and I wondered what was going on behind those other doors.

  I was about to find out. Instead of taking me to one of the exam rooms, Sarah steered me to the door right next to mine. She gripped my arm and reached for the thumb reader.

  “I’ll be back for you in fifteen minutes.”

  I gasped as she opened the door and pushed me into a dark room. The panel closed behind me and I fell against it, heart racing. Low lights came up automatically, revealing a cell almost identical to my own.

  “Elizabeth?”

  My head jerked toward the voice.

  There was a blur of hurried movement on my left, and the next moment I found myself in Murphy’s arms. He buried his face in my hair, squeezing me so hard I couldn’t breathe.

  “Jesus, how did you get in here?”

  “Murphy!” I choked out.

  I braced myself against his chest, shocked and confused. Staggered by the sudden surge of relief. Like my mother, Murphy had been carefully folded and tucked into my box of lost persons. And now here he stood, warm and solid under my hands.

  He took my face between his hands, scrutinizing me closely. “It is you, isn’t it? You remember New Seattle?” He grasped one of my hands and looked at it, rubbing his thumb over the scar from the tea mug.

  “I … Murphy, they told me you’d gone back to Earth!”

  “They what? Elizabeth, no, I’ve been right here. I’ve been so worried about you. They wouldn’t tell
me anything.”

  He led me to the bed, and I pretty much fell onto it as my knees buckled. He knelt at my feet, holding my hands. “Where have you been, love?”

  I looked into his face, trembling. Fearing a narcotic-induced hallucination. The relief in his eyes mirrored my own. Murphy was glad to see me. Murphy hadn’t left me.

  Knots of tension and suppressed emotion worked themselves loose in my chest. I cleared my throat, hoping to steady my voice before I spoke. “I’m in the cell next door. They told me you decided to go home. They told me I’d be dead in two weeks.”

  Two tears slipped onto my cheek, one following in the track of the other, and he moved to sit beside me, clasping me to his chest. “You couldn’t have believed that,” he muttered. “I wouldn’t abandon you, Elizabeth. They’re playing some kind of game with you.”

  He drew back, drying my cheek with his thumb. “This is a separation. I don’t know who authorized it, but—” He shook his head. “I was an arrogant ass. I didn’t think anyone would dare.”

  “Lex,” I said softly.

  He closed his eyes. “I don’t want to believe that. But I can’t imagine it was Braden’s idea.” I had nothing to say to this. No doubt Lex had convinced herself she was doing the right thing, but I didn’t want to talk about her.

  “Who brought you here?” Murphy asked.

  “My guard, Sarah.”

  “Did she say why?”

  I shook my head. “She said we only have fifteen minutes.”

  “Do you think it was her idea?”

  “I don’t know.” I hesitated, thinking. “She didn’t seem comfortable about it, but I’m not sure what that means. Murphy, she’s told me some stuff, Mitchell has too—”

  “Shh, wait a moment.” He pulled me close, slipping an arm under my legs and lifting them over his. I shivered as his voice came low in my ear. “If Mitchell set this up, they may be monitoring us. Let’s talk quietly as we can.”

  I relaxed against him, basking in the warmth of his body. His familiar smell. I rested my palm against his bare chest and felt his heart marking time as I murmured in his ear.