Our Child of the Stars

by Stephen Cox

  ‘That’s my decision,’ said Jarman, who wrote beautiful angry letters to the Hermes about the war and every type of injustice. Who played poker with Sheriff Olsen. Who expected to get his way.

  Sister Pearce got up and stalked out of the lounge, all but slamming the door behind her.

  ‘I’m going to get back to Cory,’ Molly said.

  Jarman looked amused. ‘Oh, he has a name now?’

  *

  It was late morning, but they kept the blind down in Cory’s room, even though it was absurd, because no one could look in, unless they had wings. Molly read in her chair, trusting to the machines to warn her if he stopped breathing. After a while, she looked up and saw two purple eyes gazing at her. With the inner eyelids back, the eyes were compelling. The extraordinary tentacles twitched and moved.

  ‘Hello,’ she said, keeping it cheery. ‘Would you like water? Are you hungry?’ Of course he wouldn’t understand. During his mother’s fevered last hour, the translator box had stopped working. Maybe Cory knew how to restart it.

  She brought over the bottle and shook it a little so he could see the water in it. After a while, a hand pointed at it. Cautiously, the tentacles danced over it and then the straw disappeared into his mouth.

  ‘Water,’ she said.

  Cory drank most of it, then curled back up on the bed with his back to her.

  Molly walked to the refrigerator humming in the corner of the room. She’d stacked his food-packs here, sealed plastic pouches with alien writing. The elaborate swirls and strokes, curves and lines made her think of music on a stave, or maybe Arabic. If they couldn’t feed him, it’d all be for nothing.

  She opened the first and the thick, creamy alien liquid filled the air with the smell of ageing fish. Hot or cold? She warmed it up on the single electric ring perched on the fridge. Another pack held dark brown slices like rye bread or cookies. She cracked the pack open just to sniff; it smelled of damp and onions.

  She took samples; lab tests were needed to figure out if the aliens’ bodies used the same basic building blocks as Earth life. If his chemistry was too different . . . Earth food would poison him, or he would starve.

  He wasn’t moving, but she walked around to his front side, the bowl and spoon on a breakfast tray. ‘Here’s food,’ she said, as cheerfully as she could. ‘My name’s Molly. Hard to tell one from another with the masks, I know – I bet we all look the same to you. But I’m Molly.’

  He lay there, very still, with his eyes closed. Then his tentacles twitched and his ears moved up a little. The bigger outer tentacles were drier than the damp inner ones which he could draw into his mouth. He opened his eyes, beautiful and inhuman.

  How can we know what he thinks, what he feels? It was an unreadable face.

  ‘Just like home. I hope this smells nice to you,’ she said. ‘I’m not sure I like it, but it’s not meant for me, is it?’

  He turned over, hiding from her, and she put the tray down, determined not to give up. Opening a precious pack of food and wasting it . . . In her mind, she saw the child starving himself to death. Would they need to spoon in the food against his wishes?

  ‘Hoo . . . hoo . . . hoo.’

  She sat on the bed and put her hand on his shoulder. How could she do the right thing for him, not knowing what that might be? The room felt full of sadness.

  She sang silly songs she remembered from her childhood, the one about the farmer’s goat and the sneezing mouse, and stuff from the radio, and he made the heartbreaking noise less and then, after a while, it stopped.

  He knows his mom died, thought Molly. He’s sick and doesn’t feel like eating. Children have a natural zeal for life, but sometimes they just give up. But he’d asked for water and she’d given it to him: communication had begun.

  He turned and tried to sit up, but the coughing got worse. She held him until he made fluting noises, then looked for the tray.

  Molly brought it across his legs and he bent his head down to the cooling bowl. He spent a good couple of minutes, smelling it, she guessed, then dipped in a tentacle to try the temperature. He looked at her as if there was some question. Then he broke off a piece of what she thought of as alien bread and dipped it in.

  He didn’t bother with the spoon but used his tentacles, making efficient little slurping noises. It looked bizarre, but it worked. A slice of the bread-stuff and maybe a third of the soup and he was done. Each tentacle went into the mouth for a clean, then he curled back up and shut his eyes.

  Later, she would find those inner tentacles helped him smell and taste; the world was as much a web of smell as pictures and noise for him.

  It was a little victory, although the road ahead was still dark and foreboding.

  He said something very quiet and she brought her head down to listen. ‘Moh-lleee,’ he said.

  She touched his back, too full to say anything.

  *

  Molly hunted in the storeroom for more clothes they could sterilise for Cory. Nurse Hooton came in and shut the door. She had that horrible high-school cheerleader-conspirator look. Pearce had her working at the other end of the building, nowhere near Cory.

  ‘It’s weird and creepy, isn’t it? It scares me.’ Hooton gave a little theatrical shiver.

  Molly stared, as cold as she could. ‘He. Not it. He’s a sick child in our care.’ She hoped her voice would freeze Hooton solid.

  Hooton flushed. That look, freckles and brown hair and quivering lip, heaven knows why it dragged in men. Too much make-up, although to be fair, probably to cover tired eyes.

  ‘Oh, we should treat it—’

  ‘Him. It’s a him,’ Molly said. ‘He keeps his penis tucked away.’ It was fuchsia, like his bifurcated tongue, and she longed to tease Gene about the practicality of the arrangement. But Jarman had ordered them to tell no one and Molly had obeyed.

  Hooton frowned. ‘I’m not saying we shouldn’t look after . . . him . . . it’s just . . . he’s horrible. Frightening. I took a blood sample and I was shivers all over – like a graveyard, you know? Like he called up a cold gust of wind.’

  Molly felt a surge of rage and dislike. She needed to keep herself under control. ‘That’s ridiculous.’ She took a breath, then tried to be encouraging. ‘It’s been very hard for all of us. And he looks odd, of course – he does take some getting used to.’

  Hooton glared at her. ‘I know what I felt.’

  Molly remembered how angry she’d got in training when some nurses had gossiped about a poor boy with a deformed skull. And for the first time in years, she remembered Annie at school, the silent girl with the twisted lip. Molly had become her defender, at the price of her own popularity.

  ‘Maybe we should only save the pretty children,’ Molly said, when she wanted to say, What a disgrace you are.

  ‘Of course we should help,’ Hooton snapped. ‘It’s our patient. You’re twisting my words.’

  Molly felt the ripped-out sadness of Cory’s loss and that called up her own heartache. Cory deserved commitment. She’d go to Sister Pearce and get Hooton sent somewhere else. Geriatrics or Community Clinics. Alaska.

  Cory’s fluting noises must be speech. Sometimes he cocked his head to one side, listening to her babble on. She touched things and named them – bed, mask, glass, hand, floor – and he watched and said nothing.

  Hooton was scared, she knew that. The boy was different and strange, but it hadn’t occurred to Molly that people might be frightened of him. Frightened people are dangerous. She would need to protect him.

  ‘I know what I felt,’ Hooton repeated, standing between Molly and the door. ‘And I don’t like your tone. I know my job.’

  ‘Get out of my way,’ Molly said. ‘If you gossip about him, I’ll break your neck. Then Sister Pearce will fire you. Get it?’

  ‘We ought to hand it over to the government,’ said Hooton, sta
nding aside. ‘That’s the right thing to do.’

  Everyone is stretched thin, Molly thought, everyone’s on edge. Dr Bradshaw, the promising young doctor, had gone to pieces when the mother died and Jarman had sent him home. Molly had liked him; he was pretty tough for a young one.

  She needed serenity, courage and wisdom. They all did.

  CHAPTER 6

  Dr Pfeiffer

  The days and nights began to blur. Gene called and she drove home to Crooked Street that evening. She needed him, and fresh supplies, and perspective.

  Gene had mended the porch light and here he was, standing underneath it, looking for her. They embraced, a long and welcome hug, and she smelled pork for supper.

  ‘I’ll have to leave first thing,’ she said. ‘Things are crazy.’

  ‘Do they not have any other nurses?’ Gene frowned. ‘Molly, that place treats people like dirt. You must be owed a day off.’

  ‘It’s an emergency – everything’s up in the air.’

  ‘You’ve always told me a good nurse looks after herself. You’ll get exhausted . . . If you get sick, that doesn’t help anyone.’ And he knew the dark road tiredness might take her down.

  She changed the subject. ‘That smells delicious,’ she said with a smile for the chef.

  As they ate, Gene talked the most, which was not how their meals usually were, but how could she discuss what was really going on?

  ‘I know the sky fell in last week, Molly-moo. They’re really lucky to have you. Just look after yourself, okay? There’re journalists and TV everywhere, taking photos and sticking microphones under people’s noses. They’ve got no compassion. It’s like they’re treading on our graves.’

  Eleven dead that they knew of, and corpses they couldn’t identify, and a dozen people still missing. People who’d managed to patch themselves up on Meteor Day were coming out of the woodwork too, needing proper treatment. And life went on: Maternity was always busy. One woman had gone into labour when the Meteor fell; they’d called the baby Stella.

  But all Molly could think about was Cory. Just think, if the press got even a sniff of the boy. It would be out of their hands.

  ‘They’re building a fence out there in the woods,’ Gene said, ‘the places we used to go. It’s covered in signs saying “Danger, keep out” – you won’t believe how many soldiers there are up there. Who knows what they think they’ll find . . .’

  ‘What I need is a bath and a back-rub,’ Molly said firmly. No more talk, just holding each other under the old quilt, in gladness they still had each other.

  *

  Back on the fifth floor, Sister Pearce said, ‘There’re some army bigwigs meeting in the boardroom. We’re wanted, but you’ll have to go for me. I’ll watch the child.’

  Molly trotted down the stairs, and along the corridor, almost bumping into Dr Jarman, who was standing by the boardroom door. A much shorter, bald man stood beside him, holding forth, his hands cutting the air for emphasis, as Jarman, stooping a little, listened with an insincere half-smile.

  Molly prided herself on her memory for faces; she knew the sour-faced man from somewhere . . . He was in his fifties, with heavy dark-rimmed glasses, a scar on the forehead . . . That flabbiness under his throat suggested he had once been fatter. She wondered why he stirred up some hostile reaction in her . . . then she remembered a television debate on the evening news: the man had been spearing the air with a finger, arrogant and aggressive, exulting in the war as he constantly interrupted the presenter and the other guests.

  Dr Pfeiffer, the President’s pet scientist. The germ warfare man.

  Pfeiffer, ignoring Molly, said, ‘We need to go in, Dr Jarman. This community looks up to you and it’s your responsibility to keep them calm.’

  ‘Give people the facts and they’ll decide for themselves,’ Jarman said mildly. A meek man in even thicker glasses stood to one side, watching Pfeiffer like a dog would its master.

  Molly waited, trying to work out what to do, whether to walk between the men. What was the most frozen of Cold Warriors doing here?

  ‘Shall we go in, Dr Pfeiffer, Dr Tyler?’ Dr Jarman opened the door.

  Now Pfeiffer looked at Molly, a determined set to his mouth. He spent a second looking her up and down, his eyes bright, but with no more reaction than if she’d been a telegraph pole. He looked back at Jarman, then they went in.

  Most people in the long room were standing. She saw medical staff, the hospital director, some of the senior nurses, as well as two State Troopers, a grey-haired soldier and some men in suits she didn’t recognise. The Mayor was chatting to three Councillors. And there was Diane, who looked surprised and pleased to see her.

  Molly made her way to her friend, who raised a notebook. ‘The Principal sent me. Who’s he?’ Diane whispered, looking at Pfeiffer striding to the end of the long table as if he owned it.

  ‘Dr Pfeiffer – remember? He wanted to destroy the rice harvest in North Vietnam to starve their women and children until there was peace.’ She shivered: a man who took the power to heal and perverted it to a weapon of war. Pfeiffer had advised the last President and, without blinking, had moved to do the same for the new.

  ‘Oh, him. The students loathe him, don’t they!’

  Pfeiffer pulled the empty chair away and stayed standing. ‘I’m Dr Pfeiffer, Chief Scientific Counsel to the President,’ he started brusquely. ‘He has sent me to take charge of the scientific team looking into the Meteor. You’ll have heard lots of wild rumours, so I’m here to explain why our army colleagues are fencing off the site. As leaders in your community, I’d like you to encourage cooperation with the army – they’re handling a difficult job very well – and prevent loose talk.’

  Someone held up a hand, but he waved them away. ‘I’ll take relevant questions at the end. The matter’s simple. There’s radioactive debris out there, dangerous stuff with rare isotopes. We’ve already had local people wandering in – they’ll poison themselves and spread contamination to others if we’re not careful. And not just locals: people are coming to rubberneck, if you can believe it. That fence is for everyone’s safety. Now, as rational people, you’ll be wondering if there’s any danger to you here in town. Dr Jarman?’

  Dr Jarman spoke with care. ‘We’ve looked for radiation in the soot that fell on the hospital and Meteor fragments and the army has done their own tests and I can assure you neither we nor they have found anything.’

  Pfeiffer’s smile was not reassuring. ‘Radiation is within normal range. You’d be in more danger in my lab.’

  If that was a joke, no one smiled.

  ‘If anything does change, we’ll know at once. We’re drawing up plans to evacuate the town if the radiation spreads, no expense spared. In Amber Grove, as Dr Jarman has said, there’s no evidence of the slightest danger. Out in the woods, though, it’s a different story.’

  He looked around the room. ‘I’ll take one or two questions.’

  Up went a forest of hands, but a younger man in a suit had pushed forward and started shouting, ‘Baby-killer! Monster!’ There was something in his raised hand.

  Pfeiffer’s face turned to pure, ugly rage. ‘Jarman. Control your people,’ he snarled.

  The soldiers pushed through the crowd to the man, but the Sheriff had already got him in an armlock and was slamming his clenched hand against the table. The metal thing he was holding bounced and fell to the ground. A can of spray paint.

  Dr Jarman rose, coughed, and became the centre of attention. ‘Easy, Lars,’ he said calmly, then, ‘Everyone, drawing up an evacuation plan is sensible, as I’ve advised both the hospital and the Mayor.’ His eyes met Molly’s.

  Pfeiffer glared at everyone: the man, the Mayor pushing forward, the crowd, the cursing protester.

  *

  Getting away from Diane took a while, but Molly didn’t hurry; she needed to keep her nosy
friends away from what she was up to. It was a couple of hours later before she finally got back to Cory’s room. As she opened the outer door, she could hear Jarman and Pearce arguing, their voices low. The alien boy slept; at least, she hoped it was sleep.

  ‘. . . ridiculous charade,’ Pearce was saying. ‘I must protest . . .’ Then she saw Molly through the glass.

  ‘We’re coming out,’ Jarman said, although three people made the outer room cramped. An odd feeling told Molly something big was coming.

  ‘Well, now we know who’ll be in charge if we talk,’ Jarman said. ‘That skunk – that warmonger. He’s a disgrace to medicine.’

  ‘I’d have thought a world-renowned expert on the immune system is just what we need,’ Pearce said, her mouth turned down.

  Jarman frowned. ‘Pfeiffer’s a nasty piece of work. He stabbed old Lippincott in the back . . . he’d have been no one without him. Then he sold out to the military. No, we must keep the child hidden at all costs.’

  ‘You can’t be serious,’ Pearce said, looking shocked.

  Jarman held Molly’s gaze. ‘Pfeiffer is as nosy as hell and our mystery infection story has just become a liability. Cheese to a rat, he’ll demand to see the patient – to identify the bug. He always was a show-off. Or he’ll be thinking it’s an alien microbe. So we need to close this down, now. It must stay secret, as few as possible knowing.’

  ‘How?’ Molly said.

  Jarman took a deep breath. ‘We’ll fake his death tonight and stage a cremation. We’ll hide the boy until we figure out what to do. There’s a sealed observation suite in the annex; it’s not been used in years and I doubt anyone even remembers it’s there. He’ll be safe.’

  Molly certainly hadn’t heard of it. The annex was an unloved after-thought to the west wing: it held no wards.

  ‘Only the people we absolutely need will know,’ he repeated.

  It was wild, but he was right: the mystery patient needed to disappear. She had no doubt Pfeiffer would tear the building down if he got even a hint of what was happening.