Plague of Memory (26 page)

"I am going to scout the perimeter of the building," Reever said abruptly. "Signal me if you need me." He walked out into the night.

"I must go and attend to your mother," TssVar said to ChoVa. "If you need anything, you have but to ask."

"I will, Father." ChoVa watched him leave, and then set down the dosage of blocker she was mixing and bowed her head. "Just an hour ago he asked me to give him the means to kill himself. He would rather end his life sane, he said, than die like a raving, wild animal." Her huge yellow eyes met mine. "I am afraid I will fail, Jam. Just as he is. I do not know how to cope with such fear. It wants to paralyze me."

"There is still time," I promised her. "We know one of the signs of infection now. We will work from there and find a way."

"If I do not go mad first." ChoVa sighed and picked up her dosage beaker. "My father said that you were abducted from his elevation rite by outlaws. Were they the same ones who attacked the hospital?"

I nodded. "They are encamped in the desert—or were—about two hundred kilometers from the city." Telling her that the head of the criminal group was a Jorenian did not seem like a good idea. "They live out there like outcasts. Is that what is done with those who are no longer accepted among your society?"

"Those without line are driven from us. Many go into the desert to live secluded and die alone. I have never heard of them banding together, but perhaps that is what these outlaws have done." ChoVa handed me an infuser and pulled up the sleeve of her jacket, baring yellow- and green-scaled flesh. "You must inject me with the blocker."

"You told me that you were not infected."

"The tests I performed on myself showed no trace of the enzyme, but that may change now that I have been exposed to my father's household." She stretched out her arm. "In any event, it is the closest thing we have to a vaccine. Infuse me."

I watched her as I did so, and her reaction was almost identical to the Akade's. "How long before the

amount of neuroparalyzer in your bloodstream reaches toxic level?" "With regular infusions," she said as she rolled down her sleeve, "three days."

ChoVa and I worked through the night examining and testing the tissue from the patient we had autopsied on the
Sunlace,
as well as blood samples she had collected from TssVar and the other members of his household. No trace of the enzyme showed up in any of the specimens, which indicated several things.

"The enzyme could be an immune response to the pathogen," ChoVa decided. "Very specific, very localized, and the levels increase as the infection worsens."

"We have biopsied that gland cluster seventeen times." I lifted my tired eyes from a scope viewer and switched off the light emitter. "We have found nothing but healthy tissue."

"Cryopreservation is killing the carriers, but it may also be destroying the pathogen in the process." She collected the cellular slides and placed them in a cold case. "Considering how hypersensitive my species is to low temperatures, it also seems logical."

I considered the theory. "The only way to know is to biopsy the gland of a living patient."

"That would prove fatal to the subject." She pulled up a diagram of the Hsktskt brain. "The gland cluster regulates most of the vital involuntary nerve and muscle functions. Respiration, muscle
contraction, and conscious thought processing cannot take place without the gland functioning."

"How can the pathogen invade only the brain tissue without spilling into the bloodstream?" I regarded her head and then consulted the diagram. "The back of your sinus cavities is three centimeters from the frontal region of the gland cluster. Could an airborne organism be inhaled and infect the cluster?"

"There is a membrane between the two that prevents any such contamination," ChoVa said, and then she jerked as if she had been punched in the abdomen. "Did you see an intact membrane in the skull of the patient we autopsied? It would look like"—she pulled up another image on the console, this time of thin, pale tissue stretched between two curved bones—"this."

I concentrated and recalled the dissection of the corpse's cranial case. "There was tissue, but it was not that color. It was black."

"It may have been diseased." She went to the case with the autopsy samples and threw it open. "Did you harvest a sample?"

"No, I did not," I said. ChoVa slammed the case shut. "We must retrieve another corpse and examine the membranes." "The estate has been quarantined," I reminded her. "We cannot leave."

"We cannot wait until one of my father's household dies," she snarled at me. "Assuming they will. We have no cryolab here. I cannot freeze them to death to suit our purpose."

"Would you rather kill one of the infected, to save time? Who will you choose? Is there one of your father's retainers you particularly dislike?" I watchec the anger fade from her eyes. "There has to be another way. You serve the Hanar, so you must have some influence with him. Ask that one of the victims from the city be brought here for us to autopsy. If they are afraid of contamination it can be delivered by humanoid slaves."

"The Hanar will not do so," she informed me. " did not tell my father, but the Supreme One issuec orders that all of the dead are to be burned."

The Hanar was afraid of being infected himself, that much I could see. "Ask him not to burn one. Only one. It may be what helps us find the cure."

"I would, but he will not listen. He is almost mac with fear—" She closed her eyes and slammed her fists into the nearest flat object, which turned out to be an exam table. Her blows made the surface of the table buckle, and she stepped back, staring at it with bleak astonishment.

"I have always wanted to do that." I admired the depth of the indentations. "I wish I had your strength."

"And I your composure." Her shoulders sagged "Jam, I can do nothing right, and I become more frustrated by the hour. Even if I am not infected, soon I will be of no use to you."

"Nonsense." I felt more inclined to agree with her, but that would not provide any motivation. "This is only a small setback. All we need do is remain calm and think clearly."

We were still debating how we might obtain a corpse when the locks on the outer door disengaged

and a pair of Palace Guards entered the lab. Both were in envirosuits and carried rifles held at ready. "What is it?" ChoVa demanded, clearly outraged

at the interruption.

"The Hanar has ordered you to return to the Palace," one of the guards said. "Gather what you need. You will not be returning here."

I touched her shoulder. "Go. Explain what we have discovered and what we need to continue."

"No," the guard said before ChoVa could reply. "The Hanar's orders are to bring you to him as well, Warm-Blood."

ChoVa quickly grabbed two medical cases and what light instruments and scanners she could fit in them, and handed one to me. The two guards held their rifles trained on us as we were escorted from the lab.

"Do they think we are dangerous?" I asked ChoVa in a low voice. She glanced at the weapons. "Evidently the Hanar does."

Outside more guards stood holding rifles on Reever and the Akade. My husband was bleeding from the nose and mouth again, and when he saw me something in his eyes glittered like light on a blade.

I had the feeling that ChoVa and I would not be at the Palace for very long.

The trip from TssVar's estate to the heart of the city took only a few minutes. The Hanar's guards would not speak to ChoVa or answer her questions about why we had been ordered to court. The

further into the city we moved, the more fires I saw burning above on the rooftops. The smell of the smoke-filled air came through the transport's vents, and the stench of cooked flesh became so strong I thought I might retch.

"Breathe through your mouth," ChoVa advised me as she studied my face. "Do you know your skin turns the color of bone when you are nauseated?"

I tried her suggestion, and it did help. "At least I am not green all the time."

It was ridiculous to jest when we were possibly facing imprisonment or execution, but I was tired and feeling a little defeated. I had come here to help these people, and I had failed. Worse, I had caused my husband and daughter to be abducted and nearly murdered by outlaws in the process. Doubtless my former self would congratulate me for my dedication to the work; but then I was turning out to be almost as reckless and impulsive as
she
had been.

"You're not half the doctor she was,"
the disembodied female voice I had heard on the launch and in the outlaw camp told me.
"You're small and scared, and you're always avoiding confrontations. Cherijo never ran from a good fight."

I was hearing Maggie's voice in my ears, but from the lack of reaction around me, no one else did. I wondered if the entity or whatever she was could read my thoughts.

"Like they were made of plas,"
she said.
"And I'm Maggie, not an entity. I was the only mother you've ever had."

I frowned. She sounded resentful, almost sulky, as a boy child did when he was thwarted. I rather expected more from the being Reever had described. How was she transmitting these messages to my mind? Was there some organic implant in my brain that had never been discovered?

"It's organic, all right,"
Maggie said.
"You'll never understand it, or the how and from where and why, but that doesn't matter. I'm disappointed in you, Jam. I expected you to at least try to recover Cherijo's memories while you were screwing her husband and loving up her kid."

She wished me to address her. That seemed as crazy as talking to myself, but I decided to try a direct thought.
Why are you contacting me like this?

"I have nothing better to do,"
Maggie snapped.
"Sure, I could float here in oblivion and wait for the end of time, but it's going to take a few million more centuries. I need some quality entertainment. Which, by the way, you are piss-poor at providing. Why don't you try to break free of these guards? Why don't you get that big

female lizard to help you?"

Some of the guards were giving me curious looks, and I glanced down to see that my hands were clenched so hard that my short nails had cut small, bloody lacerations into my palms. This was neither the time nor the place to confront Cherijo's ghost-mother.
Why don't you close your mouth?

"Okay."
The voice went silent.

Once we arrived at the Palace, we were moved

from the transport onto one of the lift-vessels, and

given only a desultory scan before being whisked

up to the Hanar's level.

"If the Hanar fears being infected by the
pathogen," I murmured to ChoVa, "why does he not have us decontaminated more thoroughly?"

"I
cannot say." She looked around her. "Most of his guards have gone, too. Have you noticed?"

The Palace did seem somewhat deserted. We walked through the corridors to the Hanar's throne room, but the guards remained outside as we passed through the entry doors, and closed and secured them behind us as soon as we had done so.

The smoke from the city's burning dead tinged the pervasive heat of the throne room, but otherwise the chamber appeared empty. Everything had been removed, even the Hanar's dais. I glanced at ChoVa, who shook her head slowly as she scanned the room.

"He must have ordered everything taken to be burned," she murmured. "When last I saw him, he was worried that the infection could be in everything, all around him."

"Perhaps he is already infected," I suggested in a low tone. She took in a quick breath. "The paranoia, yes, it makes sense now."

"Here now, my personal physician and her pet Terran." The ancient Hsktskt came limping into view, kicking something out of his way. In both hands he held long swords dripping with dark fluid.

"Hanar, what has happened to you?" ChoVa said.

He hissed, baring bloodied teeth. It was only then that I saw what he had been kicking were the remains of a guard, partially covered by the sweeping
hem of his robe. The guard's throat had been torn out, and large chunks of his flesh were missing. A bulge in Hanar's throat told me how at least one of the wounds had been inflicted. "ChoVa."

"I know," she said to me.

"This is your doing, Terran," the Hanar said, his voice thick and distorted by the flesh still lodged in his gullet. He swallowed it, and then lifted and pointed one of his swords at me. "I should cut you to pieces and feed you to her."

ChoVa stepped forward with a slow, deliberate movement. "Hanar, you are the light and reason of our people. We are lost without you. Permit me to ease your suffering." She reached into her case and removed an infuser.

"No." Although there were many yards between them, he swiped at her with the other sword as if he thought to strike her.
"I
know what you do. You mean to end me so that your blood assumes the throne. Your cursed father will never wear the mantle of leader. I will devour him myself before I allow him to kill me."

"That is not the truth. You have known my father since he took his first breath," ChoVa argued. "He lives to serve you, as do I."

"You will die serving me." The Hanar turned and bellowed, a roar so loud I had to clap my hands over my ears. "Come out, you filth. They are here. I have fulfilled my part of our bargain."

ChoVa hissed as a shadow detached itself from the wall and moved into the light. It was PyrsVar, the war master of the outlaws.

"Hanar, this male is the leader of the outlaws
who have attacked your city," I said urgently, ignoring the wild look ChoVa gave me. "He cannot be trusted. Summon your guards at once."

"He knows who I am, Healer," PyrsVar said. "I came here alone and surrendered myself to the Hanar. I have since been granted amnesty for my crimes, have I not, Supreme One?"

"Only for the cure you promised me." The old ruler's arms fell, and his swords slipped from his claws and clattered to the floor. "You have them now, renegade. Give me what you vowed, and then take them and get out."