by Moulton, CD
He was addicted to the damned things. It was a dirty habit and one that would shorten his life and make him prone to certain diseases, but everyone had one vice or another – stupid excuse for a stupid habit.
They had found the first step to stopping the virus. He, along with them all, was exonerated for running off to these islands to hide from death for a little while. Now they must do more. They must cure it. There was no lessening of responsibility to any of them except the historian who had given this small reprieve.
Well, he wouldn't have to live with the high possibility it would fall to him to keep the race alive. It wasn't a thing he was very keen on from the first.
Sop Lett put the "original" document of the new constitution, along with six of the slick copies, into a package marked for Enn Far's eyes only. It was supposed to go with the serum.
Mi Yinn, Hal Korr, Sop Lett, some girl named Tu Hupp, had signed the "original" handwritten document, as had he. Jak Tall was written largely and firmly across that sheet. It was written proudly. It was a document to be proud of.
Jak knew he had much to do with the final formulation of the document and he was certain it would become the model for many other nations to emulate so he signed it large and firm.
Proudly!
(He could not know it would someday become the most important document on the world of Kroon, that it would someday become the constitution of the whole planet or that his large, firm, proud signature would become legend. Even hundreds of years later the expression "Put you Jak Tall right there" would still mean "Place your signature on an important document." "Jak Tall" would one day become synonymous with "signature.")
Jak always had insight and he was always the smartest person around. He just hid it well as a general rule. Life was easier that way – not the smartest person, perhaps, but the wisest. He kept the fact hidden as best he could. He had little education, had in fact taught himself most of what he knew. He had a very quick mind and could learn virtually any subject with ease, but had chosen working with things, tools. He was inventive and curious. He was a natural problem solver. He had an orderly mind-set through conscious effort. He trained himself to place everything in its own place in memory and to reduce the most complicated things to their simplest terms.
He was also somewhat poetic. He could place a thing in its most artistic form as well.
The helicopter pickup bag was ready and the thing should be there in minutes. It would fly in from directly in front of him, hover, drop the hook, lift the sack and go. Everything would be sooooo sterile! They still thought there was a virulent form of the plague here and Jak had been told it was hard to find anyone to fly the copter above the island. They would know there was serum in that package so anyone with a positive for the infection would give their backside for the honor of coming after it.
The copter came to hover over the pickup point and two people waved at him. He waved back and took the box of equipment they dropped off into Mi's lab. He passed it through the UV sterilizer then shed the clear plastic suit. It wouldn't do for the people on the copter to know those careful precautions taken were to prevent contamination from THEM!
Damn it! Was he so dulled? There was that tugging at his mind as he took the box from the UV chamber. Something he had heard or seen or read and that his subconscious had added to something else wanted out! The UV chamber brought it closer to the surface.
That was silly. Any intensity of UV would cook the Kroon along with any virus!
It had something to do with wavelength. That was sure. Light was deadly to the virus, but light didn't penetrate the Kroon body. Not even UV and, while the wavelength of UV went up to X- ray.... X-rays? Could that be it?
He took the box to Mi Yinn and waited until she looked up at him.
"Will X-rays kill the virus?"
"Yes. Definitely," she answered. "Anything in the shorter ranges of light. It ionizes the gene chains and they break up. It won't work as a cure, though. Anything intense enough to destroy the virus would kill the person."
He nodded. That was much what he thought would be the case.
Outside he stopped to let it sink into his subconscious that high intensity UV or X-rays were out of the question. They wouldn't work. It was experimented with and had failed. All aspects of that were proved futile. Forget upper-limit radiations. No way.
Well, maybe something higher than X-rays, but those would be fatal as the energy expansion in those wavelengths would tear a body apart. They would cook the internal organs. Forget it. Don't waste time on what's been shown to not be workable. That would be counter-productive at best.
He had always had more trouble convincing his subconscious of a thing than he had learning a whole new field, but he was aware that most of his inventiveness was due to active subconscious processes. He had formulated a way to reach that part of his brain. It was to present his case in many ways and strongly. If he was wrong it would come out. The subconscious, if it knew a thing, would never let it go, but if it was speculating it could be convinced when it was on the wrong track.
X-rays won't work. UV won't work. We don't have the time to spend on things that won't work. X-rays will kill. UV will cook. They won't work!
He felt as though his subconscious said, "I know it!" very smugly. The nagging increased.
There was no way to hurry the process. It would eventually come out in its own time. The fact that time was the commodity in shortest supply here meant nothing to Jak Tall's subconscious.
He walked slowly back to the kitchens where he poured a cup of bev, then sat on a table to think. He was there for more than an hour, but couldn't bring out what was nagging at him.
Well, while he was there he may as well recheck everything, but all the facilities were exactly where they should be. No more shorts or leaks.
He inserted another glamp twig in the corner of his mouth and went out to study the generators in the channel. They were fine.
Damn it all! If there's something there, let it out! Time, we don't have – not to waste on my mind playing games with itself!
Stabbing at Shadows
*
This was worse than the time of not knowing, not having real knowledge of what happened among the people on the mainland. Enn Far and Dr. Ponn had put their heads together and were trying the serum on five hundred people. That was as much as they had available, but it must be tested. There must be a safe determination as to the best dosage and of how often the dosage must be repeated. It was all for Ponn to determine, though he had projections and suggestions to work from.
Mi Yinn knew things were more than hectic ashore so she tried to control her impatience. She tried to bury her thoughts in research, knowing they hadn't even found the best way to handle this piece of the puzzle. This stabbing in the dark was given a partial direction, but it had become even more confusing than no direction by its very nature. Killing the virus by making it grow was almost a contradiction in terms. It still seemed so hopeless!
She picked the handset up to do what she had sworn she would NOT do. Ponn had enough on his mind without having her nagging, but she must know or she wouldn't sleep or rest and would become physically ill herself. She was again pushing herself to the edge of exhaustion and was susceptible to all kinds of little things.
Damn it! She had the right to know! It was from this island that the serum came and it was TO this island results must come! How in all the hells could the research here continue without followup data? Ponn knew better than this! What could he be up to?
She became angry! Just being logical, no one on this entire planet had more need of or right to the information than this research group and she was, by all the gods, going to get it!
Ponn came onto the line and she tried her hardest to control her temper. He may be a good doctor and a good researcher, but he was also a bit too condescending. There was pure arrogance about him and regardless of what the public thought she was beginning to seriously mistrust him. Maybe it was her ex
haustion, but something about him wasn't quite right.
She shook off the feeling.
"Mi! My dear!" he exclaimed. "I've been thinking of you a lot! I'm awfully busy, though. What can I do for you? Something quick, I hope, ha, ha!"
"You can give me the results of your tests and keep me up to date on the serum! I can't carry on the new research without data! Why do you think we have you as a central distribution center? Our research here is at a virtual standstill without your test results!"
"Oh, ha, ha. Yes, I see. It's been awfully hectic, you know. Up to here in paperwork already. Figured you people would have much better things to do than to sort papers. All that nonproductive bureaucracy has detained progress forever already!"
"Dr. Ponn," Mi replied through her teeth. "We can't very well work without information. That data points the direction for any further research. The serum doesn't cure a thing. I must have the data. We must know if even what we have is sporadic or definite and whether the subjects wake up a week later immune to the VG serum!"
"It seems to me you already know all about it! You know the serum merely arrests the virus. It doesn't kill it. Why should I waste my time sending you what you already know?"
"I see. It's asking too much of you and your valuable time to punch the keys on the computer to have the data sent here. You might sprain your valuable syringe finger!
"DOCTOR, I see we've sent the serum to the wrong person. You aren't going to cooperate so I suppose it'll be best to send the new one to someone who WILL give us the data we very desperately need. If we've found a cure in this new variation you would never inform us!
"Good-bye, DOCTOR!"
She heard him yell something as she hung up. She really was mad, now! She called Enn Far and was yelling before he had time to answer her greeting. She ran down after a long minute and apologized.
"Enn, that pompous ass has refused to give us the data on the tests! I thought Ponn was supposed to be somebody special! I thought he was the one person we could trust! What is he doing? Why is he deliberately obstructing this research?
"Enn, without that information we're at a standstill on the only piece of research that's yielded anything! That old fool will cost us the cure! What is he trying to do?"
"Mi, I swear to you I thought he was working very closely with you!" Far replied. "I flatly guarantee you'll have every damned bit of data that's been collected and that it'll be there before this day is done. I'll also guarantee you'll get all future data instantly as it comes in from whatever source. I'll set the next series up with Dr. Mor. Lea Mor. Know her?"
"I've heard of her. Thanks, Enn. I'm serious about our work coming to a standstill here on reactive serum. I've been waiting and fuming. I should've called you three days ago. The data should be supplied to us as it comes in. Minutes are vital in this. The Kroon race is at stake. We can't have some self-serving pompous ass pandering to the media out there!
"I can't understand Ponn's attitude! He knows the importance of field information to medical research! What in all the nine hells could he be thinking of? Has his own infection affected his mind in some way we don't know about?
"I have to control my temper. I'm very tired.
"I hinted that we've found a possible cure to Ponn, then hung up. He'll probably call you to try to get it. We don't have one."
"This is going to be handled immediately. I promise it," Enn replied dryly.
They talked a moment, then said their good fortunes. Mi buried her face in her hands for a moment then went to the lab where Hal was staring into the microscope screen.
"This one works. That's three combinations," he said to her. "If the stuff becomes resistant to one type we can use the next one.
"What's happening, Love? You've been crying again! Don't let it get to you. We've delivered so far and we'll lick this thing now. We have the time."
"I called Ponn to find that he's a pompous damned ass or probably something worse. I called Enn so we'll have the data from all the tests before dark. Enn thought it was being sent daily.
"Hal, I don't believe this! We sent him the serum for the express reason that we needed the data only he could provide! I don't know what's happening out there!"
Su Neaa came in to say the data was finally coming through in a huge rush. She was afraid it would overload the computers, but Jak Tall laughed at her and said the capacity was more than the lines could carry. If those computers overloaded he would use his pocket calculator! They would have to spend time with the special statisticians and computer staff to correlate the data. This was the main point where they would need the statisticians and other simpleminded bureaucrats she originally planned to include on the islands. This was the one place she could think of when pencil-pushing paper shufflers had value.
Mi sighed deeply and Hal reached to put an arm around her. "Don't take this so personally, Love. Just call the first time you think of it in the future. No sense in nervous collapse when a comcall will solve it all. We'll have to catch this sort of stuff at the outset from now on. It's done now and we have to make the best of it. If your new contact gives you any trouble take care of it the first day – and make Enn the first call. He'll very damned well see that you get what you need!"
She smiled and leaned tighter against him for awhile. She was the best chief in the world at organizing and running things – so long as it was smooth and easy. She made a solid plan for such things and followed it to its conclusion. The trouble came when others didn't follow the plan.
*
Enn Far hung the comset lead and picked it up again immediately. He yelled instructions, then called another office. He was becoming more angered and more worried by the second. This would mean disaster – and all because he had trusted Doctor Nil Ponn. Something was very wrong.
Dr. Nil Ponn hadn't impressed him as the kind to pull a stunt like this. He was a bit theatrical and egocentric, but Enn thought the man had SOME intelligence! The man had the virus himself, for the gods' sake!
He walked in circles and fumed. The fate of the race hangs in the balance while some idiot plays games with the research! Why? If Mi didn't have the information – and all the information – in one hour he was ready to have a public execution or two!
Damn! The whole race could perish from this thing! What was Ponn trying to prove? Did he think he could write a book? Go on all the big television talk shows? What if his stupidity had cost them a cure? What was his real motive?
The set special line buzzed. He answered quickly and was told that all stations were reporting directly to the islands except for Ponn at station one. Ponn was on another line with a waiting call. Enn shifted lines and tried to control his temper.
"Dr. Ponn, you'd better have one hell of an acceptable explanation," Enn said coldly.
"I'm a doctor, not a researcher or data collector for others," Ponn replied as coldly. "I was speaking with Dr. Mi Yinn a short time ago, but we were cut off. I've tried to call the island, but am told all lines are occupied. I can't understand that.
"Dr. Yinn was telling me about the new serum. I was wondering if you’ve learned anything more about it and I'd really appreciate it if you would expedite its delivery to me."
Mi told Enn she had told Ponn there was a new serum and that he wouldn't be getting it. There was another serum, but it had no advantages over the one delivered so far as they knew. That was one reason they must have the data. Ponn was up to something. The whole Kroon race could die and Ponn was trying to con him into sending him the new serum.
Another "why?" – but the answer was forming. Enn was, at the moment, working very hard to control his rage.
"It's untested yet and CAN'T be tested unless and until the results of the first tests are known. It's possibly a cure, you know. A real, total, final, complete cure, but they lack the background data. I'm sure it'll come in soon, then we'll know. I'm sure you're sending the data to them as you gather it so we can distribute the new serum as soon as the results of the 'A' serum are
statistically mapped or something. I've asked my staff to see the data is sent directly from each test station to the island. Hal said yesterday they weren't getting the information as quickly as they should.
"I'll allow you doctors to arrange delivery of the serums. I have far too much on my mind to take directorship of that from the scientists. I'm sure you can make your own arrangements with Mi about serum 'B' – after all, you're her main data base.
"I really must go. Good fortune."
He hung up quickly before Ponn could ask the several questions that would surely be burning him up!
"Steam in your own gravy, you stinking slimy bastard! I'm going to know what you're up to but, by all the gods, I want you to think it's cost you the serum that would save your own worthless life! I want you to beg, cringe and crawl for awhile before I have you stood against a post and shot!"
What could this once-proud and loved doctor be doing? Why was he trying to con the council chairman? He had the virus, for the gods' sake! What could he possibly gain?
Tomorrow that special investigator will report. I'll know the answer to that one.
Enn spent a sleepless night. He was worried about Ponn and he was more worried about the danger of them not receiving that data on the island. As soon as the board was open in the morning he made a call the island and got Mi out of bed.
"I'm sorry, but I have to know if you got all the data?"
"We got it all except station one. We haven't heard one word from Ponn. Enn, what's he up to?"
"I wish I knew, Mi," Enn answered sadly. He informed her what he’d done and about the conversation. "I can't imagine what he has in mind, but he'll go out of his mind if he thinks his actions will cost him a cure. I, quite frankly, am beyond feeling anything but contempt for him."
"It could well cost the entire Kroon race a cure. Here. Hal wants to say something."
