by Linda Nagata
Stony silence fell around the table. Skye felt her mouth open. She closed it. Fear was a dry pain in her throat. Across the table, Zia stared at her, wide-eyed with dread. Devi’s cheeks had gone sallow beneath his brown skin. Buyu cleared his throat. “Skye—”
“No, wait.” She held her hand up to stop him. To stop anyone from saying anything as a chef finally approached their table, pushing a cart full of fruits and pastes and protein cakes. On one end of the cart there was a cutting board, and a small flame that burned under a wok. Skye could smell heated oil.
This chef was an ado girl with thick dark hair that reached her shoulders, and a winning smile. “What would everyone like tonight?” she asked.
Buyu looked at her with a dazed expression. “I think we need a little more time.”
“Oh.”
Skye stroked Ord’s smooth, warm body until they were alone again. “Thank you for waiting, Ord.”
“Good Skye.”
“I will listen now.”
“Yes, good Skye.”
“Tell me exactly what you found.”
Chapter 7
“Puzzle pieces,” Ord said. It spoke softly, so that its words could not be heard by anyone beyond the table. “City library gives this name to the structures in Skye’s blood. It is from an article written 678 years ago, by Liang and Aferra. It is rated 93% plausible, which is a very high plausibility, and has been accessed two times since—”
“Ord,” Skye whispered. “What are puzzle pieces?”
Ord’s little brow wrinkled, as if it were searching for just the right explanation. “They are incomplete versions of a Chenzeme plague called Compassion.”
“That’s a strange name for a plague,” Buyu said, keeping his voice low.
Zia gave him a hard look. “Let Ord talk.”
The little robot crouched perfectly still upon the table, one tentacle tip resting lightly on the back of Skye’s hand. In its stillness it looked like a machine, and not at all like the little human she pretended it to be. She listened.
“Liang and Aferra record the outbreak of an unknown plague in a city called Nanda Wes on a newly colonized frontier world. All adults in the city died of this plague when their Makers failed to overcome the infection. The children survived. The plague did not attack the children. Nanda Wes was quarantined, and the children were carefully tested. No sign of the plague could be found in their tissues, so compassionate rescuers removed them from the city. They were taken in by adoptive families all over the frontier world. Then, within a few weeks, new outbreaks of Compassion occurred. Each outbreak began in a family that had adopted an older child from Nanda Wes—except this time the child died too. All of these children were at the end of their growing period.”
“In other words,” Devi said, “physically they had become adults.”
Ord bobbed its little head. “Sooth. In time it became clear that children were carriers of Compassion. The DNA in every human cell is a chemical code that instructs the body how to grow. Most of this code is dormant. Only a few parts of the DNA are active at any time. Compassion used this fact to hide itself. In the children’s DNA it hid the instructions for building itself. Not all in one location, where it might be easy to find. Instead, it broke the instructions into small groups of code, and scattered these throughout the children’s DNA. These tiny, scattered parts went undetected by those who rescued the children of Nanda Wes.”
“So when the kids grew up,” Devi said, “the dormant plague rebuilt itself … and killed them?”
“Sooth.” Ord patted Skye’s hand with its soft, warm tentacle. “It also spread to the compassionate adults who had adopted the orphaned children, and killed many millions of them. It is called Compassion, because it exploits the natural love any adult will feel for a helpless child.”
“That’s evil!” Zia squeaked, trying to keep her outrage at low volume.
She glanced around nervously, while Ord bobbed its head again. “Sooth. Smart Zia is right. It is a clever, evil Chenzeme plague.”
Many Chenzeme plagues were known, and almost all of them were spread through animate microscopic dust. Zeme dust. Skye’s skin felt cold, and her hand trembled under Ord’s tentacle. “So Ord, you’re saying I have this plague called Compassion embedded in my DNA?”
Ord’s little mouth puckered up, as if this were a difficult question to answer. “That is the logical conclusion to draw from the presence of puzzle pieces in your blood.”
“But I don’t feel sick!” Skye whispered. “I am not dying.”
Ord’s tentacle tap-tapped against her hand. “Yes. Skye is clever and strong. Skye is fine. Sooth. For now.”
“For now? Come on, Ord. Explain it all. What’s the meaning of these puzzle pieces?”
Ord’s tentacle trembled for just a second. “In the article, Liang and Aferra surmise that as growth hormones decline, the alien DNA gradually becomes active. At first only parts of the plague structure are built. These are ‘puzzle pieces.’ They are harmless.”
“Like a model with missing parts,” Devi said.
“Yes. As growth hormones continue to decline, all parts of the alien DNA become active. The plague structure is fully formed, and now it is harmful, and contagious. For a day, maybe two, there will be no sign of illness as the plague is spread from adult to adult. Then it kills.”
Skye didn’t want to ask how it killed. “And it’s these puzzle pieces that you’ve found in my blood.” Harbingers of the disease to come. “How much time do I have before the plague becomes active?”
Zia’s cheeks glistened with perspiration. Her voice sounded a note too high as she said, “Skye, the monkey house can cure this! Ord’s article is six hundred years old. There’s a cure by now. Right, Ord?”
“So sorry, no,” Ord said. “Not yet.” It sank down against the table, almost puddling. “The monkey house is very clever, good Skye. Not fun, no. Just very clever.”
Skye slipped her hand out from under Ord’s tentacle. She rubbed at her cheeks. Her skin felt cold and clammy. Her heart did too. “Ord, if it’s only puzzle pieces then the plague’s not active yet. No one else could have caught it from me, right?”
Once again Ord bobbed its head. “Yes, if Liang and Aferra are correct.”
“And there’s no one in Silk I could have caught it from.”
“This plague structure is not known here,” Ord confirmed.
“So I brought it with me from the great ship. That’s what you’re saying?”
“Unknown, Skye. City library does not say.”
“How long before this plague becomes active?” she asked again.
Everyone huddled together, awaiting Ord’s answer. “Liang and Aferra propose seven to ten days,” Ord said.
Zia made a little moan deep in her throat. “Skye—”
“I don’t think I’m hungry,” Skye said. Her voice had an ugly squeak to it. She started to get up, but she was trapped in the booth by Buyu.
He stared at her, his eyes glistening with too much moisture. “This is crap, Skye,” he whispered. “It’s unprocessed garbage. Ord doesn’t know what it’s talking about. There’s nothing wrong with you.”
Skye looked up, startled to see that the hostess of the Subtle Virus had returned to their table. Had she overheard anything? Surely not. Yet she frowned suspiciously at Buyu. “Ah … are you all ready for dinner yet?”
“No,” Devi said. His voice was curt. “Something’s come up. We won’t be having dinner tonight. Thank you. Thank you.” He scooted against Zia, bumping her out of the booth.
“Hey—!” she protested as she stumbled to her feet.
“Are you quite certain?” the hostess asked. She looked seriously annoyed. Skye was glad to see it, sure now that she had not overhead any talk of plague. “The special tonight is grilled fungus with synchovy stuffing.”
“Another time,” Devi growled as he stood up behind Zia.
Skye watched him anxiously, waiting for him to run away, to alert the m
onkey house. And why shouldn’t he? I would. Seven to ten days. She suddenly felt terribly small, and horribly alone.
But Devi didn’t leave. He was standing by the table, glaring at her with a fierce expression. “Come on!” he commanded.
“W-what?” she stammered. “Where?”
“Out of here. Some place private. Where we can talk.”
She blinked at him, not getting it. “You want to talk to me?”
Devi rolled his eyes. “Skye? Please?”
The hostess treated him to a disapproving frown. “If the lady would like to stay—”
“No,” Buyu said, scooting out from his seat. “She’s coming with us.” He turned, and very deliberately, he held out his hand to her. “Come on, Skye. You’re not as scary as you like to think.”
Outside, the night sky gleamed faintly white with the light of the nebula. Only a handful of bold stars shone through it. Skye felt herself gliding dreamlike on the gleaming street. Sounds arrived muffled as if by distance and her skin felt numb. Inside though, deep in her core, her sense of self blazed hot and frightened and vitally alive.
Seven to ten days. Worlds had changed in far less time than that.
“You shouldn’t be with me,” she said abruptly. She looked around. Devi was just ahead, rushing down the street like a madman, almost breaking into a run on the steeper sections, turning back every few steps to exhort her to “Hurry up!” Jem held onto his shoulder, an awestruck expression on his little fox face as if he had never traveled so quickly before. Zia held onto Skye’s elbow, almost as crazy for speed as Devi. Buyu followed a step behind.
“You shouldn’t be with me,” Skye repeated, stumbling to a stop in the middle of the street. “At the least, it will mean trouble from city authority when they find out what’s—”
Zia gave her elbow a little shake. “Shut up. Devi’s got something in mind and I don’t think it’s the monkey house.”
“We can’t talk here,” Devi growled. “Just come on, Skye. Trust me, okay?”
She wondered why she should. She had only just met him. But strangely enough, it was easy to nod and say, “Okay.”
They followed the street all the way down to the base of the city, where it merged with the broad promenade that bordered Splendid Peace Park. Splendid Peace was a huge greenway that ran all the way around the city’s circular base. The park promenade separated the woodland from the city’s residential slopes. Devi darted across it, startling several real people who were out for an evening stroll. Skye heard gasps, and two or three mutters that sounded like crazy ados.
At those half-imagined words, a rich, luscious sense welled up in her, a bright consciousness of being alive, crazy wild alive, full of life that was as sweet as night-blooming flowers, intoxicating as music tuned to your mood. She let this giddy sense fill her, until it bubbled out of her mouth in a merry laugh.
Devi turned to look at her with a quizzical gaze.
“Come on,” she urged him in return. “Hurry!” And she sprinted past him, tagging him on the side as she went. Behind her Zia shouted, and Buyu called out in surprise, but Skye didn’t slow down. She dashed into the park, her filmy skirt waving behind her like a fin.
She followed a narrow, luminescent foot trail that led her away from the promenade and into the darkness that huddled under the spreading branches of the trees. She could hear Devi running a step behind. She had no idea where they were going—where he intended them to go—but in that moment she knew where she wanted to be … in the most isolated, awesome place in the whole city.
She raced along the foot trail, startling the occasional couple clutching in the shadows, and every time the trail branched, she took the fork that led deeper into the park, until, within a few minutes, the city’s lights were all but lost behind the vegetation. Her breath tore in and out of her lungs, sweat poured from her cheeks, and her belly felt slack with hunger, but she didn’t slow. If she could run fast enough, she could run away from fear. She knew she could.
A few minutes later the path came to an end. It flowed into a shimmering pond of light—a gleaming pavilion only a couple of meters wide. Being afraid was part of being alive, wasn’t it? She edged across the pavilion. Her shoulders heaved as she drew in great lungfuls of air bearing the scent of flowers and mulch, the sound of night insects. Shrubs crowded the pavilion on all sides but one. She crept up to that open space. This was where the world ended.
The city of Silk was like a conical bead hung on the column of the elevator cable, enclosed by a transparent canopy that kept the air in. Here at the base of the city, along the outside edge of Splendid Peace Park, the canopy reached all the way to the ground.
Skye eased forward until her toes reached the very edge of the pavilion, and then she looked past her toes … at nothing. Or rather, at a great empty ocean of space unfolding before her.
Her heartbeat had begun to slow, but now it picked up again. She breathed a little faster. If she raised her hand, if she moved her toes just a little farther, she would feel the canopy’s transparent membrane, and the effect would be shattered. But for now it felt as if she stood on the edge of the world, on the edge of life, with the Universe spread out beneath her feet and if she took but one step more she would plunge into it.
The dark mass of the planet loomed below her. Tiny sparks of lightning could be seen flickering in some distant thunder storm. Beyond the planet lay the thready white gleam of the nebula where uncountable numbers of butterfly gnomes lived their silent lives, and beyond that the bright stars whose names she didn’t know, and the Chenzeme ships prowling menacingly between them, and beyond that … Well, beyond the nearest stars lay everything—all the other stars and dust clouds and black holes of the galaxy, and distant galaxies beyond that, and galactic clusters, and quasars, their light almost as old as the Universe itself. And time. Looking at ancient starlight was like looking back in time.
Skye smiled, filled with reverent wonder. No wonder Devi had fallen in love with astronomy. In the night, everything can be seen.
She was suddenly aware of Devi standing beside her, so close the heat of his body touched hers. The slowing pace of his breath was like the city breathing. “They’re out there somewhere,” he said, his voice low.
“Who?” Her own voice no more than a whisper.
“Your people. The other children from the great ship. Do you see? We had it all wrong. There was no Chenzeme warship. Your parents … they must have put you in the lifeboat to protect you from Compassion plague. They might have been like the rescuers at Nanda Wes. They might have thought that you—that all the children—had a resistance to the plague. So they put you aboard lifeboats, and sent you toward Deception Well, hoping that a compassionate people would find you, and raise you, after they were gone.”
Had it been that way? She glanced at him. Jem still balanced on his shoulder, though the little dokey looked frightened. His claws dug into Devi’s shirt and his tail swished. Devi absently stroked Jem’s chest. Sweat glistened on his cheeks as he stared into the abyss.
Skye said, “So there could be hundreds, thousands of other children out there. Every child from the great ship. Why haven’t we seen them? Why haven’t we seen their solar sails?”
“I don’t know. It’s a mystery. There may be some clue aboard the lifeboat.”
She shook her head. The lifeboat was far away. “Nothing was ever found. Whatever records it once carried, were hidden, or erased.”
“Still, other lifeboats have to be out there. If it wasn’t a Chenzeme warship …”
Skye reached up to stroke Jem’s soft fur. “If it wasn’t a warship, then every lifeboat should have survived. But Devi, everyone of them will be a plague carrier … like me.”
He turned to her and nodded grimly. Jem took that moment to scamper down his arm and drop to the ground. The dokey’s claws clicked against the pavilion as it paced, sniffing at the night air. Devi watched his pet for a few seconds. Then he leaned against the invisible wall, and sli
d down until he was sitting halfway over nothing. “Ord’s right, you know. The monkey house might cure it. The trouble is—”
“I know. Or, I think I can guess. If the doctors can’t cure it—”
“Everyone of those kids is doomed. City authority won’t pick them up if they’re plague carriers.”
Skye sat down beside him, smoothing her skirt over her knees. The elation she had felt was still with her, but quieter now, like a stream that has left the rapids to flow unruffled over smooth, round stones and past the bright orange scales of koi fish. “You’re not afraid of me.”
“I’m afraid for you.” Devi’s voice was low and rough. “There’s a third thing that could happen.”
Jem came over, and she stroked the dokey’s soft fur. “Tell me.”
“If the monkey house can’t cure you, the doctors still might find a way to control the plague by controlling your metabolism—never letting you grow quite all the way up.”
“You mean they could use medical Makers to undo all my body’s growing.” She shuddered. It would be like an artist every night deleting all the colors that had been summoned that day into her painting, every night erasing a fresh layer of meaning from her life’s work. Skye gazed at the palm of her hand. “This is all that’s left of my mother and father. I don’t want to change it. Not now. Not like this.”
She looked up, as muttered obscenities and the sound of approaching footsteps arrived from the forest trail. A moment later she heard the low buzz of a hunting camera bee … and for the first time realized that Zia and Buyu were missing. She smiled. Then she leaned back against the invisible wall, and it was as if she were leaning against the Universe itself.
From somewhere nearby Zia called, “Sky-eye! Where are you?”
Softly Skye said, “City authority would never let me out of the monkey house if I was a carrier. No matter what. Would they? And they would not pick up the other children, if they could not be cured.”
“So that leaves only one option,” Devi said as the camera bee buzzed into sight, a faint gold spark emerging from the darkness under the trees. Devi waved at it. “Hey Buyu, we’re here.” Then he turned to Skye. “We have to see to it you’re cured.”
