The Homestead

by G R Higginbotham

  He needed to contact Rebecca.

  ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

  “Where have you been? I’ve been trying to reach you.” Rebecca looked frustrated. Her voice sounded more nasal and didn’t have the smile behind it that it always radiated.

  “Sorry, I’ve been in a meeting with Dr. Lamar. What’s wrong?” Moses wanted to tell her about the box of Epps’ belongings, but something was bothering her. It would be better to find out what that was before bringing her up to date with their shared mission.

  “Everybody is getting sick.” As if for emphasis, she released a rib-rattling cough that came from deep within her lungs.

  “Who is sick?”

  “There are too many to name. It is spreading around the hab fast, and some people are starting to get worried.” She paused to cough. “Some of them are really bad off. It sounds like they are having trouble just taking in air. You have to help.”

  Moses thought for a moment. “Who is the closest doctor that can come right away?”

  Rebecca didn’t even need time to consider, having clearly worked through this already. “Homestead II is closest, but all of the transporters are away. The closest doctor with a driver on-site is you. But that is a full day away. What do we do?”

  Moses wasn’t sure what the right answer was. When he left, many people had minor respiratory issues. Rebecca was in perfect health the last time he had seen her, and now she sounded like someone in a tuberculosis ward when she coughed. Whatever this was it was moving fast. And he still needed another day to gather details.

  “How fast can you get to my office?”

  “I can be there in ten minutes.”

  “OK. Go there now and call me when you get inside. I’m going to walk you through some lab work.” He was operating solely on instinct now.

  “And how am I going to do that, exactly?” She looked worried and scared.

  “Don’t worry. I can see everything you’re doing, and can walk you through exactly what to do. Besides, you’ve got the samples we need inside of you. By the way, next time you cough save some of your sputum.”

  “My what? That sounds disgusting.”

  He laughed to try and put her at ease. “It is. That is the mucous you’re coughing up. We need some of it to find out exactly what is going on. Then I can tell you how to treat everybody.”

  “That’s just crazy. I can’t even pronounce half of things you do. How can I treat everyone?” She stood up to protest, now out of range of the camera.

  “Just breathe, Rebecca. You can do this. I know you can. But hurry up. If people are really that sick, we need to rush. Every moment you wait, the sicker people will get. Besides, I’ve already got an idea of what is going on.”

  ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

  Moses worked with Rebecca through the video comm system over the next several hours. Since he already had a good idea of what the cause of the sickness was, it wasn’t difficult to test for and identify cyanobacterial spores in Rebecca’s sample. She was able to follow his directions to create a fungicide that was airborne, safely inhalable, but strong enough to wipe out the colonies living in her respiratory system. Within thirty minutes her symptoms were reversing.

  They managed to garner cooperation with Chief Jacobs to synchronize a habitat-wide release of the fungicide on a large scale to treat everyone simultaneously. Some people came very close to passing away, but in the end everyone pulled through.

  “I can’t believe we made it through this,” Rebecca told him the next day. He was checking in with her while performing his own research at Station III. “I don’t know if I’ve ever been that scared before.”

  “Well,” Moses replied, “it’s a good thing you were there. Nobody else knows my medical facilities like you do. You’re the only person who spends any time in there willingly other than myself.”

  “I know what you mean.” She chuckled quietly. “You’re not the easiest person to spend time with.”

  “I take great offense at that,” he feigned sadness.

  “Let’s face it,” she said. “You are not a master at small talk or subtlety.”

  “Some people may think that is a strength,” he answered. She remained quiet. Moses decided to change the subject back to the sickness. “It’s good to hear that everyone is doing better. Did anyone have a bad reaction to the fungicide?”

  “Just Dr Idleman. She delayed the treatment release by an hour trying to make sure the cloud of fungicide wouldn’t infiltrate her grow labs. She didn’t want her work to be effected by the gas.” Rebecca made a face to show her dislike of the mycophycologist.

  “That sounds reasonable, though.” Moses said. “It is a large part of what is making Homestead IV successful. Without her work, I don’t know that we would be as close as we are to taking a long walk on the surface of the planet.”

  “Yeah, yeah.” She dismissed his defense of the researcher. “But she could have locked her lab down a lot faster. It’s like she would rather choke to death on sputum than risk anything happening to her precious algae fields.”

  Moses laughed out loud.

  “What’s so funny?” she demanded.

  “I see you’ve adopted my word.”

  “So.” She looked into the camera challenging him to be careful how he proceeded.

  “Be careful,” he replied. “Non-medical people may get grossed out when you talk like that. We’ll make a doctor out of you yet.”

  “Which brings me to my next point.”

  “And what’s that?” he asked.

  “Why did they go to all of the trouble of bringing you to Mars, and the added expense of training you and putting you to work here, when all they had to do was have a doctor walk me through everything. It wasn’t that hard.”

  With that she terminated the connection, leaving him alone in an isolated research lab on Station III. He shook his head, laughing to himself. She must be feeling better to be back to her feisty self again. He was glad she was doing OK.

  Chapter 8

  Moses arrived back to Homestead IV two days later, just as everyone was beginning to feel better. Rebecca’s sample was consistent with his expectations. The people of the hab were starting to show symptoms of respiratory distress related to inhaling spores from harmful algal-fungal-bacterial substances in the air. In this case, algae spores that somehow went airborne and infiltrated the air recirculators. There shouldn’t have been enough moisture inside the air system to allow for algae growth, and definitely not enough light to encourage growth. The newly mutated variety of algae was able to circumvent the air-scrubbing system that ran throughout the hab. By the time Moses was back in his office, he was assured that the entire system had been sanitized with improved enzymatic air scrubbers and by a robot cleaning force that rivaled an army.

  Rebecca met him at his rooms. She was smiling, perhaps even a little smug. Her crooked smile spoke volumes.

  “So you think you can be the new doctor now?” He managed to sound angry without laughing. “Cure one plague and suddenly you’re a great healer.”

  She punched his arm. Hard. “Shut up. And thank you.” She hugged him tight. She refused to release him until he returned the hug awkwardly.

  “Gross. You’re probably still contagious.” He let go of her.

  She finally released him as they walked into the room. “How did you know? There was no way my . . . whatever that was . . . could tell you how to cure everybody here.”

  “It didn’t. Please sit. We need to talk.” He was all business now, and she followed his lead. “Your sample only confirmed my suspicions. And nobody is cured. Just stabilized. The additive we released into the water is just keeping the problem at bay for now. Unless we can track it to its source and eliminate the cause, it will come back.”

  “That doesn’t sound good, Moses.”

  “You’re right.” He studied her face for a moment to see if she was ready to hear what he had figured out while he was away. There was only one way to know for sure
. “And what is weirder is that I think it is the same thing that killed your buddy Epps as well as Adrie Petersen.”

  She shook her head slightly as if struck by a blow. “How is that even possible? One mutation kills two people months apart from each other, goes away, and then comes back to get everyone sick?”

  “Not hardly. You’re giving this algae too much credit. It can’t plan or attack someone. It just tries to survive.”

  “Then how would that happen?”

  “That’s the part we have to figure out. But I can guarantee someone dosed both of them. It wasn’t in the air re-circulator for the first two victims. I do know one thing, though.” He raised his index finger in the air to illustrate his certainty.

  “What’s that?” she asked.

  “I’m going to have to pay Dr. Idleman another visit. Her section of the hab is where all of this is coming from. Literally. She created this algae. Her foolproof system of screening the mutations doesn’t appear to be as efficient as she thinks it is.” Moses filled her in on the conversation he had with the scientist before he went to Station III. “You don’t know how to track her down right now do you?” He wanted to get to the bottom of the current problem right away to prevent any recurrence.

  She knitted her brow to apologize for the next blow. “She won’t be your first stop.”

  “Why is that?”

  “Because Chief Jacobs is insisting you come to him first thing. Sorry.”

  Moses wasn’t worried. “Is it good or bad?”

  “It’s never good with him. He’s such a prick. Do you want me to come with you?”

  “That depends. Would your being there help me get information out of him, or make him clam up?”

  “I don’t think it will make a difference. He operates at a pretty consistent rate of prick.”

  Moses thought for a moment before inviting her along. She was going to be knee-deep in everything from here on out anyway. May as well clue her in.

  “I stole some of Epps’ property from Lamar’s office.” He dropped the now half-filled vial and the mechanical bee on the table between them. “This is how I managed to find a treatment for the algae. The vial is filled with fluid from the area around his body, and the bee was nearby, too. Just like you said it was. Something doesn’t quite make sense about all of this, but the spores in the water are what killed your friend. I have no doubt.”

  She picked up the vial and held it to the light to gaze at the clear liquid. Knowing that the contents of that clear liquid could end a life, and more specifically had already ended the life of her close friend, had to bring up some painful emotions for her. Moses couldn’t decipher her face, but she was definitely affected by the evidence. Good. That meant she was ready to hear the rest.

  “And I needed the next day to find this.” He pulled a file folder out of his bag and dropped it on the table. “It’s Adrie Petersen’s autopsy report.”

  “I didn’t know they did one on her. I had heard that her death was ruled natural causes and she was buried as soon as they reached earth.” She put the vial down gently and started leafing through the report. After a few seconds she gave up and faced Moses. “What does it say?”

  “Basically, same cause of death as Epps. Just like I thought it would. It just affected them differently.” He watched it soak into her for a minute. “Something big is going on here, and I don’t know who is to blame, who is covering it up, and who knows about it. But I intend to find out.”

  Rebecca’s concern intensified. “Moses, you need to be careful. Obviously whoever is doing all of this won’t hesitate to kill. You can’t let anybody know you suspect something or you could be next.”

  “I don’t know how I can look into everything without revealing my hand. Besides, I already told Dr. Lamar my suspicions.” Before she could object, he added, “Don’t worry. He’s no threat.”

  “How do you know he isn’t involved?” she asked.

  “Because,” he said, “I hid the mechanical bee from him and he never noticed it was missing. If he was deep into this, he would have known the contents of that box like his own name.” He shrugged. “Besides, that man may be annoying, but he has no backbone. He just wants to stay out of the way. Inserting himself into our business would just draw him in deeper.”

  She was obviously hesitant to agree. “Just act like you’re investigating the spore attack. That’s a good enough reason for the habitat’s doctor to start poking around, right?”

  “That would work.” He smiled at her. “But I’m going to need help. Are you in?”

  “I don’t really have anything else going on right now, so sure.” She smiled back weakly and resumed rolling the vial of toxic liquid between her fingers.

  “Then go home and get some rest. We’re going to be busy for a while.”

  They said goodbye as he walked her to the door. But there was no way he was getting any sleep. The wheels in his brain were turning at full speed with no sign of stopping. He needed to get to Jacobs, have another visit with Harold Petersen, and find Dr. Idleman. All before they figured out what he was doing. One of them, or some combination of them, was behind the two murders and the mass sickness. And Moses had to find out who it was before they did it again.

  ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

  As he exited the lift, Moses was struck once again by the beauty of Harold Petersen’s plot of land. It could even be called a farm by the more poetic observer. That was crazy, of course. How could someone have a legitimate farm beneath the surface of Mars? But the man had done it. Walking by the fruiting trees and vegetables growing all around the area, Moses was reminded of the home in Virginia on the banks of the James River where he had spent the second half of his childhood. It was a great thing to be self-sufficient. The ability to be independent and not need others to assist with your day-to-day needs had an appeal that he had to admit sounded very nice.

  At the same time, there was a certain amount of social awkwardness that accompanied that goal. Case-in-point: Harold Petersen’s less than appealing personality. The old farmer had noticed the doctor’s arrival and was coming out to greet him. Somehow it seemed perfectly natural that he would be wearing a flannel shirt and overalls. When he was still too far away to use his normal speaking voice, he called out to Moses.

  “I don’t remember sending you an invite, and I’m still not coming for that checkup. What do you need?”

  Nice. Petersen sure had a way about him. “It’s good to see you, too. I was hoping you could help me.”

  Harold chuckled. “I don’t do colonoscopies. That’s your department. This here is a drill-free zone, doctor.” He never smiled in spite of the joke.

  Moses grinned just to piss off the old man. “I was looking into the recent sickness - trying to figure out how it spread so completely through the different levels of the habitat - and had a thought: most people stick to their own level and the few around it unless they are on a special errand, but those bees of yours are all over the place. I wouldn’t want someone to get the wrong idea and start blaming them for what happened, so I was hoping you could help me rule them out as suspects. We don’t want any tiny Typhoid Mary flying around the place. I know that you and your wife worked hard on making this planet more habitable so that civilians could help with the terraforming process. I’d hate to think what would happen if all of that hard work were taken away.” Moses left the idea in the air between them, hoping to entice him into cooperation. Petersen looked away toward the center of the pyramid. He swallowed hard, twice, and walked across the farm to the railing that overlooked the result of his and his wife’s brilliance. He never looked back to acknowledge the idea that still lingered there in the air between them, but it obviously weighed heavily on him; shoulders sunk, head down as he surveyed the levels below.

  Moses approached slowly and placed a hand squarely on his shoulder blade. He was surprisingly muscular for an older man, even through the flannel. There were tears slowly breaking free. Moses hadn’t even notice
d the dirt on his face until the tears swept it away. He thought it was just the man’s skin tone. He looked away again and removed his hand just to be polite and give the widow some time.

  “Young man, we worked damn hard, you’re right. Just the thought of Adrie’s work disappearing is more than I can bear. I can’t see how they would have anything to do with spreading that disease. Adrie would have made sure they couldn’t hurt anybody.” He palmed his cheeks and just smeared the streaks of dirt.

  “I hope that you’re right. But it is an obvious answer to how it spread so quickly through the facility. I would like to think that there would be some way to make sure that theory is wrong. I’m with you, sir. I agree that Mrs. Petersen would have had failsafe after failsafe to prevent such a thing. But I also have reason to believe someone may be tampering with her work.” Moses didn’t mention that Harold Petersen was one of the leading candidates.

  Petersen turned to face him, face smudged and with no emotion remaining on it. “And what makes you think that?” The intensity in his voice was almost angry. Moses had to remind himself he was talking about a crime to someone who may be guilty of it, and stepped away from the railing. It was a long way down. Harold followed closely.

  “The recent illness that spread throughout the habitat was just a mild version of whatever took Adrie away from you . . . and the last doctor away from Homestead IV. I have proof.”

  “We need to get that proof to Jacobs,” Harold said. “We have to run this up the chain.”

  As far as Moses could ascertain, Harold Petersen blamed the leadership of Homestead IV for everything bad that happened. Moses couldn’t figure out why he would want to take it to someone he hated, and also someone he blamed for much of the trouble associated with his wife’s death, if not her actual murder. It didn’t add up.