by Pike, JJ
There was no way to be there instantly and she couldn’t see who was doing what. Dad was on the ground, crouched down. So was Petra. Bryony was to the right of the vehicle, playing one-armed baseball with Mouse. That meant things were okay. A kid playing with a dog while a grandmother looked on meant things were okay.
Pleasesayitsokay.
She didn’t have eyes on anyone but Midge. Her sister wasn’t strapped to her stretcher. They’d loosened all the restraints. She was awake. Hallefrickinlujah. She was awake. Her eyes were open.
Fred was at her side, digging in his backpack, getting out a stethoscope. He breathed on it, then rubbed it on his palm.
WHATDOESITMATTERIFITSCOLD?!?!?! Aggie wanted to throttle the doctor while at the same time praying he would make it all better. She wanted the bad things to stop happening. Now. Right now.
“Nice steady heartbeat,” he said. “How long was she seizing?”
Bill shrugged. He had Midge’s hand in his, tears streaming down his face, no language it seemed available to him.
“It began at fourteen-oh-seven.” Mimi used military time.
She had a watch. Like Betsy. The oldies were going to be useful again. That was nice for them. Aggie had to tamp down her extreme reaction. She knew where it came from and it was pointless and did no one any good. Being jealous of Fran and now Midge, because they got Bill’s attention, made her lower than a worm. Her sister was as pale as the moon and just as unblinking. Pleaseletherbeokay. Please. She didn’t just mean it for herself and the stupid little things she wanted, she meant it for Midge, whom she loved with all her heart.
“It lasted for fourteen minutes, off and on.” Mimi was calm and precise. “We put a pencil in her mouth to stop her from swallowing her tongue and secured her head to make sure she didn’t bounce around. Was that what we were supposed to do?”
Nigel didn’t answer. “How are you feeling, Margaret?”
“I’m cold.”
“That’s normal. Totally to be expected. You expended a lot of energy. Do you know what expended means?”
“No.”
“You used up a lot of your energy store. You’re going to be cold and probably tired.”
“Yes, I’m tired.”
“I need to do some tests before you can relax. Is that alright, Margaret?”
“I like you, Dr. Fred. You’re the only one who remembers to call me Margaret. I’m glad you came back. We can talk about explorers again, if you like. My daddy’s here and he knows all about all the explorers that ever were in the whole world.”
Fred had shifted to the end of the stretcher and folded up the sheet so Midge’s feet were exposed. They were the tiniest feet and most miniscule toes Aggie had ever seen. Fred used his thumbnail and drew it up the middle of her sole. Her foot curled.
“Good. Very good.” He tested the other foot with the same result then folded the blanket back down and moved a few feet higher. “I’m going to take your hand from your daddy and do a couple more tests. Is that alright?”
“I’m ready.”
“Make a fist.”
Midge…sorry, Margaret made fists with both hands.
“Excellent. Now, squeeze my hand three times.”
He was nodding, but not smiling. What did that mean?
“You’re doing excellently, Margaret. How many fingers am I holding up.”
“I don’t know.”
Aggie held her breath.
“How about now?” He took his hand closer to her face.
“I can’t see them. I could feel them when you squidged my hand, but I can’t see them.”
He held two fingers a couple of inches from her face. “How about now?” His tone didn’t change. He gave off no panic. Which was just as well because Bill was sobbing and Mimi had her hand over her mouth and even Hedwig had wrapped her hands all the way around her midriff to comfort herself.
“It’s night,” said Margaret. “I can’t see anything.”
CHAPTER TWENTY
When the procession finally made it to the end of the road, Betsy’s house was strangely quiet; so quiet that Alice could hear the stream out back.
That was not good.
“Hello?” Alice was on alert. When she’d left it had been a hive of activity. Now there were no people.
She held up her fist, ordering the caravan of soldiers, prisoners, scientists, dogs, along with one very sick general and one very dead assistant, to halt.
She waited. No movement in the house or the surrounding structures. Not even the flick of a curtain.
There was, however, an alpaca tied to a goat in the front yard. That meant Aggie was around. She’d been taking care of the livestock. Betsy had told her of Aggie’s bravery and hard work. While she and Bill had been gone, their middle kid had hunted, provided food, and found a place for them to bug out to. They needed to have a talk. They’d skirted around it, more than once, but she wanted to tell her daughter—face-to-face and in plain English—that she loved her, was proud of her, and couldn’t be more ashamed of her own behavior.
First, she had to find her.
“Aggie? Are you here?” She didn’t want them to go charging into the house if it was a trap.
No answer.
She called Corporal Sandrino over. “Get a couple of your men…”
“Or women,” Sandrino cut in.
“Get a couple of your people and sweep the house. There are barns to the south and a paddock on the far side of the barns. Don’t leave any stone unturned.”
Sandrino barked a couple of names, gave them orders, and ran towards the alpaca.
“Don’t shoot, though. My daughter might be in there,” Alice shouted after him. Geez, she’d just sent a bunch of soldiers off in search of her daughter with only the scantest instructions.
The wind had picked up considerably since she’d last been at the house, but she still had time to get to the mines. She leaned against the nearest tree, flanked by her sweet hounds, and absentmindedly ruffled their heads while she considered her position.
What would she say to Aggie when they finally had time to sit down? The words she wanted to say and the words she was supposed to say weren’t perfectly aligned. She was supposed to say, “I am sorry. I messed up. I wish I could take it all back. No one could be sorrier than me. I hurt you and for that, I am deeply, deeply sorry.” She had practiced this speech with her shrink, Dr. Moore, many times.
“Stop there,” the doctor would say. “You don’t want to try to explain away your behavior. People experience that kind of rationalizing as weakening the apology.”
Alice had been trained not to say, “I didn’t mean to. I wasn’t in my right mind. I was sick. I hope you understand that, mi niña querida. Sick in my head. Sick with grief and anguish and all the things I’d never said or done to save my sister or those other little girls. I thought it was my fault, you see…”
She could see Dr. Moore, nodding her encouragement. “It’s fine that you feel these things, Alice, but they’re not what you say to your children. All they want to hear is that you’re sorry that you caused them pain and that you love them.”
Alice agreed with the good doctor, because that’s what she was supposed to do, but in her secret heart she believed other things. Bigger, darker, more important things. Could she say those things to Aggie? Maybe not. Maybe stick to Dr. Moore’s advice.
Sandrino returned. They’d swept the house. No signs of life.
They had to have started the move to the mines. That was good. Very good. Aggie was so sensible. She’d add that to the list of things to tell her daughter.
Alice gave the order and they moved out of the dappled shade and towards the house. She’d already picked out the spot where they were going to bury Fran. On the east side of the house there was a patch of land that Betsy had allowed to run wild, “For the sake of the bees,” she said. There were beautiful flowers—splashes of yellow-headed butterfly weed, scads of purple asters, clumps of cardinals, beds of clover—that
bloomed in waves throughout the seasons. Fran would be happy there.
Christine Baxter’s general continued to keep himself at a distance, but he was well enough to give orders and organize the troops.
Sandrino briefed him on the layout of the house and grounds—nothing more sophisticated than a stick in the dirt and a keen eye for detail—and between them they came up with a plan for setting up a communications suite, a mess hall, and a place for the soldiers to get themselves cleaned up and ready for the next phase of the operation.
At Professor Baxter’s request, the soldiers who’d accompanied Sandrino were tasked with collecting Angelina and conveying her to the house.
“Angelina? Our Angelina? The actress?”
Professor Baxter nodded. “Oh, yes. You may think I don’t care about my specimens, Alice, but I care very much. I said from the beginning that she could be the key and she’s proven very valuable. I’ve been able to make several key deductions because of her.”
Alice could hardly take it in. How incredible that the girl had survived all this time. If the world ever returned to its resting state, or at least the one she’d come to know and love since she’d moved to America, Professor Baxter would have the mother of all papers to present to her peers.
There was a ruckus over by the garage. Betsy was giving one of the soldiers a good dressing down. “This place is out of bounds. Alice, tell them. They can’t go in here.” She had her arms full of laundry. There was no place to wash clothes other than the stream. Betsy was a saint, but there was no way she should be scrubbing uniforms by hand. The drugs had done more than taken her pain away; they’d made her a little screwy.
Alice reached for the uniform, but Betsy wouldn’t let it go. “I don’t know who messed this up, but they shouldn’t have done it.”
“We could move Jim’s cars, Betsy. They wouldn’t get scratched or dinged.”
“It’s not the cars,” Betsy hissed. She cocked her head to one side; universal gesture for “get yourself over here, I have something important to say”.
Alice did as she was told and joined Betsy a few feet from the soldier she’d just been upbraiding.
“That’s where the bodies are.”
“Bodies?” Alice hadn’t heard anything about bodies being stashed in Jim’s garage. What other horrors had taken place while she’d been battling to get off Manhattan?
“The nurse who had the hand.” Betsy wasn’t making any sense. “You know. The cut on the hand. The one that was infected. The one Petra shot.”
Alice needed to get Betsy seated, hydrated, and calmed down. She also needed to get Betsy off her foot and get it splinted and elevated. Then they could stop with the narcotics and the nonsense.
Betsy resisted when Alice tried to move her to the back porch. “This was Jim’s. One of his uniforms in Vietnam. I kept it all this time. It doesn’t mean anything. It’s just cloth and history and memories.” They climbed the steps to the back porch together. “I used to go up there every year and unpack our uniforms and—don’t laugh, I couldn’t stand it if you laughed—”
Alice shook her head. Why would she laugh at war memories? Hers had defined her whole life.
“I used to go upstairs so I could smell his uniform. Then I’d pack it away again for another year.”
“I would have given all the tea in China to smell my mother’s veil. It was the pride of her wardrobe. It was locked away in a trunk. Six feet of lace that was supposed to bring her good luck.” She held Betsy’s hand in hers. “I understand wanting to smell the past.”
The uniform in Betsy’s lap didn’t look like an heirloom or a treasure. It was smeared and smudged. Alice scraped at a blackened patch on one of the pant legs. The fabric gave way, creating a finger-shaped hole. When she pulled her finger back the smudge had transferred itself to her.
“Betsy.” Alice wanted to wash her hands. Scrub them in fact. “I think you need to put these down.”
Betsy clung to the uniform as if it still held Jim.
“I do not want to start a stampede but I believe the uniform has been contaminated with MELT.”
Betsy blinked at her. “How?”
“I have no idea, but I want you to put it at your feet now and we’ll walk away slowly and talk about this.”
Very reluctantly Betsy put the uniform on the ground. Her hands were covered in the same oily mess that was on Alice’s hands.
Alice moved Betsy to the other end of the porch. “Here’s what we’re going to do. We’re going to find Christine Baxter and she’s going to advise us.”
Betsy was weeping quietly. “I need Jim. I’m high on oxy and I need Jim.”
“I know.” Alice stood. “Stay here, but do not—listen to me. Betsy, are you listening?—do NOT touch those clothes again, do you hear me?”
Betsy nodded.
“Keep your hands at your sides. Don’t touch your face. In fact, don’t touch anything. We want to contain this, whatever it is.” Alice leapt off the porch in search of her favorite genius. If Betsy was infected, Jim would fold up his tent and die. She didn’t doubt it for a second. They could no more live without each other than she and Bill could bear to be parted.
Christine wasn’t far from her general’s side. She’d taken the opportunity to re-wrap his hands in the plastic wrap she’d found in Betsy’s kitchen.
So much for her neighbors listening to her.
“He’s my top canary.” Christine was extremely pleased with herself. “His wounds have not progressed. We like this. We like it very much.”
“Good. Great. Now, listen. The garage has been contaminated. There’s MELT on the premises. I don’t know how it got here or when but I’m going to recommend that we leave immediately.”
Christine shook her head. “It’s everywhere, Alice. You haven’t been keeping up with the reports, obviously. Which surprises me. But, this is not the time to chastise you. I understand how stressed we all are. The bottom line is this: MELT has been spreading throughout the Northeast since the moment K&P collapsed. We couldn’t have known it back then or we would have recommended the complete quarantine and isolation of Manhattan. No one in or out.” She continued to wrap the general’s hands. “Though I do not want to speak ill of the dead—and I know she was important to you so I am cognizant of your feelings on this matter—but I wish Fran hadn’t allowed the fire department to demolish the building. Your plan, to house K&P in a sarcophagus, was a far better idea.”
Alice was lacerated with a million glittering shards of guilt. She’d walked away—relaxed, allowed herself to order a meal, spent half an hour in the company of Steven McKan even though she knew better than to encourage his attentions—because she’d believed K&P was safe. Ugh. Petra-speak flash: “Ugh to the max,” which made the guilt a billion times worse.
“People have it on their tires, their shoes, their clothes, their skin. It has been added to the waterway—including, but not limited to, the ocean—the dirt, the sidewalks, even the sky.”
“The sky?”
“This is not a metaphor.” Christine smiled at General Hoyt. Okay, so this was his phrasing. That made more sense. “The birds have it…”
Alice remembered the spasming pigeon she’d dispatched under the front desk of K&P. She’d killed a carrier without knowing it.
“There’s no point running. We’d do far better to set up here as previously discussed…”
“You sound like you’ve given up.” It was Alice’s turn to be surprised. She’d assumed Christine Baxter would fight MELT until her last breath. It was, in a very real sense, her baby.
“If you would let me finish. Far better that we set up here, use this as our base, and conduct tests. This location isn’t in a state of collapse. MELT may be here, as you say, but…” She caught sight of Alice’s hands. “I see you have evidence that it is.”
“I think this is transfer.” She rubbed her palms together. The fabric rolled up into little, greasy lint balls. “There are no lacerations underneath.”<
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“Aren’t you the lucky one?” General Hoyt held his right hand up. “I had a hang nail, as I recall. That’s how it got in. Via the tiniest break in the skin.”
Alice wasn’t sure what to say. He might be a walking time bomb. He might have his death sentence, written into the crevices of his skin. He could be looking at his last days on Earth.
“Don’t do that.” Christine’s tone was harsh. “Don’t drop it. Leave it where it is.”
Alice stopped rubbing her hands.
“Imagine that you’re correct, Alice. Let’s agree that you’re immune. We don’t know that to be the case and neither can we test for that—at least, not deliberately, I’m not a monster—but if you are immune to MELT but we come to find out that it’s in those nasty little bits of detritus sitting in your hands, then someone like the general, who is not immune, could literally catch it if you were to casually throw it on the ground.”
Alice wasn’t sure what to do with the gritty pile of balled-up fabric nestled in her palm.
“We will set up receptacles throughout the compound to collect material we believe to be infected. This is a rustic home with plenty of non-plastic material. I believe I’ve already seen a wooden barrel that we might use.”
“Betsy has it on her hands, too. I’m not sure she’s immune like me.”
Christine handed Alice the roll of plastic film. “Wash her hands. Use rubbing alcohol if you have it. If not any alcohol will do. Wrap her hands in this.”
“Could you come and see to my friend Betsy, please? I want a second opinion. This is important to me.” Alice knew the Professor ought to be working on the big picture, rather than looking at one person’s injuries, but Betsy was practically family. She couldn’t help herself. She wanted her friend and neighbor to pull through.
Christine turned to Hoyt, all smiles. “I’ll be right back. This might be my chance to see a specimen in the earliest stages of the infection. It’s important to the investigation. Don’t run away. I need to be sure you’re safe.”
The two women walked towards the porch.
Christine stopped abruptly. “I’ve been giving this DNA question of yours some thought.”
