First Warning: Acorna's Children

Chapter 24

Aari and Acorna were awakened by a strange sound. A slow, rhythmic pounding shook the door of their cabin. Calling for the pounder to come in evoked no response, so Aari rose and opened the door.

Maak stood there, something limp and furry draped over one arm. "We are broken," he said in a slow, slurred voice much like a recording played on a damaged machine. Aari hurriedly took the raglike form of RK from the android. Maak was emitting sparks from his oral cavity, and the arm that had been holding RK stayed upright, as if carrying something invisible.

"Where is Joh?"

"Broken," Maak said.

Acorna was now fully awake. Neither of their horns had returned to full opacity yet, but she felt a little better. "Who is on the bridge, Maak?"

"Brokennn," he repeated, his already slowed voice deteriorating further into unintelligible noises.

"I'll go, Aari. Here, give me RK."

"He's very-"Aari started to say, but when Acorna felt the cat's body she gasped in alarm.

"His life is nearly gone!" she said, and immediately lowered her horn into the cat's fur while she carried him to the bridge.

To her chagrin, RK didn't immediately rally as she had expected, though he did give a miserable mew and coughed. His eyes were crusted shut with discharge, and the fur of his tail and hindquarters was matted and filthy.

How long had she and Aari slept anyway? The last time they'd seen RK he was his usual boisterous, bouncing, and bossy self. His sickness looked like a feline version of the plague, but how could that be? She and Aari had thoroughly decontaminated the ship before they left. All of the Condors crew had been in good health then.

Her horn was not functioning fully yet. She could smell the foulness of RK's illness, and it was growing stronger rather than weaker. She saw the side of Captain Becker's head and his arm in the command chair.

"Captain, RK is very ill and Maak appears to be malfunctioning. He said the Condor was also malfunctioning. I came to help. We are so sorry we've rested for so long when you needed us. You should have awakened us."

But there was no reply from Becker. She laid RK in the copilot's seat and knelt beside the captain. His head lolled, and the hand she had thought was merely relaxed actually flopped back and forth when she raised it.

The smell had been coming from him, not RK.

"Oh, Captain Becker, Joh, why did you not call us?" she asked, still reeling from her weariness.

Laying her horn alongside Becker's face did no good. It did not even take away the smell of illness. Unzipping the neck of his soiled shipsuit, she laid her ear against his chest and felt it rise a little and fall back as if taking in oxygen was too much effort, each slight breath he took wheezing through his clogged passages as he exhaled. His heartbeat was loud but quite irregular, as if it was beating any way it could to try to pump his blood, but had to make an extremely difficult effort to do so.

She looked away from him long enough to see that he had set the Condor on autopilot, but that their fuel was low.

Aari came out. "I shut Maak down," he said. "I am giving him a fresh energy charge until we can solve what is wrong with his organic components. Where is RK?"

She nodded to the very quiet cat in the copilot's seat.

"Joh, too? Yes," he said, wrinkling his nose. Automatically, he lowered his horn to his friend's head, but shook his own head when he received no response. "You tried your horn already, also?"

"Yes, but we are not yet recovered enough to be able to cure even RK. We must take them to the captain's cabin and clean them and try to make them comfortable as we saw Jalonzo and Abuelita do with the victims who were waiting for us to treat them."

"Fine. I will clean the captain while you clean RK and monitor the Condor's instruments."

"When you have finished cleaning him, try to sleep again so that your horn will regain its strength, my love. Otherwise I fear …" She did not finish saying it, because she could not bear to, and although she tried to hold it back, a single tear welled in her eye.

"Yes," he said briskly. She knew he ached for their friends, but his eyes held the same steely glint and his jaw the same stubborn set as they might have shown when the Khleevi had tortured him so long ago. In some ways, this had to be worse, for there was no enemy here to be spotted and fought against, only an insidious invader that seemed to threaten them time after time.

"I cannot sleep. Right now I feel about as helpless as I have ever felt in my life. We cannot even pilot the ship back to Vhiliinyar so that other Linyaari could heal them. I do not know what humans do to help each other in these situations. Without horns, they have to rely on other methods, and I have never learned what those are. If I can make Joh somewhat comfortable, I will ransack his library and try to find a way to help him and Riidkiiyi."

"That is a very useful idea, but we still must continue to rest, yaazi, so our horns will recover their power. Nothing humans have done for the plague so far seems to work very well. I don't know if they've ever had to deal with such a disease before. There have been other plagues, but never one so widespread. I fear what those books can tell you may be of limited use. Rest . . ."

"We must keep them alive until we recover enough to heal them though, mustn't we?" he said. "I do not know how to do that. Joh saved me from a slow death by starvation after I escaped the Khleevi. Because of him, we were able to defeat the Khleevi and rebuild our world. We must do everything possible to save him now."

"Yes, of course we must. Find the books and when you can rest, give them to me, and I will research, too. Human medicine is imprecise, but surely there is something that will help."

The com unit beeped for Acorna's attention. It had been so long since anyone had been on the other end, it startled her. "Acorna and Aari, are you okay? Oh, this is Jalonzo." He waved from the vid screen. "Hola. I was just wondering because you're still up there, aren't you, and I thought you were going to go to the other planets."

"We've had a problem, Jalonzo," Acorna said. "We can't go anywhere just now."

"Well, if you're not, would it be possible for you to come back down here and fix the lab so I can start my research? I have some good ideas about this, and one of the elders is a biologist who is going to help me with some experiments, but I need somewhere to work."

"No, I'm sorry. We haven't recovered our strength yet." She thought about mentioning Becker's and RK's illness, but decided against it. It might alarm Jalonzo and everyone else to know that the Linyaaris' own human crew was sick.

"Too bad. As soon as you're better, would you do this before you go, please? I really think I can help."

"Let's see how things progress, Jalonzo. We have some complications here."

"Oh. Well, okay. Good-bye then. Uh. Jalonzo out."

RK coughed and coughed, but produced no hairballs. She wished that was his problem. He was so weak afterward, and his breathing was very fast and shallow. She laid her face and horn in his fur again. It felt hot, spiky, and damp. Feeling helpless, she stroked him until he stopped writhing and lay motionless in her lap.

The intercom from Becker's cabin made a scratchy noise. She jumped at the sound, then flipped the toggle, almost afraid of what Aari might want to tell her. "Acorna, yaazi, I have bad news," he said.

"Worse than it is already?"

"I am afraid so. I have been reading about plagues in these books. I believe that we have both become what was once called a Typhoid Mary."

"What?" She wondered if Aari was succumbing to the fever himself.

"Typhoid Mary," he said, and began to read, "In the early part of the twentieth century on the part of the Earth known as New York City, an Irish cook named Mary Mallon was identified as a healthy carrier of typhoid fever. Although she claimed never to have had typhoid herself, outbreaks of the fever followed Mary from job to job. The health department found typhoid bacilli in her blood and stool. Many people became very ill from her contagion and three died. Eventually she was isolated on a tiny island for the rest of her life."

"You think we brought the plague back onto the ship to Joh and RK, even to Mac's organic parts?" she asked.

"Yes. I think in our weakened condition, our resistance to disease was down and the plague attacked us. It could not make us sick because we are Linyaari, and we don't get sick, even if our horns are not functioning normally. But we brought it with us to Joh and the others, and even worse, I don't know how we are going to save them."

Khorii waited her turn for the sonic showers. Hap, who had been in the engine room, went first. Elviiz, whose nonorganic components could be adversely affected by the shower's sonics, sought privacy to initiate his self-cleansing routine and change his clothing.

When Hap emerged, Khorii stripped off her shipsuit and shook it. Linyaari shipsuits were extremely resistant to dirt and body soil and could be worn continually for months if necessary with nothing more than an occasional good shaking. A piece of paper fluttered from one of the deep pockets down onto the deck. Khorii picked it up.

It was a page from the passenger manifest to the Blanca. She must have missed it when she gave the rest of the list to her mother. Tucking it inside her shipsuit, she showered, came back out, and dressed. The list could go back in her pocket until later.

Then Elviiz, his toilette completed, returned to the bathing area.

"Look what I found," she said.

"Ah," he said. "The hard copy of the passenger manifest. You do not really need it though, you know. I downloaded all of that information from the ship's computer while searching the Blanca's bridge."

"You've been holding out on me," she accused.

"Not really. I have never taken the time to collate the data other than by general categories."

"We have time now. What general categories did you download?"

"Passenger manifest, crew roster and schedules, personnel files, captain's log . . ."

"You found the captain's log? Why didn't you say so? That's one of the things I was looking for."

"Why did you not say so?"

"I'm saying so now. Please upload it to the Manas system so I can read it."

"I could recite it for you," he said.

"Actually, I hate it when you do that," she told him.

"Have it your way then."

That was one of the good things about Elviiz's being an android. Unless she wanted to do something that would cause her immediate injury or death, he usually agreed to almost any scheme she came up with, and was more than ready to provide any information she wanted. The only thing he wasn't very good at was taking the blame if something went wrong. Her parents always looked straight at her. Being a Linyaari child definitely had its drawbacks. Adults could read your mind, and you couldn't read theirs. But she was working on that . . .

Once Elviiz has finished uploading the information, Khorii settled down at a screen and started from the beginning.

Captain's log Day 1:

Shipped out of Dinero Grande with a passenger roster of dignitaries, ambassadors, corporate heads, royalty, and Federation and local government officials. Most arrived in their own shuttles now docked in our bay. We carry a cargo of the best the Solojo system has to offer, including the finest new vintages of Rio Boca Rojo, the distinctive wine of that world that is much better fresh than aged.

Day 2: The ship's surgeon reports four cases of fever and respiratory distress among the cargo handlers. The supply officer is also ill. Fortunately, they have time to recover before we need to off-load the cargo to the Stella Nuevo at Santa Catrina Station.

Day 3, Hour 14: Two of the handlers, the supply officer, and the ship's surgeon have died of the fever. Two stewards and sixteen of the passengers are now displaying symptoms as well. Infirmary packed to capacity, with only medical aids to provide care. Have contacted the Federation regarding our condition and am awaiting further instructions.

Day 4: I went to see about the welfare of the stricken passengers. All but one had died, and that one died an hour ago. This is a very virulent and aggressive disease, whatever it is. Federation reply advocates staying away from populated areas for fear of spreading infection. They have promised help, but were strangely vague about when to expect their arrival.

Day 5: We are trying to maintain calm and a sense of business as usual among the passengers and crew but forty-six people are now dead or dying. We bypassed Santa Catrina, angering some of the passengers, who threatened to take their private vessels and jump ship. I cannot allow this to happen. Have imposed strict quarantine on the sick, but as soon as one group is isolated, others outside the group come down with the symptoms. The service crew, what remains of it, refuses to interact with passengers. The ship's navigator does not look well either.

Day 8: Peculiar how people refuse to believe evidence they don't like. With crew and passengers dropping like flies around them, the Premier Class passengers, so far mostly unaffected by the disease, have demanded that they be put ashore at Luna Sangre for the event they plan to attend there two days hence. I have been informed that if the Blanca does not dock, these people will be leaving in their private vessels. This I cannot allow. The crew is also turning mutinous. Have contacted nearby Federation outposts, but they seem to be having their own problems with this illness, and no stations near us are equipped to handle more patients. Everyone is frightened, but this illness must be confined to the ship. We have seventy-five dead and fifty near death at this point. There seems to be no treatment. I will do anything necessary to prevent anyone from leaving.

Day 9, Hour 23:1 have confined all crew members except essential bridge personnel to their quarters and ordered the passengers to stay in their cabins. The first officer is attempting to wrest command from me. I made the mistake of confiding my contingency plan for the passengers should any of them carry out their threat to escape quarantine. To prevent any from carrying the plague with them, I have changed the course of the Blanca to an uninhabited section of space outside of their shuttles' ranges.

Day 10: I am not a monster. It was a medical necessity for the entire universe that I did what I did.

I was forced to execute the first officer and navigator for mutiny. They attempted to stop me from detaining the passengers who panicked and ran for their personal vessels. I could not permit that, of course, and at first I thought I succeeded in hiding it from my senior officers. I did, long enough to achieve my goal. I tried to make it as quick and painless as possible. I simply turned off the scrubbers in the ventilation system on the passenger decks and docking bay and back-flushed the vents, reversing the air flow. Though two of the passengers reached their private vessels, as I see on the surveillance cam, none succeeded in leaving the ship. Everyone suffocated. It was not pretty, but it was relatively fast. Once the first officer, Francisco Martinez, looked at the screen and saw the bodies in the corridor, he ordered the second mate and the communications officer to assist the passengers. Of course, I could not allow them to open the door and pollute our air-not that it would have ultimately mattered, but I still had to try to save some of us. I ordered them to stop and when they didn't, I shot them. Martinez looked at me as I resheathed my sidearm. His expression could not have been more amazed if I'd suddenly turned into an alien right before his eyes. He asked, "What have you done?" So I tried to explain. He directly countermanded my orders, immediately resetting the controls. He succeeded in turning the scrubbers back on and reestablishing normal ventilation, but by then it was too late. Realizing that anyone still alive would not long survive and if they did, would be in no condition to oppose my orders, I allowed him to do so. When he saw that his countermeasures were of no use, he became deranged and attacked me. While he attempted to restrain me in a bear hug, I was able to free my arm and my weapon. I shot him through the chest, then, once I was free again, I shot him at the base of the skull. It was a relatively painless death, though not, as I had hoped, instantaneous. I made him as comfortable as possible at his duty station, and it won't be long until he's gone. It is my turn now. I cannot operate this ship alone, I cannot allow others to enter it in an attempt to detain me, and I cannot leave the ship for fear of carrying the disease to the outside world. God forgive me and have mercy on us all.

Captain Maria Grimwold, M.D.

"So I was right," Khorii said, looking up as she finished reading. "It was the plague."

"No. It was the captain, as you can see, who was responsible for the total annihilation of the crew and passengers, as I mentioned before," Elviiz, who had been standing beside her reading over her shoulder, said. "The plague did kill many of the passengers, but the captain killed the rest."

"Only to stop the plague from spreading," Khorii said. "But this makes me wonder. Why didn't all of the passengers get it? From reading this, it sounds as if isolation really was impossible to enforce. And why didn't the captain herself get sick?"

"She sounds as if she may have been insane at the end," Elviiz said.

"She knew what she had to do. But she does not mention being sick with the plague. She was a medical doctor herself. What a terrible decision to make!"

"Yes, terrible. It was ka-Linyaari," Elviiz said, in a severe tone.

"Had she been Linyaari or had anyone aboard been Linyaari, no one would have died and none of that would have been necessary," Khorii replied.

Danger! Warning! Quarantine alert! This entire sector is under quarantine by order of Federation directive number 000472985-2-FDR. All ships are ordered back to their homeports. Any vessel not complying will be destroyed. Reverse course at once. In precisely fifteen minutes this ship will target your vessel with a diterium warhead."

The announcement continued over the loudspeakers of the Linyaari ship. "Firing will begin in fourteen minutes and fifty-eight seconds. Fourteen minutes and fifty-seven seconds. Fourteen minutes and fifty-six seconds . . ."

"What a lovely voice she has!" Maarni said to her husband.

"Yes, isn't it? Especially considering the message," he replied.

"Federation vessel, this is the Linyaari vessel Mahiiri. We are plague-free from another quadrant and are here to help. Do not fire. Have you any plague victims aboard who need our assistance? We have the means to cure them."

"Firing will begin in thirteen minutes and forty seconds."

"Well, dear, extrude the boarding apparatus. They are not responding, but it does not look like a drone to me."

"Nor me. Boarding apparatus extruded. Fasten your helmet, Yiitir."

"Already done, my love. Shall we?"

"Firing will begin in thirteen minutes and fifteen seconds."

Once aboard the Federation vessel, they disarmed the warhead as they had been taught and examined each crew member to see if, contrary to appearances, any of them still lived.

"Oh, how sad. All gone. And so very young, too. This makes how many of these ships we've encountered, dear?"

"Six."

"And how many survivors we have been able to assist."

"None."

"I do hope the Balakiire will have better luck at Maganos Moonbase, while the rest of us tidy up space out here and maintain communication lines while patching up the Federation's. Surely the youngsters on the Moonbase will be fine. Aari and Acorna are well able to protect a small moon and still prevent the plague from spreading elsewhere."

"One would think. It does seem to be a very widespread plague, judging from all of the threats and warnings we've been receiving. But then, I have no idea what is usual in this sort of situation. There's certainly nothing in our history to inform one, is there?"

"No, dear. Certainly not."

After conducting a thorough decontamination of the ship so it could be retrieved later by the Federation without risk of infection, they returned to their own craft. Like all Linyaari vessels, the Mahi-iri was egg-shaped. It distinguished itself from others in the Linyaari fleet by the appearance of its hull, which was decorated with swags of gilt and tasteful patterns in lavender, mint green, and purple.

"Oh, good, the com signal is on. Perhaps there's word from the vanguard even now!"

"Mahiiri, this is Naarye aboard the Haatniiri. Transmission from the Balakiire says that Aari and Acorna did not land on Maganos Moonbase. Acorna's fathers and their wives are all safe at a health facility on Kezdet. The baby boy was born at two o'clock in the morning Kezdet Standard time. He was fifteen inches long and weighed seven and one-half pounds. He is being named Harry, in honor of Uncle Hafiz Harakamian, according to the father. That is the good news."

"It is indeed,"Yiitir said. "Hafiz will be so proud. Well, actually, he always is, but this will please him very much."

"There is also bad news," Naarye continued. "Acorna and Aari left without seeing the baby or her fathers. The Federation asked them to help contain the plague."

"That was to be expected, I suppose,"Yiitir said.

"That is not all. They left young Khorii and Maak's son Elviiz at Maganos Moonbase, but the younglings took a shuttle to an infected cargo ship and left the system. Since communications are down, nobody knows where they are except, of course, for the guess that they are probably going to try to intercept Aari and Acorna, whose mission is in a star system called the-it is not something we can pronounce. I will write it for you in Standard. S. O. L. O. J. O."

"My stars, that is rather alarming! The younglings out in space all alone on an infected ship."

"Not entirely alone. Three of the other students went with them and one of the teachers as well."

"Ah, well, a teacher," Maarni said, somewhat relieved.

"The Balakiire stated its intention of joining Aari and Acorna and probably Khorii's ship as well, but the Federation has requested that we continue to help plague victims and decontaminate critical areas such as the communication chain and health-care facilities. We have agreed, of course, as long as we may maintain our own relay back to MOO as we do so, and the Balakiire is free to seek our friends."

"That sounds fair enough,"Yiitir said.

"Poor children," Maarni said. "I hope they can be located soon so that Khorii can return to the safety of her own family."

"I believe we are all in sympathy with that sentiment, Maarni. Your assignment will be to visit Uncle Hafiz's headquarters on the planet of Laboue. House Harakamian's enterprises are crucial to the smooth recovery of this sector, according to the Federation."

"Delighted, Naarye. You can count on us. Please keep us informed."

"Yes. Naarye out."