Poseidon's Wake

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

Sadalmelik had fallen over onto his side, crushing one of the tubular sculptures in the process. He was so motionless that at first glance Goma thought he was dead. But he was still breathing, albeit with a slow, laboured rhythm, and as she watched, the tip of his trunk tried to lift itself from the ground.

‘No,’ Ru said, rushing past Goma.

Goma joined her at the fallen creature’s side. Eldasich and Achernar flanked her, still on their feet, but it only took a glance to confirm that they were also ailing — their breathing heavy, their eyes red and weeping with a white suppuration. A similar whiteness spilled from the sides of their mouths.

‘Fetch her,’ Ru said, kneeling to place a hand on Sadalmelik.

‘What is it?’

‘I don’t know. Something fast — they’d have raised a warning otherwise. What are you waiting for? Go!’

Goma went. She raced back up the corridor to the camp’s human accommodation. Eunice was where she had left her — seated at her table, discussing arrangements with Vasin.

Goma was breathless. She had to fight to get the words out.

‘You have to come.’

‘What’s the matter?’

‘I don’t know. Something’s wrong with Sadalmelik. The others don’t look good, either.’

Eunice was already rising from her table. ‘He’s sick?’

‘It looks pretty bad. You’d better hurry.’

Eunice went to a cabinet and pulled out a green toolkit. ‘Excuse us, Captain.’

‘No, I’m coming with you. What can it be — an infection? Something we’ve brought with us?’

‘I don’t know. These Tantors have never had contact with anyone other than myself so their immunological response may not be particularly strong. But their ancestors moved freely on Zanzibar in close association with hundreds and thousands of human beings. Nothing should hit them this hard. Have you had any contagious diseases on Crucible since Zanzibar’s departure?’

‘Nothing that should hurt them,’ Goma said. ‘Our own elephant populations have never been affected by anything serious.’ A sudden black despair washed over her. ‘Oh, god. What’s happened? What have we done?’

‘Let’s not assume the worst,’ Eunice said. ‘Sadalmelik had an infected tooth once — it looked very bad at the time, but he recovered.’

‘I’m worried about the other two.’

‘Where is Ru?’

‘Still there. Can I carry anything?’

Eunice hefted the green box. ‘These are my medicines. I seldom get ill, and nor do they. If we need anything more potent, it’ll have to come from your ship, and pray that it works on elephants. But first we need to know what we’re dealing with.’

‘We should act pre-emptively,’ Vasin said. ‘There are portable medical supplies on the lander, some analysis equipment. Saturnin — do you think you could get back there with a tool sled? The ship will open to any one of us, provided it recognises our suits.’

‘There’s a chance I might be more useful here,’ Dr Nhamedjo said. ‘That said, if I suit up and leave immediately, I should be able to get back within half an hour.’

Vasin nodded her assent. ‘Eunice — will your locks allow him to come and go, even if you’re down with the Tantors?’

‘I’ll make sure they do. Grab a sled and load up as much as you can — antibiotics, antivirals, anything you have. Are you comfortable going out there on your own?’

‘I could go with him,’ Loring said.

‘Thank you,’ Nhamedjo said, ‘but the trail’s clear enough, and I’ve been back to the lander since we arrived. I won’t get lost.’

‘The others can’t be far from the camp by now,’ Eunice said. ‘If you see them, move with caution and don’t block their way. The formal introductions will have to wait.’

While Nhamedjo went to suit up and make the short trek back to the lander, the rest of the party raced down to the Tantors. Eunice and Goma took the lead, but at the door the older woman raised a hand. ‘Goma and Ru have already had close contact with the Tantors; the rest of you haven’t. Let’s keep it that way for now.’

‘Surely you don’t think it’s anything to do with them?’ Vasin said.

‘I’m taking no chances. Wait outside this door until we have a better idea of what’s happening.’

Eunice sealed the door behind her, locking Goma and Ru in with her and the Tantors. She made an adjustment to the room’s air pressure and air-circulation settings.

Ru was still kneeling at Sadalmelik’s side, a hand on his trunk. It could not have been more than four or five minutes since Goma left, but Sadalmelik’s condition had clearly worsened. Having witnessed the death of Agrippa, the progression was as unmistakable as it was harrowing.

Eunice knelt down and snapped open her medical kit. There was more in it than Goma had been expecting, and it was all very neatly organised. She took out an enormous syringe, stabbed it hard into Sadalmelik’s thigh and drew a dense purple cylinder of blood. She slotted the blood sample into the maw of some kind of miniature analysis device built into the kit.

‘Plasma assay will take a few minutes to run,’ she said, tapping a finger against a tiny readout in the top of the analyser. ‘In the meantime, I’m going to take a chance on a double bolus of broad-spectrum antibiotics and antivirals.’ She dug deeper into the kit, produced another heavy-duty syringe filled with straw-coloured liquid. ‘It’s worked before, so it may give him a fighting chance. Eldasich, Achernar — what happened? When did you all start feeling unwell?’

‘They say they can’t breathe,’ Ru said. ‘It started during the night — coughing, fluid build-up in their lungs.’ She was looking up at Goma from her kneeling position, abject concern on her face, nearly crying from the distress of it all. ‘Sadalmelik was the first to succumb, but Eldasich and Achernar are going the same way. It’s something we brought, isn’t it?’

‘Eldasich,’ Eunice said again, ‘Achernar — I know this is hard, but we need to isolate the three of you. I want you to move into the secondary chambers — one in each. We’ll do what we can for Sadalmelik, but I have to think of you as well.’

‘Will Sadalmelik pass into the Remembering?’ asked Achernar.

‘Not if I can help it. But all three of you are ill and I don’t know what’s causing it. Trust me to do my best for you.’

‘We will leave him,’ Eldasich said.

Eunice recharged the syringe and injected the other two Tantors. ‘This may or may not make any difference, but it’s all I can do for the moment. Think hard, both of you — did either of you feel ill before the people arrived? Did you notice anything wrong with Sadalmelik?’

‘We were well,’ Achernar said. ‘This came quickly.’

‘Then it must be connected to their arrival somehow,’ Eunice said, in a deliberate, judicial tone.

With visible reluctance, Achernar and Eldasich moved away from their fallen friend and trudged into the adjoining chambers. Eunice promised she would look in on them later, then sealed the connecting doors.

Goma, meanwhile, stood helpless, desperate to be doing something but utterly at a loss as to how she could help. ‘Test our blood as well,’ she said. ‘Just in case.’

‘I was about to. Has either of you experienced a recent illness?’

‘Other than Ru’s AOTS, we’ve both been fine.’

This drew sharp interest from Eunice. ‘AOTS?’

‘Accumulated Oxygen Toxicity Syndrome — it’s a condition, not a disease,’ Ru answered. ‘The oxygen partial pressure on Crucible is high, but we’ve adapted to it with drugs and therapies. I lapsed on the drugs — allowed myself to suffer oxygen toxicity over a prolonged period.’

‘Go on,’ Eunice said.

‘At its worst, it’s like a persistent case of the bends. But that was years ago — I’ve been managing it ever since. Besides, as I said, it’s not contagious.’

‘What about bacterial pneumonia?’ Eunice asked as she prepared to take the two human blood samples.

‘What about it?’ Goma asked.

‘Zoonotic infection. It’s hopped from people to elephants in the past — usually with fatal consequences.’

‘Neither of us has pneumonia,’ Ru said.

‘We’ll see.’

Eunice drew blood from both of them, docked the syringes with the analyser, tapped buttons on its keypad. The machine was already making whirring and clicking sounds, interspersed with the whine of high-speed centrifuges and pumps. While it was preoccupied, Eunice moved to a bucket, retrieved a wet sponge and used it to soothe Sadalmelik. ‘Easy, my friend,’ she whispered, dabbing around his eye. ‘We’ve come through a lot, you and me. Too soon to bow out just yet.’

Sadalmelik’s trunk moved. Eunice stroked it, closed her fingers around the tip.

‘I’m right here.’

The analyser chirped — it had completed the first battery of tests. Eunice peered at the cryptic numbers and symbols of the readout. ‘A viral infection,’ she said, delivering the news neutrally. ‘Give it a little while and it will attempt to cook up a targeted antiviral.’

‘Attempt?’ Goma asked.

‘It isn’t perfect.’

The device gave two more chirps. The earlier medical data shuffled aside, replaced by more numbers and symbols. Goma knew some basic medical biology but this was too arcane for her, and the technology of the assay device was unfamiliar. ‘Well, the good news is that neither of you has an elevated viral load,’ Eunice said, after a moment’s consideration of the numbers. ‘You had the closest contact with the Tantors, so that was my first suspicion. But if it’s something airborne, any one of the others could be responsible.’

‘You’ll have to test all of us,’ Goma said.

Eunice gave a snort of derision. ‘I fully intend to.’

A chime sounded hollowly throughout the chamber and the adjoining volumes. It repeated twice more, with an interval between each chime, and then there was silence. Goma looked around, wondering if it might be some kind of alarm. They had heard nothing like it since their arrival.

‘What’s that?’

‘The doorbell,’ Eunice told her. ‘Atria, Mimosa and Keid, back from their repair work. I told you they must be nearby. They’re waiting at the main lock. I’ll need to speak to them, explain the situation. They can wait outside a little longer if they need to.’ Then she handed the sponge and bucket to Ru. ‘We’re going to need more water. I’ll show you where to refill the bucket, and then you can take care of it when I’m not in the room.’

‘Where are you going?’ Goma asked.

‘Not far. I just want to be sure about these blood samples, and there are some more involved tests I can only run in the upper levels.’ Eunice closed the toolkit and rose to her feet. She went first to the door and punched her fist against a control. ‘Atria — can you hear me? You must wait outside. It isn’t safe for you to come back inside just yet.’ Then she stepped away from the door and gestured to Ru. ‘This way. Goma — keep an eye on Sadalmelik. Talk to him. Reassure him.’

‘I will.’

Eunice walked with Ru across the stepped platforms of the floor. They had not gone more than a dozen paces when Eunice discarded any pretence that this was about fetching water. She locked one arm around Ru’s neck, applying enough pressure to force out a yelp of surprise and pain, and used the other to twist back hard on Ru’s own arm, as if she meant to yank it out of its socket.

‘Goma,’ Eunice said, turning back and raising her voice, ‘do nothing and say nothing. I may only be human these days, but I’m more than capable of hurting Ru.’

Goma jumped to her feet, kicking over the medical kit in her surprise. ‘What are you doing?’

Ru screamed. She was barely ten metres away, but it might as well have been kilometres for all the difference Goma could make. She shuddered to think of the force Eunice was applying, the nasty biomechanics of bone and muscle and nerve, the pain she was likely inflicting.

‘I told you not to speak.’

They were still walking, ascending the raised sections. Finally they reached one of the doors leading into the secondary chambers. It was not one of those through which Eldasich and Achernar had already passed, but rather a smaller door that would have been a squeeze for anything but a juvenile elephant. At the threshold, Eunice gave Ru a violent shove and then stepped smartly back from the door. Ru fell inside and the door sealed before she had a chance to spring back through the gap. Eunice touched the panel next to the door and Goma heard the sound of heavy locking mechanisms moving into place.

‘What are you doing?’

Eunice turned back to address Goma. They were on the same level now, eye to eye. She was unfazed — no sweat or other sign of exertion showing on her face.

‘Ru has an elevated viral load. She’s carrying something, and my guess is we’re looking at the consequences.’

‘Why did you lie?’

‘Because I had to. Because she still trusted me enough to walk away from Sadalmelik. Understand that I could easily have killed her, Goma, with the things in this room — the things in that medical kit. I’ve chosen to quarantine her instead.’

‘Let her go!’

‘She’s a weapon, Goma. Whatever’s in her blood acts so quickly it can’t be anything but an engineered zoonotic virus.’

‘What are you talking about?’

‘I mean it’s something put there deliberately, designed to take down Tantors. Why else would she be asymptomatic? Extreme measures were necessary. Even more extreme measures might be required.’

‘You’re wrong.’

Eunice walked back to Sadalmelik, dipped down to offer him a reassuring hand. Carefully she released the harness securing the speaking plate to his forehead and eased the whole assembly away. Goma guessed that it must have been more comfortable that way, and that Eunice had decided that he was now too weak to generate language.

‘How long have you known her?’

‘Half my life. This isn’t what you think.’

‘People can keep the strangest secrets from each other, Goma. Doctors make the best murderers. Someone who truly hates what the Tantors are — what they stand for — what would stop someone like that becoming a scientist? Being drawn to the thing they most despise?’

‘You don’t know her.’

‘I can see the evidence.’

‘Let me speak to the others. I have to tell them what you’ve done.’

‘Of course. Make it clear to them how far I’m prepared to go.’

‘And how far is that, exactly?’

‘If I feel you are a threat to the Tantors, I will kill you all. Do you think you understand me well enough to be sure that’s an idle threat?’

‘I don’t think I understand you at all.’

Goma reached the door leading back into the sloping corridor. She touched the panel and it opened without any intervention from Eunice. Vasin was standing on the other side, looking back at her with something of the horror she must have immediately seen in Goma’s face.

‘What’s wrong? You look like someone just walked over your grave.’

‘Tell them,’ Eunice said, standing a little way back from the door.

It was all Goma could do to force the words out, never mind hope that they made sense to anyone else. ‘She says Ru is the weapon. That there’s something in her blood, something that kills Tantors. An engineered virus. She’s got Ru locked up, practically broke her arm getting her in there.’

‘Is this true?’ Vasin asked.

‘Why would it not be true, Captain? She’s given you the facts and I’m not disputing them. I have Ru in quarantine now. I may wish to draw another blood sample so my instinct is not to kill her immediately, even though that would probably be the wisest and safest thing. Do you see Sadalmelik over there? He’s dying. That’s inevitable. My medicines can’t help him — the best I can do is ease his passing.’

‘We can help,’ Vasin said. ‘When Saturnin gets back—’

The doorbell sounded again — the three chimes.

Eunice hammered a control. ‘Wait! Didn’t I say we had a problem here?’

The three chimes came again, then repeated in groups of three, so close that they nearly blended into each other. This was no longer a request to enter, Goma sensed, but an urgent demand.

‘Can’t you speak to them?’ Karayan asked.

‘It’s only one-way communication from here. For two-way, I have to be upstairs. It’s just the way I wired the place.’

‘It might be to do with Saturnin,’ Loring said. ‘Maybe he’s ready to come back inside.’

Goma did not think half an hour had passed yet, but perhaps the doctor had been swifter than expected.

‘Is Ru safe where you’ve left her?’ Goma asked.

‘For the moment. Without me you won’t get that door open in a hurry, so don’t think of attempting a forced takeover.’

‘I’m not. But if you harm a hair on her, I’ll personally skin you alive — fearless space explorer or not, you still bleed.’

‘Nice to know the ties of blood are that strong.’

‘Oh, they’re strong — but I also know something you don’t. Ru is innocent. She didn’t do this.’

‘Her blood says otherwise.’

‘Then your analysis is screwed up, or she’s carrying that virus unknowingly.’

‘And how might that have happened, exactly?’

‘I don’t know — maybe if we all calm down and stop talking about takeovers and force we might get somewhere. We’re on the same fucking side, Eunice. Against stupidity. So let’s start acting that way, shall we?’

The chimes sounded again.

‘Damn them!’

‘It sounds as if they really, really want to come inside,’ Goma said. ‘Maybe they have an emergency of their own — have you considered that? Maybe you should speak to them. Meanwhile, we might have medicines that can help the Tantors — but only if we all start cooperating again.’

‘She speaks sense,’ Karayan said. ‘And I will add this — I may not know Ru well, but I do not believe she set out to hurt those animals.’

Goma looked at him with something between suspicion and gratitude. He was the last person she would have counted on for support, and yet it appeared to be given with all sincerity.

‘I’d have thought you’d be quite happy to see Ru blamed for the virus.’

‘Because it keeps the blame from falling on the Second Chance delegation?’

‘Exactly.’

‘The Tantors may have been a development we viewed with unease, Goma, but that does not mean we endorse their cold-blooded murder any more than Ru would. This is something else. It is not our doing, and I doubt very much that it is hers.’

‘I need to talk to Atria,’ Eunice said. ‘Remember what I said about that door. You can follow me.’

‘I could remain here?’ Loring said. ‘Keep offering comfort to Sadalmelik.’

‘You might all be carrying the virus by now.’

‘Ru’s obviously the primary carrier,’ Goma said. ‘Anyway, the damage is done — let Aiyana do what ve can. We can’t just leave Sadalmelik on his own.’

Eunice looked at Loring for long seconds, performing some private assessment of ver suitability. ‘Fine,’ she said brusquely. ‘We’ll be as quick as we can. If anything changes, use that red button by the door to speak to me.’

‘I shall,’ Loring said.

They were soon on their way back up the sloping corridor, Eunice almost sprinting ahead of the others.

‘We have superb medical facilities on Travertine,’ Vasin was saying. ‘Anything in Ru’s blood, or which has spread to the rest of us, we can isolate and treat. You just have to trust us.’

‘And where has trust got us, exactly?’ Eunice said sharply. ‘One dying Tantor, and two more that won’t be far behind?’

‘We came across light-years of space to answer your call,’ Vasin answered. ‘Gave up our lives, our futures. We made sacrifices you can’t begin to understand. Mposi even died for you.’

They reached the accommodation level, all of them breathless except for Eunice. She barged through chairs, brushed aside kitchen utensils to reach a dusty communications console. ‘Atria? Can you hear me now?’

‘Yes, Eunice,’ came the Tantor’s voice. ‘We should like to come in.’

‘You can’t, not yet. The humans have brought a sickness with them. Sadalmelik is very unwell.’

‘How unwell? Will Sadalmelik pass into the Remembering?’

‘I don’t know. I’m doing what I can, but I won’t risk the rest of you becoming infected. I want you to remain in your suits, outside, until I’m sure the air in here is safe to breathe.’ She sniffed, rubbed a hand under her nose. ‘Can you do that for me?’

‘We can remain outside if we need to. But you must open the secondary lock, Eunice.’

‘Why?’

‘We found a man outside. We think he may have passed into the Remembering.’