Spaceship medic

Chapter 12

'There was nothing you could do, sir,' Rama said.

'Perhaps...' Don started to say, but could not finish. He knew that Rama was right. He turned away as Rama pulled the sheet up over the dead man's face.

They had tried everything. Transfusions, cooling bath, heart stimulation, drugs, everything. And nothing had worked. Preece had died, just died, his life turned off like the switching off of a light bulb. All the powers of modern medicine could do nothing to reverse the process.

'I can tell you now,' Rama said, in a low voice. 'We have another two patients. I admitted them while you were working in here. Did London say what the disease is? What we can do to stop it?'

Don shook his head in a slow no, realizing that in the frantic rush to try to save the patients life he had never told Rama Kusum about the last message.

'They have no idea what it is either. We are all alone in this.'

'But they must know,' Rama insisted. He had an almost religious respect for the unlimited powers of medicine. 'They know about all diseases, so they must know about this disease.'

'They don't appear to know a thing about this one.'

'That is impossible - unless it is a new disease.'

'Which it appears to be. How Preece was infected before he boarded this ship has now become only of academic interest. Since there will be no help from the outside we shall have to stop it right here. So the first thing will be to prevent the spread of the infection. We will have to quarantine the sick bay, then make some arrangement to stop the spread to others. We must find out who the present patients may have contacted, then see if we cannot possibly separate them too.'

'That will be very hard to do in a ship this size.'

'Probably. And perhaps impossible; But we have to at least try. 'I'm going to the control-room and I'll be back as soon as I can.'

He phoned ahead and his officers were waiting when he came in. Sparks at the radio, Tyblewski from the engine-room, the Purser, and Kurikka. The Chief must have received the message while he was shaving because one cheek was smooth while the other was covered with stiff bristles.

'At ease, sit down,' Don ordered, and wondered how to tell them. Straight, it was the only way. They were trained spacemen and were not afraid to face facts.

'All of you here are volunteers - because I just volunteered for you. We have some cases of fever in the sick bay, and more coming in. And the first patient has just died. I can tell you, frankly, that no one even knows what the disease is. I am going to quarantine the sick bay and the bridge. I have been exposed to this disease, so I should quarantine myself in the sick bay alone. However I am still in command of this ship. I don't really know how much risk of infection there is, but I am afraid that I must ask you all to stay on duty in the control-room when I am here.'

'There's nothing else to do, Captain. It couldn't be any other way,' Kurikka said, speaking for all of them. 'How is the quarantine going to work?'

'I want to isolate the sick bay. There are water taps there, and if we move in some boxes of dried rations it will be self-sufficient. Then I want to have all the passengers transferred to the other side of the ship, as far away as possible. I know there will be complaints, but we should be used to them by now. Lastly, I want to set up a secondary area of quarantine for passengers who were exposed to anyone who is now down with the disease. Room-mates, wives, friends. We don't know how the disease is spread, but if we do this quickly enough we may be in time to slow it down. Purser, do you have your passenger list with you?'

Jonquet nodded and tapped the folder beside him.

'Good, then let's go to work. I want the two lists as soon as is possible.'

It was Chief Kurikka, the man who had helped build the Johannes Kepler, who noticed the relationship. He looked up suddenly from the control-board while the names and compartment numbers were being called out. He frowned, and his frown deepened as the numbers were written down. Unnoticed by the others he went to the chart cabinet and rifled through it. He produced a large blueprint and spread it out upon the table and studied it carefully. Only when he had verified his suspicion did he make it public.

'Captain, would you look at this, please?'

Don came over and stared at the blueprint, one of the cross-sections of the spaceship.

'What about it?' he asked.

The Chief tapped it with a broad finger, then produced a stub of red pencil. 'These are the compartments that were penetrated by that meteorite. The ones that were open to space, then sealed and pressurized again.' He drew a ring around each of them.

'Jonquet,' he called out, 'will you read me the compartment numbers of the patients now in sick bay.'

As each number was read he tapped the compartment on the blueprint. Don looked on with growing disbelief. Only when the list was finished did he look up at the Chief.

'Are you trying to suggest...?'

'I'm not trying to suggest anything, sir,' Kurikka said grimly. 'Just pointing out a fact.'

'But what kind of a fact is this? Every one of the patients now down with this fever is from a compartment that was holed. They had the good luck to be in other parts of the ship when the meteorite hit. But what can it mean? It has to be a coincidence.'

'I don't believe much in coincidences, Captain. Not when so many people are involved. One, maybe two. But all of them?'

Don laughed. 'It has to be a coincidence. Otherwise you are suggesting that there is some connection between the meteorite and this disease.'

'You're suggesting it, sir. I'm just pointing out a fact.'

'There just can't be a relationship!' Don paced back and forth, while the others looked on in silence. 'All the air was evacuated from those compartments. The temperature dropped. Then they were sealed and the air pumped back in. But no one returned until the temperature, everything, had returned to normal. It's not a matter of just catching a cold, or anything like that.' He stopped dead, suddenly, his eyes widening.

'No, it's an impossible thought,' he insisted. 'Chief, what was our position when we were hit?'

Kurikka pulled out another chart and pointed. 'Roughly here, sir.' Don looked and nodded.

'Between Earth and Mars, on the plane of the ecliptic, correct?' Kurikka agreed. 'Then, one important question, what else is on this plane, between Earth and Mars?'

'Nothing.'

'Don't be too quick to answer. What about the asteroids?'

Kurikka smiled and tapped the chart again. 'Out here, Captain, way out between Mars and Jupiter, that's where the asteroids are.'

'If I remember my astronomy, aren't there some asteroids, like Apollo and Eros, whose orbits not only come inside the orbit of Mars, but inside the orbit of Earth as well?'

The smile faded from Kurikka's face. 'That's true, I had forgotten about them.'

'Then - and this is the important question - if major asteroids are in this area, isn't it possible that we were struck by a smaller fragment of asteroid, one of the pieces of space rock that make up the asteroid belt?'

'Very possible, sir. A very good chance that's what it was. But what is the importance of this?'

'The importance is that the best theory of the origin of the asteroids that we have states that they are the debris of another planet that once existed in orbit between Mars and Jupiter. And the chunk that hit us was from this planet.'

There were baffled looks on all sides, but Jonquet was the first to understand where the train of supposition was heading-

'Mon dieu? he breathed, and his face was suddenly pale. Are you suggesting that this disease, this fever, came from the meteorite? That this is a disease from a planet that was destroyed millions of years ago?'

I'm suggesting just that. The idea is not as preposterous as it sounds. You must realize that I have given every test imaginable to the fever victims, and have made blood examinations, stool cultures, sputum and urinalysis. This ship is equipped with a small electron microscope, and if there were any micro-organisms there I would have found them. But you can't see a virus with this microscope. I am certain that this is a virus infection that we are battling, but I have no idea which virus it is. Now there are perhaps some facts about viruses that you may not know. They are the smallest forms of life, right on the borderline between living and inanimate matter. In fact some scientists don't believe that they are alive at all. They have been constructed in laboratories from neutral chemicals, and the artificial forms were proven to be identical with the natural ones. Some of them, when dried, appear to be very stable and can be revitalized after many years in this state. We know that they remain unchanged for hundreds of years - so perhaps they can exist in this neutral condition for thousands, even millions of years.'

'No wonder the disease could not be identified. It is a new one on Earth. Though it may have existed for a far longer time than we care to imagine. If this supposition is true then we are the vietims of a plague from another world. A disease against which our bodies have no defence at all, against which our medicines are totally ineffective.'

Jonquet's whispered words were loud in the silence that followed.

'Then - we are all dead men...'

'No!' Don shouted, trying to break the aura of despair that filled the control-room. 'This may give us a chance. I have enough equipment aboard to construct a R.N.A. analyser and duplicator. I haven't considered it before this because it is necessary to have only a single virus to duplicate, while there are many different kinds in our bloodstreams and those of the victims of the fever. I had no way of separating out the infectious strain, because that is a long and complicated laboratory procedure. But I do have a chance now to prepare a viricidal agent. Chief, don't I remember your telling me something about the meteorite that hit us still being lodged somewhere in the ship?'

'Yes, here in the unpressurized hold, in the centre of the ship.' He pointed to the spot on the blueprint. 'In the centre of the wheel here are the cargo holds that are open to space, bulk cargo and containers and that kind of thing. It's in there somewheres.'

'Could we find it?'

'Why yes, I guess so. But why...?'

'To get samples of this virus in its dried state. If particles that were brushed off as this thing went through the ship could reconstitute themselves and cause the disease, I see no reason why I cannot do the same in the laboratory. If I can, there is a good chance that I can manufacture a cure for the disease. It's a long shot, but I don't see any other possibilities of stopping the spread.'

'Sounds good to me,' Kurikka said. 'I'll get a spacesuit and track that thing. I'll bring it back if it's still there.'

'Get two suits - because I'm going with you. I want to be there when we find and examine it. I want to make sure it doesn't cause any more trouble when we bring it in'

'You're the captain, you shouldn't risk

It's more important that I be a doctor now. The ship's running smoothly enough. But I'm the only person who can do anything with this virus material - if it exists. I'll be coming with you, Chief.'

The door had opened while they were talking, but no one had noticed it. They wheeled about, now, when the voice spoke.

'No one is going anywhere.'

General Briggs stood in the doorway with a revolver in his hand. Doyle and two other men pushed in behind him, carrying lengths of metal.

'I am now in charge of this ship, doctor, and you will return to the sick bay where you belong. You made a mess of things after you assumed command, and I assure you that all the passengers feel the same as I do. They agree that a man who is used to command, myself, should act as captain. Now proceed to your duties - and forget this wild plan and any other insane ideas that may be hatching in your head.

'You are an ordinary doctor again, and I am in command of the Johannes Kepler!