Nexus by Robert Boyczuk (best large ebook reader txt) 📕

“How many of the cells are still active?” Sav asked.

“Impossible to say,” Hebuiza answered. “A few hundred would be my guess, based on the power consumption of the nodes in each chamber. The Director did precisely what she said: she cut the lines to stem the spread of the virus. Only the power cables are intact. No data has passed between the AIs in each chamber and the central hub since then. Without walking into each room and counting, there is no way of telling with certainty how many cells are still active.” Hebuiza nodded at Josua. “Has he had any seizures?”

“No. Why?”

“Have you observed any splinter haemorrhages under his fingernails, or red nodes on the pads of his fingers or toes?”

“Don’t think so,” he said. “But you’d have to ask Liis.”

“We can discuss his condition later,” Liis said. “Now that we’re all here, let’s worry about getting him back to the ship where we can treat him properly.”

Hebuiza widened his eyes is mock surprise. “The ship? I’m afraid we cannot do that,” he said. “He has been exposed to the plague.”

Liis curled her hands into fists. “We don’t know that,” she said in a whisper, her arms trembling. She turned so her helmet lamp fell on Josua, seized by a sudden, irrational hope that he might be sitting up, eyes open, listening to all this. But her light revealed only his prone form, his skin dull and powdery now that he had stopped perspiring. The slight tremors that had shaken him, that had demonstrated to Liis he was still alive, had ceased. If it weren’t for the small, intermittent clouds of breath that rose from his lips, she would have guessed him dead.

Hebuiza stepped towards her. “We know nothing about the plague’s vectors or its incubation period. And we know very little about its symptoms. Nor do we have any equipment here to do a blood workup or any other meaningful tests.”

“He’s in shock,” Liis repeated. “He doesn’t have the plague.”

“I didn’t say he did,” Hebuiza replied coolly. “Only that there is a probability he has suffered exposure. And if he has suffered exposure, then by taking him back to the ship we risk exposing ourselves.”

“There is no plague!” Liis shouted. “It died twenty-nine years ago with the last carrier!”

“It’s not as simple as that.” Hebuiza said. “The initial appearance of the disease was never adequately explained. And as I already said, the disease is highly infectious. Human carriers may not be essential. There could other vectors. Insects, animals or plant life could still be harboring it. Even inanimate matter constructed of organic material: furniture, paper, clothes. Perhaps it is in these boxes, in that container on which Sav was sitting, in the dust that is on everything here. Viruses can remain dormant until an appropriate carrier appears. Some for centuries.” Hebuiza raised his hands, held them before her face. “Death might be no further away than the width of the material in our suits.” He turned to Liis. “You still haven’t answered my question. Did you observe any red nodes on the pads of his fingers or toes?”

“No!”

“Why?” Sav asked. “Why is that important?”

“It was a common symptom of the plague.”

Relief flooded Liis. “Then he hasn’t got the plague!”

Hebuiza shook his head. “No. I said common, not universal. This symptom was not recorded in every case and often took some time to appear….”

“He needs treatment,” Liis said; she struggled to keep the desperation out of her voice. “Help we can only give him on the ship. Or he’ll die.” She turned, wrapped her arms around herself and walked to the end of the corridor. She stared into the darkness. He will be killed by their fear, she thought. The idea sickened her. She spun on her heel and looked at Hebuiza. “We can isolate him in the galley,” she said. “Seal off that section of the Ea. Take every precaution possible.”

“No,” Hebuiza answered. “It would be a foolish risk. Don’t you think the people here were careful? And where did it get them?”

“You’re afraid,” Liis said angrily.

Hebuiza’s face coloured; his head began its agitated movement again, one eye regarding Liis, then the other. “Yes,” he answered, “I am. As any reasonable person should be.” Turning, he stared at Josua. “It might have been better if he had died. For him-and for us.”

Outraged, she looked at Sav. “What about you? Are you afraid of Josua?”

“Hebuiza’s right,” Sav answered. “We can’t risk exposing ourselves.”

Liis couldn’t believe what she was hearing. “We can’t leave him here,” she said, fighting back a rising panic. “He’s sick. He can’t handle the cold.”

Sav reached out, placed a hand on her shoulder; Liis shrugged it off. Sav looked hurt. “Even if we wanted to take him back to the ship, Liis, there’s no way the three of us are going to get him up the dropshaft. Not in these suits.”

“You want him to die too!”

“No one said anything about letting him die,” Sav said quietly. “We can find a place here where he’ll be comfortable until we decide what to do.”

“Down here?” Liis was flabbergasted. “How can you even suggest that?”

“I’m sorry, Liis. But as I see it, we don’t really have a choice.”

Liis felt nauseous. She’d always thought of Sav as a friend. But now he’d betrayed her. She wanted to scream at him, to shout some sense into him, but bit back the impulse. If she alienated him now, Josua’s chances would diminish even further. She knew that without Sav’s help, there was little else she could for Josua.

“Our oxygen’s running low,” Sav said. “We need to go back to the ship to get fresh cartridges. Maybe we can find some other things to make Josua comfortable, to set up a room for him down here. After that, we can begin searching for more useful things. There’s dozens of small towns along the coast, and Temperas is only a few hundred klicks south. It’s bound to have a hospital.”

A hospital. Liis felt a rush of hope. Then something else occurred to her. “There must be an infirmary here. These places always have one. If we can find it, maybe we-”

“No,” Hebuiza’s said. “I downloaded a schematic of the complex. The infirmary is on the bottommost level. I thought there might be more detailed data on the plague down there, so I went to have a look.

“It is in complete disarray. Every cupboard has been ransacked. Most of the equipment has been smashed too.” He looked directly at Liis. “There are many skeletons down there, most clothed in disintegrating lab coats or workman’s coveralls. The bones collapse into a pile of dust at the least touch. And, like the first body we found in the elevator, there are two mummified corpses sealed inside SPG suits-for all the good it did them.”

“We’ll find a room here,” Sav said firmly. “On this level.” He looked at Hebuiza. “Is there someplace nearby?”

Hebuiza’s eyes flickered and his head bobbed. “Yes,” he said. “Down the corridor a hundred and twenty meters is storage room. It’s small, but should be adequate.”

“Then let’s get him down there,” Sav said, moving closer to Josua. Squatting down, he tucked in Josua’s left arm and gathered up the corners of the thermal blanket underneath him. He looked at Liis.

At this moment Liis hated Sav more than she had ever hated anyone; but in a part of her mind she also understood she’d run out of options. She gathered up the other end.

Hebuiza stood perfectly still. “What if Josua begins to display symptoms? What will we do then?”

“What we’re doing now,” Liis shot back.

“Yeah,” Sav added, looking back over his shoulder. “With every possible precaution, of course.”

“If we discover he is infected, I will have nothing further to do with him.”

“That’s your prerogative,” Sav said, before Liis could answer. “But until then, we could use your help getting him down the corridor.”

Hebuiza looked at Sav, then at Liis. “I will help you,” he said, his voice low and his lips curling in distaste. “For now.” And with that he stepped up to Josua and took the edge blanket between thumb and fingers, gripping it with revulsion, as if he could see the virus crawling relentlessly across the silvered surface toward him.

Liis had volunteered to remain with Josua while Sav and Hebuiza returned to the Ea to collect fresh oxygen cartridges. The round trip had taken them about six hours, during which time she’d sat next to Josua, her helmet light fixed steadily on his pale, uninhabited face.

They’d returned only briefly; after Sav had taken a quick look at Josua, he decided to return to the dropship and follow the Lyst six hundred klicks to the south-west. There, at the mouth of the river, the regional capital Temperas perched on an alluvial plain. And there, Sav had told Liis, would be their best bet to find medical supplies. They gave Liis the few things they’d thought to bring other than the cartridges-a thin foam pallet they’d ripped out of a stasis cell and on which Josua could lie; another blanket; an emergency lantern that glowed with the dull orange of fading batteries; an old medical kit they’d found at the bottom of a storage locker; and a container of water-should Josua wake. Moments later, they were gone.

Alone again, Liis sat on a crate next to Josua and placed the medical kit on her knees. She opened it. Inside were rolls of yellowed gauze, bandages of various size and two antimicrobial patches. When she opened the first patch, she discovered it had dried out. The second was also useless. In disgust, she threw the patches away.

Liis was about to shut the kit when a mirror on the underside of the lid caught her attention. She stared at her reflection, startled by how unfamiliar her face looked through her visor. The elaborate scars that decorated her cheeks and forehead seemed the only thing behind her faceplate, like the translucent plastic had washed out all the other detail of her face. It made her feel detached, unreal.

Am I here? she wondered. She raised her fingers to her helmet, rested them on the edge of her visor. She tried to remember what she had looked like before the scars, but found she couldn’t. Certainly she had never been beautiful; her face was, at best, plain and uninspiring. A face not worthy of love. The thought came into her mind unexpectedly.

She slammed the lid of the kit shut. Beside her, Josua stirred uneasily at the noise.

Liis slid kit underneath a makeshift cot she’d assembled from some crates and a narrow pallet.

Do something, she told herself. Don’t just sit here brooding.

Rising, she began exploring the storage room where they’d put Josua, running her helmet light over the shelves that lined the concrete walls. One by one she opened and sorted through the contents of the boxes on the shelves. But she found nothing of use, only printed circuit boards, an assortment of fibre optic cable on spools, and things that looked like light sensors of some sort. She