How the h.e.l.l can anyone here catch food poisoning?"

She broke off and looked down as she felt Steve tug at her trouser leg.

He was trying to say something but seemed unable to get his tongue into gear. He jabbed his right forefinger nervously at the bed, then carefully traced out three letters on the coverlet.

R...O...Z...

Fran exchanged a puzzled look with the doctor. 'Roz?"

Then she made the connection. 'ugh, jeezusss! Roz!" The doctor remained perplexed. 'I beg your pardon?"

'It's ROZ who's got food poisoning!" The doctor looked at Joshua for enlightenment, then returned to Fran.

'I'm afraid I don't understand' 'You don't have to,' cried Fran.

'Just get him to the clinic and do whatever you have to do!" By the time Steve was admitted to the Cloudlands clinic, he was exhibiting the cla.s.sic symptoms of botulism - the deadliest form of food poisoning.

The toxin was known to attack the fine nerve fibrils, stopping the chemical reaction which, in a healthy person, causes muscular contraction.

With his speech muscles paralysed, it was not long before the toxin affected other parts of the throat, making it difficult for him to swallow. A breathing tube was inserted, and he was put on a ventilator to prevent any further deterioration. He was still fully conscious, but without an antidote, it was only a matter of time before the breathing muscles became paralysed. Without artificial respiration, he would suffocate, and with its supply of oxygen cut off, his brain would be irreparably damaged.

Unable to sit still, Fran paced up and down beside his bed, gripping his hand now and then to rea.s.sure herself that the masked, unmoving figure in the bed was still alive. Karlstrom had joined her in the intensive care unit, and now stood on the other side of Steve's bed.

Fran took hold of Steve's hand again. 'Can't they do anything? Isn't there some drug they can give him?!" 'It's not that easy,' said Karlstrom. 'There is an antidote - but that can end up killing you as well. What we have to remember is that it's not Brickman that has been poisoned."

'But he's dying!" shouted Fran. 'Look at him!!" She let go of Steve's hand and strode angrily to and fro, clawing the air in frustration. 'I just don't believe this is happening!" But Karlstrom was right. The tests on several samples of Steve's blood revealed no trace of the botulinum toxin.

Just as Roz's body had reproduced Steve's wounds, his body was duplicating the creeping paralysis that was bringing her closer and closer to death's door.

Twelve hours later, Steve's chest muscles were almost completely paralysed. It was only the ventilator that was keeping his brain supplied with the oxygen it needed.

Karlstrom dropped in again to see how he was. Fran was still at his bedside. She looked worn and crumpled.

'I hear the verdict's not good."

'No. They told me he could die within twenty-four hours of the first signs of paralysis. He could last longer - it depends on Roz. But if she's at the same stage without any of this equipment she hasn't a hope." Fran gestured helplessly and gave a tired laugh. 'I don't know what I'm doing here. When I hear people talk about bedside manners this is not what springs to mind."

'The fact that you are here shows him you care. That must be a help."

'Maybe." She became angry. 'Isn't there some way we can break this telepathic link?!" 'I've already asked that question. And as usual the psionics department doesn't have an answer. None of us know how this telepathy business works, but that's only part of the mystery that surrounds these two. We know of other telepaths, but what's happening here is absolutely unique."

'I know that, but Roz is his sister, for crissakes! Doesn't she realise she's killing him?!" 'She must do, but perhaps in a situation like this the contact is involuntary,' said Karlstrom. 'I can't think that either of them would make the other suffer deliberately.

We'll just have to keep our fingers crossed and hope that when she dies, she doesn't take Brickman with her."

'So that's all we can do is it? "Keep our fingers crossed"?"

Karlstrom smiled. As their controller, Fran had been overseeing the lives of Steve and Roz for the last five years. 'Look on the bright side. If they both die, it'll lighten your case load."

Shrewd as he was, the head of AMEXICO was wrong.

With Steve's connivance, Roz had induced the progressive muscular paralysis that was the hallmark of fatal food poisoning which often arose from eating smoked, uncooked meats - a standard item in the diet of the Plainfolk. In the small hours of the following morning, Steve's condition deteriorated further. As the doctors and nursing staff cl.u.s.tered round him, his body was shaken by a series of violent convulsions, then he went completely limp and his eyes opened. When they removed the oxygen mask and the tube from his throat, he was able to speak and breathe normally, but was completely exhausted.

Fran, who had s.n.a.t.c.hed a few hours sleep in an adjoining room, welcomed him back to the land of the living with an exuberant kiss then shook his wrists.

'Don't you ever do this to me again!" She sat down on the edge of the bed and gave him a searching look. 'Roz is dead, isn't she?"

Steve nodded and made a show of mastering his grief.

Fran reached out a hand and gently brushed away the br.i.m.m.i.n.g tears.

'Never mind. You're safe. That's all that matters."

Steve gazed out at the view through the triple-glazed window of Clearwater's hospital room. A well-kept stretch of red gra.s.s, broken here and there by beds of flowering shrubs and trees in full leaf, ended in a high wall of dressed stone.

The window didn't open, but a constant whispering stream of fresh filtered air entered through louvred ducts in the walls. The room itself was light and airy, part of a small suite consisting of the treatment unit where Clearwater now lay, a tiny kitchen/utility room, bathroom and a sitting room, where the sealed windows reached from floor to ceiling.

From her sitting position on the high bed, Clearwater was able to see the trees and gra.s.s, and glimpse the blue sky above the wall. Steve could not help comparing her surroundings with the cell he had occupied at Pueblo following his first adventures with the M'Calls. And the A-Levels - which was one vast prison camp, where the air was filled with smoke, dust and constant noise, in which there was no night or day. Finding himself there, with a three-year sentence hanging over him after those eye-opening, mind-expanding months on the overground had been a h.e.l.lish experience.

Never again ....

A female nursing orderly came in carrying two vases full of flowers part of a bunch that Steve had selected with the help of one of the Mute gardeners. It was a small token to help Clearwater keep in touch with the overground. He had brought the first soon after being given access to Cloudlands and had replaced them regularly ever since. The nurse brought them over for Clearwater to touch and smell, then placed one on the table and the other on the window sill. A third vase, containing yellow roses - which Steve hadn't brought on his last visit - stood on the bedside cabinet.

As he watched the nurse make a last adjustment to the floral displays, Steve reflected on how much he had changed. Two years ago, before that fateful journey aboard The Lady, he had had no interest in any kind of plant life. He had viewed flowers as just part of the poisonous junk that littered the overground.

And now ....

He closed the door as the nurse left. 'So... how are you feeling today?"

'Much better. Look -' Clearwater extended her arm and aimed her forefinger at the chair Steve was about to move from the table to her bedside. It shot away from his outstretched hand, slammed against the wall, then began to slide upwards as she raised her arm.

Steve leapt towards it and grasped the front legs. 'Are you crazy?!"

he hissed. The tubular metal chair remained glued to the wall with its back rest touching the ceiling, resisting all his efforts to prise it loose. 'Let go! I' Clearwater dropped her arm. Steve caught the chair awkwardly as it fell on top of him and lowered it to the ground.

'What are you trying to do?" he asked, in the same harsh whisper.

'Get us killed?"

'Don't worry. I know where the hidden eyes and ears are." She pointed to the air vents around the room. 'But they cannot see or hear us."

She beckoned him to sit beside her.

Steve eyed the vents uneasily as he carried the chair over and sat down. 'How do you know?"

'Because I have killed them."

'You can't kill them,' hissed Steve. 'They're not animals, they're electronic devices!" 'But they are dead. The power that runs through them like the blood in your veins has vanished and can never enter them again. Isn't that the same thing?"