CHAPTER.

73.

DALE REEVES.

Each new chamber they opened contained dead aliens.

Dale and Shelud found the mummified creatures preserved by the cold, desiccated space environment. The first ones were sprawled in the corridor, like discarded rag dolls. Their skin was gray and discolored by blotches. The puckered eyelids had turned into iron-hard leather, their lips drawn back as muscles contracted to reveal tiny rounded teeth.

The bodies were naked. The preserved skin looked hard and smooth, and they appeared sexless, as if they were all dolls made from an identical mold. Dale recognized the Onthos from the images in the library chamber. He found it strange for a race to be in such a large city with no garments, no pockets, no adornments. Shelud, who wore only a loincloth, did not think it unusual.

The green priest paused at the open hatch. "They're all dead." In order to explore farther, he would have to step over the fallen alien bodies.

Dale tried to be brave. "Of course they are-it's been thousands of years. Now we know where at least some of them went." The mystery of this gigantic empty city had grated on him like a subsonic vibration. "Not knowing is more frightening than the truth."

He ventured ahead, and Shelud followed. They opened the habitation chambers. Doors scraped and groaned aside to reveal more stacked bodies, some carefully arranged, some sprawled in desperate positions, arms and legs at odd angles.

In a large gathering chamber, they found hundreds of the Onthos. Dale turned away and instinctively covered his mouth, but after so much time the only smell that lingered was a papery sweetness that reminded him of tobacco.

Shelud stared at the corpses. The aliens had died together, and in a relatively short period of time. They looked as if they had known their fate. "How could they all have died at once?" Shelud asked.

The green priest had spent his life on Theroc and didn't understand the rigors of living in space. Dale explained, "Okiah is an isolated city, entirely dependent on energy systems, air, water, and food brought in from outside. One small failure could have been enough."

Dale thought of disasters that had befallen Roamer installations, not just the recent debacle at Sheol, but also dome settlements that experienced sudden decompression after meteor impacts; on Teritha, a slow buildup of poison in the central life-support system had made an entire colony succumb before anyone realized the danger.

"We found air inside the city when we first broke open the hatches," Shelud pointed out. "The Onthos power reactors were still intact even after so many centuries. We got them running with only minimal repairs. It doesn't make sense."

Dale didn't know the answer either. "These fatalities weren't instantaneous. Some of the Onthos died before others, because you can see that their bodies were tended, while the rest fell like stragglers. That argues against a sudden, massive decompression." As he considered the hundreds of corpses, Dale slowly shook his head. "Let's go back, Shelud. We need to tell my father."

Once the news spread, the Retroamers needed to understand why their new home had become a mysterious graveyard. Olaf Reeves sent teams into spoke five to learn what they could about the fallen aliens. He wanted to put the matter to rest.

Shelud retrieved his treeling and accompanied the team. If they found another library chamber to explain what disaster had caused the deaths, he would tap into the worldforest mind and translate the Onthos language.

In Okiah's central hub, Olaf held up a hand before Dale could rush back out to spoke five. "I know you're pleased with yourself, but you're a Roamer and you should tend to your family."

Dale blinked. "What's wrong with my family?"

"BO brought both of your sons back from their lessons today. They've fallen ill, something going around among the children. I pulled Sendra from her duties to watch them, but you're their father. You should be with them, too."

Dale put aside a flash of resentment; Olaf had never wasted any time tending his sons when they were sick. "I'll go to them right now. Have they seen the doctors?" Among the group that left Rendezvous, six were fully qualified doctors and surgeons with various specialties, and another ten had basic medical knowledge.

"The medical bays are busy." The clan leader snorted. "A lot of people are claiming to be sick. I think it's just an excuse to get off their duty shifts so they can go exploring. See what you started?"

Dale lowered his eyes, but then felt a strength and raised his chin. "See what I found? Now we understand more about this city."

Olaf grumbled and sent him off, not wanting to make any admissions.

Inside the quarters that Dale's family had claimed, he found both of his boys in their sleep clothes, wrapped in blankets. Scott was dozing fitfully, his face flushed. Jamie looked miserable as he sat watching one of his favorite interactive entertainment loops, though he wasn't interacting much. Dale didn't see Sendra. "Where's your mother?"

Jamie seemed to need extra time to process the question, then he nodded toward the reclamation chamber. "In there."

Sendra emerged, wringing out a wet towel, then wiping her mouth-clearing vomit away? "I think I caught it too," she said. She coughed and looked queasy. "The doctor sent over broad-spectrum antivirals and antibiotics, but we probably have to ride this out." She ducked back into the reclamation chamber.

Because Roamers lived in enclosed habitats with reprocessed air, sicknesses were rare and usually brought in from the outside. The sterile environment, however, left them with little resistance when they did encounter a virus.

He sat next to sleeping Scott; Jamie's eyes were heavy-lidded, not watching his entertainment loop. In such close quarters, Dale supposed he couldn't avoid catching the bug himself. He could wash his hands, get rest, take vitamin supplements, but it was a lost cause. The flu would strike most of clan Reeves.

"I'll make some soup," he said.

Shelud came to talk with him before he presented his information to Olaf Reeves. Standing at the door to Dale's quarters, the green priest looked concerned. "We need to tell your father-and soon. As clan leader, he has to decide the best way to inform everyone."

Dale felt tired and feverish, though he hadn't yet suffered the full-blown symptoms of the strange flu. Both of his boys had high fevers, and Sendra-normally so dynamic and independent-stayed in bed most of the day, too tired to get up and help. Dale didn't want to leave his family, but the look in Shelud's eyes disturbed him greatly. "What did you find? More records?"

The green priest swallowed. "Yes, more records-the last log entries, which I translated through the worldforest mind. I know why all the aliens died."

Inside the hub chamber that Olaf Reeves used as his office, the clan leader looked haggard, though not sick from the same illness that so many were suffering. Olaf's heavy brows drew together as the two entered. He ignored the green priest and turned to his son. "By the Guiding Star, where have you been?"

"Tending my family, as you told me to. They're sick."

Olaf sighed, as if Dale had disappointed him again. "Everyone's sick. It'll pass."

Shelud's voice was urgent. "I don't think so." He set his potted treeling on the clan head's makeshift desk. "The aliens all died from a plague. We found more information about the Onthos."

Olaf shook his head. "You said the aliens came here to escape from the Klikiss. That's why they built the city. They even took refugees from wiped-out Onthos settlements."

The green priest nodded. "Yes, the Klikiss attacked them on their worlds, and the survivors came seeking refuge. But some of the wounded were infected by a disease the Klikiss carried-and they brought it here."

"Are you saying the Klikiss were struck by a plague, too?" Dale asked.

"They were just carriers, unaffected. They had some kind of resistance, but the disease mutated, infected the Onthos, and spread throughout their race. This refuge city became a death house." Tears shimmered in the green priest's eyes. "Even I could hear the passion and despair in the Onthos voice. Their leader said, 'We marked this city with pink triangles to warn everyone off. We used the symbol to let all visitors know that this is a plague station.'"

Dale said, "Pink triangles? How were we supposed to know what that means?"

Olaf hung his head in defeat, and Dale was surprised by his father's reaction. He expected the man to be scornful about irrelevant matters from millennia ago, but Olaf looked at a desk screen filled with names; he rotated the file so that Dale and Shelud could see a report from the medical bay.

"The doctors just transmitted this list to me. Fifty of our clan members have been struck by the flu, and the sickness seems to be getting worse. No one was ill before we came aboard Okiah."

Dale couldn't stop thinking about his two boys still shivering and miserable after two days. "But it can't possibly be the Onthos plague. It's been centuries-and it affected an entirely different race. Diseases don't translate across species."

"Klikiss were the original carriers," Shelud said, "and the disease adapted to the Onthos. Who's to say it can't adapt to human biology, too?"

Dale stared down the list of names. Fifty sick already ... and how many more felt feverish like himself with the first stages of the disease?

Olaf looked at the green priest. "Translate the records and give our doctors whatever information you have, any clues that will help them cure this."

"I'll do what I can, but the Onthos never found a cure. Thousands of inhabitants of this space city ... and every one of them died from the disease."

CHAPTER.

74.

TOM ROM.

When Tom Rom passed through the Klikiss transportal to Kuivahr, he saw that the tides were substantially down from the previous time. The flat seas were more of a quagmire.

On this trip, though, he would not be visiting Del Kellum's distillery. Zoe's researchers had already tested the sample kelp extracts and plankton distillates, from which they identified interesting antioxidants, as well as immunity and metabolic enhancers.

Now he meant to see what the Ildiran researchers had to offer.

After sending discreet inquiries, Tom Rom had made arrangements to go to the sanctuary domes. If he could convince Tamo'l that his employer had similar interests, the Ildiran researcher might even be willing to provide him with all the genetic data she had compiled on her misbreeds.

Now that the seas had dropped with the tide, the reef outcropping that held the Klikiss transportal stood high above a wet basin. Stagnant pools swirled with an oily sheen of plankton; dark clumps of kelp looked like tangled hair caught in a drain. The water level was so low that more mud than open water showed.

Tom Rom glanced at his chronometer. Tamo'l should have arranged transportation for him, but he saw no sign of a boat from the sanctuary domes. He heard a buzzing sound and saw a small open-framed flying craft wobbling toward him, dipping and bobbing in the air.

He worked his way down the outcropping that supported the transportal wall to an open area where the flying vehicle could land. It came in, extending struts to keep it balanced. The pilot stepped out, a human with reddish brown hair and freckles on his face. "Are you Mr. Rom? I'm here to give you a lift."

He regarded the man coolly. "Call me Tom Rom. I wasn't aware that humans worked at the Ildiran medical facility."

"My name is Shawn Fennis, and I was born on the Dobro colony. My wife is Ildiran, and we volunteered to work with the misbreeds. Tamo'l thought you might like to see a recognizable face when you arrived. Some of the misfits are ... startling."

"I'll thank her in person for the consideration, but it was unnecessary."

Fennis gestured to a seat behind him in the craft. The gossamer flyer had a sturdy but ultralight construction. "Hop in and buckle up. And no sudden moves, because this thing is hard to balance."

Tom Rom climbed inside and braced himself against the framework. The insubstantial flyer seemed likely to break apart in a strong gust of wind. When his passenger was situated, Fennis powered up the engines, and used his feet to nudge the flyer a few inches off the ground. At the last moment, the engines caught, and the craft flew away from the reef outcropping. With Tom Rom's extra weight, the craft dipped low toward the pools of mud and plankton.

Fennis concentrated on flying, lifting the craft higher in the air. He shouted behind him into the wind, "One last thing, Mr. Rom-don't fall out! If you hit that quick-slime, nobody's going in after you."

"Thank you for the warning. I do not intend to fall."

When they arrived at the medical station, the sanctuary dome was exposed to the sun, covered with drying seaweed and smears of mud. The landing platform was high above the standing water, and Shawn Fennis skidded the flying craft onto the deck.

Tom Rom climbed out and waited while his escort secured the flyer. "My wife and I have only been here for a couple of months," Fennis said. "Does your employer run a facility like this, to help mutations and defectives?"

"Her facility is called Pergamus. And, no, it is not like this. I'll explain everything to Tamo'l."

Fennis led him inside the sanctuary domes. The air smelled of medicines, disinfectants, and quarantine, but Tom Rom also smelled fish and salt and odd spices. This was not just a hospital or a research station-it was also a home for those Ildirans misbreeds who couldn't survive elsewhere.

He recognized Tamo'l from his prior communications. She was pretty, with a scholarly look, obviously a halfbreed; her feathery hair had a sparkling quality. When Tom Rom greeted her, he tried not to stare at the two figures beside her. Both were male, or so he thought.

The taller one had three eyes, one of which was in a socket low down on the cheekbone. His skin was leathery, and his features looked as if they had been carved out of wax and left for too long under the hot Ildiran suns. One arm was shriveled and drawn up to his chest, while the other dangled long and loose, more of a tentacle appendage than an arm.

The other misfit was hunched over, but his head was at the end of an abnormally long neck, like a stalk bent upward. His skin was covered with thick, yellowish brown scales that looked like stained thumbnails.

Showing no disgust whatsoever, Tom Rom nodded to the head of the facility. "Thank you for seeing me, Tamo'l. My employer is very interested in your work."

Tamo'l assessed his reaction, as if she had given him some kind of test, then she nodded with a smile. "You are welcome here, sir. I'm happy to share our work with a fellow researcher. Follow me and meet the rest of our people." She turned, and her strange companions turned with her, moving with a unique awkward gait that they had developed to deal with their infirmities.

More misbreeds emerged from adjacent corridors and chambers in the sanctuary dome. They were an amazing conglomeration of misshapen bodies, overgrown faces, a patchwork assortment of limbs, skin types, fur, scales.

"During the breeding program on Dobro," Tamo'l explained, "Ildiran researchers crossbred kiths in many possible combinations, including a separate group interbred with human colonists." She caught herself, then forced the words out, "Human prisoners. I am one such halfbreed. My father was a lens kithman, my mother a human green priest. As you can see, not all of the mixed offspring turned out as healthy as I did."

Tamo'l led him toward the medical research stations, which interested Tom Rom the most. Along the way, they passed living chambers, some dim, some bright, cluttered with possessions, blankets, tapestries, cushions. A group of the misfits preferred a damp environment, while others wanted dry, hot chambers.

"Kuivahr truly is the best refuge for the mixed-breeds. Obviously, they have difficult lives, often tragically short, although they can also live longer than the norm. The idea behind the Dobro breeding program was to develop hybrid vigor. Some of the mixed-breeds are indeed superior ... but they don't all turn out so well."

Misbreeds played music, they cooked, filling the air with the interesting smell of spices and grease. There were even children, Tom Rom saw-and he realized that the misfits here interbred and formed families. They all turned their faces toward Tom Rom as he passed, several were blind, several had too many eyes.

"With so many specimens to study, you must have done a great deal of research," he said. "My employer will be pleased with this data. Would you share your genetic records as well? Maybe she can find a useful breakthrough."

Tamo'l faced him, her expression hard. "I do not think of these people as mere specimens. They are my friends as well." She calmed herself with a visible effort. "I will, of course, share my information for the greater good, though I don't know how applicable our Ildiran genetic research will be to your employer's work."

Inside a large chemical research lab, Shawn Fennis greeted an Ildiran woman warmly. "This is my wife, Chiar'h," he said, as if he had won a trophy.

Tom Rom gave a polite nod, but he wasn't interested in their relationship. He wondered if these two intended to have halfbreed children, or if they were frightened by all of the misfit halfbreeds they saw around them.

"We're testing kelp extracts and mineralized slime as a palliative for some of our worst cases," Tamo'l said. "There's been a blossoming of a rare kelp strain, and that gives the mixed-breeds a strength they didn't have before. They can never be cured, but they can thrive here, even love like normal people." She looked around with obvious satisfaction. "Kuivahr is more than just a last hope for hopeless cases-this is their home. They are victims of the breeding program, as so many of us are. They just paid a higher price than most."

She showed him her extensive medical treatment facility with special wards for tending the numerous breakdowns of the misbreeds. When one of the misfits died, even the body was studied in order to help the others.

The misfits did not fill him with disgust so much as fascination. Not pity, not sympathy. Tom Rom only cared that they might be useful to Zoe Alakis.

Getting down to business, Tom Rom opened the satchel he carried. "My employer has authorized me to offer a substantial fee for your data." He revealed a glittering kaleidoscope of prisdiamonds, enough to make anyone in the Confederation gasp with astonishment.