The Season of Passage

  She checked their time.

  Thirty seconds.

  Yet their calculations were wrong. Even as she studied her watch, the bomb exploded. Searing light flashed from the direction of the cavern, so bright that it obliterated everything else. Lauren floored the pedal and Hummingbird leaped forward at high speed. One second into the tunnel, the shock wave hit, an almighty fist of blasted air. The tunnel shook violently. It was next to impossible to steer. Behind them a new wave rushed up the canal, a wave of fire, turning the black waters to shining steam. The steam shot around them on all sides, instantly raising the internal temperature of their pressure suits to that of an oven. But Lauren had gone through too much to let

  Hummingbird smash into the walls. She rode the wave of fire, and they survived.

  In the basement of the Hawk, on the same table where Lauren had cut out James Ranoth's heart, Gary Wheeler lay on his back. The bones of his fractured left arm protruded through his skin four inches above the back of the wrist. He was unconscious. Using a scalpel and a scissors, Lauren cut off the arm of his pressure suit and then his undershirt. A quick examination showed he had torn tendons and a severed median nerve. He needed surgery, she knew, a blood transfusion, and water. She could already see that his hand and arm would never be the same.

  Lauren crossed to the part of her medical cabinet that had survived the rough landing. She selected hypodermics, narcotics, stitches, and a small bottle of glucose solution. She had only one of the latter, and she knew she would need ten of them to rehydrate him fully. She started an IV, and gave him a light anesthesia. She doubted he would wake during the operation; he was out cold. It was a miracle he was even alive, she thought. During their flight from the canal, while he phased in and out of consciousness, he had explained how he had tied himself to the rope ladder, and thus survived the tsunami. He also mentioned how a soft spongy sack hit him after the wave had passed. She hadn't told him it had been a piece of Jessica.

  At present it was dark outside. The wind howled, blasting the exterior hull with snow. For an almost airless planet, Mars was sure delivering plenty of environmental abuse. Lauren sat on a stool beside the table, too weak to stand, and began to cut through Gary's arm with her scalpel. She prayed that he didn't die on the table.

  Lauren awoke on the couch in the living area to moans of

  pain. She checked the clock. Four hours had passed since she had put in Gary's last stitches. She tried to sit up but immediately doubled over in pain. She had forgotten her broken ribs. A pity they had not forgotten her. The dry heaves that followed did not help matters. She staggered down the ladder to the basement.

  Gary rocked on the table in a nightmare. He had yanked out the IV attached to the now empty glucose bottle. His left arm was bandaged, locked in a brace. She touched his forehead. It was hot.

  'Gary,' she said. 'Wake up. Can you hear me?'

  His thrashing subsided. He opened his glazed eyes. 'I'm cold, Lori,' he whispered. 'My hand is so cold. I'm thirsty. Ahh!'

  An intense spasm of pain gripped him. Lauren was at a loss. She had hoped he would awaken strong enough to pilot the Hawk into orbit. Apparently the loss of blood and the dehydration had weakened his system more than she had anticipated. Lauren took hold of his shoulders.

  'Listen to me,' she said. 'You've got to get up. We've got to get back to the Nova. I can't help you here.'

  The spasm continued. Veins bulged at his neck. It was as if his body was in one massive cramp. 'No!' he cried. 'The cold. Make it stop, Lori. Help me!'

  She could not bear to see him suffering so. She prepared a shot of morphine and injected him in the vein on his right arm. Within a couple of minutes he began to relax, and soon he was asleep. Lauren removed his bandages and studied his injury. Her puzzlement deepened. The broken skin surrounding his incision was a dark green, almost black. He had a serious infection, yet he had shown not a trace of one a few hours ago. What germ could have multiplied so swiftly? She sniffed. His arm smelled as if it was rotting.

  Lauren reinserted his IV and changed his type antibiotics. She doubled the dosage. Then she took a knife and made a slit in the skin at the site of the infection, allowing the pus that dribbled out to collect on a slide. She studied the sample under a microscope, but didn't recognize the cells. One thing she did recognize, however. The cells appeared dead, yet they were multiplying.

  Lauren took a blood sample from Gary. Here she found no sign of the cells, even though she subjected the blood to a number of tests. She was somewhat reassured. The infection was spreading, it was true, but it was still contained.

  Lauren took the pus and prepared a culture. She wouldn't have been surprised if Ivan's face had started to grow in the center of it. Then she lay down on the floor beside Gary. She would awaken when he did.

  She heard cries in the dark, and she was standing and holding his hand before she knew she was awake. Gary writhed like a frothing animal with rabies.

  'It's Lauren,' she said, squeezing his uninjured hand. 'Can you hear me?' She turned on the light.

  He awoke, shivering, fear in his eyes. 'I'm freezing. I'm cold-like them.'

  Lauren examined his left arm. The infection had moved into his hand; it was also creeping toward his elbow. The odor was worse. Indeed, he was beginning to smell like the pit where Bill had met his end.

  'What are you feeling?' she asked. 'Tell me.'

  He closed his eyes, struggling, apparently fighting an internal resistance. 'I feel cold and thirsty. I can't breathe. But I feel that if I drink ... if I drink.' He shook violently, his eyes popping open. 'No! I won't! Stop them, Lori! Stop them!'

  Lauren grabbed him, struggling to keep him on the table. She glanced over at the arm of his pressure suit that she had cut away. It was then she noticed the small torn flap at the elbow. The damage had probably occurred when he fell off the ladder during the quake, before the tidal wave hit. When the wave rolled over him, though, the pressure must have been immense. Lauren wondered if perhaps a drop or two of the canal water had penetrated his suit at that moment and mixed with his blood. The idea was not totally farfetched. There were three layers to the suit. The outer layer was made of a hard - although flexible - plastic. It was that layer that had been breached. The middle layer was a tight weave of synthetic thread. It was possible the pressure had been able to force a tiny portion of water inside to the third layer - which was basically a flannel coat - even though the suit remained sufficiently intact to keep the air from escaping.

  There seemed no other way to explain his bizarre infection. His symptoms were totally alien. The fingers of his left hand had begun to swell, the flesh turning the same dark green as her incision. Bill and Ivan had not displayed such signs, of course, but no medical text she knew of outlined all the phases human physiology went through before it metamorphosed into a walking corpse. For all she knew, both Bill and Ivan had turned a dozen weird colors. Gary continued to shake in her hands like a man possessed. Lauren put her head to his ear and spoke gently.

  'Gary,' she said. 'Tell me, what's going through your head? I have to know before I can give you another shot.'

  'I'm cold. I'm suffocating. Thirst.'

  'What are you thirsty for?' she asked.

  A sudden wild gleam entered his eyes. Lauren took an instinctive step backwards.

  You know, Lori.

  But the gleam vanished, and Gary rolled onto his side and began to mumble nonsense. Then another spasm of pain came and he screamed and screamed and wouldn't stop. Lauren gave him .another shot of morphine. This time he took a long time to settle down. Finally, though, he relaxed, and began to doze.

  Lauren checked on the culture and found a stinking dish of green fungus-like growth. She studied the sample under an electron microscope and a section of college biology came back to her. The cell structure of the infection was not totally foreign, after all. She'd seen it before, in school when they'd studied reptiles.

  Reptiles?

  Martians.

&
nbsp; Lauren hurried back to Gary. The antibiotics were doing no good. The infection appeared to spread even as she watched. He had only one chance. She shook him awake.

  'Gary! Wake up! I have to tell you something.'

  He stirred uneasily in a dream-like daze. 'Decision. Live forever. Forever.' he began to weep miserably. 'No blood. Too much blood. Immortal children.'

  Lauren shook him again. 'Gary!'

  'My guardian can't save me.'

  'You have to wake up!'

  'Chan...' he whispered.

  Then he was asleep. It was her decision to make alone. Another look at his arm and she made it quickly. She prepared another injection, and took up her scalpel and a small electric saw. She had no choice. She had to amputate his arm at the elbow.

  Lauren sat by a porthole in the control room with a blanket wrapped around her shoulders. It was night. She couldn't

  sleep. Somehow she had lost the day. At least the blizzard had abated. Still, outside was a happening place. Gary's casual remark about the warhead acting as a fuse was proving correct. The summit of Olympus Mons glowed a dangerous red; a Martian candle lit in mourning for the loss of the black altar. But this was no candle to be easily blown out. It dripped hot wax in their direction, hot lava that was going to reach the Hawk soon. She watched as the fine fiery lines crept down from the caldera and asked herself what else could possibly go wrong.

  She had studied the notebooks under Gary's bed. She would have to study them for a couple of years before she would know how to get the Hawk in the air.

  'Friend,' she said. 'What are the odds that we'll get home?'

  Of course, the computer was ho longer on speaking terms with her. Yet it must have been listening. Across the control room, on a square blue screen, large red-lettered words suddenly formed.

  [One hundred percent, Lori.]

  Gary called her name. Lauren pulled her numb face off the cold window, blinking in the morning light. She'd fallen asleep watching the volcano. It was day. The plateau was full of steam. The approaching lava was vaporizing the snow. She hurried to Gary's side.

  He was crying like a child, staring where his once strong left arm had been. Thankfully, in what was left of the arm, she saw no signs of infection.

  'Where's my arm, Lori?' he asked pitifully.

  'You had a serious infection. I had to amputate it.'

  He winced. 'Why didn't you give me medicine?'

  'The medicine wasn't working.'

  'But where is it?' he asked. Clearly, he still didn't

  comprehend the full meaning of his shortened bandage.

  'It's gone. It was rotting. I had to cut it off.' She wanted more than anything in the world to be gentle, and yet she sounded cruel to her own ears. She lowered her head. There were no gentle amputations. 'I'm sorry, Gary.'

  'You didn't tell me!' he cried. 'You didn't ask me!'

  'You were unconscious. I did what I thought was best.'

  'Get out of here! Go away! Just leave me alone!'

  'I can't,' she said. 'We have to get out of here. We have to blast off. We need water, and the volcano's erupted. You have to get up to the control room'

  'You're a monster!' he yelled. He was furious. He wanted to hurt her. He tried to sit up, but was too weak. 'Give me back my arm. I want my arm.'

  'Gary. Please?'

  He fainted. Lauren caught him as he slumped back. She took his pulse and found it thin and rapid. The green pus was gone and with it the fever, but he was nevertheless dying. If she didn't get liquid into his system soon, it was possible he wouldn't wake up again. She wasn't much better off. She couldn't swallow. Her head felt as if worms with teeth were chewing on the synapses in her brain. Her eyes were so shot with blood they scared her when she looked in the mirror.

  Lauren reached down, pinched Gary's Achilles' tendon, and got no response. She debated giving him a stimulant, but feared the drug would cause him to have a heart attack. She tried to think of alternatives and her mind drew a blank. Almost a blank.

  She wondered if it was time she started on her own diary.

  A moonlit night. The trees shook in the harsh wind. Waves of white foam crashed on the glittery shore of the wide lake. She walked barefoot along the empty beach, wearing a long

  simple white dress, with a scarlet sash tied at her waist and falling over her hip. Her hair was long, partially braided, and it touched her breast as she moved. She felt and heard nothing. She only saw. All was silent. Her feet moved over the ground but left no prints. She walked in the steps of destiny. She was home.

  She came to a gathering of people huddling in a thick of trees. They carried burning torches - the flames protested the windy night. Without effort she moved closer; nothing obstructed her. She recognized the spot. She was at Terry's cabin. Only now the cabin was nothing but a pile of ash. Three tombstones stood in the center of the mess. The people standing near them were all familiar to her. There was Daniel, Mr Russo, Jean and Stephen Floyd. She had never met the latter two, but that did not seem to matter.

  Jean Floyd, holding two white roses, separated from the group and stepped to the first tombstone on the left. The light of her torch shone on the name carved in the stone: terry hayes, 1970-2006.

  Weeping, Jean Floyd deposited her first flower, then moved to the next tombstone. It read: Jennifer wagner, 1992-2005. Here she also set down a flower. But Jean gave the third grave only a hasty glance, before making the sign of the cross and backing away.

  Stephen stepped forward next. He carried a Bible. At Terry's and Jennifer's graves he paused and recited a prayer. Lauren could not hear him directly, but she could see what he was saying. Yet he also avoided the third tombstone.

  Next came Daniel. He laid aside his torch and went immediately to the third grave. There he pulled a silver ring from his pocket with one hand and began to dig in the soil with the other hand. All of a sudden, though, Mr Russo grabbed him from behind and stopped him. His face was filled with fury. He shoved Daniel aside, and holding forth

  Ais torci, shouted curses at the third grave. Lauren couldn't understand exactly what he was saying. Daniel pleaded for him to stop, but Mr Russo turned and slapped the boy in the face. From beneath his coat Mr Russo removed a sealed wine bottle, which he raised in the air and then brought down on the cursed tombstone. The glass cracked. No wine spurted forth, however. It was blood. It dripped slowly over the front of the tombstone, almost covering the letters and numbers carved there, the name and dates Lauren had so far been unable to decipher.

  Daniel continued to protest: Mr Russo went to strike him again. Lauren stepped forward to ward off the blow.

  Then things got strange.

  The torches died; it went pitch black. A huge hand blotted out the moon. Jean Floyd screamed, and with her Mr Russo, for something had reached from beneath the third grave, and was now dragging him into the deep. The others fought to free him, but the thing beneath the soil was too strong, its grip too tight. Soon Mr Russo vanished beneath the ground. Then a shrill laugh rent the darkness, and the letters and numbers on the third tombstone began to glow with a wicked red light.

  LA UREN WA GNER, 1973-2006.

  Lauren woke to a roar of sounds, her pulse pounding in her head, and the Hawk shaking from a series of miniature quakes. She groped to her knees and looked out of a porthole. It was night again; she had slept away the day. The edge of the plateau was on fire. Now lava poured from the mouth of the cave itself. Geysers of steam rocketed into the air. Far above, the caldera of Olympus Mons spewed forth a shower of fireworks. Incandescent globs of mud riddled the sky. If just one of those massive sparks hit the Hawk, she thought, the ship could explode. She climbed to

  her feet and staggered down to the basement. She vaguely recalled having had a terrible nightmare.

  Gary was unconscious. It was now or never, she decided. Turning to her medicine cabinet, she prepared a shot of methedrine and stuck it in his vein. His eyes, covered with a dark film, opened a minute later.

>   'Gary,' she said. 'Wake up. This place is on fire.'

  He nodded faintly and closed his eyes. Lauren slapped him across the face. 'Gary!'

  His eyes reopened and focused on her. 'Lori, I had a beautiful dream filled with flowers.'

  'Olympus Mons is erupting. We have to get out of here.'

  'Erupting,' he whispered, not understanding.

  Lauren unwrapped his bandage. There were still no signs of infection. Gary looked where his arm was supposed to be. He just looked.

  'I'm sorry,' she said again. 'If there had been some other way.'

  He touched her trembling chin with his remaining hand. 'You did the right thing Doc. The cold is gone, and the nightmares. The beautiful dream started when the cold left. I wish I could remember it better so that I could tell you about it.'

  'You don't hate me for what I did?' she asked.

  Gary smiled peacefully, and went back to sleep. He was going to die, she knew, within the next couple of hours, unless she got him water. In despair she slumped beside the basement porthole and stared at the approaching river of fire. It would reach Jim's grave before it got to them. But perhaps the next expedition would know to bury Gary and herself beside Jim. Then they could have three tombstones on Mars, all in a row.

  Tombstones.

  Then Lauren remembered.

  I can't reprimand him. I still have my bottle of 'eighty-nine French wine.

  A bottle of wine! None of them had considered drinking from the Karamazov water supply for fear of contamination - especially after Ivan had turned out to be a fucking zombie. But Dmitri's wine - no one had known about the bottle except him. It was hidden, no doubt, but she could probably find it if she looked for it.

  Lauren had her pressure suit on in ten minutes. Passing through the airlock, she climbed into Hummingbird. The craft's fuel tanks were low, but the Russian lander was not far. She slowly hovered out of the Hawk's garage and then shot across the plateau at sixty miles an hour, the steam whirling about her. Twice she flew directly over huge lumps of flaming mud that burned on the snowy land like barbecues on the plains of Antarctica.