He doffed his own breather. “Doing okay?”
I nodded and turned my face to the sky, to the low brutal sun, and for a moment the solar rays on my liberated skin felt simply like a beachy summer afternoon.
“Okey-doke,” he said, “we’re gonna peel you outta that suit.”
I said, “Do I have a problem?”
“About?”
“Gammas.”
He said, grim, “Puppies throw off some gammas.”
I shifted in my two-ton suit. “Any lead in this? Like the dentist’s bib?”
“Can’t wear a suit with enough lead to protect against gammas, and still move.”
“What’s my dosimeter say?”
“Says you picked up some gammas. And I’m real unhappy about that. Rules say a civilian shouldn’t be exposed to more’n a hundred millirems a year — above and beyond the background dose.”
“How safe’s the dose limit, Scotty?”
“Depends what you mean by safe.”
“The numbers they put in the equations. That correlate millirems to likely effects. Hap says it’s a guess.”
“Hap’s a clown.”
“So you trust the numbers?”
“Gotta have some guideline.” He shifted. “Anyway, we go by alara.”
“What’s alara?”
“A-L-A-R-A. As low as reasonably achievable. It means, let’s not take the dose limit as a goal. Let’s lowball the exposures. If we can.”
But we hadn’t.
“Hey Cassie, what you got…there is nothing to worry about.”
He didn’t say ‘no worry.’ I didn’t like ‘there is nothing to worry about.’ It was too formal for Scotty. It sounded like it came from some manuaclass="underline" there is nothing to worry about so long as exposure is kept below the dose limit. I glanced at the scowling RERT crew, preparing to start the cleanup of Jardine’s mess. “What about them? How’s ALARA let them go in there?”
“ALARA for us isn’t the same as ALARA for you.”
“Jesus Scotty, you’re made of the same stuff I am.”
He reddened. “Look, nobody on my watch goes over their set limit. I time them. Keep track. That’s why we have dosimeters. Somebody gets close to dosing out, I’m gonna limit their exposure. It’s real simple.” He looked down at my boots. “Time equals dose.”
It had taken me, I calculated, about five seconds to ID the resin beads as not rat turds, and run.
He squinted, although the sun was not in his face. His skin crackled around the eyes. He looked weathered — surfer dude soaked too long in the brine, in the sun, soaking up too many cosmic rays. Surfer dude in hazmat that doesn’t protect against gammas, that doesn’t protect against the revenge-soaked unpredictability of a man with access to the rads. He said, finally, “We follow the rules best we can.”
“I know you do.”
He absently touched the good-luck medallion at his neck, then saw me looking. “Hey, we’re not gonna have you sucking up any more dose.” He peeled off my gloves and dropped them in a plastic decon bag. “I mean, it’s cumulative.”
Scotty had taken my place in the shower, vigorously going after his own hard-to-reach places. I thought, it’s old news to Scotty. He’s done it before. He’ll do it again. Get contaminated. Decon. Rub the medallion for luck, or grace, or habit. Go on his way.
Lucy had disappeared into the adit.
Walter had gone to fetch me a chilled soda from one of Scotty’s ice chests.
Hap joined me, clutching his EMT kit. “Probabilities, Buttercup.”
“Not now, Hap.”
“Don’t knock it. The radiation track is all about probability — whether or not it hits the cell. Odds are it didn’t. You’re not your grandma.”
I glared at him. How about just: chin up, Buttercup?
He knelt and opened his kit.
My scalp prickled, like I’d spent a day at the beach and come back with sand in my hair. I watched Hap — the top of his sombrero, his red-freckled hands rummaging in the kit. Probability, what means the cancer lottery. Probability, what means the genetics lottery. Step yourself right up and take a guess. Youse might win or youse might lose but no worry Buttercup. Nobody knows how to score anyway and you won’t find out how y’all did until somewhere down the road apiece.
Hap stood, opening a pill bottle. He held it out to me.
“What is it?”
“Good old ibuprofen. Ease up those sore muscles.” He passed me his water bottle. “Sorry I can’t offer a nuke-dodgem pill.”
I took the pill and washed it down.
“And next I prescribe a long hot shower.”
I glanced at the yellow stall.
“Back at the Inn.” He grinned. “A real shower where you get naked and use soap. Soothe them aches and pains.” He added, kindly, “You have had one piss-poor day.
24
Roy Jardine was a happy man.
He lay on his belly on a ridgetop, binoculars to his eyes and earbuds in his ears, watching the aftermath at Twenty-Mule-Team Canyon. He wanted to savor every last moment.
Three hours already on his belly, monitoring The Trial. The arrival. The dressing-out. That female with the purple hair — was she supposed to be ace? And then the going in and out, one after another. Right past the little hole Jardine had bored into the ground to hide the microphone. Oblivious. And then there’d been the payoff.
He just wished it hadn’t been the female geologist who got caught. He’d expected it to be one of the hotshots. If he’d had his choice, it would have been that Bastard Ballinger who went in — that was the original mission plan — but he understood the hotshots had no reason to send in Ballinger. Even if they had reason, Ballinger was a dirty coward.
And evil.
The Trial had proved that today. Ballinger was convicted. Today, everybody found out what kind of murdering coward Ballinger was.
And Ballinger’s problems were just beginning.
Jardine estimated that Stage Two could commence within a day or so. He wished he could be more precise but he had to wait for the trigger event. If it triggered sooner rather than later, he’d send another email, move up the deadline. Meanwhile, he’d wait. And he wouldn’t be waiting alone. The enemy was waiting along with him.
And if the enemy threatened, there was that cask in Vegas with their name on it.
He was riding high now on a day of great success but he had learned his lesson about riding high. Keep watch for surprises. The geologists were the ones he really had to keep an eye on. Still, after today’s events, how many surprises did they have left in them?
He’d have to make a phone call soon. He needed information.
He was suddenly bored with the flunkies down below. He scooted back from the vantage point and got up, stretching his stiff self. He packed his gear. He planned, when he got to Hole-in-the-Wall, to treat himself to the freeze-dried Shrimp Creole for dinner. A celebration. He would eat outside on that hidden outcrop and watch the sunset.
He left the ridge and headed upcanyon. The chances of meeting anyone here were tiny because this was a rough and remote canyon, not in the guidebooks.
His mind raced ahead of his feet.
After the female again. All in all, he guessed the female getting crapped up was a good outcome. Make her stay out of mine tunnels in the future. But he sure hoped she hadn’t sucked up much dose. He was embarrassed, now, about how he’d reacted watching her in the decon shower. He’d wondered what she’d look like in his shower at home. He’d buy her strawberry shampoo and that girly soap. Maybe even get in and soap her up.
The canyon narrowed. He felt a breeze. He looked up. Clouds were coming in fast.
He thought about what Miller said to her, the sneaky way it sounded in the earbuds: I prescribe a long hot shower. Getting naked. That took some real nerve. Jardine couldn’t see their faces but he was sure Miller had leered when he said it. Miller was a cad.