Life…
Was life. Or something like that.
In the dream he’d been slipping into and out of tonight, these latest installments of his dream of life, or life of dream, whatever, he was in a hospital bed, tucked between clean sheets, feeling loads better. The fever was gone. Gone, the glands in his throat swollen to the size of golf balls. And the heaves and coughs and the blood that had started coming out of him with the coughing, red streaks in his phlegm, then clots, streaking the sink when he spat into it, darkening the water of his toilet, staining the bowl even after he’d flush and flush and flush…
Gone, all gone. Pain and trouble down the drain. The doctors had treated him, the nurses were tender and attentive, and he was comfortable, on the way to being cured. And whenever he opened his eyes and found himself back in his apartment, lying alone in his bed, twisted up in his soiled, wet, stinking sheets, his head on a pillow soaked with bloody discharges from his nose and mouth, whenever he’d opened his eyes and seemed to wake alone, so alone, Palardy would force himself back into that other place, that place of comfort, where the physicians were skilled and the nurses were kind, and he was getting better, so much better, in a warm, clean bed. And then the only thoughts to disturb him would be about the message in a bottle, the riddle sent to himself and not to himself, so people would be able to figure out what happened to him in case anything bad did happen.
That message, that payback, that whopping fuck-you to his betrayers… the problem was that it could come right back at him, be a disaster for him if things turned out okay and he recovered, if it was found before he got released from the hospital to intercept it.
Definitely a thought to intrude on his peace of mind, intrude on his dream, jolt him back to the lonely reality of the apartment where he lay wretched and shivering and very possibly dying in his own bodily filth.
In fact, it was pulling him back there right now, and the timing couldn’t have been worse. Because in the present snippet of his dream of sweet mercy and healing, a nurse had been about to care for him, quietly entering his room, softly coming around his bedside, and oh, and oh, and oh, although he couldn’t quite see her features, Palardy was sure she was beautiful, like his wife on their honeymoon, when they’d made their first baby, beautiful like his wife, and he didn’t want to leave her, he didn’t want to…
Palardy opened his eyes. Unsure of his bearings, his sense of place confused. He seemed to be back in his apartment, in his moist and jumbled bed. Sometimes it was hard to be positive on awakening. The shades were drawn to keep the sun from lancing into his eyes. The lights were out for the same reason, that terrible pain in his eyes. The room was so dim, it was hard to know. But he thought he was in his apartment. Awake now. And yet he still had the feeling somebody was with him, near his bed.
He blinked rapidly. If this was his own place, if he was no longer in the dream, then nobody belonged inside it except him.
Who could be…?
Suddenly afraid, Palardy struggled to lift himself on his elbows, craning his head from side to side.
Initially, he thought the man standing to his left was disfigured. His face smashed and flattened. Then he thought his eyes still might be blurry with sleep, and blinked some more to clear them.
And then he realized the man was wearing a mask.
A stocking mask.
His fear mounting exponentially, Palardy summoned what little strength remained in his body and raised it higher off the mattress.
And was shoved back down by a black-gloved hand on his chest.
The hand held him.
Pressed hard against his ribs.
Kept him from moving at all.
He tried to speak but could only groan through his scaled, blue lips. Then tried again as the man’s free hand reached into a pouch or a bag on his belt… reappeared with something that finally unlocked his vocal cords…
“Who?” he managed. “Why…?”
Palardy would die without an answer to the first question.
As for the second, his conscience had already answered it for him.
SEVENTEEN
From Reuters Online:
Spokesperson insists Roger Gordian has not suffered stroke
Web Posted at 1:14 p.m. PST (2114 GMT) SAN JOSE—Reports that UpLink International CEO Roger Gordian was hospitalized for a massive stroke last weekend were denied this afternoon by a corporate spokeswoman. “There has been a rash of false speculation that I would like to dispel. Mr. Gordian is undergoing thorough tests after experiencing some dizziness and physical discomfort while doing yard work at a family member’s house Sunday,” longtime UpLink executive Megan Breen told Reuters, reading from a prepared statement. “He’s a very active man and may have overexerted himself, but I can positively assure you that a stroke is not suspected by his doctors.”
Ms. Breen offered no specifics about Gordian’s condition and present location but added that he was fully alert and had expressed his eagerness to return to work.
The billionaire defense contractor and communications entrepreneur became the subject of ill-health rumors when information surfaced yesterday that he had unexpectedly canceled several meetings with key Senate and business leaders…
After hearing Lieberman summarize Roger Gordian’s symptoms and lab results over the phone, Eric Oh, his colleague at public health, became concerned enough to ask him to fax over the case report the instant they hung up.
Oh waited at his machine, plucking each page out of the tray as it was transmitted. His hurried reading prompted him to make an equally fast callback.
His impressions corresponded to Lieberman’s — Oh’s version of gut radar, which he’d dubbed his “Spidey sense” in homage to his favorite childhood comic book character, was giving him physical tingles. He urged that a fresh specimen of Gordian’s blood be transported to the renowned virology lab at Stanford Medical School in nearby Palo Alto for examination and recommended that Lieberman follow the usual guidelines for a potential biohazardous threat and ship a second viable sample, dry-iced, to the Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta.
“I’d also appreciate you getting another tube of sera to the research facility at Berkeley,” he said. “I consult with researchers there pretty often, and we have a good working relationship.”
“I’ll need to make matters official,” Lieberman said. “Advise the departmental chairs, obtain their authorizations.”
“Think you can rustle them together this afternoon?”
“I’ll give it my best.”
“One more thing before I forget — Gordian’s X-rays. The reports note you’ve had series taken every twelve hours. Can I see your originals? From the initial images to the most recent. I’ll send them right back to you tomorrow morning.”
“No problem.”
“Great, they should give me a better sense of how this has evolved,” Oh said. “The material’s out to Stanford within the hour, I’ll drive down to personally sign for it and get cracking.”
“I thought you mentioned you were taking Cindy out for an Italian dinner tonight.”
“She got used to losing me to an electron microscope and assay plates the day our honeymoon ended, Eli.”