"I think there was something wrong with some of the food," he said truthfully enough. "If any of the rest of you start feeling bad, let me know. We still can't call our folks or the euros or even the sponsor, and of course you forfeit your standing in the tournament if you leave the building without permission. So we're just parking people near a bathroom till they feel better."
Later, he switched the game around so that people played in shifts, some of them sleeping on their pads near the bleachers while three or four kept the action going at the table.
When the power went off in the middle of the night, he found candles in the janitor's pantry and flashlights in the security office and everyone agreed that made the atmosphere a lot more authentic.
Only two other people got sick that night which was a good thing, because Jorge died the next morning.
When Lupe died shortly after noon, Maria went ballistic. "One of us has to go get help. Who cares about the stupid game! People are dead, Jalonzo. Dead!"
"Shhhh," he said, blocking the sound of her voice by standing in front of her, even though everyone else was still downstairs. "We can't go. It's not because of the game. I need to show you something. Come on."
He led her upstairs to the window and showed her the bodies in the streets and the quarantine flags.The flies were so thick around the bodies that you could hardly see them for the black cloud. "Nobody has picked those people up, Maria. Not since yesterday. And those yellow flags mean nobody is supposed to go into those houses or come out of them. Abuelita-" His voice caught as he thought about his grandmother. Was she lying sick alone at home worrying about him? Was she already gone? He couldn't believe it. Not his tough little grandmother. She was a doctor. She knew all about this kind of sickness."-she told me that in the old days, when they had really bad plagues that killed people, the authorities would shoot people who tried to leave a quarantined building."
"I don't think we need to worry about that," Maria said. "Doesn't look like the authorities are bothering with us one way or the other. If they were worried about well people catching something, they'd have taken away the bodies."
"Yeah, but the thing is-I mean, it's really bad about Jorge and Lupe, but not that many other people seem to be very sick, so maybe the food wasn't very contaminated. If we go out there, with the bodies and the flies and everything, more will get sick, maybe die. So the way I see it, we're all better staying here as long as we can and keeping it quiet as long as we can so everyone can concentrate on the game instead of worrying about their folks and stuff. Because from what Abuelita's told me and I've read, there's nothing we can do without probably making things worse."
"If you'll unlock the cafeteria, I'll check the freezers and the pantries and see if there's enough food to keep us from starving in the meantime. I might have to get Carlos to help me. He's a good cook. I hate to tell him, though. He's kind of excitable. But we'll have to tell the others something before long. The tournament is supposed to end the day after tomorrow."
"Maybe help will come by then."
One thing about the lack of sleep and the hypnotic concentration on the game. When they did have to tell the others, and Jalonzo took them one by one up to the window and told them what he'd told Maria, nobody said much or even seemed very surprised. Jalonzo wondered if maybe some of them hadn't figured it out on their own. He felt very proud of the gamers then that they kept their heads about them. After all, there was really nowhere for them to go. He kept trying to think of something to do, some way to get in touch with people. Maybe he'd go out himself one more time and try to find someone. After all, he'd even touched the dead guy and hadn't gotten sick, so probably he was immune or at least resistant to the mystery disease. Maybe everyone hadn't gotten sick, so maybe there were people out there who were still okay. It was a comforting thought. He hoped it was true.
Khiindi tried to follow Khorii and Elviiz, but they were too fast with the hatch door. Of course, had it not been for his recent traumatic experience, Khiindi knew he would have been plenty fast enough to thwart them, but in his weakened condition he was stuck inside with the youngsters.
They were nice youngsters, but they were not his responsibility, and he wanted none of their "Nice kitty, it's okay, Khiindi kitty, they'll be back soon. We can't go out there because the air is bad."
Nonsense! As soon as Khorii's horn hit the oxygen supply it would be plenty safe for anyone to breathe. He knew the power of Linyaari horns better than the average Linyaari did, and he had every faith in her ability to neutralize any contaminant foolhardy enough to cross her path.
She was a mere child and she needed his help. Elviiz, of whom he thought rather kindly at the moment, was, of course, of remarkable intellect, strength, and versatility, but despite his programming, he was also a child. His father had designed him that way, with regular upgrades for "growth spurts" so that he would be a suitable companion for Khorii.
Of all of the ship's occupants, Khiindi was the only one who was an adult, and not just in cat years. He was a great deal older than any of them knew, older than anyone they knew, and if he wished to get even older, no harm must come to Khorii.
However, in the interests of continuing to grow old, he thought it would be best if he looked after her somewhere other than Maganos Moonbase, where youthful thugs waited in ambush to wreak excruciating destruction on his poor little cat shape.
Khiindi, feline though he was, could never be mistaken, even remotely, for a tiger or a lion or another of the large predatory members of his genus. Well, there had been a time of course when he could change his shape to resemble one of them, but temperamentally it was not his thing. He was more of a lover than a fighter, more brain than brawn, more apt to use his quick wits than his claws to extract himself from unhealthy situations.
And it seemed to him that the best course of action for him, and therefore, naturally, for Khorii, would be to take charge of this perfectly good vessel, decontaminated by his young Linyaari charge, of course, and go find her parents. He knew from past experience that Aari and Acorna could and would look after him as well as their daughter. Whereas in times past, in other incarnations, in other shapes, he had delighted in exploring new worlds, meeting new people, siring new races upon the most friendly females among those people, new places were infinitely more threatening when one was stuck with a shape that was no more than two feet long, tail extended, ten inches high, ears erect, and fifteen pounds after a particularly satisfying meal.
They thought his present form was descended from sacred Temple Cats who guarded the holy places of their homeworld, Makahomia. The truth was, the Temple Cats were descended from him. He was smart enough to know that temples were not to defend, they were to hide in, and once they lost their value as shelters, you found another shelter. Preferably a familiar one and preferably nearby. With a steady supply of food and water and, not unimportantly, armed two-leggeds to defend the temple and the cat.
The thing they had to do was commandeer the ship, find Aari and Acorna and the Condor, and leave this plague-infested place to sort itself out while they went home. Acorna's human fathers, should they survive the plague, were always welcome to visit them on MOO, weren't they?
Unfortunately, clever though he was, he could not open the secured hatch by himself. For that, he needed an accomplice. Widening his eyes to their largest and most golden green, knowing that his pupils would be round and black as lava in the subdued light of the cabin, he fixed Sesseli with his best stare. "Open the hatch," he thought."! need to use the litter box, and there isn't one here. Open the hatch now. I will be fine. The air is fine. Open the hatch now. You must do what I tell you, little girl. You are under my spell, within my power. Open the hatch now."