“It was more than great,” Kendricks said. “It was— It was something. Everybody cheering. Everybody coming together.”
She nodded and forced another smile.
“You should have been there. All of you. Might have done your hearts some good, see what you’re working for.”
Pep rallies during the apocalypse. Crap. But it was possible, even likely, that Kendricks understood people better than Ruth. Morale inside the labs was erratic at best, and they had enough to eat and showers and lights and the chance to ignore the world beyond these guarded walls. How much worse was it in town, in the tents and trailers, in the mines? It was damned cynical to assume that the council had staged a celebration for the sole reason of bolstering their own leadership.
And yet she’d also had a new thought about their decision to change the calendar, declaring this Year One. Plague Year. The phrase was sensible and right and deeply manipulative all at the same time, if you looked at it from a certain angle — and Ruth found herself doubting everything now.
It was top-notch public relations, deceptive and smart. It played on expectations and fear and hope. It was a way to give the Leadville government even more legitimacy, to make themselves ever more necessary and important.
“I think everyone in the labs is getting close to some real success,” she said, thinking to steer the conversation toward Aiko’s rumor. “I honestly do. We just need a few more pieces to fall into place.”
“Well, that’s what we were talking about. Putting things in place.” Kendricks rolled his head toward James and said, “Gary LaSalle has a high opinion of you, Miz Goldman, and James here has been saying the same thing for a long time.”
Oh Lord. Ruth cut her gaze away from Kendricks for one instant but James didn’t react, his watchful brown eyes framed by his short brown hair and short brown beard.
Kendricks said, “We’d like you to join Mr. LaSalle’s team.”
“No way.”
James winced, a barely perceptible shift of posture, but Kendricks just shrugged. “I know you’re not on the bandwagon, Miz Goldman. But I want to appeal to your patriotism.”
“Sir, that has…” She shook her head. “I worked for the Defense Department with full clearance. It’s not fair for you to…” It didn’t matter what was fair. She tried again. “I’m totally committed to our work here.”
“That’s what we need. Total commitment.”
“LaSalle’s bug is wildly dangerous, sir. I’m not the only one who’s been saying it.”
James interjected, leaning over his desk, in a tone that remained uncharacteristically formal. “There are some aspects of the situation you’re not aware of, Dr. Goldman.”
Kendricks turned on him. “Don’t you say another word.”
“If it’s about the guy in California,” Ruth said, “the rumor’s already going around.”
James shook his head. No.
Kendricks continued to watch him for a moment before looking back at Ruth. “We’ll see how California plays out, if that man can do what he says. But we have bigger problems.”
“How could— Bigger? Than beating the locust?”
“The Chinese have developed weapons application nanotech,” Kendricks said. “You’re not okayed for any of this but Jesus Christ, I wonder what goes through your mind that you won’t cooperate with us after everything that’s happened. Do you realize we barely survived the plague year at all?”
That phrase again. He used it intentionally, like a gun, threatening and prodding her.
She was right. She had always been right. LaSalle’s snowflake would not function as an ANN, affecting only the locust, and the council no longer intended to use it as such.
It would be a matchless weapon, given a strict governor to keep it from proliferating without end — and in her records, among the things she’d worked out during her endless wait aboard the space station, had been the basics of a control.
Ruth tried misdirection. “I couldn’t help LaSalle even if I wanted to. My expertise is in a completely different field. It’s apples and oranges.”
“Now that’s not true,” Kendricks said, tilting his head again. “He says your ideas have been a big help.”
So she would always own a part of it, if something happened. Lord God. The perfect weapon of mass destruction, more killing power than a nuke and no fallout or contamination.
It would be easy to safely deliver the snowflake, capsules kicked out of a helicopter, bomblets from a jet, American aircraft low over occupied Himalaya with a hundred thousand people reduced to jelly in each thundering wake. .
Her heart beat so hard she felt her upper body rocking, a palsy of rising shame and anger.
Kendricks said, “I know you two aren’t friendly. Let’s say we don’t put you directly under LaSalle. Work together, but be your own boss.”
As if her ego was the problem.
“That’s crazy. You’re crazy.” She didn’t regret the words. “When we beat the locust it’s over, all the fighting. We save everybody and the fighting stops everywhere. We don’t need nano weapons! We can all go back down again.”
Kendricks just looked at her, the lines in the tanned skin around his eyes deepening slightly.
Ruth raised her voice. “We can all go back down again.”
“I think it was a mistake,” Kendricks said, slowly, “to overprotect you people. The Chinese sure aren’t babying their technicians.” He turned to James, his chin and long hat brim aimed down in an aggressive posture. “Make her see. Tell her everything, whatever she needs to hear. This has got to happen.”
James was respectful. “You’re a hundred percent right, Senator. Shifting gears like this, all at once, nobody here is ready for it. Our entire focus has been defensive since the beginning.” He glanced at Ruth. “It’s a lot to take in.”
She tried to play along. “I just don’t understand. We’re so close. It’s crazy— It seems crazy to take us away from beating the locust now.”
“You might be surprised,” James said, “to hear that the council evacuated the space station sooner than necessary not because of you but for Commander Ulinov.” His expression never changed, and Ruth marveled at his daring. She nodded quickly. She didn’t trust herself to sound convincing. He said, “We’re joining the war in Asia, flying the Russians in to invade the Chinese before they complete their weapons tech. The Russians insisted on having Ulinov here as their representative.”
“But so what? What does any of that matter if we can all live below ten thousand feet again?”
James made his shrugging sound, mm-mah, signaling her that he didn’t really believe what he was about to say. “First, there’s no guarantee we’ll ever beat the locust. And second, the council has good reason to believe the fighting won’t stop even if we do.”
Kendricks nodded, grimly pleased by James’s performance. “Things are too far gone. It’s been total war for too long.”
“There have always been wars,” Ruth said.
“Not like this. Not with whole nations thrown on top of each other.” He flexed his small hands, squinting past her at the window. “Not with armies eating each other’s dead and keeping prisoners like cattle.”
“. . what?”
His eyes came back to her. “You people aren’t the only ones who’ve been studying the locust, Goldman.” Kendricks had never called her doctor, and now forgot even the questionable honorific of miz. “They’ve been learning over there, too. We’ve been watching them close.”