“I see,” Justin nodded. “And what about you? I don’t mean to be impertinent or rude, but surely your name isn’t really Baron Zero?”
Zero laughed, a raspy, throaty sound filled with genuine amusement. “Oh, of course not!” he grinned. “That’s just for effect, to impress people. Actually, my name is Bill. Bill Borden, to be exact, although no one’s called me that in a long time… I got the whole Zero thing from William Gibson, the sci-fi writer. He had a book called Count Zero I’ve always liked and, well, I thought that sounded pretty cool, so I took that and then gave myself a promotion. To Baron. But really, like I said, it’s just to impress the impressionable.”
“Hmm, yes,” Justin said. “And what about Before the Fall? That is to say, I can tell you’re an educated man. What did you do before the Plague? I had heard you were some sort of scientist?”
“Oh, I was into lots of things,” said the other evasively. “Little of this, little of that. Why, is that important somehow?”
“No, I don’t suppose it is,” said Justin. “I was just curious. May I ask, how many people live here?”
“Last count, about two hundred,” said Zero. “Give or take.”
“What, all in this one building?”
“Yeah, most of ‘em,” said Zero. “This place is bigger than it looks. A lot of it’s underground. But we have the Farm, too, and maybe fifty or so people live and work out there.”
“The farm?”
“Yeah,” nodded the other, leaning back. “Maybe a half mile to the west. We raise corn, wheat, soybeans, vegetables, chickens, pigs. That’s just for food. But there’s also the algae pond, which is the source of our electricity.”
“Ah, a biomass generator. Yes?”
“You got it,” said Zero. “We have this great big pond, nice and shallow, fed by a natural spring, and we grow algae on it. Then we take all of this glop, once it’s good and thick, and we dry it out and burn it in an old converted smelting furnace, which spins a turbine we salvaged and voila! Juice! And, we also raise some carp in the same pond, so it’s kind of dual-purpose.”
“That’s amazing,” said Justin. “And did you invent this power source?”
“More or less,” Zero shrugged. “At least this particular version. But I had a lot of help, too. It’s really pretty simple, actually: grow the algae, dry the algae, burn the algae. And besides, the basics of the technology were common knowledge, even before the Fall. Mainly it was just a matter of some hard-core scavenging.”
“Still, it’s amazing,” Justin said appreciatively. “It’s almost like Before. But, um, you mentioned earlier that you were in need of a surgeon. May I ask why? Does someone need surgery?”
“Yeah, me,” said Zero, pointing a thumb at his chest. “It’s nothing that critical—at least I hope it’s not—but it sure is annoying. And painful. See, from what I can figure out from old medical books, I’m pretty sure I have an inguinal hernia. That or some kind of cancer. Like I said, I hope it’s a hernia. But the problem is that we don’t have a doctor here. Not to mention no Gamma Ray scanner, no MRI machine or CT scanner. Not even an X-ray machine. There’s a registered nurse, and he agrees with me on the diagnosis, but then again, neither of us is an MD, so who knows? All I know for sure is that I’d sure as hell like to have it taken care of.”
“I’m sure you would!” said Justin. “A hernia can be quite painful. But why exactly do you think that’s the trouble?”
“From the symptoms,” shrugged Zero. “I mean, like I said, I’m no expert, but Denny Pollner—that’s our nurse—he says that it’s a pretty basic thing. Not a lot of room for conjecture, right? Not like it’s leukemia or some disease or whatever.”
“Hmm, yes,” nodded Justin sagely. Even he, with only an elementary background in Diagnostics, knew that an inguinal hernia would be a fairly easy condition to identify. But now came the big question: “Is there anything I can do to help? I’m not a surgeon, of course, or even a General Practitioner, but I could examine you, if you’d like. We could at least confirm your diagnosis.”
“Yeah,” said Zero. “I guess that wouldn’t hurt. But, uh, let me think about it, OK?”
“Well, of course,” said Justin, more than a little relieved that he wouldn’t have to go groping under this man’s scrotum anytime soon. “Just let me know.”
“Yeah, I will,” said the other. “But what about you, huh? I mean, it’s not every day folks from the CDC come calling! What the hell are you doing? How did you get here? If you don’t mind my asking, that is.”
“Not at all,” Justin said, and, starting from the beginning, when they’d first met Dr. Bahrara from California, ran through the whole story. He left some parts out, of course, mainly for the sake of brevity, but the main points, that they were more or less on a mission to save humanity and that Lampert was the key to it all, were more than emphasized. Finally, after maybe fifteen or twenty minutes, he wound down and gave a shrug.
“So that’s about it,” he said. “We’ve been walking for the past few days and, well, we ended up here.”
“Wow!” said Zero, who had managed not to interrupt. “That’s some story! All the way from New Atlanta to Minneapolis, and then all the way to here? Given what I know of the open country around here, not to mention all of the survies and bangers, I really don’t see how in the hell you made it!”
“Many of us did not,” said Justin sadly. “Most of us, in fact. Nurse Cass, Miss Swails, myself, and Mr. Lampert are the only ones left.”
“Yeah, that’s too bad,” said Zero, shaking his head. “Not to mention, you lost all of your gear, all your instruments and tools and gadgets, all of the transport and the medicine. You must feel, well, kind of lost without all that stuff.”
“I certainly do,” said Justin. “Almost naked, you might say. I don’t have so much as a microscope. But the main thing is, we still have the Old Man.”
“Ah yes, your Mr. Lampert,” said Zero, sitting up. “What’s the story with him? That is, I know he’s very old, but why is he so… disagreeable?”
Justin barked a laugh. “Disagreeable? I’ve never heard the Old Man called that before. Cranky, yes. Mean as hell, yes. A royal pain in the ass and a cantankerous old coot? More than a few times. But merely disagreeable? Ha! You can’t begin to imagine!”
“OK, so,” said Zero, “he’s a pain in the ass. But why?”
“Oh, who knows?” said Justin, shaking his head. “Personally, I think it’s simply because he’s a mean-hearted person with no more empathy for his fellow human beings than a lump of oatmeal. But then, through sheer proximity, I’ve become a bit biased on the subject. I’d have to say, though, that if you really want to know, you’d have to ask Mr. Lampert himself.”
“Huh, OK,” said Zero, frowning. “I guess maybe I’ll do that. But this whole plan of yours, taking Lampert to California so they can develop a cure for the Plague. Do you really think it’ll work? Provided you can make it there, of course.”
“Oh, yes,” nodded Justin. “In theory, and given the proper facilities, it’s not even that hard to do. But, as you said, it’s all predicated on our arriving in San Francisco. And with Mr. Lampert.”
“Hmm, yeah,” said Zero musingly. “But I gotta admit to a certain amount of morbid curiosity about the Big Sick. As in the disease itself. Not that it really matters much anymore, but, since you’re an expert…”
“Why, certainly,” said Justin, more than comfortable with the topic but unsure of how much this man would be able to grasp, technically-speaking. “What would you like to know?”