Romy peeled off and Patrick kept on course toward the first doc. He stuttered to a stop when he saw the patient.
Anj.
She lay supine on the floor, limp as a rag doll with half its stuffing gone; the front of her bib overalls had been pulled down and her T-shirt slit open, exposing her budding, pink-nippled, lightly furred breasts.
“Don’t just stand there!” the doctor said. He was sweaty, flushed, and looked too young to be a doctor. He had his hands between Anj’s breasts and was pumping on her chest. “Bag her!”
Patrick’s frozen brain tried to make sense of the words as they filtered through air thick as cotton.
“Bag…?” Was she dead?
“Give me that!” The doctor reached across Anj and snatched the Ambu bag from Patrick’s numb fingers. He fitted the mask over Anj’s mouth and nose and squeezed the bag. “There! Do that once for every five times I pump.”
Patrick dropped to his knees and managed to get his hands to work, squeezing the bag every time the doctor shouted, “Now!” and wishing someone would cover her. Every so often the doctor would stop pumping and press his stethoscope to Anj’s chest.
“Shit!” he said after the third time. “Nothing! Keep bagging.” He pawed through what looked like an orange plastic tool box, muttering, “No monitor, no defibrillator, how am I supposed to…here!”
He pulled out a small syringe capped with a three- or four-inch needle. He popped the top, expelled air and a little fluid, then swabbed Anj’s chest with alcohol.
Patrick blinked. “You’re not going to stick that into—”
That was exactly what he did: right between a pair of ribs to the left of her breast bone; he drew back on the plunger until a gush of dark red swirled into the barrel, then emptied the syringe.
The doctor resumed pumping, crying, “One-two-three-four-five-bag!”
They kept up the routine for another minute or so, then the doctor listened to Anj’s chest again.
“Nothing.” He pulled a penlight from the plastic box and flashed it into her eyes. “Fixed and dilated.” He leaned back and wiped his dripping face on his sleeve. “She’s gone.”
“No,” Patrick said.
But Anj’s glazed, staring eyes said it all. Still he resumed squeezing the bag, frantically, spasmodically.
“No use,” the doctor said.
“Try, damn it!” Patrick shouted. “She’s too young! She’s too…” Heran out of words.
“Her brain’s been deprived of oxygen too long. She’s not coming back.”
Patrick dropped the bag and leaned over her. An aching pressure built in his chest. He felt his eyes fill, the tears slip over the lids and drop on Anj’s chest.
A hand closed gently on his shoulder and he heard the young doctor say, “I know how you feel.”
Patrick shrugged off his hand. “No, you don’t.”
“I do, believe me. We couldn’t save her, but we’ve got other sick sims here and maybe we can save some ofthem . Let’s get to work.”
“All right,” Patrick said, unable to buck the doctor’s logic. “Just give me a second.”
As the doctor moved off, Patrick pulled the edges of Anj’s torn T-shirt together. They didn’t quite meet so he pulled up the bib front of her overalls. Then he pushed her eyelids closed and stared at her.
How could he feel such a sense of loss for something that wasn’t even human? This wasn’t like puddling up at the end ofOld Yeller . This wasreal .
He pulled off his suit coat and draped it over the upper half of her body. He hovered by her side a moment longer; then, feeling like a terminally arthritic hundred-year-old man, he pushed himself to his feet and moved on.
The next half hour became a staggering blur, moving from one prostrate form to another, losing sim after sim, and pressing on, until…finally…it was over.
Spent, Patrick leaned against a wall, counting. He felt as if he’d been dragged behind a truck over miles of bad road. He’d cried tonight. When was the last time he’d cried? Romy sagged against him, sobbing. He counted twice, three times, but the number kept coming up the same: nineteen still, sheet-covered forms strewn about the floor.
The woman doctor they’d met earlier drifted by; he flagged her down.
“How many did you save?” he said.
She brushed a damp ringlet away from her flushed face. “Six—just barely. We’ve moved them into the sleep area. They’ll make it, but it’ll be weeks before they’re back to normal. Counting the older sim who didn’t eat, that leaves seven survivors.”
“The bastards!” Romy gritted through her teeth. “The lousy fucking bastards!” She pushed away from him and began pounding the wall with her fist, repeating, “Bastards!” over and over through her clenched teeth.
She dented the plasterboard, punched through, then started on another spot.
Patrick grabbed her wrist. “Romy! You’re going to hurt yourself!”
She turned on him with blazing eyes; she seemed like another person and for an instant he thought she was going to take a swing at him. Then she wrenched her arm free and stalked toward the door.
Though physically and emotionally drained, Patrick forced himself to start after her. But when he spotted Tome crouched in a corner, his head cradled in his arms, he changed course and squatted next to him.
“I’m sorry, Tome,” he said, feeling the words catch in his throat. “I’m so sorry.”
Tome looked up at him with reddened eyes; tears streaked his cheeks. “Sim family gone, Mist Sulliman. All gone.”
“Not all, Tome. Deek survived, so did some others.”
But Tome was shaking his head. “Too many dead sim. Family gone. All Tome fault.”
“No-no-no,” Patrick said, putting a hand on his shoulder. “You can’t lay that on yourself. If anybody’s to blame here—besides the son of a bitch who poisoned the food—it’s me.”
Tome kept shaking his head. “No. Tome know. Tome ask Mist Sulliman. If Tome nev ask, Mist Sulliman nev do.”
“That doesn’t make you responsible for…this. You wanted something better for your family, Tome, and we’re not going to let this stop us. I swear—”
“No, Mist Sulliman.” He struggled to his feet. “We stop. Family gone. No law bring back. We stop. Other sim die if no stop.”
“You can’t mean that!” Patrick said, stunned. “That’ll mean that Anj and Nabb and all the others died for nothing!”
Tome turned and slid away. “No union, Mist Sulliman. Tome too tired. Tome too sad.”
“Then they win! Is that what you want?”
“Tome want sim live,” he said without looking back. “That all Tome want now.”
Patrick fought the urge to grab the old sim and shake some sense into him. They couldn’t quit now—public opinion would rush to their side after this atrocity. He took a step after him, but the utter defeat in the slump of those narrow shoulders stopped him.
He remembered the night they met, when Tome explained what he and the other sims wanted:Family…and one thing other…respect, Mist Sulliman. Just little respect.
And now your family’s been murdered, Patrick thought. And the only respect you’ve gained is mine. And what’s that worth?
Flickering light to his left caught his eye. He saw Reverend Eckert’s face on the TV screen in the corner. The voice was muted but Patrick knew the bastard could only be spewing more of his anti-sim venom. With a low cry of rage he stalked across the room, picked up an overturned bench, and raised it above his head. But before he could smash the set, a hand grabbed his arm.
“Please don’t do that,” said a voice.
He turned and found Holmes Carter standing behind him. On any other day he would have teed off on the man, but Carter had surprised the hell out of him tonight—worked as hard as anyone to save the sims. And he looked it: His sport coat was gone and his wrinkled shirt lay partially unbuttoned, exposing a swath of his bulging belly. Right now he looked shellshocked.