“Do you think you’ll learn anything from the tissue samples?” one of the nurses on break asked. The doctor shrugged but didn’t answer. He didn’t have to.
They all knew the answer was no but that they’d study them as carefully as they could anyway, because what else was there to do?
Then the conversation turned general. Yes, the doctor told them, the emptying of Nordvik - was coming along on schedule. All the shuttles were busily going back and forth, bringing down everything that could conceivably be worth keeping; the hastily erected storage tents by the landing strip were already bulging with the loot. Yes, the instrument and control people were nearly finished with installing the automatic controls in Nordvik. No, there was nothing unusual about the way SE had struck the ship’s people. It was just as it had always been. Every one of them had come down with the disease, and every one would die.
It was an interesting conversation, but a little sad, too. Everyone was feeling a little of that end-of-the-party letdown. The arrival of Nordvik had been exciting. It was a once in a lifetime event more than that, because many lifetimes came and went without the thrill of a visit from space but now it was over.
In a little while the last person from Slowyear would leave Nordvik, setting the automatic controls that would launch the old ship on its final trip, accelerating until the last of its fuel ran out, then going on endlessly, forever, never to be seen again by anyone.
“It does seem a kind of a waste,” a visitor said thoughtfully.
The doctor bent a curious look on him. “Waste?
But we’re stripping everything out that we can possibly use.”
The visitor flushed. “I was just thinking ” he said. “I mean, that’s a whole operating ship. We could refuel it, you know. The equipment’s all there, and the operating material’s in the datastores. Then we could send out an expedition somewhere “
“But where?” the doctor said impatiently, looking around in an aggrieved way, and of course there was no answer for that one, either.
By then Murra had finished her second cup of coffee. She glanced at her watch and decided it was time to look for Blundy. She gathered her robes around her, nodded a pretty goodbye to the others at the table and walked gracefully to the admitting room.
She had almost left it too late. Blundy had made better time than she expected. He was there before her, half carrying the stumbling Mercy MacDonald, whose eyes were wildly glancing around, who was whispering gibberish too softly for anyone to hear, who had soiled herself, whose head lolled helplessly against Blundy’s shoulder until the nurses eased her onto a gumey for her last trip.
Blundy hadn’t seen her, and Murra decided to leave it that way. There was a question she wanted to ask Blundy was he going to write something about Nordvik and its crew? And was there a part for her?
but she confidently knew those answers already. So inconspicuously she turned and went to the outside door, where she had no trouble finding a ride back to the summer city. He was, she thought kindly, entitled to his last moments alone with the MacDonald woman.
For herself, there were things to do. She planned the rest of her day with care. She would go to their comfortable, charming home and prepare a nice meal for him. He would be tired when he got home, and frayed from what had to have been a distressing experience. Choosing the menu was a bit of a problem, she reflected on the way down the hill. It would have to be something that could be kept ready for serving him at short notice. She didn’t know just when he would get there, but there was no doubt in her mind that, sooner or later, he would; for where else was there for him to go?