The Rover Girls were in a jam. Their father has been missing for a year. Ms. Stanhope, widowed mother of Serious Dick’s sweetheart, Bruce, is being romanced off her feet by the wicked Josiah Crabtree, teacher at the Pentagon. Crabtree is really after Ms. Stanhope’s fabulously rich acid farm. He also favors a Pentagon cadet, the bully, Dan Baxter, who hates the Rover Girls. The rotten Crabtree and Baxter were honks, naturally.
Edison and M’bantu (senza cleft stick) pulled in at the same time. Ed had two heads pushing a skid loaded with gear; oxygen tank, sterilizer, plumbing, and accessories. Don’t bother to ask how he dragooned the bods into helping him or how he liberated the necessaries; the entire Group has the overpowering habit. It’s not deliberate, we just scare the Shorties. The mere fact of youth is beauty; the mere fact of longevity is authority.
“R.” Borgia in control. “Out the heads. Set up, Ed.” She opened her toolbox which didn’t look much different from Edison’s. “Ampul, M’b. We’ll shape up and move it. Fee-5, answer a few questions and then out. His height?”
“Six.”
“Weight?”
“One-eighty.”
“Age?”
“Twenty-four.”
“Condition?”
I broke in. “I’ve seen him in the saddle. Hard and fast.”
“Gung.” Borgia did some delicate loading of a syringe from M’bantu’s ampul. “Ready, Ed?”
“Ready.”
“Out, Fee.”
“I will not out.”
“Out.”
“One good reason why.”
It was a Battle of the Giants. Borgia softened. “This will be horrible to watch, kitten, especially since he’s your guy.”
“I’m not a child anymore.”
Borgia shrugged. “You’re going to be even less of a child after this is over.” She stepped to the Chief and gave him a slow, careful intravenous. “Clock it, Guig.”
“Starting when?”
“I’ll tell you when.”
We waited, not knowing what to expect. Suddenly a ghastly scream was wrenched out of the Chief.
“Now, Guig.”
The scream was compounded by agonized thrashings. Every vent in Sequoya let go; bowels, urine, semen, saliva, sinuses, sweat glands. Fee was alongside me, clinging and gasping. I was breathing heavily myself.
“Synapses breaking connections,” Borgia said in a professional monotone. “He’ll need a bath and clean clothes. Time?”
“Ten seconds.”
“If he lives, that is.” Abruptly, the Chief was still. “Time, Guig?”
“Twenty.”
Borgia got a stethoscope from her bag and examined the Chief. “Time?”
“One minute.”
She nodded. “So far so good. He’s dead.”
“Dead!” Fee cried. “He’s dead?”
“R. Everything’s come to a dead stop. Shut up. I told you to out. We have four minutes before any permanent damage sets in.”
“You have to do something. You—”
“I told you to shut up. His nervous system will make it on its own or else it won’t. Time?”
“One thirty.”
“Ed, promote another coverall and soap and water. He stinks. M’b, hold the door. Nobody in. Move it.” She examined the Chief again. “Nicely dead. Time?”
“One forty-five.”
“Can you move the frame, Fee?”
“Y-yes.”
“Give me the sterilizer temperature reading. Dial on the right.”
“Three hundred.”
“Turn it off. Switch on the left. Time?”
“Two ten.”
Another examination. Edison came hurtling in with a coverall, followed by his faithful slaves lugging a sitz bath of steaming water.
“Strip him and clean him. Don’t move him any more than necessary. Time?”
“Two thirty.”
“If he doesn’t make it at least we’ll have a fresh, well-dressed corpse.”
Borgia’s cool wasn’t fooling me; she was as tight as the rest of us. After we cleaned the Chief we started to dress him, but she stopped us. “I may have to go in. You bods, thanks. Get all the filth out of here. Fee, alcohol in my kit. Jet his chest down to the navel. Move it. Time?”
“Three fifteen.”
“Mask ready, Ed?”
“Ready.”
“It’s going to be close.” After an hour she asked, “Time?”
“Three thirty.”
The door irised open and Jacy pushed past M’b who didn’t dare try to stop him. “Guig! What are you doing to that poor man? For shame!”
“Will you get the hell out of here, Jace. How’d you know, anyway?”
“It’s all over the university that you’re torturing a man in here. It must stop.”
“Go back to bed, Jacy,” Borgia said. “Your stigmata’s showing. Jet my hands, Fee, up to the elbows. Then back off. All of you back. Save the sermonizing, Jacy. We may need it later.” She glared down at Sequoya. “Come on, you sons of bitches, link up!” She gazed around in a fury. “Where the hell are the Rover Girls? I wanted everything to be familiar. Just when you need them — Time?”
“Three fifty.”
We waited. We waited. We waited. Fee-5 began a quiet howl. Borgia gave me a black look of despair, went to the sterilizer, and took out tools. She knelt alongside Sequoya and poised a scalpel for primary incision. Suddenly his chest rose to meet the point. It was the deepest, most beautiful breath I have ever seen taken in all my life. We began to bubble.
“Quiet,” Borgia ordered. “Give him time. No fuss. Back off. Everything familiar when he wakes up. He’ll be weak, so no unnecessary strain.”
The steady breathing was accompanied by tics, muscular contractions, twitches. “Linking up fine,” Borgia murmured to no one.
The Chief’s eyes fluttered open and took in the scene. “ — but cryology recycles ontogeny,” he said. He tried to get to his feet. Borgia motioned to Fee, who ran to him and helped him, steadying him while he rocked. He looked at himself, looked around, took us all in. Then he smiled. It must have been his first realsie and very painful, but it was a nice smile. Fee began to weep. “The old familiar faces,” he said. He swayed to me and slapped palms. “Thanks, dude. You’re ace. Fee, you’re my girl more than ever. Lucy Borgia, down tools.” She dropped them and he palmed her. “Edison. M’bantu. Gung to the fifth power. Jacy, you heard the lady, go back to bed. Where’s that tutta? Oh. The Rover Girls take a break every two hours to make room for the next shift, Borgia. We’d better get out of here before they’re back.”
I stared at her. She smiled. “Told you he was aware of everything around him.”
“Guig, the greatest thing you ever did was putting a hold on the cryocapsule. Fee, chop to JPL and call a stockholders’ meeting for one hour from now.”
I gave Borgia another questioning look.
“Everything.”
“This is going to be tremendous,” the Chief said. “Those naked rats have opened up a Pandora’s box that — I have to eat something. Where?”
“My place,” I said, “but don’t walk into the oven, the door doesn’t work.”
Edison started to protest vehemently. Sequoya soothed him. “Never mind, Ed. I was impressed by your smoke screen at JPL. You’re brilliant. The whole Group is.”
“He knows too much,” I muttered to Borgia, “and I’m scared.”
“How many times must I ditt? He was aware of everything going on around him.”
“Y, but I think he’s aware of things that didn’t go on around him. I think I’ve got a tiger by the tail.”
“Then let go.”
“I can’t now. I only hope we don’t return from the ride with me inside and the smile on the face of the tiger.”
The Rover Girls came on again and we got the hell out while rotten Dan Baxter was selling the secret signals to Annapolis. We marched Jacy back into bed and then walked to my place where Scented Song and M’bantu faked a sort of Afro-Chinese dinner. It wasn’t bad and it reminded the Sachem of his wolves. He said he hoped some goon would try to rip his tepee so they could get a decent supper. While we were cross-legged on the dining room floor, Fee-5 came tearing in.