As Adam’s health failed, Tom Rom dismissed the few remaining volunteers on Vaconda, who were glad to get away. But he stayed, as he always did. After Zoe told him about the abandoned Heidegger’s research she had found, Tom Rom looked at Adam, then gave a brisk nod to Zoe. “I’ll go find them, retrieve their data, and interview them to see if they can offer any hope.” He left the two alone in the watchstation.
Zoe wished she could take her father away to some kind of hospice, where he would receive the care he needed as his health failed, but Adam refused to leave Vaconda. With great effort he managed to make his answer clear: no. She knew his reasons. He had spent many years here, and his wife had died here. He knew full well that no one could help him—in fact, he seemed to accept that fact long before his daughter did.
Zoe was frightened and frustrated by her inability to do anything except care for him. How was it possible that human intelligence and science could be defeated by some mindless germ?
While they were alone in the vast planetary wilderness, she read aloud to her father, played his favorite music, talked about how she would find a cure for Heidegger’s Syndrome—and not stop there. She would cure many other medical conditions too. She waited for Tom Rom to come back from New Portugal.
He was gone for a month, and he returned at last with a disappointed expression and a pack of data that amounted to little. “There was not much progress, Zoe. The experiments were incomplete and inconclusive.”
Her voice cracked as she felt her last hopes slipping through her fingers. “So you spoke to the research teams, then? Did they run into some difficulties? Maybe we can work—”
“I brought you all the results they had,” Tom Rom said. “From early indications, I have no doubt that they could have developed a cure, or at least an effective treatment, but they never bothered to pursue it, because Heidegger’s is so rare. The work did not meet their cost-benefit requirements.”
Zoe was disgusted. “It shouldn’t be an either-or! They should find cures for everything.”
“They claimed they didn’t have enough resources. They had to pick and choose.” He narrowed his eyes. “It boils down to money. They work on whatever they can get funding for. Everyone else is out of luck.”
From his seat by the watchstation windows, Adam Alakis could hear the two of them, though he could not respond.
“It’s not fair.” Her throat felt raw, her face hot with rage.
Tom Rom hesitated a long moment, then wrapped his arm around her. He felt as sturdy as a tree. “You’re right, it’s not fair. Other people are selfish. They don’t care about you unless it benefits them somehow.”
Zoe watched her father who sat in his chair facing the sunset. As colors deepened in the sky and the taller lichentrees began blooming with the twilight, he was trembling. A single tear leaked out of the corner of his eye and trickled down his cheek.
FORTY-FIVE
TOM ROM
Rest only made him restless, and after a week of being back at Pergamus, Tom Rom was anxious to go out on another mission for Zoe.
James Duggan’s desperate demand for access to the Heidegger’s cure had unsettled many of the researchers. From his offices, Tom Rom tapped into their private conversations and eavesdropped on their laboratory chatter. He found it disturbing.
Some of the scientists went back to their work as usual, but several grumbled about the terms of their contracts. By now, Tom Rom knew that idealistic medical researchers, and humans in general, would rationalize ways to do what they wanted, to change the terms of their promises. To him, that was like breaking the backbone of a moral code. He didn’t understand why anyone would prefer chaos and uncertainty to clear-cut, black-and-white stability.
Zoe never shared her cures, her library, her information. Never. Tom Rom understood that. If she decided to make an exception because of James Duggan’s sad story, then she would have to make decisions on anyone else who asked for information or treatment or cures. It was only a matter of degree. Even if she had given the Heidegger’s cure to save one blind artist, she couldn’t possibly help all the sick. That had never been Zoe’s goal. What would be the point? Anyone who called her selfish and ruthless simply didn’t understand her.
Now, Tom Rom entered the main Pergamus infirmary dome for his scheduled medical inspection. He had a complete workup each month and another physical examination before he left on any mission. He underwent a full body scan, 3-D muscle map, blood tests, saliva tests, DNA scan, heart monitoring, pulmonary function workup, circulatory tests, dental and vision exams—whatever the doctors wanted to do to him. Zoe’s face appeared on the screen, watching him, always watching him. That didn’t bother Tom Rom; rather, it made him feel secure.
“We have to keep you healthy, Tom. No surprises, no disease, no malfunction, no degeneration. You expose yourself to so much out there for me. You know how much I appreciate it.”
“I do it for you, Zoe. That’s enough.”
If he ever did contract some exotic malady, he knew she would move planetary systems to treat him, bankrupt herself to fund a cure. He didn’t believe he deserved it, but Zoe did, and he wouldn’t disagree with her.
As the doctors prodded and scanned him, he ignored them and spoke to Zoe instead. “Any new findings on the Klikiss royal jelly I delivered?”
“It’s an interesting substance, unusual biochemistry. We don’t quite know what to do with it, yet. Three teams are still running analyses.”
Tom Rom focused on her face on the screen so he could ignore the sting of a deep lymph needle. He didn’t measure what obtaining that royal jelly had cost, didn’t consider the blood price of the annoying camp administrator. If the man had minded his own business, he wouldn’t have had to die. Tom Rom never sought out violence, but when someone got in his way, he did what was necessary. “Where would you like me to go next?”
Zoe brightened, although he knew she didn’t want him to go so soon. One of Tom Rom’s greatest rewards for the risks he took was the pure joy Zoe expressed whenever he returned. If he hadn’t had any other reasons driving him, that alone would have made it all worthwhile. Zoe’s voice broke into his thoughts. “Several possibilities, but we’ll start with this one. Rumors of a brain parasite on Ramah that causes rapturous hallucinations. I’ll transmit the files.”
The planet sounded familiar. “Ramah was the home of the madman who claimed to have found heaven in the Klikiss royal jelly.”
“He may have suffered from the parasite himself,” Zoe said, “but the royal jelly controlled it. We would need specimens to understand better.”
Tom Rom listened. “Obtaining tissue samples as well as an intact and viable brain parasite may be difficult. And it would raise questions.” His lips curved in a faint smile. “But I’ll get you one.”
“Be careful,” she said.
“I will be—always.”
When Adam Alakis was dying, Tom Rom had hated to leave young Zoe alone, but it was pointless for them both to stay on Vaconda just to wait. And wait. Zoe kept herself awake by consuming high levels of jungle stimulants in order to keep researching the disease. She slept only two hours a night for weeks at a time.
After all the time Zoe, Adam, and Tom Rom had spent trudging through the lichentree forests, studying the underbrush, testing leaves, berries, roots, and fungi, Zoe was convinced there must be some option for a cure on Vaconda. No one knew how her father had contracted the extremely rare disease. Armed with his tissue samples and blood tests, she refused to give up hope, insisting there was a miracle solution hidden in the biological reservoir, somewhere.