Nice view.
"Cute," Chip Delaney said.
Dennis looked up at him; he and Chip were sharing quarters and getting to be friends. "You think?" he said.
"Uh-huh. Redheads, man. They're testy but they're worth it."
He slapped Reese on the shoulder. "The captain wants you, buddy. ASAP."
* * *
When the lieutenant walked into Captain Yanik's office, it was to find the head nurse on the verge of blowing a gasket.
"You can't be serious!" she was screeching. "We can't send these people on a trip. Most of my patients are too sick to be moved. And where are they being taken? How far away is it?
What are we supposed to tell their families when they come looking for them? Besides, you know I can't spare any personnel to go with these trucks and they didn't provide any. What they'll be delivering at the end of their journey is a load of corpses!"
"I have my orders, Ms. Vetrano. Worst cases to be moved to the central hospital. Doctor," Yanik appealed, "surely they'll have a better chance away from here."
"That is not necessarily correct, Captain," the Sikh physician told him. He frowned. "Perhaps we could send some patients who are very ill and some patients who are still ambulatory and might be able to administer to those who can't take care of themselves."
"Doctor, I don't understand why we have to do this at all," the head nurse said. "What we need are more supplies and more trained medical help. And we don't know why this epidemic is happening, so maybe we should truck everybody out of here."
"Nurse Vetrano has a point," Ramsingh said. "Close investigation has not turned up an answer to what has caused the epidemic. Everyone is boiling their water and washing their hands carefully, yet the contagion keeps spreading. Perhaps the problem is this place."
"This place has been a fairground for more than a hundred years," the captain pointed out. "Not once, to the best of my knowledge, has it ever been the source of an epidemic."
"Then what is?" Reese asked.
They all looked at him, the captain scowling. The look in his eyes informing the lieutenant that he wasn't helping. Dennis steeled himself, deciding to tell them what Mary had reported.
"Nurse Shea claims to have overheard some men speaking in a way that indicated they might be deliberately spreading the contagion. She suggested that they might be spraying germs onto raw fruits and vegetables after they'd been put out for consumption."
"Who?" Yanik demanded. "Can she tell us?"
"No, sir. She claims to have only caught a brief glimpse of them from the back before they drove off in a green van. She said they were wearing fatigues."
"Very useful," the captain drawled.
"It might be worth looking into," Reese suggested.
"You believed her?" Yanik said. His tone implied that the lieutenant had a screw loose.
"I have my doubts, sir. But she also heard them say that trucks would be coming for the patients and that its arrival would correspond with a decrease in medical supplies."
The captain and the doctor exchanged glances.
"All we would need to do is station someone in the cafeteria to watch," Ramsingh said.
"Better set up a video camera," Reese suggested. "They wouldn't be expecting that. Besides, if anyone is just lingering in the cafeteria, they'll be noticed. We could make sure it's a different someone every few hours, but even that would stand out. And since we don't know who might be doing this, we might blow our cover before we've even started by enlisting the perpetrator."
"Like I said, you believed her," Yanik said flatly. The captain looked more contemptuous than annoyed.
"Under the circumstances, sir, I think it's worth investigating." Reese stood at ease, hoping Mary Shea hadn't dreamed her encounter.
"I don't know," Yanik mused, rubbing his chin. "Electricity is at a premium right now."
"How about human life?" Nurse Vetrano snapped. "That at a premium, too?"
The captain flicked a look at Dennis that said, "Thanks!
Thanks a lot!"
"All right," Yanik said. "We'll set it up. I'll check to see if Nurse Vetrano's proposal is acceptable to HQ and get back to you. Meanwhile, you two can be deciding who goes."
"If we can't come to an agreement on this," Ramsingh said regretfully, "then I'm afraid I can't release those patients, Captain."
"Let's just assume everyone is working in good faith, shall we?" Yanik suggested. "I'm sure not sending medics with the trucks was an oversight. Everyone, everywhere, is overburdened at the moment. HQ is working with too few resources, too.
Remember that saying: never attribute to malice what can be explained by stupidity."
Vetrano looked somewhat mollified. "Truer words have never been spoken, Captain."
"Sad, but also true," Yanik agreed.
DILEK, ALASKA
The little cove hadn't been much even before the bombs fell, and it was less now—a dozen shacks, a pier for fishing boats, and a fuel store, grubby and shabby against the steep, austere green beauty of the coastal mountains. Dieter and John had planned to meet Vera in some out-of-the-way spot, avoiding anyplace too populated. They'd reasoned that at this point people might be so desperate that they'd mob the ship. But Vera had rejected their suggestion.
"I need fuel," she said. "You can't get fuel from bears." It might well be that they couldn't get fuel from people either, but they had to try. John couldn't believe that they'd forgotten to set up a fuel dump in their own backyard when they had a number of them elsewhere.
"It's not our oversight," Dieter had insisted. "It's Vera's. She should have asked us where she could fuel up when she was still off California."
But when they came to the dock where Love's Thrust was moored and the great white yacht with its touches of pink came into view, John decided that he couldn't go with them.
Just when I think I'm over Wendy, something comes along to remind me.
And Love's Thrust held far too many memories. He could feel them weighing down his gut, making the world turn gray and purposeless.
"I keep thinking of those kids," John said. "Their parents may be fools but that doesn't mean I can just give up on them."
Dieter didn't question John's motivation for heading back. He just handed over the Harley. "Keep in touch," he said. "And for God's sake, stay alive. I don't want to have gone through all this only to find Skynet in the catbird seat."
"Me either," John said. He offered his hand and the big Austrian took it, squeezing with careful strength.
"Good luck," he said.
"Back atcha," John said, grinning.
Dieter snorted, but returned the grin, ruffling John's hair.
"You remind me of your mother," he said.
"Then I'm sure to survive."
They grinned at each other for a moment.
"Give Vera my love," John said, and kicked the Harley to life.
"She'll be disappointed," Dieter said.
"Truth is, sometimes she scares me more than Skynet," John told him. He thought he caught a glimpse of champagne-blond hair at the rail and with a wave started off.
Dieter watched him go, laughing, remembering that he'd occasionally felt the same way himself.
* * *
BLACK RIVER RELOCATION CAMP, MISSOURI
Captain Yanik walked up to Reese, who was checking on the installation of cots inside the bodies of the trucks. "Good work, Lieutenant," he said heartily as his boots splashed through the gray mud.
Meaning, Reese thought, that because I stuck my oar in, Yanik has decided I'm the perfect person to liaise with the hospital on this matter. He certainly doesn't want to contend with Nurse "Virago" Vetrano.