Symbiosis Chapter 23

“I don’t think so, Captain,” Adams answered. The doctor shifted a little in his chair. “Her genome gave science a template for reversing the genetic vaccine mess, but there’s nothing in her genes to cure bacterial infections.”

“No, not in her genes,” Tom said. “Well, maybe it is her genes.” He walked up and down the sick bay with his eyes on the floor. The white lights illuminated every corner of the room, and dark monitors sat silent at the moment.

“Jack, if her ability is in her genes, we’ll never find it. She has more genes than humans, and even then, it could be something as simple as … how one segment touched another in the folding process.” Adams stood up and put his hand on Tom’s shoulder, stopping him from his endless journey back and forth. Tom looked at the doctor as if he’d forgotten he was even in the room.

“If she went down there she’d try to cure everyone, wouldn’t she?”

“Jack, you’re not thinking of tasking her with that?”

“Certainly not! I’m saying she has some innate instinct to help sick people. She can feel disease or read it in people’s eyes, or something.”

“If she were my little girl I’d not let her within a thousand kilometers of that planet.”

“I’m just confirming my decision, Doc, nothing more.”

“How’s the plan coming along?”

“I can guarantee it’s going easier for me than it will for the Cinconians. I’ll have it for you tonight to review, make sure I didn’t miss any steps.”

“I’m ready. Rianya and Jane are putting the sandbox together for testing the two defense lines. Anything can look great on the tablet but application is the critical factor.”

“Captain Jackson, please report to the bridge,” the intercom hailed. Jackson stepped to the panel on the wall to acknowledged the request before he left the sick bay.

“Captain, we received a message from the Continental Health Organization.”

“The who? The what?” Jackson asked. Watson shrugged slowly.

“I didn’t ask for clarification,” the young man said with a sheepish smile.

“I’ll get it in the doyen’s office.”

When he sat at his desk the scattered readers and data file chips reminded him of The Plan yet to be finished. He opened the message file. A furry face he didn’t recognize appeared on the monitor and began to demand something in its own language. He stopped the message, tapped a few buttons to engage a translation program, and then replayed it from the beginning.

“Humans, I am Yee Talib Odalis. We of the Continental Health Organization had understood your efforts would be planet wide, not just for the population that falls under custody for United Medical Assembly. We have not been represented in your meetings and this is unacceptable. The CHO intends to be included at your next meeting and we request your agenda. Awaiting your response.”

Jackson tapped some different buttons on his desk.

“Watson here.”

“Get me Yee Odalis right away, the one who sent this com,” Jackson said. “And ask Dr. Ferris to come up here, too.” While he waited, the liability of the project grew a little heavier.

Jackson hadn’t been informed that there were two medical entities involved in his mission. Now he was wondering how many other organizations might need to be sought out and brought into the plan. He pulled up some intel on Cinco to find out if he’d overlooked the number of associations he was supposed to contact. A faint knock came at the door.

“Come in.”

“Good afternoon, Captain,” Anne Wallace said, surprising Jackson. He looked back at his data screen.

“Anne, this isn’t a good time, can you come back later?”

“Of course, sir,” she said, but she hesitated.

“Something I can do for you? Is the second shift becoming a problem or…?”

“No, Captain, I just wanted to make sure you’re getting what you need, if all is okay.” She moved a little closer to his desk away from the door. Jackson’s antennae pricked up despite his preoccupation with the plague plan. The Admiral’s daughter wanted something. She invited herself to perch on Jackson’s desk.

“Everything’s fine, Anne. I have a lot of work here to do,” he said firmly and stood to usher her to the door.

“Yes, sir, I’ll come back later, then,” the girl said and sauntered toward the door. Was she flirting with him? Oh, hell no. That was too damn funny! He bowed his head to hide the compulsive smirk. Another knock prompted Jackson to open the door himself.

“Captain?” Jane Ferris asked, backing up a few steps when her eyes focused on Anne.

“Come in, Ferris,” Jackson instructed and ignored Anne as she drifted out.

“I’m sorry,” Ferris said, and her eyes darted left, right, and down.

“For what? Come in, sit down. I need you to translate for one of the Cinconians who’s about to call.” Jackson watched her perch on the edge of the chair, put her hands in her lap, fix her eyes straight ahead. “Are you alright, Jane?”

“Yes, Captain, fine.”

“Coffee?” He filled his own cup and held the carafe up to support his request.

“No, thanks, sir; I won’t get any sleep if I have coffee at this hour.” Jackson set the carafe down and handed a reader to Ferris.

“There’s another medical group that wants to be involved in our mission.” Ferris had been avoiding the captain’s gaze but then looked up quickly.

“How can that be?” A chirp came from the com.

“We’re about to find out,” Jackson said. He flipped on the com and a live picture of Yee Odalis appeared.

“Hello Yee Odalis, I’m Captain Jackson of the Earth ship Maria Mitchell,” Jackson said. Ferris repeated his words in the native Cinconian language.

“Hello Captain, I thank you for taking my call.”

“I received your message and wanted to get in touch with you right away.”

“Thank you for your quick response,” Odalis said.

“I was unaware that more than one medical organization was involved in the crisis. I apologize for the oversight.”

“We didn’t contact you, but we have become aware that you are assisting with the contamination.”

“Yes, we have a cure, but we will need significantly more resources.”

“What is your containment plan?” Yee Odalis asked.

“It would be premature to disclose it now. Could we arrange a meeting face to face?” Jackson asked.

“That would be ideal,” the furry fellow said. “Right now, our only recourse is to destroy those that are infected.” The delay from the translator grew shorter the more Odalis spoke, but Jackson thought it may have converted a word incorrectly.

“Destroy?” Jackson didn’t understand his reply so looked at Ferris, but she hesitated before voicing the translation.

“They’re euthanized,” she said quietly. Jackson locked on to Ferris’ blue and brown eyes. A shiver trembled along his spine and he raised one hand over his mouth to keep the horror from spilling out. The Cinconian began to speak again.

“What would you have us do? We spare them a horrible existence and death, and keep the disease from spreading.”

“Isn’t that a bit severe? How can you kill everyone who gets the plague? There’ll be no one left!”

“We have no other alternative. No one is forced, Captain Jackson. It is an optional procedure. If they choose to live with their illness they live out their lives on an island designated for their hospice. And when they are dead, they are cremated on that island as well. It’s the only way.”

“If that’s so, how does your population continue to be infected?” Jackson asked.

“As I said, it is optional. We can’t seem to eradicate it. Hence, our desire to share in your alliance with the UMA for technology. An operative told us of the proceedings.”

Jackson and Ferris stared at each other briefly and he nodded at her. She responded to Yee Odalis and set up their meeting for tomorrow at mid-day.

“Did you have any idea we were dealing with more than one medical group?” Jackson asked the doctor.

“This is the first I’ve heard of it,” Ferris said. She looked as perplexed as he felt.

“I need to talk to Yee Akadar and find out why no one told us about it. Thank you for coming up. I don’t mean to take you away from your work.”

“This is part of my work, Captain. Happy to be the translator as well as the doctor.”

“Jane, is everything alright? I can tell something’s bothering you.” She looked at him from the light side then averted to the floor.

“No, sir. I mean, yes, sir, I’m fine. It’s not for me to say. I should get back to sick bay.”

“Wait,” he said, shutting the door. “If you have something on your mind I want to hear it.” Jackson made a conscious effort to soften his expression after the tense conversation with Odalis had hardened it.

“Ms. Rianya and I have gotten very close and my concern is for her, sir.”

“Go on.” Jane looked up, then down, anywhere but at him. She closed her eyes.

“Off the record?”

“If you like.”

“I… Anne… If you must know, sir, I’m afraid the captain may have betrayed my friend. Sir.” She slowly opened her eyes, almost glaring at him, her mouth drawn straight, her hands behind her back. He wasn’t sure what she was talking about but if her stare could kill…Anne.

“You surprise me, Jane. Not that you drew a conclusion but that you spoke to me in defense of my wife. That took a level of courage I’m not sure anyone else on the ship has.”

“Is that a problem, Captain?”

“No. I assure you, whatever you thought you saw when you came up here was all in Anne’s mind. I’m sure her attempt at, uh, flattery is about power, not attraction. Her impudence alone is enough to be… offensive.”

“I’m glad to hear that, sir. I apologize for assuming such a position.” Her face softened; her different colored brows lifting her eyes upwards. Her lighter half flushed a dull pink.

“That’s all, Doctor.” He chuckled to himself and turned back to the pile of data readers.

Symbiosis Chapter 22

“Doctors, I understand rocket science, but I don’t understand how you use genes to do something like this.”

“It came about precisely because of bacteria developing resistance, oh, more than 100 years ago,” Doctor Adams said to the captain. He, Ferris, Mills, Jackson, and Rianya sat around the table in sick bay where the monitors could quickly access images and information, audio visual aids, which Tom was grateful for.

“Do I need to know this much detail?” Tom asked.

“You asked,” Rianya said gently. Only she could get away with a smart-alec comment to the captain.

“I won’t tell you about the past, just what we’re going to do. It’s important that you understand it if you’re going to address any of the medical personnel.”

“Alright, let’s get this show started.”

Dr. Philip Adams had recently celebrated his 80th birthday. He’d been around the block more than a few times and had been practicing medicine longer than Tom had been alive. What seemed simple to him, as with most doctors, was complicated for the average person to comprehend. Being the only non-medical person in the room, the conversation was tailored for the captain.

“In the 21st century, doctors literally ran out of antibiotics to think up to kill some of the simplest bacteria,” he began, and put an image of five different kinds of microbes on the big monitor, each in a different color, a different shape, and in the glorious detail of one million magnification. Tom stifled a yawn.

“So, they came at these killers with a multi-pronged approach. That’s what we can do here, and it will work perfectly. The first step is to use an antibiotic that they haven’t seen here, and the Polymyxin E is our weapon. We have one million freeze dried doses of that on board, which is not nearly enough, so that will have to be synthesized as soon as possible. We need more like five hundred million doses.” The image on the monitor changed to one of a molecular formula.

“How long is it going to take to make that many?”

“It could take months, maybe a year. Depends on how fast we can get a facility set up and its capacity,” Dr. Ferris said. Tom nodded.

“The next step is more complicated,” Adams said. “We have to rip the shields from Yersinia so it can’t mutate and become resistant, and will always suffer when poisoned with Polymyxin E.

“We already know why the bacteria has become resistant over the years here, because of overuse and indiscriminate use of first cillians, then myacins. Dr. Lam informed me that about fifty years ago they put the streptomycin into the drinking water, but those subclinical levels only made everything worse.”

“Humans used antibiotics in livestock feed and it had the same result,” Mills added. “It took a revolution to get the commercial food industry to change its methods so antibiotics wouldn’t be necessary for profitable yields.”

“Ciprofloxacin is the drug of choice now back home.”

Steward Harchett came into the meeting room with a tray of assorted breakfast items from muffins to cheeses, and also a customary carafe of coffee. Jackson was the first to pour.

“Go on, Doctor.” He looked around the table at the participants as they all engaged in the miniature buffet.

“Alright. So, we treat all those hospitalized and those with emerging symptoms with Poly E. I want to use a plasmid, carried by virus, which would insert a gene into the DNA of Yersinia, which would stop the mutation gene from having the ability to mutate. It’s a Trojan horse and we administer it through the bloodstream, similar to any other injectable.”

“That sounds plausible,” Tom said.

“There’s a small problem with that approach,” the doctor continued. He looked at Ferris who set her coffee on the table and picked up where Adams left off.

“We don’t have enough information about the Cinconians’ physiology and beneficial symbiotic bacteria in vivo, the body. We could end up killing all the bacteria because the virus can’t discriminate what cells to infiltrate and which to ignore.”

“That’s not good,” Rianya muttered.

“That was the same problem they had with this approach on Earth when they first started using the viral-plasmid tactic. So, here’s what we’ve come up with.” Doctor Adams took a sip from his water glass before continuing. He also changed the image on the monitor to a fragment of RNA, something that looked like half the ladder of a spiraled DNA gene, and also a bright pink pincer that was aimed at another four-color segment inside a cell membrane.

“What we can do is send a segment of RNA into the bloodstream where it seeks a matching bacterium, then seeks out the MCR-1 gene. The RNA simply looks for the identical sequence to match up with. The MCR-1 gene is responsible for allowing transference of antibiotic resistance.”

“Simply?” Jackson rubbed his forehead and then came up for air. “Wow, um, you think you might explain that in a language I understand? I don’t consider myself an idiot but you just went a kilometer over my head.”

“We go after the bad gene, not the bad bacteria. We don’t wipe out the disease with the genetic splice, but we defunct the genes inside it so it can’t pass on mutations and become resistant.”

“That’s extraordinary,” Jackson said as the implications sank in.

“We could also release this into the environment, rather than the patient, but again, this is unfamiliar territory. With millions of species of bacteria out there I couldn’t be sure that it would only affect Yersinia. If this were restricted to a vineyard or orchard, it would work better applied to the foliage, but in this case, off target effects might be devastating to their ecology.”

Jackson sat back and tapped the side of his coffee cup with two fingers while he simmered on the information. Mills played with a data reader, Ferris and Adams were silent. Tom looked to Rianya for a hint.

“I’m with Adams on this,” she told him.

“So, we treat three hundred million Cinconians with the antibiotic, then give them all this segment with a gene killer on it?”

“Essentially. We can release the segment environmentally in locations where Yersinia is rampant and can’t be sterilized, such as gathering places where the bacteria could be lurking, but not the food or water supply.”

Jackson rubbed at his temples with one hand to remove the tension but it only worked for a brief moment. The enormity of the task at hand was as large as anything he’d ever had to deal with before.

“These Yersinia are microscopic titans, invisible killers of an entire population,” the captain said quietly, and refilled his cup with fresh coffee, and more sugar.

“And I have microscopic weapon,” Adams added, looking around the table with a slight smile on his face.

“How long will this take?” Jackson asked.

“First, we need to get the Polymyxin out and down to the planet, start reproducing it, and then start administering it. I will have to spend some time on the gene editing, a week, two, three maybe, and then we have to test it.”

“Sounds like we should have started yesterday, so whatever you need, let me know. I’ll get it for you.”

“See if the Cinconians can take factories they have and convert them to making doses of Poly E. We’ll work on other things from our end.” The doctor handed Jackson a document reader with a recipe for the antibiotic. “At least 300 million doses.”

“This will take a thousand factories,” Tom said.

“And a lot of machinists, physicians, and money,” Adams added. Captain Jackson took the pad and rapped it on the table before taking his coffee and leaving the medical personnel to their jobs.

~~~

“Papa?” came a small voice from behind the door to the doyen’s office where Tom had been hashing out a step by step plan for the pandemic operation. He stood up and took three stiff strides to open the door to Zalara and her allegiant companion, Honey.

“Come in, girls.” His brain was ready for a break anyway. “What do you need?”

“We have a question. Mama said I should ask you.”

“Sounds important; better sit down,” he told them and indicated the softer chairs against the wall instead of the austere chairs around the conference table. Honey danced to the farthest chair and Zalara followed half a step behind. Tom poured some fresh coffee in his cup and dumped a tablespoon of sugar in it. “Do you girls want any coffee?” he asked in mock seriousness. Both shook their heads melodramatically. “Okay, then, what’s on your mind?”

“We want to go see the planet.”

“You do?” The bright faces nodded this time. Tom would of course have to say no for several reasons that instantly came to mind. The plague, the official mission, their age, and their mothers all fought for the first-place reason.

“Mama said I had to ask you.”

“Did she say it was okay?” Zalara sedately shook her head. “How about your mother?” he asked Honey.

“She said whatever you said was okay with her,” the older girl admitted.

“Hmm. Well, I don’t think I can say yes to that request,” he said gently, taking a test sip of his coffee. The bright faces dulled.

“Why?” Zalara probed.

“Well, number one, they have a pretty bad germ down there and I don’t want you two exposed to it. That’s why we’re here, to help them get rid of the germ.”

“That’s all?”

“That’s enough.”

“The germ that makes them sick can make us sick too?”

“Yes, it can. It’s actually an Earth germ that no one has even seen on Earth for a long, long time.”

“How did an Earth germ get here?” Honey asked. Her light brows knitted together and she tilted her head off to one side.

“We’re not sure yet,” Tom said. “Some of the officers are trying to figure that out.” The girls didn’t have any more to say, but didn’t get up to leave, either. “I have to get back to my work here. Do you need anything else?”

“Can I fix the people so they aren’t sick and then we can go down?” Zalara asked. Tom almost jumped out of his chair.

“No! You can’t go fix them,” he declared. He sounded like Rianya. “Isn’t it time for school to start soon?”

“School is over for today, sir,” Honey said. Tom glanced at the timepiece on the wall: 14:22.

“Well, go find your mothers and something to do. I have to put this information together today,” Tom said and got up to open the door for them. Honey walked out, Zalara followed. Tom stroked her head as she passed by, her hair as silky as her mother’s. He hated to say no but it was easy to do.

Jackson returned to his ever-growing plan to present to Yee Akadar for people, facilities, raw materials, and money. He thought about Zalara and her need to help people who were sick. At first, he thought it was a learned behavior from Rianya, being she also seemed to want to help the sick and injured. Could her empathic ability have a mental component, something that urged her to heal? A genetic component from Rianya? The words on the screen in front of his eyes blurred and he stared through the monitor as if it weren’t there. He reached across his desk and tapped the intercom for sick bay.

Symbiosis Chapter 21

“You must use a new drug, a new treatment, a different kind of medicine,” she said. “This germ is hard to kill.”

“Humans have drug to kill?”

“Yes,” she said cautiously. Ferris fidgeted in her chair some. She looked at the captain for instructions. He could only shake his head.

“We have two problems,” she continued. “Manufacture of drug, distribution of drug. We need Cinconians to help. Humans cannot do all for you.”

“We can pay humans to do,” Akadar said.

“We do not have enough people.” A silence fell that bothered Jackson. He waited for the translation.

“We can buy new drug from Pegasi?”

“They don’t have it.”

Jackson looked at Rianya and then back at Ferris. He was growing impatient, and frustrated, that he didn’t understand the conversation. He huffed loudly and looked back at Akadar. Dr. Ferris quickly gave the captain a summary of their conversation. He nodded his appreciation. Akadar bowed his head.

“Pegasi can make much drugs. Can Pegasi make drug if you instruct?” the hairy fellow asked.

“No, Pegasi must not help,” Ferris said. “They perpetuated disease by give you wrong drug.” Although not entirely accurate, it sounded reasonable to Jackson. Akadar sat back in his chair with what could only be described as puzzlement on his face, his eyes wide, and his ears raised. “We must isolate every Cinconian with disease. We must treat them. And we must treat everyone with symptoms for many moons to come. Only then will it stop.”

“We three hundred million sick last count.”

“Humans can only give you one million doses. You must make the rest and distribute it on whole planet.”

“Such plan could take several planet trips around Eta Cass.”

“We estimate eight years, eight trips around star,” Ferris said. Her voice was steady, low, and the captain felt she’d said something grave to Yee Akadar. He fidgeted in his chair instead of expressing his anguish verbally.

“We trust Pegasi to help. Are you sure you help be rightly?”

“It will work if we distribute enough drug as soon as possible.”

“Did you tell him we need them to make a factory to produce the doses?” Rianya asked Dr. Ferris. She nodded.

“We want to bring some medicine down and treat your sickest citizens, make sure it works. But we can get sick, too,” Ferris explained, motioning to indicate the three of them. “This has to be well organized with no mistakes.”

“I understand,” he said. “You give instruction and we do.”

“Here are the basic steps. We will give you details shortly,” she said, and handed Yee Akadar a portable reader.

• · Cancel large social gatherings; suspend education at all schools; strict quarantine unnecessary.
• 
  
• · Treat infected first with two different drugs. 
• 
  
• · Treat asymptomatic with gene plasmid vector.
• 
  
• · Bring drugs to people, do not require people to go to clinics.
• 
  
• · Must be global effort starting in largest cities.

“Is this going to be possible?” she asked the yee.

“We will communicate best we can. Will need many citizens and doctors.”

“We can train you, teach you, but you must stop everything else and focus on this. It’s war on the bacteria.”

“Was war that brought bacteria,” Akadar said absent-mindedly.

“What?” Ferris asked. She turned quickly to Jackson. “He just said war brought it here.”

“War with who?” he snapped

“Pegasi?” Ferris asked. The short-furred lemur in a lab coat shook his head.

“Sky Runners,” he told her. Jackson watched as they spoke back and forth.

“How?”

“Every people know! They sent sick peoples from sky in flying metal box transporters. Those people sick, made us sick. All died, but disease not gone. It come back. Then all die and it gone again, then come back. Now we all die. We don’t want it come back.”

“Other people like you, like Cinconians?” she asked.

“Not like us. Not like big green Pegasi. Like you but shorter, more fur, not wear garments like you wear.”

“Captain,” Ferris said quietly. She turned to face him clearly hoping Akadar wouldn’t know what she was about to say. She glanced at Rianya then back to the captain. “I think he is describing the Kiians as the ones that brought the plague.

“Biological bombs?”

“No, infected people he describes as short and hairy, not in uniforms like we are.” She turned back to the Cinconian. “War, explosions, taking over your planet? Weapons?”

“We have information o’ library,” he said, and took a hand-held screen out of the desk drawer, propping it up on the surface and selecting a button, then several icons.

“May I?” Dr. Ferris asked, holding the screen. Yee Akadar pushed it toward her. She examined it with Rianya and Jackson looking on.

“What is all this?” Rianya asked.

It showed crude illustrations of large, black boxes spilling a primate species, not Kiians, onto the land, accompanied large batches of text. More illustrations showing the symptoms of Yersinia on the invaders were followed by more text. The last pictures showed what appeared to be Cinconians with Yersinia symptoms, Kiians killing Cinconians with handheld weapons, and documentation that appeared slightly different from the text. Jackson pointed to those characters.

“Numbers, Captain.”

“Would these be Cuatrons? They were at war with Kiians?” Jackson uttered.

“I’m not so sure,” Rianya said. “These aren’t Kiians,” she indicated, pointing at the ones spilling from boxes. “This doesn’t look like a war, it looks like, maybe, the Kiians are killing the very sick Cinconians. See, they are all infected, showing symptoms.”

“Kill the sick instead of heal them?” Ferris stared at Rianya, then Jackson, then back at her. “That’s barbaric,” Ferris said.

“It can happen. It could be a mercy killing,” Jackson said quietly, not wanting to speak of it aloud.

“Would you expect that of the Kiians?” Ferris said with incredulity. Jackson thought back to the last time he dealt with Kiians. They weren’t unreasonable, or particularly evil, but they were about serving their own interests.

“Maybe less to put the Cinconians out of pain but to stop the spread of the disease?” he suggested.

“They want a detailed plan,” Ferris said, handing the electronic document back to Yee Akadar.

“Tell him we’ll bring someone and something down tomorrow. I’ll get Adams to work with you on this.”

“A day, Captain? You’re giving Doc and me a day?”

“Just come up with a containment and treatment plan, not cure the plague. Leave that to Adams.” She took a deep breath and exhaled loudly, turned to Yee Akadar and explained the best she could.

“All okay?” Jackson asked.

“We’ve been invited to the evening meal, and to enjoy the day here. Not sure I have time for that,” she muttered dryly.

“You and Chen go back to Maria Mitchell. Rianya and I will play ambassadors.”

“You risk infection the longer you stay down here.”

“We’ll stay away from anyone sick. Tell Cat to watch Zalara for us, my request,” he said, biding her goodbye.

“You sure you don’t need a translator?”

“I’m sure we do, but we’ll muddle through,” Jackson told her, then smiled slightly at Rianya. When they’d first met, they couldn’t communicate, but it didn’t take long to come to a meeting of minds.

Yee Akadar made a circular motion in the air as if he were cleaning a plate glass window, then pushed a portable reading device across the table to the Jacksons. Tom picked it up and saw a map of the city and outlying area.

“Als het donker komen hier,” Akadar said to them and tapped a spot on the screen. Tom wished Ferris hadn’t already left.

“Yes,” Tom said blankly, and with a nod of his head, they took leave of Yee Sanga Akadar from his office to the outdoors. Both quickly put on their field jackets but it wasn’t so cold that they actually needed them zipped.

“What do you think he was talking about?” Rianya asked as they walked away. Tom’s face was in the map, orienting himself to the map and their current locale.

“Hmm? Oh, my guess is dinner is here,” he said, tapping the same spot Akadar had. “What time is anyone’s guess.”

“The evening,” she said. “What should we do until then?”

“I don’t really feel like business today. Look at the mountains behind the city, all icy and covered in snow, and the meadows in the plains at the base of the range.” Tom looked at Rianya, seeing a subtle joy dancing in her eyes. He looked back at the mountains before her web snared him. “Let’s take a walk. It’s been a long time since we’ve been on terra firma.”

“I could use something to eat.”

“I’m not sure I know how to find a restaurant on this map,” Tom muttered. “Maybe up that direction?” he said, looking away from the map and nodding at a nondescript one story building that had smoke rising from its chimney.

Once inside they took seats at a table but found their legs dangled above the floor a bit. Chairs made for Cinconians were not dually compatible with humans. A Cinconian with dark brown fur, somewhat longer than most, came to talk to them.

“Je bent niet van hier,” the feminine voice said, and she pointed to a menu written on the wall. “Wat wil je?"

“We’ll have that,” Rianya said promptly, pointing to something that looked edible being carried to a table across the room. The Cinconian made the same ‘glass cleaning’ gesture that Akadar had, then left. She returned with two stoneware bowls of water for each of them.

“Think of it as a really large, short cup,” Tom said with a chuckle and holding it with both hands he drank from the side. The water was sweet and cool, and he almost finished the whole thing when it occurred to him that he could have just been infected by the plague. They were sitting with many other Cinconians, and who knows if they’d washed the tableware?

“Tom, are you alright?”

“This may have been a bad idea, plague contamination,” Tom muttered. Upon a second thought, however, none of the diners seemed infected. Still uncertain of the staff in the kitchen, he pushed the bowl a few centimeters away. Rianya scoffed a snicker and took a long drink of the water using the bowl as a large two handed mug.

Tom had never seen the kind of things they brought to the table before that moment. One dish seemed to be made of clear worm segments like fat, transparent spaghetti. Another dish might have been a plant stem cut into discs and served with a runny green sauce. A third dish he recognized: a dozen small eggs, raw, with embryos, cracked open into a shallow bowl.

“Just what did you order?” he asked Rianya as if she’d taken leave of her senses.

“It looked good on the tray.”

“It has no smell,” Tom said. “How do we know if it’s good or spoiled?”

“I don’t think they would serve it spoiled.”

“Vijfentachtig munten,” the Cinconian said, and held out her naked palm.

“You think she wants money?” Tom said realizing they had no money. Rianya’s lips drew into a straight line and her eyes grew round and black like an owl’s.

“Yee Sanga Akadar,” Tom said, gesturing as if he were dropping coins into her hand. Her head tilted, nodded, and her hand again made the circular ‘cleaning glass’ motion and she left.

“Should we try it?” Tom asked with trepidation. He looked for utensils, then saw that no diners had them; all simply ate from the side of the bowls.

“I can’t eat dead baby things,” Rianya said, not taking her eyes off the egg dish. She lifted the bowl of transparent spaghetti and slipped some into her mouth. She shuddered then nodded. “Tasteless worms,” she uttered and set the bowl back down on the table.

Tom lifted the dish of small discs in green sauce and tipped the bowl just enough to taste it. He nodded and took more, realizing he, too, was hungry and hadn’t noticed.

“Not bad. Here, try this, it tastes like asparagus in seaweed sauce.”

“Never mind, Tom. I’m not hungry anymore.” Tom looked at Rianya and opened his wrist com.

“Dr. Ferris, Mr. Lee, have you left the surface yet?”

Symbiosis: Chapter 20

Tom was more than ready the next day to get into orbit and down on the planet to find out what the Cinconians knew about the history of the Yersinia. He walked with Rianya and Zalara from their quarters to the elevator.

“I still hate this thing.”

“It’s okay, I like it Mama.”

“Are you still taking the stairs?” Tom asked and poked her gently in the ribs. She flinched but smiled anyway.

“You have your own phobias,” she said. “Like blood.”

“I can handle blood,” he said but took a small step back from her. He looked at Zalara hoping for an advocate but she stood oblivious to his desire. “Are you bringing anything to the surface?”

“Should I? Don’t I look enough official?” Tom looked her up and down with artificial criticism. She’d dressed in the same uniform the rest of the crew wore but for minimal decoration on the sleeves and collar.

“You’re pretty, Mama.”

“Thank you ‘Lara. So are you.”

The elevator stopped gently and Tom headed for the shuttle bay. Rianya took Zalara in the opposite direction to the gymnasium where Honey and Cat would be for the morning school and play time. A few minutes later Rianya joined Tom in the launch bay with Dr. Ferris.

“Chen is waiting for us,” Tom said when she entered and the three persons on the landing party climbed into the shuttle, Osprey, and prepared for takeoff, strapping themselves in while the bay became a vacuum, listening to sucking and hissing as the air escaped through porthole flaps. The bay doors opened and the shuttle drifted out with a little bit of a nudge from the rear thrusters.

Tom preferred to fly the shuttles himself, but he also liked to challenge his crew now and then. Flying a shuttle required exponentially more skill than a jet, or the entire ship which was mostly computer controlled. Shuttles were small, noisy, and subject to zero G conditions. Like the difference between a cruise ship and a sailboat, shuttles required different skill sets to handle the craft properly.

“Mylan,” Rianya whispered to Tom. “Why do I go this time but not last time?”

“You wanted to go down, and I was kind of inflexible last time. Adams gave us all advance protection and before we didn’t even know what the germ was. Besides, we’re not going to see doctors and patients, we’re going to talk with the decision makers.”

“Thank you,” she said. He resisted the temptation to lay some affection on her. Instead he winked.

As Osprey cleared the atmosphere and began its descent toward land, the three passengers craned their necks to see out the two side windows. When they’d reached an altitude of 20 kilometers, the surface features became recognizable as rivers or streets, mountains or buildings, lakes or craters, trees or people.

The longitude and latitude given to Lieutenant Lee this time directed them to a city near the coast of the northernmost continent, at its southernmost point. Several rivers and lakes snaked and dotted the surrounds of what was obviously a busy city not far inland from a small ocean.

Eta Cass Cinco wasn’t dissimilar from Earth in that it was large enough to maintain an oxygen nitrogen atmosphere that, although thin, didn’t require any special equipment to breathe. Although it orbited at the outside edge of humans called the Goldilocks Zone, its equatorial the temperatures hovered in the teens. Humans and other warm climate visitors simply put on another layer of clothing, whereas the inhabitants were mostly mammals and fully furred.

The sea life was remarkably varied but Jackson didn’t have time to investigate on his own. A few varieties of birds and reptiles seemed to live in the equatorial area, but he doubted many other climate zones on Eta Cass Cinco would support them. Axial tilt was just 11% making for marginal seasons. The northern and southern poles sustained enormous glaciers and permafrost, and they’d not learned about any life forms at those locales.

The chosen landing site and coordinates offered a cool, moist environment with trees and forest, a temperature of 13 C, and a view of the city. Buildings rose at most five stories high, although nothing akin to skyscrapers. Most appeared brick or adobe, wooden logs and mud, or were even built into the hillsides. In the distance a soaring range of mountains covered in permanent snow protected the settlement from the northern weather patterns.

“I’d like to go skiing down a slope on that mountain range. It must be four kilometers high.”

“I didn’t know you liked to ski, Captain,” Chen said.

“It’s been a long time since I’ve had the chance.”

“I have the UMA building on the scanner, sir. It’s just about a kilometer ahead to the left, the red brick structure that’s three stories high.”

“Let’s go see what we can find out.”

Jackson led; his wife and Dr. Ferris followed half a meter behind, the three of them making an interesting looking group in a crowd of Cinconians. Small electric vehicles transported one or two Cinconians in various directions on narrow hard pan roads. They walked in the same direction parallel to the three wheeled vehicles which appeared to going toward the UMA.

“Doctor, tell me again the name of the administrator we’re supposed to meet with?” Jackson asked.

“Yee Sanga Akadar; you could call him Yee Akadar or just Yee. Yee is his medical title, sort of a cross between ‘doctor’ and ‘manager’. Akadar is his name. I met him when we were here a few days ago, in the medical center. I’ll introduce you as Captain Jackson, and Ms. Rianya,” Dr. Ferris told them.

They entered the austere building that belied a lush interior inside with soft chairs, ambient lighting, and potted plants sporting wide leaves in every color except green. Several Cinconians wandered the foyer. Jackson noticed they were all varying colors from white to black and every shade of grey in between, cinnamon, sorrel, auburn, seal, sand and walnut. He wondered, again, if he could attribute any significance to them or if all were simply normal variations.

Flanked by the two women, Jackson stepped up to a reception desk with a Cinconian sitting behind it.

“We come see Yee Akadar,” Dr. Ferris said in her best imitation of the Cinconian language. Jackson watched the furry native and decided it was female. A softness in the eyes and the refined bone structure of the face quickly reflected gender to the captain.

“Yee Sanga Akadar expects you,” she said, and used an interesting device on her table to signal Akadar wherever he was inside the building. It appeared to be a simple signal device that interrupted an electron flow to illicit sound in a specific area or room. In conclusion it was a telegraphic intercom. Electricity seemed to be the foundation of their infrastructure, at least in this city.

While the trio waited, Jackson looked all around the room. Like the medical facility they’d visited a few days earlier, the vestibule was double story tall to allow for the height of trees which grew from openings in the floor, reaching for the windows on the roof that provided most of the light. Cinconians crisscrossed at a more leisurely pace than humans might have done in a medical building.

“Was the hospital like this, full of plants?” Rianya asked.

“Very similar,” Ferris said. “But more austere, probably because of the sanitation factors.”

Yee Akadar approached them from across the chamber. He was a tall being, two full meters, and his fur was a pale shade of cinnamon. It was clipped relatively close to his skin, only about three centimeters long all over and smoothly groomed. He wore a long flaxen garment that Jackson considered to be the Cinconian version of a lab coat, not fastened in front.

“Greetings Yee Akadar,” Dr. Ferris said with a quick tilt of her head.

“Is agreeable to meet,” Akadar said and also cocked his head slightly.

“Captain Jackson, Ms. Rianya,” Dr. Ferris said. All exchanged brief nods and then silently followed Akadar to his private office where more large, soft chairs provided measured comfort. A small buffet laid out with finger foods seemed intriguing, yet Jackson hesitated, not wanting to find something inedible then having to endure eating it out of respect. Jackson watched Akadar select some morsels and pop them into his mouth using dexterous, hairless fingers rather than an implement. Only a few moments passed before Akadar was ready to talk business.

“You have information?” Akadar said to Dr. Ferris.

“Yes, and questions,” she answered. Both Jacksons allowed her to continue leading the conversation. Having recorded her and Dr. Adams’ meeting with the Cinconians at the clinic site, it wasn’t hard for Maria Mitchell’s computer to analyze their language and produce a Rosetta Stone. Apparently, Dr. Ferris was a quick study with languages.

“What have you?” he asked. Ferris looked at the captain, then Rianya, then back at Akadar.

“We have identified the bacteria. On our planet, Earth, we call it Yersinia.”

“You have same bug on your planet?”

“Yes, we used to, but no longer. We killed it.”

“You can kill our germ also?” Yee Akadar leaned forward. He had the most striking, vivid blue eyes that intensely glistened. Jackson could swear he saw a smile.

“Your germ changed over many years,” Ferris said. “It can live because medicine was not used right.”

“We used drug and germ… stronger?” he asked.

“Misuse of drug made stronger germs.”

“Our history shows ‘cillians worked, then stopped working. Then glycoside worked, but now not working.”

“You buy these drugs from Pegasi?”

“Yes.”

Jackson recognized the word Pegasi and snapped back to the conversation.

“Your whole world must stop using Pegasi medicine,” Ferris said.

“That not go easy over all world.”

“The Pegasi want you to stay sick so they can keep selling you more drugs,” Jackson said to Ferris, and she repeated it for Akadar. He sat back in his chair and said nothing, his furry face wrinkling, his head cocked to one side and the odd blue eyes vibrated.

“What?”

Symbiosis Chapter 19

“We’ll be back in orbit around Cinco in 37.2 hours, Captain,” Ensign Rougeau said.

“Thank you, Ensign,” Jackson said and shut the intercom. He took a deep breath and let it out slowly. He and Dr. Gregory sat in the doyen’s office before a scattering of readers and holograms on the table. Dr. Ferris and Rianya also puzzled over the information volumes in front of them. The view from the window was mostly black as they travelled back to Eta Cass’ fifth planet, with the Milky Way ever visible, always appearing as distant from the ship as it appeared from Earth.

“Tom, somehow the extinction on Cuatro and pandemic on Cinco are related. Cuatro’s humanoid extinction event happened on the verge of their space exploration program. Cinco’s pandemic started near the same time. I can’t believe it’s a simple coincidence,” said Dr. Gregory.

“Could they have had a nuclear winter? A space accident?”

“No, the extinction was only the mammals,” Rianya said.

“Here’s the statistics on that class,” Dr. Ferris said, pushing a small square to the center of the table and tapping it to activate a hologram. A small strand of DNA appeared in color 3D. “This specific sequence is unique.”

“It’s interesting,” Tom said, then looked around the table. “The area where the Kiians are doing their research is mostly desert, uninhabited, but on the southern continent an entire civilization with buildings, roadways, and airports had existed. They were more advanced 400 years ago than the Cinconians are today.”

“Why is that interesting?” Rianya asked.

“They suffered an extinction event but at that level of technology I think they should have been able to stop it. They were more advanced 400 years ago than humans were 400 years ago.”

“Asteroid?” Dr. Gregory threw out.

“Why just the civilization? Why higher mammals but not most of the other animals?”

“Extinction of dinosaurs on Earth didn’t kill everything. Just the big reptiles. And not overnight,” Ferris said.

Knocks at the door meant their mid-morning brain fuel of cheeses and fruit had arrived, with two carafes of fresh coffee as well.

“Why are we focusing on Cuatro?” Dr. Gregory suddenly said. “We want to cure the pandemic of Plague on Cinco and get out of here, right?”

“It must be something specific --” Tom stopped and looked around at each person, then filled his coffee again. “Was the extinction on Cuatro caused by Yersinia and taken to Cinco somehow?”

“That’s stretching it,” Ferris said.

“Could the extinction on Cuatro have been biological, interplanetary warfare that made its way to Cinco?”

“That sounds more likely,” Dr. Gregory muttered.

“But where did they get the Yersinia?” Rianya asked the group.

“Pegasi brought it to them from Earth and sold it as a weapon?” Tom said.

“Okay, so now the Pegasi are running meds and making profit. If the Cinconians stop getting sick, and stop needing new medicines…” Dr. Gregory trailed off.

“That’s sobering,” Tom said. “Could the Pegasi have planned it? Dropped a biological contaminant in order to create demand for antibiotics?”

“The time span is too long for a project like that.” Ferris said.

“Kiians are on Cuatro, they don’t seem to be getting sick, and they are primates,” Dr. Ferris suggested, then shifted in her chair and rubbed her face in frustration.

“Nothing’s making sense,” Rianya said.

“All right, let’s take it from the top. Scott, astro data?”

“There’s no indication of an asteroid or other space body that would have caused an extinction of just a couple vulnerable species on Cuatro. Cuatro was not quite space faring, and Cinco is not. So if there’s a connection, it must be alien.” Tom turned to Dr. Ferris and raised his brows asking for her contribution.

“Agree that Yersinia is a valid theory for the extinction of just the slow reproducing fauna. But there’s nothing to contraindicate another cause of the extinction.”

“Rianya, what did you and Adams turn up?” Sometimes, Tom swore she got prettier every day.

“The Pegasi have been supplying antibiotics to Cinco for decades, but no exact data. The Cinconians don’t have much of a medical program of their own.”

“Are the Pegasi acting alone or with Kiians?” Ferris asked aloud. “And are they working to keep the population dependent on ever increasing resistance to drugs? Did the Pegasi take Yersinia from Earth to Cuatro or to Cinco or both?”

“That’s a string of disturbing thoughts to say the least. Could they want the population to continue to improve then fall, improve then fall? It could be profitable for centuries,” Tom mused aloud. “Thoughts?”

“Still doesn’t explain how a human bacteria killed off an alien civilization and is now doing the same on a neighboring planet,” Dr. Ferris added.

“Are we back to square one?” Tom asked.

“No, no, we have some facts,” Dr. Gregory said, lining up several readers on the table and pushing the holograms to the center. “Let’s work backwards with what we know,” he suggested. “From now to the event.”

“Alright.” Tom thought for a moment, then turned on a monitor to record the data easily for all to see at once. “Cinconian primate mammals are dying from Yersinia. It’s been going on a long time, let’s say at least 200 years, likely more.” He recorded his words onto the pad that displayed on the large monitor. “They are buying antibiotics but each time the bacteria mutates and then they need a new drug, which the Pegasi happily supply for an undoubtedly punitive price and profit.

“So the Pegasi get the antibiotics from…where?” Tom continued. “Their home world? The Kiians? We don’t know for how long, or which species discovered the problem and began the addiction, for lack of a better word.” Tom stood up to pace around again.

“Before Cinconians began to have the plague, an extinction of the same order of animals happened on Cuatro: slow reproducing, mostly primate mammals,” Dr. Ferris added in. Tom recorded her words into the pad.

“So circumstantially it’s likely that Yersinia is the cause of the extinction,” Tom said. “Which happened a long time ago. And it appears as if Cinco is heading in the same direction.”

“Are there two humanoid species on Cinco?” Rianya asked. Tom recalled the shorter people with the taupe fur, but they didn’t seem to be a different species, more like a different race.

“Did you notice a second species, Dr. Ferris?” Tom asked. “I didn’t, but, then, I wasn’t looking for one.”

“No, sir, I didn’t, but that doesn’t mean there isn’t one.”

“How would the Cuatrons take the plague to Cinco? They didn’t have space technology. Another species must have taken it either on purpose or by accident,” Dr. Gregory said.

“We’re getting off track. No questions, just facts, everyone. Let’s think.” Tom took a handful of black grapes and began to pop them like candy while he paced around the table.

“Meteorite would be the only other method,” Gregory said.

“That’s plausible, sir,” Ferris added. “Yersinia is both aerobic and anaerobic. Low oxygen, no oxygen, it doesn’t matter to the bacteria.”

“Okay,” he entered the data and it appeared on the screen. “But we don’t know for certain.” He indicated that sentence was suspect with a small symbol at the end.

“We’re going with the theory that the plague raged on Cuatro, killed the population, and some of it escaped to Cinco,” Tom said. “I think we’re getting some of this figured out.”

“Except,” Rianya said, “Now we need to find out how Yersinia got to Cuatro in the first place.”

“An alien or meteor must have brought it,” Tom concluded. He tapped in the rest of the data. “Could it have been brought to be used as a bio weapon?”

“Tom, a meteor couldn’t go twenty light years, you know better,” Dr. Gregory said.

“I’m grasping at straws here.”

“The Pegasi could have been biological arms dealers to the Cuatrons. Pegasi brought it from earth to profit off one side’s civil war?” Ferris said.

Tom passed by Rianya and touched her shoulders, absorbing some of her strength without taking it away from her.

“Regardless of who or how, we still have to stop it,” the captain said, and sat down. “As long as we can ensure it doesn’t come back.” He tapped the intercom. “Dr. Adams, can you come to the doyen’s office?”

“On my way,” came the answer. While they waited, the four of them grazed on the brunch foods and avoided the discussion.

“Come in, doc, join the party,” Tom called at the door chime. “We saved the big question for you.”

“You flatter me, Jack. What’s all that?” He pointed to the monitor and stared at the screen.

“Read it and weep,” Dr. Gregory said.

“This is the intelligence?”

“So far. What have you come up with to treat the Cinconians?”

“We’re looking at treating 300 million individuals, you know. That’s just the ones who have it, not including the ones who’ll get it between now and the deployment.”

“Dr. Ferris?” Tom said.

“I looked in the Pedia about the Plague in Europe. The only thing they could do was burn everything – bodies, clothes, even homes, fields, crops where the vectors lived. Those years were affected originally from the bite of a rodent flea. This one is obviously the airborne subspecies.”

“We can’t burn everything. What about the water supply?” Tom suggested.

“It will have to be something they can replicate on their own,” Adams said. “A gene is still a way off in their technological sphere.”

“Dangerous?” Tom asked. He closed his eyes, covering his face with one hand as he slid down into a chair.

“Yes. Hell yes,” Adams said.

“Why so many people at once, Doc?”

“You have to blast everyone all at the same time and stay on top of it or the next round of bugs will likely be resistant. I’m still planning on the plasmid delivery, but that takes more time and money. The few of us can’t treat that many people by ourselves. It’s going to take a huge effort of their own populations.”

“Maybe I should see if the Cinconians are set up to make a billion doses of something. We certainly aren’t,” Tom said. “Adams, Ferris, your top priority is a Yersinia killer.”

“Jack, the populations need to be quarantined, immediately. That’s the first step.”

“Understood. I’ll contact the UMA as soon as we’re in range. Rianya and I will get down there and meet with their nation states and try to put an organization together to engage the Cinconians in distribution of the medicine. Scott, you get to figure out how Yersinia got from Earth to Cuatro and then to Cinco.”

“No one goes down to the planet without prophylactic therapy,” Adams insisted.

“I’m an astronomer, not an historian. How do you expect me to figure that out?”

“I only have so many scientists on board, Scott. A smart doctor of astrophysics like you should snap this out in a day or two. I only run the ship. Everyone dismissed.”

Symbiosis Chapter 18

I was going to post a photo of a victim, but
it was so gruesome I was nearly sick myself.

“Should I know it?” Rianya said, still puzzled by the faces.

“It was called The Black Death,” Adams announced. “This microbe caused of millions of deaths across all of Europe, as much as half of the entire population. It changed human history, set us back centuries in technology.” Mills stood and paced slowly. Tom stood as well.

“How is that possible? An Earth bacteria on Cinco? Are you positive?” Rianya asked. Vague nods made the rounds of the table. “Can we catch it?”

“Yes, we can most assuredly catch it. Transmission is by touching an infected person or breathing after an infected person has coughed. Just like the common cold or the flu,” Ferris said.

“How did an Earth bacteria get on an Eta Cass planet?” Rianya asked.

“Brought as a doomsday weapon?” Tom asked.

“Maybe the Kiians brought it,” Ferris suggested.

“Wait, when did it go extinct on Earth? How would Kiians get it to bring it here?”

“Would any species intentionally inflict this monster of a disease on their worst enemy?” Mills muttered.

“You’ve heard of biological warfare. If a population has never been exposed to something, well, it can devastate them. And that’s what is happening down there,” Ferris said.

“Some of the strain was undoubtedly kept in stasis,” Mills added.

“Streptomycin was a perfectly good antibiotic against Yersinia. Treated early and quickly it could be stopped. But there are literally millions down there with it; obviously resistant to streptomycin classes of drugs,” Dr. Adams said gravely. He sighed heavily and the characteristic twinkle in his old eyes had vanished.

“What do we do?” Rianya asked, looking around at blanks.

“It’s our job to get an effective treatment, right now, yesterday even. I may not have time to play with gene splicing.” Adams kept rubbing at his face and sat hunched over the table. Jackson sat down again; Mills stopped pacing at also sat down. Ferris seemed to stare into space without any focus at all, her brown eye and blue eye both vacant. “We have our work cut out for us, people,” Dr. Adams said.

“This scares the hell out of me,” Dr. Ferris said.

“This is an antibiotic apocalypse. We can start with Polymyxin E, that will work and we brought mountains of it, and it’s easy to manufacture.”

“Won’t it just become resistant to that?” Mills asked.

“Eventually, but for now, if we hit it with Poly E in the infected population, we can use a phage plasmid virus prophylactically to introduce a stop-gene in the environment.”

“What’s that, a phage what?” Rianya asked. Adams addressed the entire room of worried faces.

“Well, old protocol was to introduce a cell disruption gene plasmid in vivo, into the patient, that killed the bacteria. But those disrupted beneficial bacteria as well. Now we use a virus and piggyback a splice onto it, targeting only the gene in the bacteria that actually mutates. This stops survivor bacteria. Now we can target the specific mutation gene, in vivo and in the environment, the food supplies, and stop the species of bacteria from mutating. Takes longer, lasts forever.”

“Doc, the Cinconians said they had help from Kiians and Pegasi. Is it possible the Pegasi supplied them with antibiotics? As long as they could keep the population sick, and the bacteria resistant, it could be especially profitable for them, long term.”

“There’s a terrifying thought,” Dr. Ferris said.

“Anything’s possible. I’ll start working on the gene therapy. Until then we’ll use Poly E and go from there.”

“You medical people do what you have to do, but whatever you do don’t let any Yersinia loose on my ship,” Tom said. “I’m going to chase down Dukvita and find out what he’s up to. Whatever it is, I’m sure it’s no good.”

                                      ~~~

“Captain Jackson!? Captain Jackson, it’s been a long time, hasn’t it?” The olive green face appeared on the bridge monitor and was equally offensive at it had been a decade ago.

“Dukvita, yes, not long enough, actually.” Jackson lifted his chin a little when the green face appeared.

“Don’t be bitter, old friend. It was just business.”

“Let’s move on, can we?”

“Would you like to come aboard so we don’t have to talk over monitors and microphones? I’d love to show you my new ship.” Jackson hesitated for a split second.

“I’d invite you here, but we have some nice microscopes we’d like to hang onto. You’re not going to fly away with me and affect some revenge?” Jackson watched the Pegasi’s face carefully for any tics or twitches.

“If you don’t bring any gifts, Captain, I won’t push you out an airlock. What is your interest out here? I’m sure this isn’t a social visit.”

“In a way it is. I was actually wondering what your business was out here in the Eta Cass system. Aren’t you a long way from home?”

“Simply business, simply business. I’d be happy to discuss it with you although I’m not sure what I do is any of your concern.” Jackson’s thoughts raced, not wanting to be fooled, tricked, embarrassed, or kidnapped.

“I’d be happy to discuss it with you, Dukvita.”

“I will have my pilot come right to you. Bring a friend, if you prefer. I don’t recognize your ship. Where is your docking port?”

Captain Jackson and Sergeant York waited by the airlock for Dukvita’s transport ship to dock. He handed her a button sized sphere.

“Dukvita is a pirate, and don’t forget it for a second. Keep this on you in case we’re separated for whatever reason,” Jackson said to his sentry leader. She nodded and put the ball in her pocket. “You can’t trust him. Whatever he says, believe the opposite.”

“Are you sure we should board his ship, sir?” Jackson chuckled a little.

“Oh, yes. We’ll get much more out of him this way on his turf where he’s comfortable. You’ve met Pegasi before, right?”

“No, sir, not in person. Only over monitors.”

“There’s something you should know about. The males have a toxin gland on their temples, kind of a dark, army green spot. Be sure he doesn’t touch it before he touches you. It’s like touching a chili pepper then rubbing your eyes.”

“You’re kidding me,” she said, pulling back a few centimeters from the captain.

“Um, no, I’m not. It’s not a big deal, but just be aware.”

Jackson heard the ship dock alongside the Maria Mitchell. He watched the door controls flash red, then go solid green. A barber pole signal snapped still and a digital readout flashed on: CAPTURE. He pressed a couple of buttons and the airlock hissed briefly as it pressurized. A moment later, the door slid open. Jackson nodded at York and they entered the airlock, waited for the Pegasi hatch, and they entered the alien ship together.

“Welcome, this way,” one of Dukvita’s associates greeted them. Jackson and York followed behind the large man. When York glanced at Jackson he saw her from the corner of his eye and glanced back. Never having met a Pegasi in person, York was understandably taken aback at his hefty size, metallic wardrobe, and his pea soup skin tone. Seeing one of them on a monitor couldn’t prepare a person for a face to face, or rather, a face to chest meeting.

He was willing to take the lead and stepped just a meter ahead of York. The long legged pirate made quick time and Jackson almost had to jog to keep up; Ms. York did break into a jog now and again. In half a minute, they arrived and were greeted considerably warmer than expected by Commandant Dukvita.

“Captain Jackson,” he smiled. The man hadn’t changed much. His stomach had grown fatter, his heavily enameled teeth were still a mustard color, but his skin was more olive than he remembered. He had unusual dermal art on his hairless head that hadn’t been there before, something resembling a badge or another symmetrical symbol.

“Dukvita, is it captain now?”

“It’s whatever I want it to be,” he said, handing Jackson a glass with an ochre liquid inside. Small bubbles floated upward and popped at the surface. The associate handed a similar glass to Ms. York. “To a renewed friendship, Captain.”

“Perhaps we should call it a truce. I’m not sure friendship is the appropriate word you had in mind.” The two men raised glasses just a few centimeters without taking their eyes off each other before sampling the brew.

“My English vocabulary is limited,” he offered, sweeping his hand towards a comfortable seating area. They didn’t appear to be on the bridge, but in a conference area. “It’s been a long time since I’ve bumped into humans.”

“Not that long. This is my armory chief, Sergeant York.”

“Please, sit, relax. Captain.” The animated fellow shook his head and sipped his drink. “I’ll never understand how you can employ females on your ship. We would be distracted to impairment.”

“Pleasantries aside, Dukvita, I came to discuss your commerce activities.”

“You get right to business, don’t you Jackson? No matter, I appreciate your point of view. What may I do for you?”

Jackson gritted his teeth knowing Dukvita was being much too cordial and cooperative. He sat anyway and decided to play along. Against a master of games, to win, one had to play by the house’s rules.

“You seem to be running cargo to Cinco. I just wondered how that came about. You’re not exactly their neighbors. What are you selling?”

“How does it concern you?” The giant sipped his ale.

“The Universal Medical Association for Cinco asked for human help in combatting their plague. It’s a pandemic.”

“That’s what we’re doing. Providing antibiotic drugs to fight the germ they can’t seem to get a grip on. They’ve been trying for years.”

“We made a visit there yesterday; the drugs are ineffective. I couldn’t help but wonder why you’re still supplying them if the bacteria are resistant.”

“No one has mentioned it to me.”

“No one on Cinco has given you a clue? The increase in orders, larger dosages, for the drugs, perhaps?”

“Captain, you know a lot about medicine for a soldier.”

“I’ve been living closely with scientists for more than a decade; my wife’s a biologist.” Dukvita sat back on the long bank of white cushions, then leaned forward.

“Captain Jackson, when did you marry? And why would any captain do such a foolish thing?” The greenish pirate slapped his meaty thigh.

“Discussion for another time, Dukvita.”

“Yes, yes, my apologies. We all make mistakes, I shouldn’t impose my culture on aliens. Where were we?” Jackson sighed.

“The antibiotics.”

“Captain, I’m no scientist, or a doctor. I’m a businessman, doing a job, that’s all, making some honest money transporting goods.”

Jackson glanced quickly at York and back at Dukvita. A trickle of chartreuse sweat dribbled its way down his forehead towards the venom gland on the side of his head.

“I just need to know what we’re working with so we aren’t, well, at odds, you see,” Jackson said carefully. “We’re working on this problem at their request, and I can inform my doctor to cross treatments you’ve already tried off his list.”

“I hope you aren’t expecting me to discontinue my current business deal. I can tell you, Captain, we supplied them with a variety of ‘cillians, not me personally, but for many decades. Now it’s this newer medicine. I’m hired to deliver a product, Captain, nothing more. I think you’ve mistaken me for someone who cares about what happens to the Cinconians.”

“I don’t know whatever came over me,” Jackson said in all seriousness. He inhaled sharply. “What do you call this new medicine?”

“Captain, I’m not accustomed to such direct inquisition from a person in your position, that is, irrelevant.”

“I get the feeling you would prefer we butt out and not assist the population with a cure. Perhaps that would eat into your profits?”

“There are hundreds of millions of sick Cinconians, Captain; there is no such thing as curing them all. I doubt if your efforts could put a dent in my profits.” Jackson knew then he’d not get the information on the drug out of Dukvita. He’d have to have his medical team reverse engineer a sample. Another time wasting task but necessary. He finished the fruity ale-cider and handed the glass to his host.

“Thank you for your hospitality, Dukvita. We’ll not take up any more of your valuable time.”

“Very well, Captain. I will offer you a suggestion because I can see this is eating at you.” The brute leaned forward to speak quietly to Jackson. “Go back to Earth and don’t look back.” He took the glasses from both Jackson and York and ushered them to a crewman who led them off.

Symbiosis Chapter 17

“I’ve never seen this bug before,” Ferris said. She sat and tapped a keyboard while a disturbingly intimate image of a single bacteria in false color and glorious prickled detail appeared on a monitor.

“Did you expect to recognize an alien bacteria?” Jackson asked. He stood next to Rianya and the two of them watched with Dr. Adams while Ferris focused in on the tiniest detail with her proton microscope. “Down on the planet they all look alike under those old microscopes, a thousand power, like you can see anything but it’s damn shape.”

“What have they been fighting it with?” Rianya asked.

“I’ve analyzed the chemical structures and named them A-K. One looks like the same structure as streptomycin.” Jane Ferris turned to look at the Jacksons, her blue eye and white hair closest to them that gave her a different look entirely than if they had stood on her brown and black side. A little of the dark pigment crossed the bridge of her nose into the light skin.

“You didn’t bring this bug on board, right? I don’t want an outbreak of something nasty,” the captain said.

“No, no live cultures. Adams and I sat through a second round of decon just to be sure.”

“Good. I have some surveys to decipher,” he said quietly. “You want to have dinner?” he asked Rianya. She’d not said much to him since his return from the planet. She nodded once and followed him out the door.

“I know you’re angry,” he said as they walked down the corridor to the galley and captain’s mess. “I couldn’t send you down there.”

“You said I could go then you said I not go. Why?” Tom hesitated, wanting to get the words right.

“This bug is killing thousands of Cinconians every day. They haven’t been able to kill it, for centuries. If we end up with this problem, I want Adams to concentrate on humans, and not have to split his attention half a dozen ways to humans, and you, and Zalara, and Quixote, and Cinconians. I want the least exposure possible.” Rianya was quiet. “Do you understand what I’m saying?”

“Of course. That was an intelligent decision,” she said softly. They came to the mess and followed through until they passed into the private dining room.

“Where’s Zalara?”

“I had kid-watch this morning, then they had an hour of school with Anne, then another with Bailey, and they’re with Cat now since you all got back.”

“I heard my name,” their chef said, entering the captain’s mess from the galley. “You two are here for dinner? It’s a little early, but in ten minutes I’ll have it out for you.” She vanished as quickly as she’d come in.

“So how’s the body from Cuatro coming along? Anything interesting?” The steward brought a tray of assorted items including iced tea and bread to the table.

“Actually, yes,” she said, taking a hot dinner roll and biting into it. “I confirmed human DNA, but not exclusively. There are other nu… nuu…nuc-lee-oh-tides that I’m going to catalog then compare to what’s in the database.” She dipped the roll in a shallow dish of honey. Tom poured two tall glasses of tea.

“This thing is re-writing our history. I just don’t understand how it can be all those things: old, human, and on Eta Cass Cuatro.” He shook his head and took a long drink of the tea.

“Well, Tom, you’ll figure it out.”

“Not my job, really. I’m here to deal with the crisis on Eta Cass Cinco. And I haven’t figured out why Dukvita is hovering around but I’m betting he’s connected somehow.”

“Do you think they’re all connected?” Rianya picked up her tea. Tom reached to the intercom and pressed a red button.

“Sick bay.”

“Doc, can you tell me what the Cinconians are using right now to treat their plague patients?”

“Sure. An aminoglycoside,” Adams said.

“That tells me exactly nothing. Is that an antibiotic? How long have they been using it?”

“Yes. Decades. That’s why it’s not working anymore. The bug is resistant. I’m thinking of using a Trojan horse gene to target the little titans’ cell membranes, just this one bacterium--”

“What did they use before that?”

“Are you taking up medicine, Jack?” Tom didn’t answer but gave the voice panel an impatient stare. “They had a form of synthetic penicillin, something like Earth’s amoxicillin, but the bacteria is resistant to that now. It’s just like we suspected.”

“Thanks, Doc.” Tom looked at Rianya.

“Antibiotic resistance,” she said. “Oh, I said that right, didn’t I?”

“We had a terrible issue with that on Earth a century ago. The doctors couldn’t come up with enough variety of drugs the bacteria were mutating so quickly. Ten billion people all suffering from something. My father’s father got a cut on his leg, and in three days he was dead from a simple bacteria. Three days.” Rianya’s eyes widened and she sat up straighter, staring at Tom while he stirred his tea.

“You never told me that. How did they deal with it?”

Mr. Harchett, the ship’s steward, came in with two dishes of a casserole, still steaming from the oven.

“That looks great, thanks.” Tom dropped the conversation over the bacterial quandary when the scent of baked chicken and pasta compelled him to take a bite despite the obvious temperature. “This is so good,” he mumbled, then looked up. Rianya was waiting for an answer. “Oh, ask Doc but they used genetic splicing.”

“You humans love playing with genes.”

“A little too much if you ask me,” Tom said before spearing another chunk of chicken casserole.

“You eat all that pasta and you’re going to crash at twenty hundred.” Tom looked up suddenly to discern if she was sending a subtle communication or it was just his imagination.

“I thought you were mad at me.”

“I was, for a lot of reasons that don’t matter anymore.” She faced her dinner but looked up at Tom. The corners of her mouth turned up just the tiniest bit, and her brows relaxed over her exotic eyes. The frilled pupils would dilate to big round dots when she was about to ambush him with affection.

“Harchett!” he shouted into the galley. The man’s face appeared in the archway. “Coffee with desert tonight.”

                                                                     ~~~

Morning arrived exactly as it always did on the Maria Mitchell. Lights brightened slowly from darkness, and a faint chime grew a little louder as the seconds ticked by. Rianya didn’t want to get up at all, comfortable as she was sharing Tom’s pillow, her face in his neck, his scratchy morning face touching the tip of her nose.

His body was warm, smooth from his neck to his legs on the back. She shifted until they fit like spoons in a drawer, despite how much bigger he was in every dimension. She placed one hand on top of Tom’s shoulder and slowly stroked down his arm, curious, still, why humans had sparse hair growing from their elbows to fingers but not higher. Was there an evolutionary benefit, or was it akin to bright colors on a male bird’s tail, something to attract a mate?

The lights were at full brightness and the chime had gotten louder then finally stopped. Oh six hundred was oh so early for her. Tom rustled over to his other side to face her, wrapping one arm around her and pulling her close. He still hadn’t opened his eyes and she didn’t want him to. If he woke the bliss could break and might not return for a long time again.

She was fond of Tom’s alien hair against her skin when they were face to face. If her theory about the male birds was right, it had certainly worked on her. His maleness surpassed other men she’d known intimately. From top to bottom he was nothing but bone, muscle, and heart.

“Hmm. Breakfast in bed,” he muttered, eyes still closed, not moving a muscle. She nestled up under his chin and moved her hand to his ribs. Finding her face under her blanket of hair he kissed her brows and her closed eyes. The chime started up again, softly, growing louder.

“Make it stop,” Rianya said.

“Alarm, stop,” Tom commanded and the chime obeyed. For another minute they lay together, entwined, warm, quiet.

“Mama, Papa,” came Zalara’s voice through the door a half second before she did, promptly climbing on the bed. “Time for get up.”

At noon Rianya traded off the child care to Cat and went up to sick bay. She walked in on a huddle. Dr. Adams, Dr. Ferris, P.A. Mills, Nurse Henderson, and Tom clustered around a table and a peculiar silence pervaded the room.

“What’s going on? Have you found something?” All faces turned to her. She stepped back, startled at the look of panic, or horror, or surprise, or all of those emotions to one degree or another on each face.

“We’ve identified the pathogen,” Adams said gravely. He nodded to call Rianya closer to the gathering. She joined them, unsure if the name of the bacteria was important or if they should just start treating it. “It was in our database, but we didn’t find it right away. It’s ancient, and virtually extinct on Earth.”

“You all look like you’ve seen death itself.”

“We have,” Tom said. “This is Yersinia pestis.”