Symbiosis: Chapter 35

“We not cancel games!”

“You must postpone them until after the crisis is over, or, at least contained,” Jackson insisted. He stood as tall as he could but he still had to look up into Yee Odalis’ face to meet his gaze.

“You understand not tradition and important games. All people come, people on all planet. Most journey to New Hope festival to choose leaders.”

“It’s going to set us back years; you’ll be starting all over with the pandemic.” Jackson cleared his throat and sat down in one of the discomfited chairs in the medical office. “We came light years in our fastest ship at your request to stop the spread and contain the outbreak. “If you can’t stop the games, tell me who can and I’ll talk to them.”

“We did not request,” Odalis said.

“I’m sorry, you’re right, it was Akadar.”

“Akadar ask Kiians solve, they not make disease go away. Kiians tell Akadar to request humans help, not Pegasi help.”

Jackson closed his eyes and let the new information sink in. The Kiians suggested that humans come to help. Why humans and not any other advanced race? The mummy, the mostly human mummy, they found on Cuatro had the same disease as the Cinconians have.

“The Kiians thought humans could cure the plague? Why?”

“I said before, Captain, Yee Akadar and Kiians not include New Hope peoples at time.” Jackson scratched hard at his head and started to pace in a circle in front of Odalis. The body and this plague are linked, and the Kiians know more than they’re admitting to.

“I sent my crew to ask the Kiians to provide people to help. The few dozens of us can’t treat half a billion Cinconians. If the Kiians won’t come to help…”

“We have all people needed. The Ortars help.”

“The Ortars?”

“Those That Work,” Odalis said. “You see them. They pale, small, long fur. They work as we ask.”

“All of them?”

“They are,” Odalis began and frowned. “Otars not attend schools, all live together, only work, not thinkers. All Yees can command their Otars to work on medicals with humans.” Was Odalis was referring to that race, that caste, as slaves? Perhaps, but he didn’t have time to think about the social norms, just the medical ones.

“Humph. Okay, Doctor Adams wants a thousand pairs of feet at every Site to go out into the communities with medicine. Can they do that?”

“Yes, they always do. Do what a yee ask.” Jackson wasn’t sure Odalis understood what he meant by ‘can’.

“They follow instructions well?”

“Yes.”

“Do any speak Kiian or Human language? How can we give them orders?”

“We tell, not humans tell.”

“My team can write down the instructions, we will get it translated, and then all the Otars can read the instructions?”

“Inst… in … read? Otars not read. But yees read and tell Otars.” Tom nodded as he thought he’d made a break through. “But after our games to choose new chancellor of New Hope Colony.”

Jackson’s hands clenched. It was still a stalemate but at least he’d moved a few pieces.

“I’ll be in my room, talking to my team,” he told the white Cinconian, who nodded. On his way down the hall he thought about the new tidbits. Yee Akadar had been the instigator of the mission, and Yee Odalis was simply following suit.

“Adams,” the doctor answered.

“It’s Jack. How’s it going at UMA?”

“I found out something this morning. There is some kind of outdoor event game going on in a few days and that’s all anyone wants to talk about now. Something about elections I think.”

“Same problem here,” Jackson said. “Look, I can’t talk them out of it, but I did get Odalis to commit bodies to the medical stations. You know those furry ones always sweeping and cooking? I think they’re a slave caste.”

“You didn’t know that?”

“They don’t seem ill-treated, although they aren’t educated. I don’t have time to debate the morality of their civilization. Odalis assures me in his broken ‘human’ that we can put something together, get it translated, then distribute it to the stations and then the Cinconians can take it from there.”

“We’ve managed to set up a pretty large production facility here, and a lot of those Otars have helped. As soon as Mr. Lee can bring the raw materials we can get moving.”

“Lee has the list. I’ll touch base with him. Anything else besides these games going to throw us off schedule?”

“Jack, I want to use an attenuated vaccine I was working on aboard Maria Mitchell using tissue cultures from Quixote and Rianya.”

“A what?”

“It should be effective with a single dose against Y. pneumonia. But the catch is it’s reactive. It can make a body sick if the body is compromised to begin with. So I want to make a killed version as well to take with us.”

“I thought we were giving antibiotics to sick patients, not vaccines.”

“We may encounter Cinconians that aren’t sick with Yersinia and will still need a vaccine. I’m not going to give anyone a course of ciprofloxacin prophylactically.”

“Doc, bottom line me. How long?”

“I don’t know for sure. Five or six days if I have incubators and lab equipment. I think I can use what’s here at UMA headquarters.”

Jackson sat back in his chair. Naked Neptune, it was gonna be another damn week.

“Maria Mitchell’s at Cuatro. It will be a bit before they’re back. They might as well go ahead with their election games. I can’t see that anything we have to say about spreading infection will stop them.”

“We could treat everyone who comes with the modified vaccines. Look at this as an opportunity for a huge immunization party.”

“That thought crossed my mind as well. Alright. I’ll talk to Lee, get him started on the raw materials, I’ll let Odalis know his Otars will work and they can expect us to be vaccinating those who attend the almighty important games.”

“You sound tired, Jack, get some rest.”

“I’m still standing. Don’t worry about me. Thanks, Doc.”

~~~

“We’re about to enter orbit around Cinco,” Ensign Rougeau announced. Quixote stood behind the navigator as the icy features of Cinco’s surface began to grow larger and richer in the bow windows. The black space began to disappear.

“Thank you Mr. Rougeau. Assume a geo-standard orbit at the UMA longitude. Mr. Watson, please hail Captain Jackson at the New Hope facility.” Although accustomed to standing when he spent time on the bridge Quixote decided to ask the captain about modified seating options for non-humanoids.

“Mills to bridge.”

“Quixote.”

“Have you contacted the captain?”

“Not as of yet, Mr. Mills. I’ll contact you as soon as I am able to patch him through. I didn’t forget.”

“Thanks.”

“Sir, I have Lieutenant Lee in the shuttle,” Watson said. Quixote nodded and stepped a little closer to the com panel. Humans often had difficulty with his voice if he wasn’t relatively close to the sound receiver.

“Mr. Lee, what’s your status?”

“Glad to hear from you Maria Mitchell. Things have gotten a bit dicey here and we’ll be coming up to secure supplies needed for the vaccine manufacture.”

“Is the captain nearby?”

“No, sir, he’s stationed at New Hope. I’m at Site One.”

“Mr. Watson?” Quixote asked the man next to him.

“There was no response to the private coms at New Hope. I tried all three.”

“Mr. Lee, when do you next check in with New Hope?”

“Well, sir, about an hour ago, and, um, I can’t raise them. I heard from Dr. Adams, though. He wants me to rendezvous with you to pick up medical supplies. I have a manifest to transmit.”

“So where is Captain Jackson?” Mr. Lee’s pause gave Quixote just enough time to worry.

“I’m afraid I don’t know, Quixote, sir.”

“It’s urgent I speak with him regarding several different situations we’ve encountered. Before you come to get supplies, I’d like you to find him. I suspect he will insist on accompanying you.”

“Aye sir.”

“And Mr. Lee…we have taken a geosynchronous orbit near the UMA longitude. Seems there is a Pegasi spacecraft doing the same but at the New Hope longitude.” Another pause.

“Understood. Any message, sir?” Quixote tilted his head to Mr. Watson and blinked once, slowly, the small round pupils growing large.

“Communications, Mr. Lee, will follow protocol by Factor Eleven.”

“Aye, sir,” came the reply. “Lee out.” Quixote stepped back toward the elevator.

“Quixote,” Mr. Rougeau called. “Do you suspect the Pegasi are tapping?”

“If they know we’re here, or discover we’re here, I could bet my life on it.” He called the elevator; the steps were not particularly simple for a Draconian to take on the down trip. “I’ll be in sick bay.”

Mr. Mills stopped him as soon as the doors opened.

“Did you get a hold of Captain Jackson?”

“I’m sorry, he’s not available. You must know that I’ll have him contact you at his first possible convenience. May I ask how Ms. Zalara is doing?”

“She’s starting to come apart at the seams. I can’t distract her, she won’t play with Honey, watch pictures, she won’t do her schoolwork.”

“Her affection for her mother is irrepressible. She is still here in the sick bay?” Mills nodded in the direction of one of the bed chambers. “Call the galley and ask them to prepare us some dinner and bring it here, would you mind?” Quixote stepped as quietly as he could, his claws clacking on the floor. Zalara sat by Rianya’s bedside. Xe had so little experience with the human family unit; what would one of the humans do? 

Symbiosis: Chapter 34

Jackson watched the activity outside the window of his room in the New Hope building. He could see the stone marker, an obelisk, where Kiians had arrived and changed the course of their history. Dozens of Cinconians crisscrossed the courtyard going about business as usual.

The rusty colored, longer furred Cinconians outnumbered the white and brown Cinconians as he’d noticed when they first arrived in New Hope, at least the ones doing the work. He began to wonder if they operated under a caste system and these were the unskilled labor caste. They focused on their tasks: sweeping, driving, cooking, cleaning, carrying out repairs in the road. Satisfying his curiosity would be a diplomatic inquiry he wanted to consider from all angles first.

Tom was surprised when someone knocked at his door. The room was cold, as usual, so he threw a heavy blanket over his shoulders and slid off the cot. He’d not been expecting Yee Akadar.

“Come in, please,” Tom said and stepped aside. The person in charge of the United Medical Authority looked down and stepped just inside the doorway.

“Jackson, we invite you, humans, at yearly Tournament in five days.”

“A what? A game?”

“Many games but not for fun. For new leaderships.” Tom opened a Mylar package and poured the contents into a solar kettle. He was going to need coffee for this conversation.

“Choosing new leaders? A contest?”

“A battle contest. Cinconian tradition require teams which want rule to earn must in combat.” Tom didn’t like the sound of that. It sounded like Yee Akadar was proposing a polite war. He tried to rub some sense into his brain with his hands.

“Tell me more.” He retrieved a cup from the table and readied it to receive the liquid magic heating in the kettle. The room had two chairs; Tom pushed one a dozen centimeters in Akadar’s direction. The fellow sat and began his story.

“Hundreds years as world go round sun Cinconians want to be leaders must…” Akadar stopped and a scowl appeared on his face. “Not know right words. Eh, champion must show strong more than other.”

“I understand. A contest for leadership.”

“Agreed. All want to be leaders battle in showground. You human people come on showground, see battle?”

“Do a lot of people come to the showground? It wouldn’t be a good idea to get a lot of people gathered while we try to stop the plague.”

“Not able stop Tournament. Many people come.”

“I thought you understood that all gatherings had to be cancelled while we fight the epidemic.”

“Not can stop Tournament. Must go, all go.” The yee’s face didn’t easily reveal its owner’s emotions, but Tom could hear an apology in his halting human words. He sighed in defeat and poured his coffee.

“We will come to the Tournament.” Akadar smiled, more or less, and got up to leave.

“Humans at Stations also see? No Cinconians to give medicine to so should all come.” Tom nodded as the yee left, ambling down the hall on short legs, his green cloak waving goodbye around his ankles.

A fight for leadership didn’t sound like a good idea in the best of circumstances, but with a killer bacteria on the loose, one that transmits through casual contact, well…

Tom picked up his portable telecom and signaled Scott Gregory. The doctor answered after several long moments.

 “Captain?”

“Sorry, I know it’s early. We need to talk. I’m bringing coffee.”

Tom poured a cup while his friend dressed for the cold weather outside. He explained what Akadar had just tried to communicate about the social event of the year.

“We told them no big gatherings. Where did this come from all of a sudden?” Scott grumbled. He took the cup from Tom and cautiously tested the temperature with a noisy sip.

“Apparently it’s their election cycle.”

“That’s barbaric. This is a civilized world. Why not just promote from within or by vote?”

“Ours is not to reason why. I had an idea. Akadar wants all of us to come – not just you and me but Adams, Ferris, everyone out at the site locations. He says no Cinconians will be there, everyone goes to the Tournament. What if we use the Tournament as a medical station? Everyone who is going in will get a vaccine or medication.”

“Closing the barn door after the horse is gone?”

“Not necessarily,” Tom said. “If people are really sick they can’t come. Only the healthy and exposed will be able to make it. We can tackle hundreds in one day.”

“Are you sure the contagious ones won’t show up?”

“If you had the Black Plague would you go to an election rally or a basketball game?”

“These people don’t do what you’d expect them to,” Scott said. He took a serious drink from his coffee cup. “How many do you think will show up?”

“I couldn’t get a number out of him. I expect it will be at least a thousand.”

The two sat in silence with their morning coffee and looked back and forth at each other in sympathy. Tom finished first and refilled his cup. He wondered if Rianya was having tea alone and if his daughter might be doing the same thing with her playmate.

“If we can’t talk them out of it, we might as well use the opportunity to treat a bunch of them at once,” Tom summarized. “Why don’t you get a hold of the site leaders and tell them to prepare to come to New Hope in a few days.”

Jackson left shortly to assess the size of the showground but wasn’t prepared for what he saw when his hired ground vehicle stopped a few kilometers out of town. Akadar hadn’t done it justice when he called it a showground. Showgrounds were for county fairs. It was bigger than The G in Australia. It was bigger than the Superdome in North America. This ‘showground’ was an Olympic masterpiece of architecture if for nothing but sheer size alone that made anything on Earth look puny. Constructed of iron beams, it wasn’t oval but octagonal, and by some feat of engineering it was covered, probably because of the incessant cold weather. Nevertheless, this was a monument to the Cinconians love of entertainment.

It covered acres of land. He wasn’t sure he could walk around the entire thing if he’d had an hour to do so. Hundreds of the rusty, slightly shaggy Cinconians busied themselves around the amphitheater, putting up flags, zig zagging every which way, hustling to prepare it for the Tournament and the spectators. Tom has seriously underestimated their commitment to this event and the magnitude of the task.

The captain meandered toward what appeared to the main entrance taking in the vastness and details as he walked. Square stones decorated the entire exterior, and the entrance was flanked by dozens of thick lush greenery. An angular arch, half an octagon, led into the stadium. As Tom neared the entrance a pair of rusty Cinconians crossed his path and stopped.

“No can enter yet,” one of them said in his native language. Tom recognized the word “no” and turned back, taking a few steps but then cautiously made his way towards the bushes until they were out of sight. When his patience had run low he trotted to the entrance and slipped inside.

Inside the octagon a massive fire pit, cold, filled with rocks, and five meters in diameter, blocked his direct path. Each gigantic wall had two arches that led out of the arena and into the depths of the stadium. The floor was dirt, no turf, and Tom felt a genuine chill zip down his spine and raise every hair on his arms. He saw gladiators, swords, shields, blood, Romans screaming in the seats, their hands with thumbs up and thumbs down. He stood at the threshold of the Colosseum.

This would more than exacerbate the plague. An event of a hundred thousand people spreading disease and slowing the rescue to a crawl, or even halting it completely, had to be stopped. Jackson jogged out the way he’d come and raced down the stone steps. He bolted to the street where he could wave a vehicle to stop and return him to the New Hope building. Despite the chill sweat broke out and his heart pounded. Almost nauseous he jumped in a transport and tried to remain calm on the ride back.

He nearly jumped out of the vehicle and stumbled, paying the driver and shooting inside the building, down the hall to the sleeping rooms. He banged on Scott’s door, waited ten seconds, then banged again. Jackson spun about and dashed back to his own room. Inside, he stood still and took a few deep breaths to calm himself before he dug out his telecom and hailed the Maria Mitchell.

He waited. It would take a couple of minutes to get a signal to them and get a reply. He couldn’t let this Cinconian spectacle of power proceed. It wasn’t just a small gathering of a thousand, or even ten thousand. New Hope would soon be hosting a hundred thousand people in the middle of an eternal pandemic.

His telecom bleeped.

“Captain, we’re reading you. We’re currently in orbit of Cuatro and discussing terms with Kiians. Please acknowledge.”

“This is Jackson. Return to Cinco at the first possible opportunity. We’re not going to have time to wait for Kiians to get on board. Let me know as soon as you’re in orbit. Jackson out.”

Symbiosis: Chapter 33

“We were not informed of such data,” Gorren said with a decidedly dramatic inflection.

“Were you not part of the team that discovered the genetic components of the mummy?” Mr. Rougeau asked before Quixote could respond.

“We didn’t examine why it died.”

“How do you know it died from Yersinia?” Rougeau said. Quixote was impressed with the navigator’s interrogation.

“Everything that gets it dies.”

“Excuse us a moment,” Prediz interrupted, gathering the Kiians in a huddle while Quixote and the three humans waited.

“What’s this about?” Stone asked quietly. Watson shrugged.

“Is there more we can talk about?” Gorren said. The four of them returned to the table and sat down.

“Can you shed some light on the role of the Pegasi, then?” Quixote asked the four Kiians. Harchett came in with more water and this time a carafe of coffee and seven cups. Quixote never drank coffee and made no secret that, in fact, xe hated it.

“Pegasi?” Gorren asked. Stone sighed audibly and Rougeau shook his head ever so slightly. Quixote ignored their communications as to not draw attention to their disrespect, although xe wished xe could do the same.

“You said earlier that they took over the care of the Cinconians when Kiians were unable to find a cure,” Quixote said with Job’s patience.

“Yes, but why would be know?”

“Never mind. Let me get back to why we really came to speak with you. It’s about help. Our team is helping the Cinconians fight their plague, but we need people to help. We are asking for you to bring people to Cinco to help fight the plague.” The only sound was that of Harchett pouring coffee in ceramic cups.

“How many people?” Markrem asked.

“A thousand people.”

“A thousand! To do what?” Gorren demanded.

“Help on Cinco to spread the medicine, or, perhaps, set up one of your research facilities here on Cuatro to manufacture vaccines.”

“I don’t understand your words. Is Captain Jackson going to join us?”

“Captain Jackson is on Cinco. He asked me to step in for him in this matter.”

“Quixote,” Prediz said. “We may have some answers for you, but I’m not authorized to release it.” The project overseer should have the authority.

“About the Pegasi?”

“Not Pegasi. The artifact, the dry dead human.”

“I’d like to know that information,” said the woman suffering from exposure by the body of Yersinia.

“Is there, perhaps, something you would like to trade in exchange?”

The Kiians smiled at each other and nodded, chattering and twittering like children about to negotiate candy bars for rocks.

“We didn’t think humans would want to collect another artifact,” Gorren said. “Perhaps you would like to come to the planet and look at it?”

“It?” Quixote didn’t want to get stranded on the planet, at the mercy of the Kiians’ shuttle schedule, but what would xe miss out on by declining the offer of another artifact.

“It’s almost destroyed,” Prediz added.

“I’m afraid you’ll have to tell me what would be worth a trip to Cuatro. I dislike EV suits as I told you before.” Xe had a custom suit that accommodated a large tail, a tall body, and a mesocephalic skull, but the actual wearing of the garment posed difficulties aside from discomfort.

The Kiians hesitated and dawdled over the coffee for nearly a minute. Prediz set down her cup and took a deep breath.

“It’s a space capsule.”

~~~

“Well, somebody has to stay on deck,” Quixote said as the small crew boarded the Kiian shuttle at the airlock. Honey Stone and Zalara Jackson stood by the big reptile’s side like soldiers as the doors shut. “I hope you young ladies are able to occupy yourselves in the gymnasium this evening until Mr. Mills can come for you.”

“We can both stay in my quarters,” Honey assured him.

“You are required to have adult supervision, and we are short of available adults right now. I want your mother to be able to watch you from the video system,” he said directing that to Zalara. “I’ll be on the bridge,” he told them and hustled them toward the elevator.

Quixote stopped at the galley and begged a tall glass of juiced celery from Bailey before he headed up top. The bridge was remarkably quiet; only xtself and the navigator were there as Mr. Watson had joined the landing party.

Xe thought about putting together a report for the captain regarding the diversion from gathering medical troops to collecting a space ship, and despite the magnitude of the outcome, xe’d not accomplished the mission Jackson had assigned. The captain would still need bodies in the field doing actual work on Cinco, and vaccines in the manufacturing process as well, if they were to ever leave the Eta Cassiopeia system.

“Sick bay to bridge.”

“Quixote.”

“Sir, I’m worried about Ms. Jackson,” Mr. Mills said bluntly.

“Which Ms. Jackson?” Quixote asked.

“Rianya. Her symptoms are worsening. The antibiotics don’t seem to be working.”

“Not everyone responds to medicine for humans the same way,” he reminded the young man. More than once the same situation had applied in xts own life.

“But it’s the germ that we’re targeting, and it’s the same as the one we’re killing on Cinco.”

“Is there something you would like me to do, Mr. Mills? I would think this is your area of expertise; it’s unquestionably not mine.”

“I need you to be aware. I’m going to try a new therapy for her, but if you hear from the captain, it might be better if he doesn’t speak with her. She sounds terrible.”

“I agree, Mr. Mills. The captain will worry, as he would for any of us.” Well, perhaps he would worry a bit more for his wife but Quixote wasn’t positive. Captain Jackson was created of curiosity and compassion to a fault. “I’ll simply tell him she’s resting and that you’ve said she can’t be disturbed.”

“Thank you, sir, Mills out.”

“Rougeau, who is aboard?” Quixote rarely sat down when on the bridge. Again, the chairs were designed for humans.

“Beside the two of us, and the children, Bailey, Anne, Kym, Harchett, Mills, and Rianya, of course. Ten souls.”

“Stay in orbit, and let me know if anything comes up. I’ll be in engineering, where it’s warmer than this bridge. When Stone calls up just patch it down there.”

“Aye, sir, will do.”

Quixote and Kym Byrd spent several hours testing and adjusting the positron–electron chambers while the landing party had all the fun on Cuatro. He’d just taken apart one of seven de Laval nozzles when the com channel signaled.

“Stone?”

“Yes sir. I have intriguing information for you about the space capsule.”

“I’d like to hear it.”

“I’m not sure you will.” Quixote looked at Byrd. Her eyes widened and shoulders lifted.

“Like it or not, I need to know what you found.”

“Mr. Watson and I think we should have it towed on board.”

“Wait, wait, just a minute. Bring it on board Maria Mitchell? Just how sizeable is it? What about radiation emissions? Why risk bringing it--”

“I don’t want to discuss it on an open com, sir. The ship is small and would fit in the CEV bay. It only appears large enough for four people at most. It’s in bad shape, obviously crash landed some time ago.”

“The Kiians are willing to tow it to us?”

“For a price,” she responded. Quixote considered the possibilities. It could transpire into a Trojan Horse of any number of dangerous variants.

“I’m going to need more than that, Ms. Stone. Send me some images and data on its hull. Can you tell where it came from? Does it verify interplanetary travel for the Cuatrons?”

“No, sir. But I can tell you one very odd thing.” He waited.

“And that is?”

“Quantum dating registers the vehicle as four hundred eight years positive, and four hundred twelve years negative.”

Symbiosis: Chapter 32

The Maria Mitchell entered orbit of Cuatro with Quixote in the captain’s chair. Mr. Watson began to connect a transmission with the original Kiians they had contacted when the mummy was picked up, for lack of another person to contact.

“Standard orbit, sir,” Rougeau said as the ship’s thrusters locked the starship in a geosynchronous dance with the fourth planet in orbit around Eta Cassiopeia. From the massive bow windows, Cuatro appeared more cloudless than cloud covered, its ruddy complexion dull and muted compared to the azure oceans and emerald continents of Earth, or even the icy aquamarine poles and rich liquid lapis of Cinco’s equator.

 

The planet would be dry and hot; the atmosphere was as thin as the air on Mount Everest. Quixote thought for a few moments before ordering anyone to the airlock that xe should make every entreat to entice the Kiians to the Maria Mitchell without exposing their vulnerability: no shuttle, no doctor, no captain, no evidence. What did xe have to offer?

“I’ve got Commander Gorren, sir,” Watson said, tapping some icons on his screen. Then xe nodded at Quixote.

“Commander Gorren, this is Lieutenant Quixote of the Earth ship Maria Mitchell.”

“Yes, Lieutenant, what can I do for you? I wasn’t expecting to hear from any humans since you collected the specimen.”

“We’re looking for your help, actually,” xe told her. “It’s a complex issue. Perhaps you and your colleagues would like to come up to the Maria Mitchell. We’d be happy to host you here.”

“I’m not sure our schedule would allow for a visit,” the commander said. Quixote didn’t have any other choice.

“If I may appeal to your generosity, I personally have difficulty with our environmental suits. I am Draconian, not human.”

“We haven’t met?”

“No, commander. Captain Jackson asked me to manage this request on our behalf.” Xe looked at Stu and Jean, searching their faces for their thoughts on xes approach. Accustomed to reading humans by their body temperature, xe hadn’t become adept at reading their faces, even after forty years of working with them daily.

“I will get back with you shortly, Lieutenant,” Gorren said, and the telecom went off. Xe was a little surprised at the Kiian female’s abrupt disconnect but simply turned to Mr. Watson.

“You’ll be sure to advise me when she communicates again?”

“Aye, sir.”

“I’ll be in engineering,” the big reptile said and xe left the bridge but stopped in the galley on the way.

“Quixote, I don’t see you in here too often,” Bailey greeted him warmly with a soft tone of voice. “Can I get you a celery juice?”

“You’re so very kind to offer, yes, thank you,” xe said. She immediately turned and started to dig inside the refrigeration unit. “I actually came to let you know we will be hosting some Kiians later today, likely lunch or dinner fare. I’d like to ensure we’ve made our best attempt to accommodate them. I will be asking for a large favor; captain said they respond best over a dining situation.”

“Sure, we can do that. How many?” She straightened up with a vacuum packed heart of celery in her hand.

“I haven’t ascertained the exact number, but no more than six, I have to suspect.” He watched Bailey tear open the package and snap the stalks in half before putting them in a chopping machine.

“I think the captain told me about what they’d eaten on Cuatro a couple weeks ago. I’ll look in the ship’s log and see what I can find.” She turned on the machine for ten seconds and an ear splitting racket shook xes senses. Xe hadn’t thought about what was entailed in preparing his favorite morning drink before, and considered Bailey needed more credit for her efforts in caring for the crew.

The Kiians arrived a few hours later; Quixote greeted them at the airlock with Mr. Watson and Ms. Stone. Quixote made every effort to shorten his stride on the way to the mess so the Kiians wouldn’t be jogging behind them but doing so put him off balance a little. Xe’s species had evolved to run, not walk the halls of spaceships in a diplomatic march.

“Will Jackson be joining us?” asked Commander Gorren.

“I’m afraid not,” Quixote said. “I hope that won’t be a hindrance. He sends his regrets but the urgency of our situation necessitated his absence.”

The four Kiians, two humans, and the Draconian settled around a table with plates filled from the buffet line. Steward Harchett approached with two carafes, one of water, and the other, as Quixote requested from the galley, tequila. Harchett began with the water.

“I am not fluent in the humans languages,” she said. “But we will do the best we can do.”

Ensign Rougeau joined the party making a party of eight around the table. He was the only one aboard who had gone to visit the Kiians when they’d picked up the mummy. Focused on the edibles, few words exchanged until Harchett poured the tequila and brought small dishes of custard for each diner.

“This is good,” the commander said, holding up her small goblet of tequila.

“I’m glad you like it. Captain Jackson remembered a plant ale you were fond of that was served on Cuatro.” Quixote watched Gorren’s face, the expressive wrinkles and brows similar to the humans, noting the reflective, somewhat distant focus of her eyes.

“I’m honored he remembered. Thank you. I would like to talk business now,” she said while Harchett cleared dishes. “This is our research manager, Markrem,” she pointed to her left, then turned to her right. “This is Prediz, our project overseer,” and she indicated the last Kiian on Markrem’s left, “and this is our security council chief, Selix.” All four Kiians around the table were female.

“It’s a pleasure to make your acquaintance,” Quixote said politely and introduced Rougeau, Stone, and Watson. “Let me get quickly to the subject at hand, Commander.” Suddenly Quixote knew why the captain had chosen xe to conduct the mission at hand. Xe had a permanent poker face that few primates could read except for the pupils of xe’s eyes that he had a margin of control over. He shifted in his seat a little, the human chairs not made for his physique.

“Were you aware that we were contacted by Cinconians to assist them in combating their medical plague? We’ve come to some interesting conclusions about it.”

The Kiians looked around the table at each other and then at the humans, then Quixote.

“Yes, actually, we had that information.” Her short answer clued Quixote that she knew more.

“We wondered because while we’ve been on Cinco illustrations surfaced that implicate Kiians bear some responsibility for the plague.”

“I am not understanding your words,” Prediz said. Faint chatters scuttled among the four hairy participants. Quixote looked at his crew members.

“Kiians have some blame for Cinco’s problem,” said Mr. Watson. It was blunt, but effective. They erupted in a few high pitched squeals and grunts.

“We not have blame for plague. Kiians had try helps long ago, long long time in past. Cincos asked Kiians for help, but we not have success in help,” Gorren insisted. The others bobbed their heads.

“May I ask what your efforts involved so that we don’t duplicate them?” The chattering subsided.

“We not have right medicine. Kiians kill many Cincos that had sickness much bad, do two things. One stopped suffering, other stopped germ. But too many.”

“Can you tell us when that happened?” The females looked at each other and seemed to be conferring a date.

“Revolutions of Cinco, 350, of Cuatro, 450 in past” Prediz said. Quixote looked at Rougeau for a translation.

“About 410 Earth years,” he said. Quixote nodded; the figure was cozy with Jackson’s estimates.

“So the Kiians just left?”

“Kiians contacted Pegasi long time past. They were okay to help Cincos.” Quixote froze at the word ‘Pegasi’. Quixote had little knowledge of medicine, and he was probably the most medically educated of the four of them, but perhaps for Ms. Stone. Her insulin resistant daughter cursed a knowledge of diseases upon her. He stepped to an intercom station and called Rianya.

“Rianya.”

“Ms. Jackson, I hate to disturb you,” Quixote began.

“It’s alright; what can I do for you?”

“Can you listen in to our conversation? Commander Gorren is speaking medicine and I need an interpreter.”

“Heh, of course,” she chuckled and coughed deeply. The raspy noise startled Quixote and the rest of the table. Xe thought better of turning on the visual.

“Do the Kiians know how the people on Cinco got sick?”

“Know how they got sick? Why would we know?” Gorren said. “We study the germ, found odd behavior,” she said, looking at each human in turn. “It changed all the time. Germ made little fake germs from adipose that fool the medicines. While medicine tries kill adipose, germ would change in secret.”

“Gorren, if I may, many facts we’ve encountered suggest that Kiians brought the plague, Yersinia, from Earth to Cinco.”

Silence draped over the table like a cold mist. No chattering, tittering, or words escaped from the Kiians. Suddenly Gorren stood up, tottered a moment on her feet, then became as stiff as steel.

“Kiians did not give germs to Cincos.” Quixote realized he would have to back up a bit, turn a little, try another approach. But that was the captain’s strong point, not the engineer’s. He took a long drink from the glass of water in front of him and grasped for another angle.

“I didn’t mean to accuse. We are simply looking for the answer as to why the mummy you gave us has Yersinia.”

Symbiosis: Chapter 31

CPO Stuart Watson sat at his console on the bridge and watched the small blip slowly travel across his view screen alternating orange and blue as it moved into the Eta Cassiopeia star system. He tried raising the ship through all transmission frequencies but all he could get was silence.

“Rougeau, can you take a look here?”

The ensign stood, stretched, and crossed the bridge, twisting his neck as his walked.

“What’s that?” he asked. Watson raised his brows and looked face-on at the navigator. They both looked back at the transparent screen and Rougeau took a closer look. “What kind of radiation is it emitting?”

“Krypton-Argon.”

“That’s what that Pegasi ship was putting out, a pale blue-green spectrum?” Watson touched a few spots on the viewer and the spectral analysis of the chemicals appeared before their eyes. “You better contact the captain,” Rougeau said. Watson nodded and turned back to his console panel to signal the landing party.

“Jackson.”

“Captain, I thought you’d want to be aware; there’s a Pegasi ship headed for Cinco. Appears as if it’s coming from Cuatro’s orbit, sir.” The com was silent. Stu wondered for a moment if he’d lost the signal.

“ETA to Cinco orbit?”

“About 22 hours, sir.”

“Keep me posted, Stu, every four hours, and can you patch me through to Rianya?”

“Stand by, sir.”

“Hi Tom!”

“Hello Love, how’s everything going?”

“I’m bored crazy but I don’t think I’m going to die.”

“Well, that’s good, because I miss you; it’s hard to get to sleep.”

“You’re not working hard enough, then.”

“Ha, that must be it. Have you gotten any symptoms?”

“No, not yet,” Rianya said.

“How’s ‘Lara?”

“She’s her bouncy little self, but she’s asking for you. How’s the fight down there?”

“Slow, but steady. Stu just told me a Pegasi ship is approaching, so I’m not sure what’s going to happen next. Might not have a chance to call you.”

“Oh, that’s not good. What do you think they want?”

“Profits. If we cure the Cinconians we’re crashing their little business here.”

“Please be careful. ‘Lara and I both need you back.”

“You know I will. Give ‘Lara a kiss for me.” 

Tom shut off the com and turned back to the food he’d been trying to eat. The Cinconians did their best to make more palatable choices available to the humans, hearing requests for something besides the plates of dried insects, worms, and crustaceans but some of it seemed truly inedible. And most of it was retch inducing raw. He could have sworn one crunchy fried morsel was a spider in some kind of batter.

Uncomfortably cool in the room for humans the Cinconians would have thought 15 was a comfortable setting. Tom didn’t know how to change the room temperature so he pulled on his field jacket and zipped it up.

He’d wondered if Dukvita might appear again since his business was about to dry up. He pushed the plate of grubs in their deceptively aromatic gravy away and figured hungry was better than the horror of eating maggots disguised as cuisine. What Tom wouldn’t give for an Angus steak, medium rare, and a pile of steamed zucchini with several gobs of butter melting on top. At least he’d had the sense to bring coffee and sugar. He looked up at a mercifully distracting knock on the door.

“Come in.”

“Hey, can you eat this? Because I’ll let you have mine. Melinda doesn’t even cook this badly.” His old friend held out a bowl with the same gravy covered larvae.

“No, I can’t. Is that what you came across the hall for?”

“I just wondered if you’d contacted the Kiians.”

“I just spoke with Stu. All he had to say was that a Pegasi ship is headed our way.” Tom pushed a chair towards Scott with his foot and Scott promptly fell into it and slid the bowl across the table away from both of them.

“Dukvita?” Scott asked. Tom only shrugged. “I think this occasion calls for some four letter words.” Tom broke a smile, closing his eyes and nodding at his old friend.

“Everyone’s deployed but you, me, and Mr. Wagner, so we all start at oh eight hundred tomorrow. Manufacture, distribution, administration, and documentation.”

“If it sounds good to you, then, I thought I’d have Chen make a daily round to each primary station we set up so he can deliver supplies, pick up records, and so on. I’ll coordinate so you can concentrate on whatever you need to. I can pick up the documentation if you want.”

“Who said you were only an astrophysicist? You obviously know how to execute a plan.” Tom stood up and grabbed a pitcher of water off a table and filled two glasses. “That’s good, because I have a feeling the Kiians and Pegasi are going to keep me pretty busy real soon.”

“How’s Rianya?” Scott took the proffered beverage. “Have you talked to her yet?”

“Just a few minutes ago when Stu called about the Pegasi ship. So far so good. I told the Maria Mitchell to break orbit and go to Cuatro. The greenies should be here about the same time. I didn’t want them seeing Maria Mitchell up there. Quixote’s orders are to get the Kiians to send at least a thousand medics to deal with this crisis, obviously not from Cuatro but from their home world.”

“Will they get here in time?”

“In time? Hm.” Tom refilled his glass. “We’ll be here for a year if they don’t get here pretty soon. We need people power, feet on the ground.” Tom took a few sips of icy water and set his glass down before the condensation would slide it from his grasp. “Let’s go find something to eat.”

~~~

“Good morning, Mr. Watson.” Tom blinked a few times before turning on the visual component of their com system. “I wasn’t expecting to hear from you quite this early.”

“I’m sorry if I woke you, sir.”

“No, no, I wasn’t asleep. What’s our status?”

“I’m going to patch you in to Quixote, sir.” Tom slid off the cot and in a few seconds realized he should have gotten up at least thirty minutes earlier.

“Good morning, Captain.” Tom returned to the com box when he heard Quixote’s vaguely British accent, retained from his education at Oxford a decade before they’d ever even met. For Tom, Quixote was proof that any language could be learned and retained for a lifetime. “I wanted to review the mission briefly. I’ve not had many opportunities to be your surrogate.”

“Sure.” Tom yawned and poured his cup of morning ambition before responding. His brain hadn’t quite engaged just yet. “It seems that the Kiians are responsible for bringing Yersinia from Earth to Cuatro and Cinco, either intentionally or accidentally, and we’re going to need them to commit medical personnel to the effort on Cinco. I want a thousand people, and if they can’t help or authorize it, find out who can and I want to talk to them.”

“I wasn’t aware we’d come up with evidence to implicate the Kiians.”

“Not so much evidence as circumstances with no other explanation,” Tom explained. “Illustrations confirm Kiians on Cinco burning victims. I have to think that the research teams on Cuatro aren’t a coincidence given that the mammalian species are virtually extinct there. I want to connect the dots once and for all.”

“Understood, Captain. I’ll do my best for you. Quixote out.”

Captain Jackson hurried through his morning routine and stepped into the sunshine of the lobby on time for the big launch. Containers stacked three meters high filled the room and his crew stood restless, ready to embark after the long trip in space to arrive.

Yee Akbar greeted Jackson and presented him to a table covered with trays of biscuits, hard cooked eggs, and a pale pink beverage. He raised his brows and a curious smile broke out.

“We asked for diet of your ship left before orbit. Breads, cooked eggs bird, juiced fruit mankella. Try,” the brown fellow insisted. Jackson glanced around but it didn’t appear as if any of the others had sampled the cuisine. He hoped the mankella juice would at least be palatable if nothing else, and taking a small sip he was surprised, amazed even that it might have passed for strawberries in lemonade on Earth with a hint more sugar.

“It’s good, I like it,” he said, waving Dr. Gregory and Mr. Wagner to join and try the drink. “Thank you, Yee, that was very thoughtful. We appreciate your consideration,” Jackson said while selecting a biscuit, or perhaps it was a muffin, finding it more than edible but downright enjoyable with a nutty flavor and sweet topping. The eggs were unusual, gamey, but edible.

Food! Things were looking up. Jackson insisted both of his crew members got plenty from the table before he went back for more. His brain cleared with an infusion of sugar and protein which it hadn’t done for the last couple of days. After a final glass of the sweet and sour fruit juice he looked around at his staff crew, the Cinconians, and saw them patiently waiting his orders. He pulled a telecom from his jacket pocket and opened up a broad band frequency.

“Jackson to Mission Teams, acknowledge. Jackson to Mission Teams, respond.”

“Team Three, acknowledge, Captain.”

“Team One, standing by.”

The New Hope team waited. Jackson looked at his men and the Cinconians.

“Team Two, respond,” he said.

“Team Two, aye Captain,” was Dr. Ferris’ voice.

“Does anyone have any questions about deployment? Everyone has their supplies and resources?” Some chatter on the telecom seemed confirming. “Very well, commence operations, check in with me directly every eight hours or as needed. Good luck.”

Symbiosis: Chapter 30

“Natural Selection favors the more resistant bacteria that adapts to its environs the best and procreates the most,” Dr. Ferris explained.

“It certainly does. Are we ready to get this project off the ground?” Captain Jackson asked his team. Eta Cassiopeia began to peek above the mountains and dawn had just turned to day. Mr. Wagner and Dr. Ferris stood with two Cinconians near the Osprey. They would be the first team to deploy away from base, assigned to the first map point about 3000 kilometers west of their current location. They all exchanged glances and climbed into the shuttle to be delivered to Site One.

While Lieutenant Lee flew them off, Jackson took advantage of the downtime and headed back inside the New Hope building where the climate was considerably more comfortable. Thousands of freeze dried vaccines made on the Maria Mitchell in boxes nearly reached the ceiling. Beside them millions of antibiotic pills in cubic meter containers also awaited deployment.

“Mr. Campbell, Mr. Bowen, I want you to team up with Pasi and be certain that all the necessary materials are available to start producing vaccines here at the New Hope factory. Once the supply list is confirmed, I’ll have the Painter join you to supervise the machining. And, you’re all going by ship, right? Okay, dismissed,” Jackson said and looked down at his planner and the two standing with Pasi, a dark brown Cinconian not much taller than humans.

“York, you and Adams are on Station Two with Akadar at the UMA building. The facilities there should be set up for drug manufacturer and you will have to shut down all other production in favor of the antibiotics. Adams, when that is set up and running, I’ll put you someplace else. They have enough medical staff there to do the job, no training needed, no oversee required. Put all your gear together so when Lee returns you can just jump in and go.”

“Aye, sir, we’ll get on it. Come on York,” Adams said and the two of them began their tasks.

“Okay, Painter, in the meantime, you and Odalis will travel to Station Three for factory repurpose. There are plenty of employees but that’s where retrofitting will be easiest to start production. Get the employees to do the work while you ensure all is on schedule. Then I’ll have you out to check on Station Two. Wagner, you’re here with us for now.”

“Mr. Lee is going to be awfully busy,” Dr. Gregory muttered to Jackson.

“We have to keep this going all day and night until there’s nothing left to do. I can fly a few in between so he can get some sleep.”

“What do you want me to do, exactly?”

“I need a mature team leader for these Cinconians. I feel they lack some discipline to stay on task. Stay here at New Hope and make sure they get these vaccines on transportation to the outer areas, the small towns and rural areas. Ships will be kind of slow, but again, there are places we can’t take the shuttle.”

“Aye, Captain.”

“And remember, Dr. Adams said we vaccinate three with one vial in areas where there are no reported cases. Our supplies will go a long way doing that while the manufacturing ramps up.”

“We’re going to be here more than a week, Tom,” Scott said.

“Maybe. The idea is to get them set up and get out.”

“What are you up to?” Scott asked.

“Besides keeping an eye on the mission I’m going to try and piece this thing together. How our half human mummy and the Kiians are related to both of these planets and a human bacteria.”

“Rianya’s smarts must be rubbing off on you,” Scott jibed.

“If only I could be that lucky. But I am picking up a lot of biology I never knew about before. Come on.” Tom and Scott wandered the corridor until they located their quarters to wait until the shuttle returned. “I brought something you might like to see,” the captain said, rifling through his travel case and pulled out a hard plastic bottle. Using two bowls from a stack he poured fifty-some mils of burgundy fluid into each, and handed his old friend one of them.

“This is?”

“Medicine for anything that ails you.”

“Since when do you drink before noon?”

“Is it still morning?” was his rhetorical comeback. He knocked his bowl against Scott’s bowl and took a sip of the Auchsonian brandy letting the flames trickle down the back of his throat until he felt the essence land hard in the pit of his stomach. Not used to celestial-proof alcohol, he wheezed out a cough, throttled by the unexpected effect and sat quickly in the nearest chair.

“Tom, what in hell is this?” Scott hadn’t touched the bowl to his lips or tasted the elixir and hesitated when he caught Tom’s reaction.

“Fortitude,” he croaked, carefully putting the bowl on a table.

“I think I’ll pass,” Scott said, putting the bowl next to Tom’s. “What’s wrong?” he asked, joining Tom at the table.

“Are you a mind reader like Rianya now?”

“Come on, it’s me you’re talking to.”

“Something doesn’t make sense here and I’m trying to loosen the cement in my head. These people barely have technology to talk to each other across the planet, much less across a dozen light years.”

“You have a point; they’re all about instant gratification. Infrastructure is a mess, health is in trouble, but they seem to enjoy passive entertainment.”

“Precisely my point,” Tom said, clearing his throat of the broiling brandy. “We’ve come all this way to help them, and they’re so docile about it. I don’t understand. They had Pegasi supplying them with antibiotics, so why didn’t they just ask them for help?”

“Profit?” Scott’s gray eyes flickered.

“Yes, there’s no profit in curing the plague. But Earth is twenty light years from here. Why us?”

Tom pushed some items to the back of the table and pulled out a large touch screen from his bag. He drew a circle in one corner and then another in the opposing corner, marking one with a 5 and one with a 4. He drew three squares along the bottom labeling one with an H, one with a P, one with a K. Scott watched on. Before Tom began, he took another swig of the vile brandy to reinforce his mettle.

“Help me sort this out. All right,” Tom began. “We have a couple scenarios as to how Yersinia got here and how Cinconians have been fighting it for decades and how it’s tied to that mummy. One way is if the body infected them, the other is if they infected the body.” The men huddled closer to the table, standing because the tall table and short legged chairs weren’t ergonomically designed for human comfort or function. “Let’s go with the ‘they infected the body’ theory first.” He entered some data on a portable reader and picked up another one.

“Who brought the disease from Earth if not the body?”

“It would have had to be Kiians or Pegasi or another space faring civilization. Earth wasn’t space faring four hundred years ago.” Scott nodded. “Stick with me on this one, we’ll tackle the other scenario when we’ve done this one to the end.

“So at some point Kiians, most likely, came to Earth, somehow contracted Yersinia, and brought it to Cuatro. It spread like crazy and wiped out the primates and higher mammals.”

“Okay, but how did it get to Cinco?” Scott asked.

“The Kiians again, must have taken it there. We saw those illustrations of Kiians killing Cinconians with laser pistols,” Tom reminded him.

“That might explain the research stations on Cuatro that Kiians are living in.”

“But why didn’t the Kiians help the Cinconians cure the plague? They don’t seem to have it anymore, if they ever did.”

“Why would Kiians take a human off Earth and bring him back with them?”

“He’s not all human,” Tom reminded him.

“They brought back a human, then it interbred, so our mummy couldn’t be the carrier. He must be a descendant.”

“Yes, that’s what I’m thinking too,” Tom said while he wrote the notes into a data pad and sat down in the odd chair. “So do you have another idea about the spread of this thing? It looks like Kiians are the culprit. They must have abducted a human for some reason.”

“What about the Pegasi?” Scott asked.

“They came later, obviously.”

“Why couldn’t they have been the vector?”

“You think a Pegasi landed on 14th Century Earth without being noticed? The Kiians could pass as humans if they had to.”

“You got me there.”

“Now your theory is that the mummy brought the Yersinia from Earth. But I can’t see how a mixed race human ended up on Cuatro without help from Kiians or Pegasi.

“So just for yuks we’ll say the Kiians brought a mixed race human with Yersinia to Cuatro four hundred years ago and that’s how they wiped out the Cuatrons. Then some of the Kiians took it to Cinco.”

“You’re right, Tom, that doesn’t make sense. How could there be a mixed race human anywhere 400 years ago, much less 800 years ago.”

“Yet…” Tom said, lightly biting the tip of his tongue. “The body dates to 800 years old. The extinction on Cuatro and the documentation on Cinco support the disease came 400 years ago.” Scott also sat down and the two officers’ faces mirrored each other with glossy eyes and impassive smiles.

“What is the missing piece here?” Tom asked rhetorically, almost under his breath.

“Does it really matter? We just need to get this pandemic under control and get out of here.”

“I need to know the responsible party. I think the Kiians were on Earth, brought the plague to Cuatro somehow, then infected the Cinconians, and asked the Pegasi to help with mountains of antibiotics, and now they have a resistance problem.”

“And so…” Scott hinted. “That still doesn’t explain Hero all dried up on Cuatro.”

“I need to get the Kiians on board here. A dozen humans and a few hundred puerile Cinconians aren’t going to be able to do this.”

Symbiosis: Chapter 29

“Papa, I want to go home.”

“Mama’s sick. You’ll just have to stay with Mr. Mills here in sick bay.”

“Why can’t I stay at Honey’s?”

“I need you here, Zalara,” Mills told her. The former nurse, now a Physician’s Assistant, would be the senior member of the medical team remaining in sick bay during the mission. Nurse Henderson would also stay aboard.

“To fix people?” she asked with wide, emerald eyes. Mills glanced at the captain and then bent down to Zalara’s level near the floor.

“Not necessarily, but you never know,” he said. Tom hadn’t disclosed Zalara’s ability, and he didn’t think Adams had done so either. Tom tried to ignore the real meaning behind her question.

“Can I fix Mama?” she asked, looking at Tom.

“No, what she has is all mixed up,” he told her. Zalara could heal a laceration, make a single organ cooperate, or, as in Tom’s case, remove a growing tumor deep in his brain, but microscopic trouble, at the cellular level, was not something she had the instinct to deal with the way a single cause could be isolated and dispatched.

Tom glanced up and Mills and shrugged as if he had no idea what Zalara was talking about. Mills winked back, and it seemed the Jackson secret was still safe.

“I’ll be back in a couple of days, Pet.”

“I want to go with you!” she wailed.

“’Lara, the germs are on the planet; I can’t let you go down there.”

“I don’t want the germ to get you like Mama.”

“It won’t,” Mills cut in. He leaned close to the small girl where her ear would be under her mop of chestnut hair. “I gave your dad a special weapon to take with him so he won’t get sick.” Check.

“Can I have a special weapon, too?” Checkmate.

“Pet, you just stay here with Mr. Mills and Honey will be around. You always want to stay at her place, but I want you to sleep in sick bay, just in case.”

“In case I need to fix someone.”

“Yes,” Tom said, and put a light kiss on the top of her head and hurried out before he was lassoed again.

Captain Jackson headed to the launch bay with tenacious focus. He checked the chronometer com device on his wrist noting he was barely on time at 08:00 hours. Rather than wait for the elevator he dashed down the steps two at a time to the lowest deck of the Maria Mitchell.

“Good morning, All,” he called, clambering through the submarine style door to the launch bay, his gear bag slung over one shoulder. A chorus of ‘good morning’ resounded a few meters away near the Osprey where the landing party had loosely assembled.

“Everyone did have their treatment from Dr. Adams, yes?” A chorus of “yes sir” was followed by some scuffling and scrambling as last minute additional equipment was stowed into the shuttle. Ten people were the maximum occupancy for the transporting vehicle. Jackson climbed in and checked their Hydrogen, Nitrogen, and O2 tanks, tracking antenna, and uplinked communications to the Maria Mitchell’s sensor data. With a full complement of people and equipment, Jackson liked to double check behind his helmsmen, not because he didn’t trust them, but as a second set of eyes and ears to confirm function before he risked everyone’s lives.

“All aboard,” he called to the gaggle outside the Osprey. The last person in, Sergeant York, closed the hatch and employed the lock seal. She took her seat, strapped in, and engaged the thermal conditioners before they left the ship.

“Osprey to bridge,” Lieutenant Lee called. “Chick’s ready to leave the nest.”

“Bridge to shuttle, beginning depressurization, stand by for space door retraction,” came a voice that Jackson identified as Mr. Watson’s. Although every officer knew the protocols, he always appreciated their formality given the gravity of their actions.

“I have the vents purged and switched to nitrogen,” Lee advised. “Auxiliary power engaged, space doors open, thrusters at the ready, static discharged.”

“Osprey,” Watson’s voice again. “You are clear for launch. Godspeed.”

“Aye, Osprey out.”

Lieutenant Lee set the shuttle near the coordinates of the Continental Health Organization satellite office in New Hope. Yee Akadar from the United Medical Assembly confirmed that the location would be an ideal place to start the project but also expressed dismay that the CHO had gotten involved. Jackson didn’t share Akadar’s uncooperative attitude. He found it partisan and contrary to the entire mission, making a mental note to keep a closer eye on the project than he had originally hoped to do.

Jackson and Adams left the rest of the crew with the shuttle and headed for the single-story adobe half a kilometer to the north. Both shrugged their field jacket hoods tighter around their faces when an icy gust briefly stopped their march.

Milling around the building Cinconians wore little in the way of protective clothing. The white furred race seemed oblivious to the cold, and the brown shaded race simply wore cloaks to buffet the wind. Jackson checked around but didn’t see any Pegasi or Kiians lurking in the corners. At least that was one thing off his mind.

Once inside the New Hope Facility for the Future, Jackson spotted both Yee Akadar and Yee Odalis speaking with three others on the far side of the hall. The men strode quickly to meet their new associates. Jackson pulled the hood from his face as the slightly warmer interior temperature defrosted his skin.

“Hello Earth friends,” Yee Akadar said in a fairly reasonable approximation of English.

“We meet again,” Jackson said, not extending a hand but tipping his head slightly. “You remember Dr. Adams.”

The Earthlings followed the Cinconians to a medical room that had been set up with multiple tables and business machines as well as medical tools, including microscopes, surgical tools, and overhead surgical lighting. All seven took a seat around the largest table.

“First things first,” Dr. Adams began. “Have all social gatherings been suspended? Religious services, public transportation, entertainment venues, amusement hubs, supply malls, restaurants, all schools?”

“Yes,” Yee Akadar said. He spoke to Odalis in their language and turned back to Jackson.

“But not secluding everyone. That’s just a drain on medical supplies and resources and it’s not necessary.”

“Patient and family of patients. Five or six each patient.”

“Are there enough people available that we can set up manufacturing and distribution.”

“We are hope.”

“Children are the primary focus,” Adams continued. “They seem to be the best vectors for anything anywhere. Where, globally, are the main distribution stations? You’ve been able to communicate that we’re going to do this all at once everywhere?” The two yees looked back and forth with some confusion; at least Jackson guessed that’s what it was.

“We said to all. Here is map, location,” Akadar said, pushing a large paper map across the table. “But no methods get many medicine to all fast. Must go on vehicle water course or metro.”

“We have our transport shuttle that can fly in a high orbit and make deliveries to central locations. You have vehicles to take it to cities, and people to take it to small isolated towns,” Jackson said, making sure there were no obstacles to completing his mission. He gesticulated to help the yees comprehend his words. “You will need to have everything else stop – no making tables, music boxes, teaching school, going to court, everything must stop and focus only on getting everyone the medicine in thirty days.”

Adams nodded in agreement, and Jackson studied the map for a minute. It was a reasonable global map considering they had no satellites in orbit. Six locations were marked and a figure was scribbled next to the X mark. Was it the name of the nation state, the city, or a number? He could barely speak the brown fur race’s language, much less the white fur race’s dialect, and reading was out of the question. He didn’t want to learn it, either. He had so many languages and alphabets in his head he was only going to commit the ones to memory that he would need for more than one mission.

He knew one language of Beta Hydri Four, a local language of Tau Ceti D, and a rudimentary grasp of merchant Pegasi, and an almost fluent universal Kiian, and English, Earth’s dominant language but certainly not the only one.

“Adams doctor, what do females have infants?” Akadar asked. Jackson and Adams exchanged glances. They both looked at Akadar, and he made a gesture to indicate a round belly. His wide blue eyes suggested a question.

“Pregnant patients?” Adams rubbed his fingers together. “That’s a decision you will have to make. I can’t be sure of side effects or efficacy.” The brown male looked at the white male.

“E fee cee?”

“If it will work, safely, or not.”

Jackson hadn’t even thought about pregnant females. These backwards places without modern medicine sent a cringe along his spine, compelling him to compare their situation with 19th century Earth, or earlier.

Dr. Ferris, Ms. York, and Mr. Wagner entered the room escorted by a pale furred Cinconian. Jackson stood and introduced the members of his crew.

“They will be working with us, Dr. Ferris leading the medical project, Ms. York and Mr. Wagner on the manufacturing and distribution projects. I have more crew members who will help at each facility you have noted on the map.” Everyone sat down again.

“Captain,” Ms. York said. “Should we set up a camp or will there be indoor accommodations for us? I think we should prefer the latter. All of us can’t sleep in the shuttle.”

“We would like to unload our supplies and equipment,” Jackson said to both yees. “Where would you like us to stay?”

The two looked at each other, then to the three associates at the table, spoke some words in their own language, and seemed to come to a consensus.

“We have room ah building here ah stay ah sleeps human. I think too cold ah staying outside,” Odalis said with a Cinconian smile. “Come, we talk later more.”

One of the Cinconian associates with longish rusty fur waved for them to follow, and he ambled down the hall and out into the foyer before striding to the other side of the building. Jackson kept a mental image of their travel through the maze in case, as he imagined, an escort wasn’t available every time they would have to wander the halls.

Symbiosis: Chapter 28

“I am so stupid,” Rianya said once they were in the privacy of their own quarters. “I could have ruined everything.”

“But you didn’t. Doc won’t bring it up, the rest of us will be fine, and you’ll be fine too, eventually.”

“I have stay here two weeks. How I to explain that?” she moaned. She and Tom sat on the sofa, the day over, the child asleep in sick bay, dinner done and the lights low. He reached around her and rocked her just a bit. “I just want do thing helpful. What I going do with Zalara?”

“Cat can come and get her from sick bay in the mornings and I’ll ask Bailey or Anne to take your afternoon time with them.”

“I not have made such mistake before.”

“It’s okay, everyone makes mistakes. I’ve even been known to make one now and then,” Tom said. He wore a poker face until she finally broke a smile.

“When you go to Cinco?”

“When you calm down.”

“I is calm.” Tom tenderly poked her in the ribs with his elbow. “I am calm.

“I’d kiss you but I don’t want to risk getting the plague, you understand.”

“Don’t tease me. I feel bad enough.”

“Anything else you need? I should get down to the decon and get back to what I was doing. Adams said it will be a long session.”

“I’m sorry,” Rianya said with her voice quivering.

“Oh, don’t cry, Love. My guess is we’ll be all done on the planet while you’re up here on vacation.” She sighed and stood up.

“You better go. I don’t want to make you sick.”

“I’ll call you every day, make sure Adams is taking good care of you.” Tom touched her cheek and turned to go. He stopped at the door and turned back. “I still love you.”

“And I you,” she said. “See you in two weeks.”

~~~

After a night in sick bay Jackson spent the day in the doyen’s office hammering on the plan, sorting out the officers and crew to take on the landing party. Of course, the doctors, engineers, and security would go. He defined who was responsible for what part of the mission – the vaccines, the administration, the storage and dispensing, who were the leaders and who would meet with the Cinconians and where.

He put portable readers together for each team member, and tasked the crew members remaining on board that would pick up the responsibilities of those on the landing party. He decided what overnight portable gear they’d need, and who would load the shuttle. Jackson wished he’d put more thought into this on the way, but it probably wouldn’t have helped. Visiting the Cinconians on the planet crystalized what his team could do for them and what they would need to do for themselves to stop the plague.

When he finally looked up it was after 18:00. His coffee carafe was empty, his stomach rumbled a reminder, and he yawned while rubbing sand out of his eyes. Jackson groaned out of his chair and stretched to reach the intercom.

“Rianya,” sounded from the small box.

“Hey, how are you? Switch to visual.” A live image appeared on the ten-centimeter monitor next to the speaker.

“I’m the same as yesterday. What have you been up to all day?”

“Work. You look good,” he said. “I missed you last night. I hate sleeping without you.”

“You look like you need some coffee. How’s Zalara?”

“I’ve been locked up in here all day, but this morning she wanted to come with me, then go to you, heal you empathically, you know, her usual self. Not showing any signs of infection.”

“I’m glad to hear that,” Rianya said. “I feel helpless; I wish I could help.”

“Do your best to relax and enjoy the break. Think about where we’ll be soon, on Beta Hydri Four.” She nodded. “I’m going for some coffee and dinner. Has someone brought you dinner?”

“No, I haven’t asked. I’m not very hungry.”

“I’ll bring you something later.”

Tom finished his project but had no place to go. He looked around the office and sat back in his chair, realizing it would be several days on the planet before he was back. It would be prudent to double check.

He had the computer start some music to distract him from where he really wanted to be and stacked up the readers to distribute in the morning. He glanced at the wall chronometer that displayed 19:41 in bright green block numbers.

The office door opened suddenly and Tom almost jumped from the surprise. He turned quickly; it was Anne Wallace.

“Captain! I didn’t expect you here,” she said.

“It’s alright, come in,” he told her. “I shouldn’t really be here.” He looked at the books on the shelf and touched both of his final choices, Verne and Twain, as if that could help him decide, perhaps.

“I can come back, sir.”

“Anne, I thought you had a day shift.”

“I did sir, I hope you don’t mind, but I find it easier to work in the evening.” The captain considered the unauthorized change in the duty roster.

“How are you cleaning officers’ quarters while they’re occupied?” He stopped puzzling over the books and faced her squarely. “I was missing my afternoon coffee.”

“I’m sorry, sir. I asked Zoe to take care of that.”

“It’s your assignment; shift changes are supposed to be approved by me,” he stated. She didn’t seem particularly concerned about his questions and set her robot vacuum on the floor, touching the top of it to turn it on. The appliance started to whine loudly. Jackson clenched his jaw at the annoying thing and tried to ignore it. He wasn’t going to be driven out of his own office by the lowest ranked member of the entire crew.

“Captain, can I ask you, there’re a lot of rumors about the plague on the ship. Dr. Adams has us all on a daily antibiotic.”

“Dr. Adams is in charge of medical issues aboard the Maria Mitchell, crewman, but you don’t have anything to worry about.” Tom stood back in front of the bookshelf and decided on Twain, pulling it off the shelf and setting it down with the electronic readers. Trying to ignore Anne he went back to his desk and opened a com channel to engineering.

“Quixote.”

“It’s Jackson. Can you tell me the last time you calibrated the accelerator?”

“Spacedock. We must be certain we’ll have 100 consecutive hours of downtime.”

“Now would be a good time. We’re going to stay in orbit at least that long,” he said. “What method are you using?”

“I always calibrate with a fast neutron irradiation of poly-tetra-fluoride and lead. It’s straightforward and reliable.”

“Good. I want you to start in the morning-” Tom jumped a quarter meter when he felt hands on shoulders. “Jackson out,” and he slammed the intercom button. He looked up and turned back effectively torqueing her hands away.

“I didn’t mean to startle you,” Anne said. “I just need to get in here,” and she nodded toward the shelving area above his monitor. He shoved away from the desk and stood up.

“Anne, come back at another time. I can’t work with you hovering around like this. And take that raucous thing out of here as well,” Tom said and pointed directly at the robot as it rolled under a cabinet.

“I’m sorry, sir, I didn’t mean to interrupt,” she said. She took a step closer to him and reached for something on that shelf, innocently enough, but she didn’t stop her vacuum or pick up her supplies. “Sir, you look like you could use a break,” she said.

“Not your concern. You can spend a week in here starting tomorrow, but right now I need my office.” She’s the admiral’s daughter; I can’t toss her out on her ear, much as she deserved it – he closed his eyes when realized what was happening, again. He marched to the door and opened it, wide. “You can’t be in here when I’m in here.” The office intercom chirped.

“Tom?” Rianya. He waved at Anne to shoo her out the door and crossed the room.

“Hi, Rianya,” he answered. Anne still hadn’t left.

“What’s that noise?”

Tom picked up the robot and searched for an OFF switch. Anne reached across the captain’s chest and touched a spot on the opposite side of the vacuum. As soon as it stopped he shunted the machine into her arms and pushed both away from him.

“Nothing now. What’s up?” he called over his shoulder.

“Doesn’t your monitor work?” With only his eyes Tom shot Anne an unmistakable warning to leave his office, which she finally acknowledged and departed, taking the robot with her.

“Sure,” Tom said touching another button. Rianya’s face appeared and Tom sat back in his chair in front of the image capture lens.

“I just wanted to say goodnight. I'm not hungry, and I’m going to go to bed early, try and get a little extra sleep.” He caught his breath finally and nodded. “Is everything okay?”

“I’m getting tired, I’m just finishing up. Going to be a long day tomorrow, I should get down to sick bay and get to sleep as well.”

“Well, goodnight, Mylan.” She kissed her fingers and held them up as if maybe she could pass them through the monitor somehow and he could pick them up. He did the same and the monitor went dark.

What in hell was that? Tom sank into his chair with a huff and felt a ball of anger ricochet in his gut. That girl was less than half his age and she was coming on to him! He was certain of it. Ten years ago, he might have missed Anne’s clues but ego aside, that girl was getting to be a problem.

Symbiosis: Chapter 27

“Sick bay to Jackson,” the intercom squawked. “Captain, I need to see you right away in sick bay,” Dr. Adams called. The urgency of Adams’ voice startled Tom out of bed.

“On my way,” he answered while pulling on a shirt.

“It’s 23:00, what could be that important?” Rianya mumbled. In the dark, he couldn’t see her.

“I’m sorry, did I wake you up?”

“No, Dr. Adams did.”

“I wonder why he’s up at this hour?” Tom grumbled and left their quarters for the sick bay. From 22:00 to 06:00, he ordered lighting at half power to conserve energy and keep the crew on a schedule of sixteen hours of light, and eight hours of darkness with safety lights only.

The door to sick bay opened and he walked in without breaking his stride.

“What’s so important it couldn’t wait until morning?” Tom asked. Adams simply waved him over to a monitor displaying colorful worm shapes that swarmed and slowly moved.

“I have some disturbing news. I’m not sure how to break it to you.”

“Disturbing?” Tom’s stomach jumped into his throat.

“It’s about the mummy.” He sighed and found a chair to sit on, then yawned and shook his head a little.

“Oh, is that all? I was afraid you were going to tell me Rianya’s pregnant.”

“I’m serious, Captain.”

“So am I.”

“The mixed up human mummy died of a Yersinia infection.” The doctor didn’t bear a hint of humor on his face. His eyes were pained, somber, and intense. Behind his head the moving image of Yersinia, magnified at least a thousand times, reminded Jackson of the morbid gravity of their mission.

“How can that be? Are you sure? It wasn’t an animal bite or a head wound, or-”

“He obviously contracted it and carried it to the Cuatrons.”

“How do you know the Cuatrons didn’t infect him? Which came first, the chicken or the egg?”

“I don’t know, but I believe this person, mostly human, some mixed races, contracted Yersinia on Earth, brought it to Cuatro. They were quick to die out.”
Tom didn’t know what to say. He opened his mouth but words didn’t come out. He stood and got himself a glass of water and came back to face Adams.

“How did a mixed species person bring Yersinia from Earth several hundred years ago? Even time travel can’t explain that. He couldn’t be that age and be a mixed species.”

“We don’t know for sure if Earth was alone that long. There could have been aliens on Earth in the fourteenth century.”

Tom refilled his glass and came back to stare at Adams for a moment before he could put thoughts together.

“You’re certain this body brought the plague, not Kiians or Pegasi, as a biological weapon so they could play both sides.”

“The body is dated to Earth year 1345-1355. The Plague was absolutely rampant then in Europe.”

“But the body didn’t mummify eight hundred years ago. Only four hundred years ago. And the extinction wasn’t eight hundred years ago, it was also four hundred years ago. We lost four hundred years somewhere.”

“That’s why I called you down, Jack. I need you to help me with a timeline.” Adams tapped the monitor; the screen promptly turned black.

“Can we do this tomorrow? I had a pint of Guinness an hour ago and my brain is not fully engaged, Doc.”

“You’re a lightweight. Come to sick bay first thing in the morning.

“I always come on duty at oh seven hundred. After I get the bridge running I’ll be here.”

“Goodnight, Jack.”

~~~

“Doc, what if we have it backwards? What if this body brought Yersinia to Earth in 1350, maybe as a biological weapon, and then came back to Cuatro.”

“That doesn’t explain why Cuatrons went extinct. Plus, remember, the mummy is mostly human.”

“This is the most confounding thing I’ve ever heard of. We’re just guessing at this point. Someone must have answers, someone on Cuatro or on Cinco.” Jackson leaned back in the chair and scowled at nothing. Behind him just the blackness of space reflected in the window, but before him the fifth planet of Eta Cassiopeia glowed in a greenish blue haze covered in transparent white clouds. The planet didn’t have nearly the ratio of water to land as Earth, with double the land surface. Lower moisture, thinner atmosphere, its features had different visibility from orbit.

“Did you talk with Rianya about this?”

“No, why? She was asleep when I went back last night. She never gets enough sleep; I actually got up alone this morning.”

“I don’t want to talk about the Cinconians or Cuatrons right now. I want to talk about your wife.”

Tom sat up and focused on the old man’s face. Tiny lines around his eyes and deep grooves on his forehead agreed with his eight decades of age. Living with an empath and her mother he’d learned to read body language and facial expressions beyond the average human's abilities. The doctor never looked so grave.

“What’s wrong?” The doctor wouldn’t meet Tom’s eyes. “Doc?”

“I know she was taking initiative, trying to find out about the genome of the mummy--”

“She ruined it?” The doctor shook his head. “She what?”

“She handled the body. She may have exposed the whole ship, including herself, you, the children.”

“How do you know?”

“She told me. She didn’t use sterile attire, not even gloves. I don’t know what possessed her to do it, I have no idea.”

“From a mummified 400 year-old dead body she could get infected by Yersinia?”

“In the case of this mummy, without any lesions on the skin, it points to the airborne transmission, the pneumonic plague, not the bubonic plague. There have been cases where a person contracted it just handling the tissues. She handled its blood. Its blood, Jack.”

“Well get her down here and let’s find out!” Tom stood up so fast his chair rolled back and hit the wall.

“Wait, hold on, don’t panic. I don’t want anyone else to know unless we have proof. But we need to find out today, this morning, yesterday in fact. The saving grace is that this genus of bacteria is not spore forming, and without water it perishes. It simply depends on how dry the spleen was when she invaded it.”

“You mean you scared the pants off me for nothing?!”

“Ask Rianya to come down here. I need to do some tests, I want her to think you’re getting the same tests, I don’t want her to worry unnecessarily.”

“But it’s okay for me to worry unnecessarily,” Tom grumbled. He took a few deep breaths trying to regain brain function and calm down his adrenaline factory.

“I know you Jack. I don’t know Rianya. In fact, since she’s not a human, I can’t be sure what we’re going to find. She might be more vulnerable or completely immune. But given this mixed-race human had it, and died of it, that’s what worries me.”

Tom’s anxiety ratcheted up again. He stepped over to the sick bay intercom and called his quarters.

“Rianya,” she answered.

“Hey, Love,” Tom said as calmly as possible. Just knowing that he was going to mislead her would change his voice enough for her to notice.

“Tom? You’re in sick bay?”

“Doc wants to run some tests. Can you come down here first thing?”

“What kind of tests?”

“I uh, don’t know, he just asked me to call you.”

“What’s going on?” Dammit. He knew she’d hear between his words.

“Come on down, please.”

“’Lara is up, I have to bring her with me.” Tom looked at Adams to catch his reaction to Rianya’s words. He spread his hands in defenselessness. Tom squirmed and closed his eyes.

“Okay, just come straight away.” Tom closed the com and saw the doctor from the corner of his eye still somber, looking at his desktop and ignoring a cup of something still steaming in front of him.

“You can treat it, right?” the captain asked.

“I can treat the humans. It’s treating aliens that complicate matters.”

“The pneumonia plague bug is the same bug on Cinco?” Adams nodded and finally reached for the beverage.

“I already treated the landing parties. I’m going to treat everyone on the ship prophylactically, but I’m not sure what to do yet with Rianya and Zalara.” Tom sat down slowly, grinding the thumb and one finger of one hand together before covering his mouth and chin. He hadn’t felt so nauseous since his wedding day. It wasn’t a physical illness, but a mental terror that raised the hairs on his arms and clenched his jaws. Death by bacteria held no honor or purpose.

“Jack?” Tom, sitting like a statue, moved only his gaze up to the doctor’s face. “Are you alright?” Tom shook his head ever so slightly and closed his eyes against the world. The back of his tongue grew salty and could feel a sting rising from his gut. A moment later, Adams pushed a glass of water at him and a plastic emesis bowl. Immediately the doctor put a few clear drops of something into the water and pushed it into Tom’s hand. “Drink it, fast,” he said.

Tom sipped at the water and the sensation faded abruptly. Then he drank some more to make sure it wouldn’t come back. He nodded and set the tumbler down.

“It’s serious, but don’t worry. I won’t let Yersinia win,” Adams said with another pat on the captain’s back he left Tom alone.