Shockball (22 page)

Kegide stopped rolling the pebbles he was playing with and looked at me, bewildered.

“Did Wendell see these people?” I asked him.

Kegide nodded.

“That stupid, negligent, homicidal maniac—I’m going to strangle him.” I marched back inside and crouched down beside my patient. “Who gave you the drugs? Was it Wendell Florine? Was it the whiteskin patcher?”

The man rolled back over, and looked at me for a moment. Then the swollen lids closed over the filmy black eyes. “Go away.”

I didn’t go away. I scanned and examined every occupant of the shack. The strange spirochete was present in all their bloodstreams. Most were in various stages of barbiturate poisoning as well.

A search of the shack turned up an ample supply of the drug they had been taking, hidden in a pouch tucked under one of the sleeping mats. I took the old-fashioned oral concentrates with me when I finished my rounds. A few of the hybrids noticed and protested, but no one was strong enough to stop me.

Outside, Kegide slowly rose to his feet and gave me a hopeful look.

“I’m going to need to go back to Medical, then return here. Right now.”

The big man silently guided me back through the tunnel system to the alcove. I walked in to find Reever sitting on the exam table, one of my scanners in his hand.

“What do you think you’re doing?” I took the scanner away from him and checked the display. He’d keyed it for a kidney sweep. “Checking up on my work?”

“No.” He watched as I went over to the scope and put one of the blood samples I’d taken into the analyzer. “Where have you been?”

“Looking at some new patients.” I peered in the scope at the spirochete. If it had progressed to the bloodstream and lymphatic system, there was little hope of localized treatment. “Very sick patients. Kegide took me to them. They’re suffering from some kind of bacterial infection, complicated by barbiturate addiction.”

Again I had the feeling I’d viewed the nasty little spirochete before, but when? Where?

Judging from the location of the chancres, the bacterium had likely entered the body through the mucous membranes, or through the skin. That meant close body contact or body fluid exchanges.

Yet without a diagnostic array, there was literally no way for me to identify the anonymous spirochete. And until I knew what was causing the disease, I couldn’t prescribe treatment.

“All I need is a medical database. One lousy diagnostic unit. This is so
frustrating
.”

“My sentiments exactly.”

I turned around to see Wendell lounging beside Reever on the exam table. “Kegide took me out into the sewer pipes to see some very sick people. Have you seen them?”

“In the sewer?” Wendell pursed his lips and looked thoughtful, then shook his head. “Can’t say that I have.”

He was lying. I could feel it. “Well, you can come with me when I go back. There are about a dozen of them, and they’ve been infected by a bacterial pathogen. I’ll need help nailing down what they’ve got.”

“The great Dr. Grey Veil needs
my
help? Never thought I’d see the day.” Wendell gave me an insulting grin. “Well, Doctor, if they’re infected, that means they’re contagious. I’m not going near that shack.”

I put aside the second slide I was preparing and walked over to him. “I didn’t say anything about a shack.”

Wendell blinked, then recovered quickly. “I’m sure that’s all they could scrape together out there—”

Reever put a hand on Wendell’s arm. “A small piece of advice. Don’t lie to her. She dislikes it intensely.”

I folded my arms. “Well?”

Wendell shoved his hands in his tunic pockets and shuffled his feet. “Okay, so I’ve seen them. I don’t know what it is. There’s nothing you can do for them but leave them alone.”

“Ah, but I have to, Wendell,” I said, very softly. “I took an oath.”

“I didn’t.” He pushed off the table and tried to walk out.

A cold knot formed in my stomach as I blocked his path. “You’ve done more than see them, haven’t you? You tried to treat them.”

He flung out his arms. “So what if I did? I’m the only person down here who can do anything. You know what they do when someone gets sick? They
sing
. That’s their idea of treatment.”

“While yours was, what? Giving them a little something for the pain?” I didn’t wait for him to answer me. I already knew. “What were you thinking, you moron?”

“I did what I could.”

“You gave them these.” I threw the pouch of barbiturates at him. Pills pelted his face, chest, and scattered all over the stone floor. “Sedatives. For a bacterial infection!”

“I didn’t know what it was!” he shouted back. “I’ve never seen anything like it!”

“Yeah? Guess what? You not only didn’t help them, you turned them into drug addicts!”

“Cherijo. Dr. Florine.”

I whirled on Reever. “Don’t you dare call this quack a doctor!” Then I started back in on Wendell. “I can’t believe you didn’t run a blood analysis. A simple blood analysis, Wendell. Go look in the scope— there are so many spirochetes on that slide they’re practically crawling up the magnifier!”

“I thought it was cholera.”

I had a handful of his tunic in my fist before he could blink. “And you’d treat cholera with barbiturates? They shouldn’t have kicked you out of medtech, they should have thrown you in prison!”

“Calm down, Cherijo.” Playing the peacemaker, Reever stepped between us and made me let go of Wendell. “This is not going to solve the problem. Both of you must set aside your differences if you’re going to save these people.”

“Here’s an idea—keep him away from anything that breathes,” I suggested. “That should up the survival rate considerably.”

“Okay, so I didn’t know what to do. You think you’re so perfect.” Wendell sneered at me. “If you’re such a magnificent cutter, then why is everyone topside hunting for you? How many patients have
you
killed?”

“Cherijo.” My husband started looking a little worried. “Don’t.”

“Reever, get out of my face.” When he did, I got in Wendell’s. “You pathetic excuse for a floor sweeper. Don’t you try to shrug this one off the way you did back in school. Those people are barbiturate dependent now.
You
did that to them. On top of the goddamned pathogen!”

“I’m not going to take any more of this waste from you, you sanctimonious little bitch.”

Wendell walked out, and when I would have gone after him, Reever stopped me.

“Let me go.”

“Hitting him will solve nothing.”

I scowled. “It would make me feel better.”

“If you’re feeling that aggressive, why don’t you take it out on me?”

“You haven’t committed malpractice.” I glared at him. “Oh, come on, Duncan. You can’t possibly be on his side.”

“You might have found out more information about the infected hybrids if you hadn’t attacked his competency.”

“He has zero competency.” I went back to the analyzer. “And the day I need help from that jerk, I’m calling it quits.”

Hok showed up a short time later, and I vented my spleen on him. Or tried to. He stood silent and impassive as I ranted about the contagion and Wendell’s gross negligence. Then he refused to get me my diagnostic equipment.

“What?” I stopped packing my case and turned on him. “Are you out of your mind? Those people are suffering. They need treatment,
now
.”

“It is not a decision I can make. You must get permission from the chief first.”

“Stuff the chief. I want that equipment.”

“I will take you to him and see if he will grant your request. That is all I can do.”

I made Reever, who was not my favorite person at the moment, stay in the alcove while I went to deal with Rico. Along the way, my temper subsided, and I noticed once more how badly Hok hobbled.

“What caused your physical problems? Are they congenital birth defects?”

He gave me a twisted smile. “I don’t know.”

I speculated. It could have been Treacher-Collins or Pierre Robin syndrome; he had some of the clinical signs. In addition to the clumsy repair of the cleft palate, he had the abnormal jaw and facial distortions.

“It looks like someone tried to do soft-tissue and osteomic transfers to build up your nose.” Whoever had done it had given him separate but uneven nostrils, and they didn’t work. “You have to breathe through your mouth, right?”

“Yes.”

“Choanal atresia, then. You don’t have eyelashes or eyebrows, and your ears have some of the macrostomia associated with the defect.” I was starting to get angry again. “Whoever worked on you should be shot, Hok.”

“Hawk.”

“Excuse me?”

“My name is Hawk, not Hok.” He clearly enunciated the difference for me.

“Oh. Sorry.” I studied his face again. “Who did the work?”

“A doctor on the reservation did the first operation, when I was a baby. Wendell gave me my nose.”

Dr. Disaster strikes again. He was lucky it wasn’t on the side of his head. “Do yourself a favor, Hawk. Stay
away
from Wendell.”

“I have no complaints about what he did. Children no longer run away screaming when they see my face now.” He gave me a twisted smile. “Most of the time.”

“I could help, if you’ll let me.”

He shook his head. “Thank you, but I’m content with how I look.”

“That’s fine for your face, but what about your back? The scoliosis distorting your spine is only going to get worse. You could suffer partial paralysis as a result.”

“I will manage.”

We entered the central cavern. Rico was nowhere in sight, but Hawk sent one of the women to summon him. We sat down by the speaking rock, and I absently made us both a server of tea.

“
Ahe’ee zer ch’il gohwéhé
,” he said.

“Which means?”

“Thank you for the tea.”

“You’re welcome. Tell me something. How did Rico convince all these people to live underground? I thought Indians liked the wide, open spaces.”

“We do.” His stark, beautiful voice was amused. “But those who came here were not permitted to enjoy them. The clans living among the Four Mountains rejected or exiled all of us. Rico came to our hogans and spoke to us about forming a new tribe.”

“And that’s it? You guys just went with him?”

“You do not know the chief well. The Navajo call him
Nohoilpi
—He Who Wins Men, the Divine Gambler. He offered protection to the hybrids who were facing deportation, and their human families. He challenged us to build a place for ourselves, hidden in the earth, as told in the old legends of the Leyaneyani, brother of Whirlwind and Knife Boy. We came here, made this place, became the Night Horse.”

The Divine Gambler? Knife Boy? Was he kidding?

“So basically you all moved into a cave because of some old story Rico told you?” He nodded. “Didn’t any of the hybrids ever consider immigrating to their alien parents’ homeworlds instead? And why are you here? You’re not one of them.”

“You whiteskins ask so many questions.”

“You Indians do some really weird stuff.”

“We remind you of who you are, beneath the skin.”

“I’m not one of you.” I took a sip of my tea, which was getting cold. “I don’t belong here. You know that.”

“I know you are here now.”

“Not by choice. You know that’s wrong. You could help me and Reever a great deal just by getting us out of here.” I thought of Joseph, and tried a not-so-subtle threat. “Those men who searched the village— they’ll be back. Eventually they’ll find a way down here. They’ll notify the authorities about you. Help us, and you’ll be protecting your tribe.”

“No.” He got awkwardly to his feet. “I do not betray my chief.”

“Glad I am to hear it, my friend,” Rico said from behind us, making me spill lukewarm tea down the front of my tunic. “Doctor. You wished to speak to me?”

Hawk limped away. Everyone else in the cavern found something else to do or look at. That left me to handle the chief.

“Yes, I do. You have a real problem that needs taking care of, right away.”

Rico crouched beside me and offered me a colorful square of linen. “Tell me about this… problem I have.”

After I mopped up the tea with that, I related how I’d found the hybrids in the outer sewer system, and what I’d discovered from examining them. I explained what a spirochete was, how it was responsible for the symptoms, and presented my request for a diagnostic unit in order to find a cure. I used simple, nonclinical terms as much as possible.

He listened at first, but by the time I got to the part about the equipment I needed, I had the feeling he’d lost interest.

I speeded up my delivery. “The bottom line here is, I have to identify this bacteria first, then I can treat the infected patients. I’ll have to check the other members of your tribe, and temporarily isolate anyone who tests positive for the spirochete. We can have it under control immediately, and hopefully once we find out what it is, and how to treat it, have it completely cleared up in a few weeks.”

Rico, who had been watching Hawk hobbling on the other side of the cave, picked up a small stone and tossed it into the fire. “No.”

I wasn’t sure what part of that he was objecting to. “I beg your pardon?”

“No, you will not get the equipment, treat the infected, test the tribe, or isolate anyone.”

“Maybe I didn’t explain this right. The hybrids living in the sewer system are very sick. The sickness they have is highly contagious. I’m positive there are others here who—

“You do not have to repeat your words, patcher. I heard and understood every one of them.”

“Then what’s your objection?”

“It is simple.” Rico stood up. I did, too. “The outcasts you examined are unclean and worthless to me. They are cursed.”

“But—but— ‘ I shook my head, trying to process this bizarre reaction. ”Chief, you don’t understand. They’re not unclean or cursed, they’re sick. They need medicine. They may have infected other members of the tribe, who aren’t showing signs of sickness yet.“

“They will perish. If any more of the Night Horse become cursed, they will be cast out and perish, too.”