Odyssey Rising (6 page)

Finishing the latest message from Doctor Starling, Theo realized his father was the biggest geek in the universe.

Theo also realized that his discovery of the bones from GidX7 had already faded from the limelight. Everyone’s focus had gone microscopic.

A brief local message from Ellie Lloyd popped up.

Ruawake?

She was only three doors down but Theo and the rest of the crew were still under precautionary quarantine.

On his Communication device, Theo typed: Yes.

Go v-t-v?

Sure, Theo typed as he hit the voice-to-voice icon on his keypad.

“You there?”

“Hey,” Ellie said.

“What’s up?”

“They say even local transmissions are going down indefinitely,” Ellie said.

“Seriously?”

“Yes,” Ellie answered. “The computer’s maxing out with data and images and synchronization with the Ark’s mainframe.”

“This is all cause of the skeleton,” Theo said.

“Yeah, that’s what I hear.”

“Finding the bones was just an accident. Kind of dumb luck,” Theo admitted.

“Don’t say that. You’ve probably made like the most major scientific discovery since gravity or relativity,” Ellie said.

“You think?”

“It’s probably an exaggeration, so don’t go thinking you’re as smart as Newton or Einstein and don’t get me started with how smart Madame Curie was.”

“But I guess guys make all the great discoveries,” Theo said.

“Don’t get me started Theo Starling. Not in a time like now,” Ellie said, “just don’t get me started.”

“I’ll let you discover the next big thing,” Theo said.

“You’ll let me?”

“Yeah.”

“You don’t have to let me. I am perfectly capable of finding the next big thing without you letting me,” Ellie said. She was fired up, speaking quickly. “You think you have to let me find the next big thing.”

“No. I was joking,” Theo said. “You remember what they are? Jokes?”

“Ha-ha. You’re not funny,” Ellie said.

“It’s going to be okay. Let’s not stress out about this just yet.”

“But everyone is really concerned and confused and cautious. Like Red Alert cautious. What are those things growing on the bones?” Ellie asked.

“Not sure. Microbes or something like that,” Theo said. “Don’t worry so much.”

“How can I not worry?” Ellie asked.

Before Theo could answer Ellie, a frustrating message quickly popped up on his Communication device.

It read: COMMUNICATION DELAY = SIX HOURS. GOOD DAY.

All Theo heard was silence.

Back at the Ark, on the eleventh floor, Doctor Starling was sitting with his eyes on the medical screen and the rabbit’s.

Doctor Starling was playing his trumpet and Miles Davis was playing along with him, at least a recording and a virt-hologram version of the master of masters. The song Sketches of Spain was blaring and Doctor Starling was right in tune. While he appreciated other musical genres, jazz was the one he found most informative to the human condition, mostly because it required nimble improvisation.

In fact, jazz was best heard live. Doctor Starling marveled at the dexterity of the masters – Miles, Mingus, Coltrane, even the ancient swing of Benny Goodman. As a father, he felt it was his duty to educate his sons about the great works of art, even if they were truly disinterested in the melodic and sometimes discordant beeps and bops from another time.

Doctor Starling stopped playing his trumpet when an instant update flashed on his medical screen.

SUZUKI, SAM:

ABNORMAL TEMPERATURE RISE

A full thirty-six hours after the bone landed on Odyssey, the medical program noted a significant change in Sam’s vital signs and alerted Captain Barton, the medical committee back at the Ark and Doctor Starling of the change.

Sam had a basal resting temperature of 98.8 degrees. He ran hot. When there was a rise to 99.8 degrees, the program checked all vital signs and also noted that Sam’s blood pressure was yo-yoing in an unusual pattern. Vital signs were monitored automatically via a telemetry strip implanted under the skin of all residents of Odyssey.

Telemetry strips under the skin were like a Doctor’s nurses. They did it all – blood pressure, temperature, pulse, oxygen in the blood – and did it all automatically. While the strips didn’t replace a medical doctor, they were a very able nanobot assistant. The spread of the simple cold was a major concern in a confined space like Odyssey.

In his quarters, the medical program had already instructed Sam to provide a blood sample as well as a throat culture. Both procedures were routine and carried out painlessly with instructions by the medical program.

The program was just a voice from a video screen to most patients, “Place arm in this position. This will prick just a little. Comforting, though robotic words. Don’t cry, Sam. Please don’t cry. I am meant to be a painless medical program. Don’t cry. Please.”

With Sam’s samples running through the medical program diagnostic phase, Doctor Starling received the results on his computer screen back at the Ark.

At a basic level, a rise in temperature was not a major concern for Doctor Starling. Given the presence of unknown life aboard the shuttle, he received the information with a heightened level of concern. He was hoping for a simple answer to a simple question: why does Sam have a rise in temperature? The answer he was hoping would be just as simple. Perhaps something that was easy to treat, something Odyssey already had the meds for, perhaps it was just a common and treatable virus or the common cold that had no connection to the Yin-Yang Twins. Perhaps.

The unfortunate result of nanobot telemetry was that all senior crew aboard Odyssey and the medical committee back at the Ark learned about the medical situation simultaneously. There was no time for spin control.

While the medical committee knew that Sam’s throat culture was normal, they also knew they had other troubles. There was no presence of a virus or bacteria found. Good news, Doctor Starling thought. The blood, however, showed the true extent of the infectious problem.

As he read the further results, Doctor Starling realized there was a new illness brewing on Odyssey. It was an infection that he had subconsciously feared and blocked from his thought. Until now.

Sam’s electrolytes had gone crazy and there was a visitor swimming through Sam’s blood. It didn’t take long for the medical program to confirm that they were an exact match with the newest microbiotic entry in the medical database: the little Yin-Yang Twins.

By the time Doctor Starling got another three alerts from the medical program, he realized Odyssey and specifically his family was under attack. The Yin-Yang Twins had invaded both his son’s bloodstream. Even Harry Wolf was infected. Last on the infected list was classmate Ellie Lloyd. They were the only other Positives.

At a microscopic level, the alien invader existed in their sweat and in their blood. It had multiplied since exposure – growing, changing, nourishing, eating away at whatever it could lay its claws into. The organism made its quick journey through blood and guts and it would lodge near their vital organs just lying in wait for growth and adaptation and feeding time. While the Yin-Yang Twins did not like the unexposed, open air of the shuttle, they were very comfortable – almost too comfortable – inside the human and animal bodies of Theo, Ravi, Sam, Harry Wolf and the rabbits.

Doctor Starling sent an urgent text message to Theo and soon they spoke voice to voice. “You, Ravi, your friends Sam and Ellie and even Harry Wolf are infected with the Yin-Yang Twins.”

Theo’s face tightened as he heard his father’s words.

“How?”

“Sweat or saliva, it appears. A common exposure, I would guess. Now, please go to the Escape Pod,” Doctor Starling requested.

“Why?”

“Please go.”

“Tell me why?”

“Just go now,” Doctor Starling said more urgently.

“No way.”

“We need you to go. Now”

“I’m not going anywhere, except back to the Ark,” Theo protested.

“You can’t go back there right now. Okay?”

“No, that’s where I belong.”

“You’re infected.”

“I’m not sick. I feel great.”

“Don’t be afraid.”

“I’m not afraid. I just want to go home.”

“Not yet.”

“Why not?”

“You have to be quarantined. Go in a hazmat suit. Please.”

“I don’t understand,” Theo said.

“You and the Twins are in an adaptation phase that could go smoothly or not.”

“What does that mean?”

“Your body has not yet produced an antibody. That means your body just isn’t fighting to destroy these Yin-Yang Twins. It’s the same case for the rabbits.”

“We’re not rabbits,” Theo said.

“The most successful parasites are the one’s that learn to live off the host without killing the host. From the inside, they can destroy your organs.”

“How quickly?”

“We just don’t know. Not exactly.”

“Can’t you, at least, predict? Don’t you have a mathematical forecast model for everything? The model can predict everything, right? Tell me the prediction.”

“Theo, please, the future cannot be predicted accurately. I know many of my colleagues place their faith in what can mathematically be predicted. But this situation is different,” Doctor Starling said.

“Give me an idea,” Theo said.

“It depends on the actual growth rate. Our body wants them out. They want food. It’s a constant battle. You will get sick. It won’t be pretty. It won’t be easy. It might be deadly. God forbid it might be very deadly. I hope and pray that we’re wrong about this. The Yin-Yang Twins are in your body and in the rabbits and it looks like they don’t know when enough is enough.”

“What do you mean? You’re talking like they can think.”

“No. No. Absolutely not. They behave. They act.”

“How?”

“They will most probably behave like a terrible infection in your blood. I just don’t know how bad it will get.

Our bodies probably don’t have any immunity to them. It’s like an alien cancer. Do you understand?”

“But I don’t feel sick.”

“We’re at war with an alien microscopic organism. From what we’ve learned from the rabbits, infection will spread quickly. It’s just a theory – though a well established one on Earth – we can cure most parasites when we find the original host. Co-dependency might take dozens of generations. We don’t have the luxury of time.”

“Why not?”

“They live in us. They feed off of us. Compete for our food. At the worst – after generations – we may learn to live together. But for now, the nasty little buggers pose an unknown medical and bodily risk.”

“Is it really this bad?”

“Yes,” Doctor Starling answered.

“Why?”

“We don’t know yet what kills them, so, please just go to the Escape Pod. Now get into your Hazmat suit. It’s safer for all.”

“But I’m not going in that Pod.”

“Then they will make you go.”

“Who will?”

“The security team.”

“And if I don’t go?”

“You have to do this, for the good of the community.”

“Mom wouldn’t let this happen.”

“This is what needs to happen and this isn’t the time to be a rebel. You’ll be okay in there.”

“How can you be so sure?”

“Because I have the best minds working on this situation. I promise I’ll stay in constant contact.”

“What’s happening to us now?”

“Listen. Staying together you will survive. If you separate, you will die. Do you hear me? Stay together. Work together. Live and survive together.”

“What’s happening?”

“We’re sending you down to the planet,” Doctor Starling answered.

“Why?”

“If you need to kill a parasite, you go where the live most abundantly.”

“So we’re all going to GidX7,” Theo said.

“Yes,” Doctor Starling said.

“But last time I checked Odyssey isn’t a landing shuttle and it’s running out of necessary supplies and… ”

“Just the Positives. You all must to go to the "heart" of where the parasite lives. You have to go down to the source of this life form.”

“But we’re not prepared,” Theo said. “No one is prepared for that place.”

“We don’t have time,” Doctor Starling said. “Now, god speed. I’m on my way. Do you hear me? I’m on my way. I love you guys so much. You hear me? I do.”

“Dad? What’s really going to happen to us?”

“I don’t know.”

“But you always know.”

“Not this time. I’m sorry. Now god speed, Theo, god speed.”

In his sleeping quarters, with the conversation with his father over, Theo thought of how all of this would end and didn’t get a good feeling.

He couldn’t get the ache of fear in his father’s voice out of his mind. His father wasn’t a worrier. He had seen everything, done everything, taught everyone in the fleet just about everything and his father never appeared rattled, which was why Theo was really freaking out: his father was really worried.