Category Phoenix Part 8

"I don't know as I ought to leave my post," said Jones.

"You'd rather stay with us and perhaps be exposed to the Fever?"

"Okay, okay!"

When his footsteps had died away, David leaned forward.

"We've done our best. Another month or so and we should be completely ready for our retirement act."

"If we have a month," said Faure.

David grinned. "Well, if our time runs out, at least we'll go down fighting. You know all your lines, your props are ready, the plot is worked out, and we can slip into our makeup in an instant--provided the audience shows up."

"You're getting to be quite a joker, David," said Karl. "What if the audience comes around to the stage door?"

"Then we'll try to receive him properly. Our Leader is a man of iron, but I doubt that he's immortal."

They heard the approaching guard.

"I'm sure you'll benefit from your holiday," David went on. "That last checkup showed an antibody t.i.ter entirely too high for safety."

"In other words, it's time for us to get going?" asked Karl, smiling.

"That's right. Only the next time the antibody curve rises, it will be for keeps."

Four days later it was reported that Judge Brinton, the well-known champion of Category rights, was ill with Blue Martian fever. Three little-known nuclear physicists living in the same apartment in Oak Ridge developed symptoms on the same day. Sporadic cases of Blue Martian flared up all over the continent. Occasionally a whole family was affected--husband, wife, and all the children. There was a mild epidemic at MIT, a more serious one at the School of Social Structure, and at Harvard Medical School nearly a third of the senior cla.s.s, and they the most brilliant, were hospitalized at the same time.

Rumors blanketed the country like a fog, and people everywhere became uneasy. There were no deaths from the illness, but the very idea that an infectious disease could flare up unpredictably all over the nation, out of control, was frightening. It was said that the disease had been beamed to Earth by alien enemies from s.p.a.ce; that all its victims became sterile; or that their minds were permanently damaged.

It was also said, though people laughed even as they repeated the rumor, that if you once had Blue Martian Fever you'd become immortal. This particular theory had been clearly traced to the ravings of a red-haired madwoman who was confined to Psycho-detention, but still it was too ridiculous not to repeat. For a week, comedians rang a hundred changes on the basic joke:

Wife: Drop dead!

Husband: I can't. I've had Blue Martian.

The unrest became so great that Leader Marley himself appeared on the telecaster to rea.s.sure the nation.

He was an impressive figure on the lighted screen, resting solid and at ease in a leather chair, raising his ma.s.sive black head, lifting his big hand to gesture as his rich voice rolled out.

"You have nothing to fear," he said. "Under your beneficent Leaders, infectious disease has been wiped out many years ago. BureauMed informs me that these scattered cases of Blue Martian fever have been caused by the escape of a few _Fafli_ insects, which have, since then, been isolated and destroyed. The illness has no serious after-effects. And as for the rumors that it confers immortality--"

He allowed his face to break into a pitying smile as he slowly shook his head, looking regretful and yet somehow amused.

"Those who continue to spread gossip about the fever will only reveal themselves as either psychotics or traitors. Whichever they are, they will be isolated for the good of our society."

The effect of his words was somewhat diminished by the brief glimpse people had of Dr. Lanza, who reached a hand to help the Leader rise. For Dr. Lanza wore an anxious frown, and his face was thin with worry.

In spite of numerous arrests, the rumors continued. For two weeks sporadic outbreaks of the fever occurred, and then, abruptly, they ceased.

It was more than a week after the last case had been reported that David sat in his bas.e.m.e.nt laboratory beside the opened mouse cage, watching with wry affection as the furry creatures crawled over his hand. These were historic mice, he reflected, whose reactions to SDE had opened up a new world, a world which he must somehow help to make better than the present one.

His three colleagues had returned a few days ago from their holiday.

They had calmly come back to work, and apparently n.o.body had thought to put two and two together, and thus connect the epidemic with the vacationers. It had been unfortunate that Tanya should have been put under arrest; it was difficult trying to find amus.e.m.e.nt for Leah so that she would keep out of sight, but still, on the whole, their luck had been good.

But it was time for David to go back to work in his office. Gently he detached the mice from his hand, dropped them into their cage, and closed the wire trap. He took his leather pencil case and the keys to his desk from the pocket of his lab coat and laid them on the desk, below the nail on which his wrist.w.a.tch hung. Carelessly he dropped his lab coat onto the desk and reached for his jacket, then paused, listening.

The chatter in the technicians' room suddenly died. In the unnatural quiet sounded a steady march of feet.

David turned to meet the probing black eyes of Leader Marley. Just behind him were Dr. Lanza and Officer Magnun.

There was no time to conceal his mice, David realized. Shrugging into his jacket, he strode forward without hesitation, a smile on his face, and stretched out his hand.

"Leader Marley! This is indeed an honor. If you had only notified us of your visit, we should have been prepared."

"Young as ever, I see, Wong."

"Thank you, Leader." There was no banter in Marley's eyes, he noted, but he continued amiably. "It has been some years since you have honored us by a visit in person. I'm afraid a laboratory is not a very exciting place, but I'd be honored to show you anything that may be of interest to you."

A faint contempt curled Marley's mouth as he glanced around the room.

"Nothing to see that I haven't seen before, is there? A lot of test tubes, a bunch of flasks, a mess of apparatus you'd think had been dreamed up by an idiot, and a bad smell. You still keep animals, I notice."

He sauntered over to the bench, picked up the cage and looked at the scurrying rodents.

David scarcely breathed.

Marley only nodded. "Well, mice are mice." He put down the cage and turned away. "These look just like the ones I saw when I was here eight or ten years ago. Same white patch on the forelimbs. I never knew mice could live that long."

"But--" began Lanza, bending over to study the mice.

"What an amazing memory you have, Leader," said David. "Just as you guessed, these mice are the direct descendants of the ones you saw on your former visit, a special mutant strain. The chief difference is that these are marked with white patches on the _right_ forelimbs, while, as I am sure you recall, the original specimens were marked on the _left_ forelimbs. Odd how these marks run in families, isn't it?"

Lanza put down the cage and strolled toward the door as Marley took a last bored look around.

"Nothing new here that I ought to see, Lanza?"

"No. Nothing new."

"Well, I've no time to waste. I've come here for two reasons, Dr. Wong.

We both want a booster shot for Blue Martian. Ten years is a long time, and there's been this epidemic."

"Which is now under control."

"That may be, but I still want a booster. You Research people don't always know as much as you think you do. When that's done, I want a detailed report of your progress on White Martian."