receptacles that produce the spores of that life form. If we survive, if our children survive, it
will be because we fulfill our purpose-because we spread the organism.' 'Spread the disease?' Lorene asked
'Yes.'
'Deliberately? I mean ... to everybody? After you said-'
'I didn't say we should spread it deliberately. I didn't say we should spread it at all. I said we won't survive, and the kids won't survive, if we don't. But I'll tell you, I don't think they or we are in any real danger. Once we knew what to look for on Proxi Two, we found the organism in almost every animal species alive there. Some were immune-herbivores
tended to be immune-and though I can't prove it, I suspect a lot of species had been driven into extinction.'
'Some would be here,' Lorene said. 'Dogs.'
Eli nodded. 'Dogs, yes, maybe coyotes, wolves, any canine. I wouldn't give much for the chances of cats either, and some snakes-maybe all snakes, rats, most rodents. Heaven knows what else.'
'What about the people?' Lorene whispered. 'They'll die, too. Four out of seven died here. Five, if you count Gwyn's baby. Ten out of fourteen in your crew died. And what about Andy? How many more Andy Zeriams, Eli?' She had
begun to cry. 'How goddamn many?'
He got up and went to her. She pushed him away angrily at first, but then reached out and pulled him to her. 'What about the people?' she repeated against him.
After a moment, he put her aside and sat down next to Meda. 'What do you want to do?' Meda asked.
He shook his head. 'Nothing. Just go on as we have.' 'But-'
'What else? You're right about the kids. They are what they are. I'm right too. They can't make it in the world as it is. But I'm not going to make a move to spread the disease beyond the ranch, here. Not even for them. We'll have to bring
people here now and then, but that's all.'
'You're talking about leaving everything to chance,' Meda said.
'No,' he told her, 'not quite. I'm talking about stifling chance, doing every damn thing I can to keep the disease right here. Everything. And I'll need all three of you with me.'
'But the kids,' Meda said.
'Yeah.' He sighed. 'I couldn't hurt them. Even without the three of you ganging up on me, I couldn't have. But ... in this one way, I can't help them, either. Can you?' He looked from one of them to the other. No one answered. 'What happens happens,' Eli continued. 'I won't make it happen. Dead people, dead animals, no more cities because we'd go
crazy in cities. No more of a lot of things I probably haven't even thought of.' He stared at the table for several seconds.
'It will happen, though,' he said. 'Sooner or later, somehow, it will happen. And ultimately, I'll be responsible.' PRESENT 28
Keira had just eaten a large meal-overcooked, overseasoned, but filling. She was feeling well until the white-haired girl came to take her to her father. She was feeling well! She could not remember how long it had been since she had last felt truly well.
The car family had locked her in a walk-in hall closet. She had been in pain and Badger had demanded to know why. When she told him she had leukemia, he had shrugged.
'So?' he had said. 'There's a cure for that-some kind of medicine that makes the bad cells turn back to normal.' 'I've had that,' she told him. 'It didn't work.'
'What do you mean, it didn't work? It works. It worked on my mother. She had the same shit you do.' 'It didn't work on me.'
So he had locked her in the closet. Some of his people, ignorant and fearful, could not quite believe her illness was not
contagious. Badger locked her away from them for her own safety. She had seen for herself how eager they were to get her out of their sight. She wondered what they would do if they knew what she and her family had really given them- what they were really doomed to. They would begin to find out soon enough. That was what Eli was waiting for. That was why he was keeping them boxed in. He did not have to do anything more than that to win. She had heard him talking about explosives, but then the car family had begun showing a noisy movie and the faint voices from outside were drowned.
Yet there were explosives. Eli would do anything necessary to stop the car people if they threatened to break free before they were ready to join him. He certainly would not let the friends they had called reach them. Keira did not know what would happen to her, but somehow she was not afraid. She sat on the closet floor with bound hands and feet, reading from cardboard boxes of old magazines. The lavish use of paper fascinated her. A one-hundred-and- twenty page magazine for only five or six dollars. A collector's item. Computer libraries like her father's made more sense, occupied less space, could be more easily updated, but somehow, weren't as much fun to look at.
The light in the closet was dim, but Keira preferred it dim. She thought she might not be able to tolerate it if it were normally bright. She was looking through an old National Geographic when the white-haired girl opened the door. 'Your father wants to see you,' the girl said in her low, throaty voice.
Keira looked up from her magazine, stared at the girl, wondered what it might be like to be her-dirty, knowing, tough, headed nowhere, but still young and not bad-looking. The girl's dark-tanned skin contrasted oddly with her white hair. 'He might want to see my sister,' Keira said, 'but I don't think he wants to see me.'
'You the one he had the fight with?' the girl asked. Keira did not hesitate. 'Yes.'
'Doesn't matter. He just wants to see one of you to make sure we haven't shot you. Come on.' She unfastened Keira's hand and leg restraints.
Keira started to refuse. She did not think the girl would force her. Then she realized that in spite of what had happened
between them, she wanted to see her father-probably for the same reason he wanted to see her. Just to be sure he was all right. He had seemed so weak and sick when she saw him last. The organism seemed to be making her strong and him weak. That was all that had permitted her to get away from him when Rane made her realize what was happening.
It occurred to her that as things stood now, each time she saw him might be the last. The thought frightened her and she tried to reject it, but it had taken hold.
'All right,' she said, standing up.
The girl watched her intently. 'Is he really your father?' 'Yes.'
'Is he part black, then, or is it just your mother?' 'My mother was black. He's white.'
The girl nodded. 'My mother was from Sweden. God knows why she came here. Got raped her first week here. That's
where I came from.'
Shocked, Kiera spoke the first words that occurred to her. 'But why didn't she have an-' Keira stopped, glanced downward. There was something wrong with asking someone why she had not been aborted. She wondered why ttie girl would tell her such a secret, shameful thing.
'She couldn't make up her mind,' the girl said unperturbed. 'She wanted to get rid of me, then she didn't, then she wasn't sure, then I was born and it was too late. She kept me 'til I was fourteen, though. Then she went nuts and when they took her away to cure her, I left.' The girl sighed. 'After that, life was shit until I got adopted into the family. How old are you?'
'Sixteen,' Keira told her. 'Really? How old is he?'
Keira looked at her sharply. The girl looked away. For a moment, Keira hated her, wanted to get awasy from her. Her rage surprised her, then shamed her because she c'ould not help understanding its cause: jealousy. The girl had slept
with Blake-as Keira herself almost had. His scent was on her like a signature. For a moment Keira wondered how she cou Id distinguish such a thing. His scent. . . Yet there was no doubt in her mind, and she was almost stiff with jealous rage.
Then came the shame.
'Forty-four,' she said softly. 'He's forty-four' Neither she nor the girl said anything more. The girl let Keira in to see her father, then minutes later, let her out again. Only then could she look at the girl and realize her father needed an ally among the car people. The girl liked him and she could be useful to him in ways Keira certainly could not.
'Forty-four isn't old,' Keira said as the girl took her back to the closet.
The girl glanced at her. 'What'd you do? Decide it was okay for me to fuck him?'
Keira jumped. Not for the first time, she was grateful she was not as light-skinned as Rane. Nothing made Rane blush. Everything would have made Keira blush.
'I just thought you liked him,' Keira muttered.
'What if I do? He's your father, not the other way around.'
Keira tried once more. 'Did you bring him the blanket?' she asked. 'And food?' She had seen an empty plate on the floor near him.
'Yeah, so what?'
'Thank you,' Keira said sincerely. She went back into the closet, waited to see whether the girl would put the cuffs back on her. But the girl only looked at her, then closed the door. Keira waited for the soft click of the lock, but did not hear it. Moments later, she heard the girl's footsteps going away.
Keira was almost free. With her enhanced senses, she might be able to slip out of the house, escape. Alone.
But the white-haired girl had given her a choice she did not want-to challenge the car family by attempting to escape, to desert her own family, or to remain in dangerous captivity. Here, she certainly could not help her family. At any time,
Badger might decide to kill his captives, rape them, use them as shields, anything. He had kicked her father almost into
unconsciousness for no reason at all. He and his people were unpredictable, ruthless, and, worst of all, cornered. What would happen when they began to realize they were sick as well?
And whatever they decided to do, how would her staying affect
