Chapter 8

Docchi slumped in the chair, looking the place over with some satisfaction. The medical inventory was proceeding quite well; one by one each preparation was being identified and the local source checked. It wasn’t nearly as bad as he had assumed at first; they were nearly self-sufficient.

One of the checkers came in. Docchi recognized her vaguely; he’d seen her around but that was all. He didn’t know who she was nor what she did. Unless he was mistaken her arms and legs were her own, a trifle heavy but shapely enough. If there was anything about her that was camouflaged with plastic tissue it was her face--the sullen glamour was an exaggeration of nature and moreover her expression didn’t change at all as she came nearer. There must be something with her face that couldn’t be corrected surgically and so she’d overcompensated.

“We’ve got it all done,” she said in a flat throaty voice. Glamour there too, in about the same degree.

“What?” he said. “Oh yes, the check of the biologicals. All identified?” He recalled her name, Maureen something or other.

“Everything that people claimed. There was some that no one knew what it was. Useless I suppose, or worse. It ought to be destroyed.”

That was a logical assumption any time save now. Medicine was precious and had to be hoarded even if they didn’t know what it was. “Save it, Maureen. Sooner or later someone will be in for it.”

“They’ve all been in. You don’t know how they rushed here when they learned the dispensary had been ransacked by the guards.” She smiled with faint disdain.

He was beginning to doubt whether her expression came out of the cosmetic kit; it was applied with extraordinary skill if it had, flexible enough to allow her to smile without seeming strained. But if it actually was her face it was monotonous. How long could she keep up the glamour? “Don’t be condescending, Maureen. Of course they were concerned. There are people who need those preparations to live comfortably, some in order to live at all.”

“I know,” she said. “I’ve personally contacted all the regular deficients.”

She seemed to know more about it than he did. There was a fraternity of the ailing and degrees of confraternity. Within the accidentals there were special groups, allied by the common nature of their infirmity. It was possible she belonged to some such group or knew someone who did. The latter probably; there seemed to be nothing seriously wrong with her. “What do you suppose happened? Why is there some left?” said Docchi. “If everyone’s been here all of it ought to be accounted for.”

“They’re always experimenting,” said Maureen.

“Who?”

“Doctors,” she said. “They try the latest ideas out on us and if we survive they use it on normal people.”

There was some truth in it--not much, but the bitterness was there though Earth and all it stood for was far behind. “Don’t blame them. They’ve got to make improvements,” he said in mild reproof.

“You don’t know,” said Maureen. “Anyway, what I was saying is that there is some stuff we can’t place. In each case it substitutes for one or more substances that have been in use up to now. We don’t know who it’s for.”

It was more serious than he thought, if only in a negative sense. He straightened up. “How many are missing biologicals?”

“I didn’t keep track accurately. Thirty or forty.”

A small number compared to the total. But thirty or forty invalids? And some would be affected seriously, depending on the nature of the preparation that couldn’t be traced to the person who should have it. The man whose unaided body couldn’t utilize calcium would certainly be in for trouble but not as soon as he who couldn’t make use of, say, iron. “We’ll find out,” he said with a confidence he didn’t altogether feel. “There are records around and we’ll look into them.” There were records but it was uncertain how complete they were after the guards had scattered them. “Do you know where they’re kept?”

She shook her head, the sullen glamorous smile transfixing her face. “I wish I did,” she said.

He was struck by the intensity. “Why?” he asked. He wanted to know too but it wasn’t an emotional thing.

“Don’t you know? I’m one of them.”

One of what, he was about to ask before he realized she meant she was a deficient whose salvaged body lacked certain physiological elements. More, she was one whose preparation couldn’t be identified. “Don’t worry. It’ll take us a little while to trace everything but we’ll have it straightened out in a matter of days.”

“You’d better,” she said, and it was not exactly a threat. There were overtones he couldn’t account for.

Before he could stop her she began loosening her dress and for the first time he saw that she wasn’t breathing, that she never did. Her dress fluttered as the air went in and out, sleeping or waking, without volition, responding mechanically to the needs of her bloodstream. The breathing mechanism was hidden in her body, replacing her lungs. Moreover it was probably connected to her speech centers in such a way to release a certain amount to her throat when the nervous system demanded. Perhaps it accounted for the peculiar vibrant quality of her voice.

She pointed to the tube that was showing. “It’s not just lungs I lack,” she said. “Everyone, man or woman, manufactures both male and female hormones, in different proportions of course. Except me. I don’t produce a single male hormone.” She stared at him intently.

“Do you know what that means?” Her voice was rising, terror mingled with something else. “Without injections in a few months I’ll be completely female. One hundred per cent woman and nothing else.”

He thought he saw her grow more feminine before his eyes; reluctantly he turned away. Theoretically the completely female person should be repulsive, yet she wasn’t. If anything, pathetic features dominated.

Pure feminity could destroy her, but how long would it take? He could discount her own estimate as arbitrary. She had decided on it in an attempt at self dramatization.

“You’re fortunate,” he said, and he couldn’t keep his eyes from straying back to her. “There are plenty of people around, both men and women, who can be donors. There must be some way to extract the hormones you need from the bloodstream. Our medical techniques may be crude but we’ll manage. Keep that in mind.”

“I will--will you?” she asked, her lips parted, and it wasn’t to breathe because she couldn’t.

He had the uncomfortable feeling that he knew exactly what she meant and it didn’t have anything to do with what he’d said. Had she even been listening? Probably she hadn’t. A pure male or female creature didn’t exist but if one should come into being it would scarcely be human. To a human life mattered or death did but to the pure abstract creature there was only one thing of importance.

He looked up to see her coming toward him. “I’m afraid,” she said, clasping him to her, carefully keeping the tube free and open. And she was afraid--it was not dramatization. The studied glamour slipped from her face. “I don’t want to be like this,” she whispered. “But if it happens--help me, please.” Her nearness was overpowering, and deadly.

At length she drew away. Terror left her eyes--and it had been there, real though with other factors. Even in fear, and he was conscious of that and her deeper design, she had planned ahead against the time she might not be wholely human. It was something like to death to change drastically from a thinking reasoning person to someone who could react only to one stimulus.

“We’ll see that nothing happens to you,” he said with weak assurance. “There may be a delay but it won’t be long. We’ll work it out.”

She was regarding him fixedly and he could see she was reverting. What he said wasn’t penetrating. He cleared his throat. “You’re as familiar with the place as any of us. Look around and see if you can find duplicate records. There may be a clue in them as to what the new preparations are for.” Clarity returned to her face as he spoke. It would leave again and come back at decreasing intervals unless or until the hormone deficiency was corrected. How far she could descend and remain mentally unscathed he didn’t know, nor did he want to find out. “Don’t leave until I come back. Do you understand?”

She smiled invitingly to show that perhaps she did understand what he said. He knew now that the sullen glamour was real, and terrifying. She couldn’t help any of her responses. Docchi hurried out; so little time had elapsed she must be nearly normal.

He thought of locking the door but there was no way to do that. The essence of a hospital was free access at all times, and so it was built. Besides, it wasn’t a good idea to try to keep her in. Constraint might produce violent reaction.

Docchi slanted the louvers so that the place looked vacant and let it go at that. The best he could hope for was that Maureen wouldn’t think of leaving.

He walked away. There were villages. Planned or otherwise, over the years dwellings and dormitories had gradually grown around three main centers. Externally there was not much to distinguish one village from the other except the distance from the hospital. The buildings nearest were little more than very large machines which fed, bathed, and tried to anticipate the intellectual stimulation of the almost helpless tenants. The houses in the farthest village, except for certain peculiarities, were much like any comfortable dwelling on Earth.

At the third village he found the house, glancing at the tiny light on the door. It was glowing; the occupant was at home. The numbered positions flashed on, indicating further that the person was awake and in bed. This information was necessary on the asteroid where many people suffered from some disability which might strike suddenly, leaving them helpless and unattended. Docchi leaned against the button and the light blinked him in.

Jeriann was sitting up in the middle of the bed; she seemed healthy and alert. “How do you feel?” he asked as he caught a chair with his foot and slid it near her.

She made a wry face and smiled. “Fine.”

“No polite answers, please. Do you feel like work?”

“Now that you’re here, no.” She laughed outright at his discomfiture. “Maybe now you’ll believe me when I say I’m all right. Do you?”

She didn’t wait for his answer but smoothed the covers around her. “You’re the one who found me, aren’t you?”

“Jordan really. I was there.”

She didn’t attempt to thank him; help was expected. No one knew when his turn would come. “I guess you’re wondering what I was doing there without my capsules.”

He wasn’t but he’d listen if she felt she had to talk. “It seemed strange you’d forget something like that. But everyone was confused then.”

“Not me. I knew exactly what I was doing. I was running from some big lunk who kept chasing me all over the dome. He knew I wasn’t Nona because I yelled for him to leave me alone. He didn’t pay any attention and I guess I lost the absorbics just before he caught me.”

“You don’t have to talk about it if it’s painful,” he said impassively.

“What do you think?” she said scornfully. “You think I’d let him bother me? I told him to go away or I’d slip my face off. He got sick right there and let go.”

He smiled at her vigor. “It’s a good thing he didn’t take you at your word and let you remove the disguise.”

“Thank you, kind sir. Now I know I’m pretty too.” Her manner overcame the apparent sharpness. “Anyway there I was. I’d used up more energy than usual and I had nothing to take. I didn’t make it to the hospital.”

“I didn’t know the details but I imagined something like that. You’re lucky we found you and even more so that we were able to discover your particular absorbics in the dispensary mess.”

“Right both times--but you didn’t find my absorption capsules. They weren’t there. Never are. I have to go directly to the lab to get them. Of course I couldn’t expect you to know that.”

“Then what are you doing here, alive?” he asked, frowning. “The wrong thing should have killed you.”

“I’m not a true deficient, you know. It’s not that my body fails to produce glandular substances. What I lack is food and water and anything that’s composed mostly of that will do, providing it’s in a form I can assimilate. When you slapped me and held me up I saw someone else’s capsule but I knew it would do. That person has trouble with a number of blood sugars and several fluids--not what I require for a complete diet--but it brought me out of the hunger shock.”

It was not ordinary hunger which had caused her to stumble and be unable to get up; this was acute, a trauma which affected her whole organism. And because it was such a constant threat, unconsciously or not, she had prepared for it. Deficients knew each other better than any other group. They were aware which prescription could in an emergency be substituted for their own. It was unlikely to be used--but that knowledge had paid off for Jeriann.

The house ticked on as he sat watching her. That was another peculiarity of the place, aside from the lack of kitchen or any room wherein she could eat. She didn’t need it and so it hadn’t been built. She didn’t feel hunger except negatively; it would be easy to die if she should decide to do so. And so, to reinforce her will to live, a comprehensive schedule had been imposed from above. But the most rigid personal schedule meant nothing without time. Time took the place of hunger, of the need for food, of all the savour in it.

There were clocks on the wall, inconspicuous dials or larger ones, integrated in pictures and summed up in designs. There was a huge circular chronograph on the ceiling; hourglasses and sundials were contrived in the motif on the floor--and they all seemed actually to function. And when she slept or whether she didn’t, there were arrangements for that too. The house vibrated, ever so softly, but the attuned senses could hear it, feel it, in sickness and in health.

“Damn,” muttered Jeriann as the vibration momentarily grew louder. She tried to say something to Docchi but her thoughts were confused and she couldn’t concentrate. “Don’t mind me,” she said, smiling ruefully. “I was conditioned to this sort of thing. They seem to think I’ve got to be ready on the dot.”

She could see that it wasn’t very clear. “There’s a clock in my head too. Everybody has one naturally but mine has been trained. Any natural beat will regulate the self alarm, even the pounding of my heart, even if I don’t think about it--but the house is more effective. They said I had to have it if I expected to live.”