ZOE ALAKIS
The very existence of Pergamus was in danger, Zoe knew—everything she had worked for, all the precious and irreplaceable data she had gathered—and all because they had been exposed by that fool Paolus.
She had to protect herself, and she knew Tom Rom would do anything she asked. But this threat was not one she could fight directly, and even he couldn’t tackle the entire Confederation.
She wanted him with her inside the sterile dome, but Tom Rom refused. He rarely denied her requests, but this time he was firm. “I can’t react quickly enough behind all those decontamination layers. I have to be ready in case the Confederation arrives with a full military force. I very much doubt they will take a polite no for an answer. It is only a matter of time. We both know that.”
Zoe understood. “We need to decide what to do, how to respond. We have to act instead of react. The King and Queen know about Pergamus, and they believe we have information that can treat their dying son—which makes them unpredictable, perhaps irrational, certainly dangerous. It would not be wise to provoke them.”
“I concur, but the problem is larger than that. Others in the Confederation will be concerned about how many disease organisms we hold here. They will see Pergamus as a threat. They will decide to do something about us.”
Zoe’s gaze grew more intense. “Yes, and right now is the only time in which we control some of the variables. If we decide what to do, then we can guide the outcome.” She doubted she would like any of the solutions they came up with, but they had to do their best. “I will not surrender Pergamus to someone else—I’d destroy it all first, the samples and the research.”
“We will take that as a given,” Tom Rom said. “Therefore, perhaps our safest option is to release all personnel and trigger the fail-safe sterilization procedures. Obliterate Pergamus preemptively. Vaporize every last pebble and microorganism.” His determined face flashed a hint of a smile. “Then you and I can go somewhere else and begin fresh. We have all the prisdiamonds on Vaconda, so we would not lack for funding.”
He rattled off his solution so quickly that she realized he had already given this possibility a great deal of thought. And that disturbed her.
He continued, “We could take our data with us and start over again, just you and me. We’ve done it before.” He seemed almost to long for that.
But Zoe couldn’t bear to lose it all. “Then we would become outlaws, and the Confederation would keep hunting us down. We would never be able to build another Pergamus, at least not on this scale. No matter how secret our work is, we’d still need access to researchers, equipment, samples.” She touched her lower lip. “No, I’d like to try a different approach.”
Tom Rom’s face remained placid on the screen, waiting to hear what she would suggest. “I am listening.”
Zoe had been giving the idea much thought as well. “A concession and a bargaining chip. We have something the King and Queen want—all of our research into the Prince’s condition. But they also have something I want—Lee Iswander delivered all those Onthos historical records and the full database of medical files about the plague that almost killed you. We have the disease sample from your bloodstream, and the Iswander database would fill out our specimen set. I believe that’s worth a trade. That would be my opening gambit.”
Even with the flat distance of the comm screen, she could see him struggling to control his surprise. “It would buy us time. But you don’t actually have a cure to Prince Reynald’s illness.”
“They don’t know that—and I would not make them promises. I’ve learned all too well about the treachery of sharing, but right now, we may have no other choice.”
* * *
After recovering from Conden’s Fever, young Zoe became morbidly fascinated with the disease that had nearly killed her, along with the vaccines that others had denied her. Once she was healthy again, Zoe considered those people to be her enemies. And Tom Rom was not one to forgive such an insult, especially when it had endangered the life of the young woman who could have been his daughter.
They traveled to Earth, then to Yreka, New Portugal, and Cotopaxi. On Cotopaxi they learned that one of the planetary council members was also dying of Heidegger’s Syndrome, and he had flown away, chasing after a new and miraculous cure that was being offered on Rakkem. For a substantial fee.
Zoe felt a sharp pang. If such a cure had been offered years earlier, her father could have been saved, or at least his suffering might have been alleviated. “I want to know what that cure is,” she told Tom Rom. “And then I’ll buy it.”
He was disturbed. “But you don’t suffer from Heidegger’s.”
“No, but I still want it.”
So he took her to Rakkem to investigate this cure that sounded too good to be true. There, they met with a biomerchant named Aldo Cerf, who advertised many remarkable and guaranteed treatments—all of which came with exorbitant price tags. Cerf’s library of cures seemed unbelievable, miraculous. How could this seedy-looking biomerchant on a festering black-market planet have drugs and treatments that the best medical facilities in the Confederation didn’t offer? Zoe wanted to learn why, to know whether or not she could have acquired this cure back when her father was still alive.
Tapping into their newfound wealth of prisdiamonds, Tom Rom dressed as a respectable businessman from the reef settlements on Rhejak. He met with Aldo Cerf, explained that he—Tom Rom—had been diagnosed with the initial stages of Heidegger’s Syndrome, and he was anxious to obtain the cure before the disease progressed to the next stage.
Cerf was expansive and gracious, insisted that his treatment was new, that it would quite likely cure Heidegger’s. At the very least, he claimed, it would give the patient renewed energy and certainly prolong his life. Seeing the fine clothes Tom Rom wore, Cerf raised his price. Later, Zoe discovered that the council member from Cotopaxi had paid even more for the same treatment.
In addition to the Heidegger’s cure, Cerf advertised an entire catalogue of miracle drugs pulled together from the best medical researchers across the Spiral Arm. That was the reason why desperate patients constantly came to him.
Zoe and Tom Rom departed from Rakkem, glad to be away from the festering swamps and biomarkets, disease-testing stations, organ samples, and unethical people. She kept the Heidegger’s treatment like a trophy, a keepsake. It reminded her of her father, made her sad that she had found it too late.
Several months later, they learned that the council member from Cotopaxi had died of an accelerated progression of Heidegger’s.
Tom Rom spent more prisdiamonds to commission a rigorous analysis of the supposed cure, only to find that the treatment was a complete scam. Aldo Cerf’s treatment was just a concoction that produced mild euphoria so the patient felt healthier, believed he was getting better … and burned out faster.
Zoe was outraged at the con job. Back when her father was dying, she would have paid anything for this supposed cure … which would have killed him even sooner. Cerf’s treatment was merely a placebo—and worse.
Zoe wanted to do something about the twisted place, and so they investigated further. Tom Rom applied his considerable skills to digging into the biomerchant’s dealings, but Aldo Cerf was unremarkable among many similar con men, curesellers, and organ merchants.
More important, though, Tom Rom made the remarkable discovery that Zoe’s mother was still alive after all.…
* * *
The thought of Rakkem made Zoe cringe inside her sterile isolation dome. So many diseases at that place, so many corrupt people, and it was still in existence, still as corrupt.
On Pergamus, she operated differently, kept everything under tight control, neatly labeled and in its own place. She did not prey upon desperate sufferers, did not sell any of her work at all.
But she could not let the Confederation seize control of her facility. She couldn’t allow that to happen.
More determined than ever, she spoke to Tom Rom on the screen. “We need to make that bargain. We have to get something out of this and keep ourselves protected, at least for now.”
Tom Rom accepted that. “I’ll depart immediately for Theroc and speak to King Peter and Queen Estarra. I will negotiate terms. I promise I will save us.”
But she shook her head. The words caught in her throat, but she forced them out. She was terrified of her decision, but there could be no better way to demonstrate the seriousness of her offer. “Not just you, Tom Rom. I need to make a dramatic gesture.”
His eyes widened slightly, convinced that he wasn’t going to like what she intended to suggest.
“I will leave this dome and go with you and face the King and Queen in person.”