RINA opened her eyes and knew she must be dreaming. Why else were so many people there in her bedroom? She turned her head and there was Kokab right where he belonged, perched on her pillow above and to the right. So, that was fine, but why all these other people? Mama was there, talking to Papa in the corner of her bedroom room and they both looked so worried. Except, Papa was also standing, closer to her arguing with a short furry person, a Prairie Dog? And he was also over by the door angrily waving his trunk at … a Badger? That didn’t make sense. She’d learned about the Compact in gymnasium; other races couldn’t come to Barsk. Wasn’t that why she’d had to go onto Papa’s ship to meet the Sloth and Raccoon?
She smiled a bit as she remembered meeting Druz and Abenaki. So wonderful. But … back to her room, why was there three of Papa? Oh, right. Because she was dreaming. That was it.
Closest to her, the Cynomy glanced her way then looked back at her father. He looked old and kind of sad. Or, maybe not. Did Prairie Dogs look sad the way Fant did? She thought so, she’d studied, about how people were people and all showed sad and happy and scared and other things the same way. So, yeah, he looked sad.
“This is ludicrous, Jorl. I haven’t practiced medicine since I joined the senate thirty years ago.”
“I didn’t bring you here to have you practice. Your speciality on the Committee of Information is medicine and related life sciences, Welv. You know every development, every experimental technique, every disease that’s been written up in an article or a grant proposal. What’s happening to her?”
“Look, I understand. You’re hurting. You feel helpless. And she’s getting worse. But it’s not as though I can perform an examination. As you explained it, all I’m seeing is your unconscious mind’s description of how she appears to you. I can’t properly take her pulse, let alone draw blood or perform any kind of scan.”
“But you think you know what’s happening?”
“Yes, precisely because as you say I’ve seen all the articles. The imminent physicality cascade, that very phrase, appeared in a paper about a virus called Martinase-VI, written by Burkl there.” He gestured toward the Badger. “While you were finding her, I instructed your wife to soak your daughter in cold water and administer a gastric lavage using warm saline. The differential between the submersion and the irrigation should slow the progress of onset, if it is this virus. But it doesn’t make sense. There’s no way your daughter could have contracted it.”
The version of Papa arguing with the Badger looked back at the one talking to the Prairie Dog and both said the same thing at the same time.
“That’s what he says, but that’s not important. Go with the idea that she could be infected.”
“And I’m telling you that’s impossible,” said the Badger, her head turning to look by turns at each of Jorl. “My seven times great-grandmother engineered the virus for the ill-conceived Taxi rebellion on the Martin colony. She crafted a designer disease profoundly narrow in scope. It wasn’t just limited to the Taxi race, it targeted a specific family line with very little genetic generalizability. There is no possibility a Lox could have any of the necessary genetic markers. Do you understand? Not a one of them.”
“Genetic markers don’t matter,” said Dabni. She looked up from Jorl and Rina saw her mother was crying. “There’s a technique that takes the idea of the disease, the memory of it within the body. That memory can be duplicated and passed to anyone. The actual virus isn’t needed, the memory is enough to teach the new victim what the virus would do, and the body responds.”
“Even if such a thing was possible—and I don’t believe it is—the last sample of Martinase-VI was destroyed a century and more ago.”
Papa grabbed the Badger’s chin with his trunk. “Were any of the targeted family members Speakers?”
“Maybe … ye—yes, now that I think of it. There was one. How did you know?”
He turned to Dabni. “If a Taxi Speaker had the disease, the Caudex could have retrieved the memory of it, secure in the knowledge no one would ever learn of it because no other Speaker would ever summon them.”
She nodded. “That makes sense.”
Jorl whirled back to the Badger. “So what’s the cure?”
“What? There’s no cure, because no one’s contracted the disease in ages, and back then those who did didn’t know they had it in time to do anything about it.”
“But you said samples used to be kept.”
“Well, yes, for study—”
“And, as part of that study, did someone develop a cure?”
“No, not per se. But a treatment. But it only worked if the disease was caught in its earliest stages.”
Papa seemed to smile. “Which is where we are. So what is it?”
“Not something you’re going to have on Barsk. It involves administering a complicated series of retroviruses in a precise order to convince the afflicted organs that they need to stop tearing themselves apart. The only place set up for that is on Haven.”
“Your ship!” cried Mama. “You could take her there in your ship.”
“My ship is on Ulmazh,” said Papa. “And even if it were here, there’re no direct routes between Barsk and Haven. The trip would take several seasons.”
The Badger shook her head. “I don’t know how long the seasons run where you are, but Martinase-VI runs its course in less than five days.”
The room fell silent. The three of Papa all looked so sad. Mama was crying again. Even the Prairie Dog and the Badger looked unhappy. This was a bad, bad dream.
Rina coughed and her parents turned to her.
“Kokab says…,” she trailed off. It hurt to talk. And now that she realized that, it seemed like everything hurt and it occurred to her that despite the bits that made no sense, maybe this wasn’t a dream at all. Except, she was so tired. It would be so easy to shut her eyes and then maybe she’d have real dreams. Better dreams. But her doll was being so bossy and insistent. That didn’t seem fair, but sometimes he got that way and there was nothing for it but to give in or he’d go on and on and on. So she tried again.
“Kokab says, tell Pizlo to hurry.”
“Who’s Pizlo?” said the Prairie Dog.
Kokab stopped nagging her. Rina smiled as she imagined Pizlo getting to meet someone new. He’d love that. It was a nice thought to hold on to as she let her eyes close and drifted off to sleep.