Clay's Ark p-5 Page 11

  content. The organism had turned them all into breeding animals. "What do you think?" Meda asked him.

  He looked at the map. "Damn lonely stretch of road," he said. "Anyone working here?" He pointed to a quarry that

  should have been nearby.

  Meda shook her head. "Too dangerous. What this highway really is at that point is a sewer. From what I've heard about city sewers, the only reason they're worse is because they have more sewer rats. But the gangs here are just as dangerous, and the haulers . . . body-parts dealers, arms smugglers-that kind. The few holdout ranchers are dangerous too. If they don't know you, they shoot on sight."

  "Dangerous," Eli said. "And close. Too close to us here. I used to see lights from Ninety-five when I went out at night." When he went out to kill and eat chickens to supplement Meda's mother's idea of three good meals. "I think I saw lights

  from State Highway Sixty-two, too. If we accidentally catch anyone important, I don't want search parties coming right

  to us."

  Meda gave a short, bitter laugh. "People disappear out here all the time, Eli. It's expected. And nobody's important enough these days to search this country for."

  Eli glanced up from the map and smiled. "I am. Or I would be if anyone knew I was alive." "Come on," she said, irritated, "you know what I mean."

  "Yeah. I hear bike gangs and car families can be damned vindictive, though, if they think you've hurt one of theirs.

  Let's go up to I-Forty. If things are bad there, we could even go on to I-Fifteen." "That far?" Meda said. "Fuel, Eli."

  "No problem. We'll take the Ford. With its twin tanks it can go just about anywhere within reason and come back without a fill-up."

  "And there are more people on Forty and Fifteen," Lorene said. "Real people, not just sewer rats. I could get an honest hauler or a farmer or a city man." She sounded like an eager child listing Christmas possibilities. In a moment, Eli

  would have to make her hear herself. Left on her own, she could do a lot of harm before she realized what was happening to her.

  "The Ford's been to Victorville and back without fuel problems," Gwyn said lazily. She was from Victorville, Eli knew.

  Christian had met her there, where she had worked with her brothers at their mother's roadside station. She shrugged. "I

  don't think we'll have a fuel problem."

  Meda looked at her strangely, probably because of her lazy tone, then spoke to Eli. "I assume you want to use Ninety- five for going and coming."

  "We can use it for going," he said. "If you think it's worth the detour."

  She shook her head. "Car families set up roadblocks. Armored tour buses and private haulers just bull their way through, but cars get caught. Especially one car alone."

  "We'll use this network of dirt roads, then. I like them better anyway. You know the best ones?"

  She nodded. "In good weather, some of them are smoother than Ninety-five, anyway."

  "And the dirt roads will give captives the idea they're more isolated than they are. They won't be able to prowl around and find out the truth the way I did until they've made it through the crisis period. After that, they won't care."

  "Are you sure they won't?" Meda asked. "I mean . . . this is our home, but some stranger . . ." "This will be his home."

  Lorene giggled. "I'll make him feel at home. You just catch him."

  Eli turned to look at her.

  "You know," she said, still laughing, "this is the kind of thing you always read about men doing to women-kidnapping them, then the women getting to like the idea. I think I'm going to enjoy reversing things."

  Silence. Meda and Gwyn sat staring at Lorene, clearly repelled.

  "We won't touch him," Eli told Lorene. "We'll leave it to you to give him the disease." Lorene's smile vanished. She looked from Meda and Gwyn to Eli.

  "He might die on you," Eli continued. "If he does, we'll get you another one." She frowned as though she did not understand.

  "We'll get you as many as necessary," he said.

  "You don't have any right to make me feel guilty!" she whispered. Her voice rose abruptly. "This is all your fault! My husband-"

  "Remember him!" Eli said. "Remember how it felt to lose him. Chances are, you'll be taking someone else's husband soon."

  "You have no right-"

  "No, I don't," he said. "But then, there isn't anyone else to say these things to you. And you have to hear them. You have to understand what you are-why you feel what you feel."

  "It's because you killed-"

  "No. Listen, Lori. It's because you're the host, the vehicle of an extraterrestrial organism. It's because that organism needs new hosts, new vehicles. You need to infect a man and have children and you won't get any peace until you do. I understand that. God knows I understand it. The organism is a damned efficient invader. Five people died because I couldn't fight it. Now, it's possible that at least one person will die because you can't fight it."

  "No," Lorene whispered, shaking her head.

  "It's something we can't forget or ignore," Eli continued. "We've lost part of our humanity. We can lose more without even realizing it. All we have to do is forget what we carry, and what it needs." He paused. She had turned away, and he waited until she faced him again. "So we'll get you a man," he said. "And we'll turn him over to you. You'll give him the disease and you'll care for him. If he dies, you'll bury him."

  Lorene got up and stumbled out of the room.

  PRESENT 16

  When Blake and Meda had gone, when Ingraham had led Rane away, Eli and Keira sat alone at the large dining room table. Keira looked across at Eli bleakly.

  "My sister," she whispered. Rane had looked so frozen when Ingraham led her out, so terrified. "She'll be all right," Eli said. "She's tough."

  Keira shook her head. "People think that. She needs to have them think that."

  He smiled. "I know. I should have said she's strong. Maybe stronger than even she knows."

  A woman carrying a crying child of about three years came into the house. The child, Keira could see, was a little girl wearing only underpants. She had a beautiful face and a dark, shaggy head of hair. There was something wrong with the way she sat on the woman's arm, though-something Keira could not help noticing, yet could not quite identify.

  The woman smiled wearily at Eli. "Red room," she said. Eli nodded.

  The woman stared at Keira for a moment. Keira thought she stared hungrily. When she had gone into a room off the living room and shut the long, sliding door, Keira faced Eli.

  "What's going on?" she said. "Tell me."

  He looked at her hungrily, too, but then leaned back in his chair and told her. No more hints, no more delays. When he finished, she asked questions and he answered them. At one point, the woman and child came out of the red room and Eli called them to him.

  "Lorene, bring Zera over. I want you both to meet Kerry."

  The woman, blond and thin, came over with her hungry eyes and her strange child. She looked at Keira, then at Eli. "Why is there still a table between you two?" she asked. "I'll bet there's no table between that guy and Meda."

  "Is that what I called you over here for?" he asked, annoyed. "Don't you want to brag about your kid a little?" Lorene faced Keira almost hostilely.

  Keira and the child had been staring at each other. Keira roused herself, met Lorene's suspicious eyes. "I'd like to see her."

  "You see her," Lorene said. "She's no freak. She's supposed to be this way. They're all this way."

  "I know," Keira said. "Eli has told me. She's beautiful."

  Lorene put her daughter on the table and the child immediately sat down, catlike, arms braced against the floor. "Stand up," Lorene said, pushing at the little girl's hindquarters. "Let the lady see you."

  "No!" Zera said firmly. To Keira, that proved something about her was normal. Before Keira's illness, she had been called on to take care of little toddler cousins who sometimes seemed not to know any other word.
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br />   Then Zera did get up, and in a single fluid motion, she launched herself at Eli. He seemed to pluck her out of the air, laughing as he caught her.

  "Little girl, I'm going to miss some day. You're getting faster."

  "What would happen if you did miss?" Keira asked. "She wouldn't hurt herself, would she?" "No, she'd be okay. Lands on her feet like a cat. Lorene does miss sometimes."

  "I never miss," Lorene said, offended. "I just step aside sometimes. I'm not always in the mood to be jumped on." Eli put Zera back on the table and this time, she walked a few steps, leaped off the table, and stood beside Lorene.

  Keira smiled, enjoying the child's smooth, catlike way of moving. Then she frowned. "A kid that age should be kind of clumsy and weak. How can she be so coordinated?"

  "We've talked about that," Eli said. "They do go through a clumsy period, of course. Last year, Zee fell down all the

  time. But if you think she's agile now, you should see Jacob. He's four." "What will they be like when they're adults?"

  "We don't know," Lorene said softly. "Maybe they peak early-or maybe they're going to be as fast as cheetahs some day. Sometimes we're afraid for them."

  Keira nodded, looked at the child. She was perfect. A perfect, lean, little four-legged thing with shaggy uncombed hair and a beautiful little face. "A baby sphinx," Keira said, smiling.

  "Think you could handle having one like this someday?"

  Keira glanced at her, smiled sadly, then turned back to Zera. "I think I could handle it," she said.

  Zera took a few steps toward her. Keira knew that if the child scratched or bit her, she would get the disease. Yet she could not bring herself to be afraid. The child was as strange a being as Keira had ever seen, but she was a child. Keira

  reached out to her, but Zera drew back.

  "Hey," Keira said softly. "What do you have to be afraid of?" She smiled. "Come here."

  The little girl mirrored the smile tentatively, edged toward Keira again. She was a little cat not sure it should trust the strange hand. She even sniffed without getting quite close enough to touch.

  "Do I smell good?" Keira asked. "Meat!" the child said loudly.

  Startled, Keira drew back. She expected to be scratched or bitten eventually, but she did not want to have to shake Zera

  off her fingers. Anything as sleek and catlike as this child probably had sharp teeth. "Zee!" Lorene said. "Don't bite!"

  Zera looked back at her and grinned, then faced Keira. "I don't bite."

  The teeth did look sharp, but Keira decided to trust her. She started to reach out again, this time to lift the child into her lap, but Eli spoke up.

  "Kerry!"

  She looked across the table at him. "No."

  His voice made her think of a warning rattle. She drew back, not frightened, but wondering what was wrong with him. Lorene seemed angry. She picked up Zera and faced Eli. "What kind of game are you playing?" she demanded. "What's the kid here for? Decoration?"

  Eli looked up at her.

  "Don't give me that look. Go do what you're supposed to do. Then you can take care of her! And if she doesn't make it, you can-"

  Eli was on his feet, inches from her, looming over her. Keira held her breath, certain he would hit the woman and perhaps by accident, hurt the child.

  Lorene stood her ground. "You're soaking wet," she said calmly. "You're putting yourself through hell. Why?"

  He seemed to sag. He touched Lorene's face, then Zera's shaggy head. "You two get the hell out of here, will you?" "What is it!" Lorene insisted.

  "Leukemia," Eli said.

  There was silence for a moment. Then Lorene sighed. "Oh." She shook her head. "Oh shit." She turned and walked away.

  When she had gone through the front door, Keira spoke to Eli. "What are you going to do?" she asked. He said nothing.

  "If you touch me," she said, "how soon will I die?" "It isn't touch."

  "I know. I mean-" "You might live."

  "You don't think so."

  More silence.

  "I'm not afraid," she said. "I don't know why I'm not, but. . . You should have let me play with Zera. She wouldn't have known and Lorene wouldn't have cared."

  "Don't tell me what I ought to do."

  She could not fear him-not even when he wanted her to. "Is Zera your daughter?" "No. She calls me Daddy, though. Her father's dead."

  "You have kids?" "Oh yes."

  "I always thought someday I'd like to."

  "You've prepared yourself to die, haven't you?" She shrugged. "Can anyone, really?"

  "I can't. To me, talking about it is like talking about the reality of elves and gnomes." He smiled wryly. "If the organism were intelligent, I'd say it didn't believe in death."

  "But it will kill me."

  He got up, pushing his chair away angrily. "Come on!"

  He led her into the hall and to a large bedroom. "I'm going to lock you in," he said. "The windows are locked, but I guess even you could kick them out if you wanted to. If you do, don't expect any consideration from the people you meet outside."

  She only looked at him.

  Abruptly, he turned and left the room, slamming the door behind him.

  Keira lay down on the bed feeling listless, not quite in pain, but unable to worry about Eli, his guilt, the compulsion that would surely overcome him soon. Her body was warning her. If she did not get her medication soon, she would feel worse. She closed her eyes, hoping to fall asleep. She had the beginnings of a headache, or what felt like the beginnings

  of one. Sometimes the dull, threatening discomfort could go on for hours without really turning into a headache. She

  rolled over, away from the wet place her sweating body had made. Clay's Ark victims were not the only people who could sweat profusely without heat. Her joints hurt her when she moved.

  She had decided she was to be left alone for the night when Eli came in. She could see him vaguely outlined in the moonlight. Apparently, he could see her much better.

  "Fool," he said. "Why didn't you tell me you felt bad? You've got medicine in the car, haven't you?" Not caring whether he could see or not, she nodded.

  "I thought so. Get up. Come show me where it is."

  She did not feel like moving at all, but she got up and followed him out. In the dining room, she watched him pull on a pair of black, cloth-lined, plastic gloves.

  "Town gloves," he said. "People take us for bikers in stores sometimes. I had a guy serve me once with a shotgun next to him. Damn fool. I could have had the gun anytime I wanted it. And all the while I was protecting him from the

  disease."

  Why are you protecting me? she thought, but she said nothing. She followed him out to the car, which had been moved farther from the house. There, she showed him the compartment that contained her medicine. She had left it on the seat once, not thinking, and someone had nearly managed to smash into the car to get it, no doubt hoping for drugs. They would have been disappointed. They might have gotten into her chemotherapy medicines and made themselves thoroughly sick.

  "Where's your father's bag?" Eli asked.

  She was startled, but she hid her surprise. "Why do you want it?" "He wants it. Meda says she's going to let him examine her." "Why?"

  "He wants to. It gives him the feeling he's doing something significant, something familiar that he can control. Knowing Meda, I suspect he needs something like that right now."

  "Can I see him?"

  "Later, maybe. Where's the bag?"

  This time, she couldn't help glancing toward the bag's compartment. It was only a tiny glance. She did not think he had seen it. But he went straight to the compartment, located the hidden keyhole, stared at it for a moment, then selected the right key on the first try.

  "You never turn on any lights," Keira said. "Does the disease help you see in the dark?"

  "Yes." He took the bag from its compartment. "Take your medicine to your room. All of it." "The bag won't work for you," she said. "It's coded. O
nly my father can use it."

  He just smiled.

  She had to suppress an impulse to touch him. The feeling surprised her and she stood looking at him until he turned abruptly and strode away. She watched him, realizing he may have felt as bad as she did. His smile had dissolved into a pinched, half-starved look before he turned away.