As full darkness descended over Siminia Three Planet Station, Brora scanned her two charges for any warning signs, then measured out the medicine that would allow each to sleep easier. They didn’t see the slight frown that crossed her face.
Once the planetary prince and princess were curled up together in their favorite room in Fairy Castle, the ursine healer went out to check on the two injuries she knew of among the ships in the station, and whoever else might have banged themselves up that day in adventures and play.
Six-year-old Teina started crying.
Her mother kept turning on all the stove burners, and putting things directly on top of them — bags of flour, plastic containers of left-overs, and anything else handy.
The smoke and stench was terrible. Twice Teina crept into the kitchen while her mother wasn’t looking and turned off the burners, but couldn’t do anything about the smoldering food.
The second time, her mother wandered into the kitchen, talking to herself and gazing around like she was lost. She snapped out of it just long enough to spank her daughter hard. “I’m trying to cook dinner!” Then she turned the burners back on and resumed her aimless mumbling.
Tears streaming down her face, Teina ran toward the back door.
Her father was in the carport, washing the car with the engine running,
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using a rag and generous splashes from a gasoline can.
“Stop it, Daddy!”
He glared at his daughter with crazed eyes. “You want to do it?” he asked with a demented tone, offering her the rag and gasoline can.
Teina ran to her room, grabbed a beloved doll, and sat on her bed.
Suddenly an explosion tore away half the house.
Teina cried for a minute, then abruptly stopped and looked around.
Smoke was creeping under her door, colored red-orange from flames in the hallway beyond. The only window led to the front of the house.
Teina wasn’t supposed to open her window. The air conditioning wouldn’t work with it open.
The six-year-old girl looked at the smoke one more time. Her eyes narrowed, and she scanned the room with a new purpose. Her wooden toy box was the heaviest thing she could lift, just a little, if she tried very hard.
Straining with all her might, she got it up to her bed, put her doll inside,
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and picked up the box again.
As smoke started swirling around her, Teina ran toward the window as fast as her legs would go.
The shock and sound of breaking glass swirled all around her until everything, an eternity or perhaps just a second later, came to rest on the front lawn.
She saw her doll in front of her, picked it up, and ran. She didn’t feel the cuts on her arms and legs until much later. She didn’t pay attention to the other houses that were burning. She just ran, as fast as she could go, toward her favorite patch of woods, two blocks away.
And she didn’t cry again for almost a year.
Jimox was awakened by his precious partner thrashing and whimpering in pain and confusion. He wrapped his arms around her. “Bad dream?”
She eventually relaxed. “Yeah. Burning Day again.”
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Chapter 39: It’s Back
A cloudy day brought a somber mood as the invited guests gathered around the Goblin Fountain after breakfast. With the elderly pair of monkey mammals nowhere in sight, the crew of the Manessa Kwi, the three Education Service trainees, and a few others, all chatted about how they would handle what Jimox and Teina had endured in their lives.
Ashley would be deeply saddened if her civilization perished. Kolarrr’ka wouldn’t shed a feather over it. T’sss’lisss had mixed feelings, and could relate to both attitudes.
Finally about noon, the honorary station hosts emerged from Fairy Castle, yawning and chatting with Brora. They slowly approached the fountain, but before even sitting down, the ursine healer’s bracelet chimed urgently.
“Research ship Pena Belisana,” an unseen avian voice squawked in haste,
“just sent a broken transmission, saying something about a disease, and something burning, and requested approach guidance and landing instructions.”
Jimox and Teina looked at each other with wide eyes, and decades of weariness suddenly melted from their shoulders. Jimox grabbed the healer’s arm and tapped at her bracelet with his ancient furry fingers. “Rrr’tana, let us hear the entire transmission!”
After a short pause, the desperate call was replayed. “. . . entire crew affected . . . passing continental beacon A-Four . . . or is it B-Four? . . . can hardly see straight . . . contagious? . . . burning . . . should we land? . . .”
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The avian station host’s voice returned. “That’s it. I can’t make contact again.”
Teina blinked twice, then pulled the healer’s arm close. “Rrr’tana, take direct ship control, and figure out where they are!”
“Working on it.”
Jimox looked at Teina. “Let’s get up to the control room!”
The pair steadied each other, then headed toward Fairy Castle at a pace they hadn’t used in years. Brora was hard pressed to keep up.
Before going far, Teina turned her head but didn’t stop walking. “Captain, we’re going to need a ship.”
Ilika glanced at his crew, and all six of them fell in behind the elderly couple and their healer.
The avian host made room at the station control desk as soon as Jimox and Teina hurried in. Teina paused to cough deeply, then mastered it by sheer force of will and sat down.
“Pena Belisana confirmed that the crew is sick,” the bird reported, “and gave me control without question. It’s about a thousand kilometers east, heading this way.”
“They said . . . burning . . .” Teina muttered thoughtfully. “Seal the ship, Rrr’tana.”
The bird glanced at Teina for a second, then issued voice commands for the research ship to switch to internal air, and not open any hatch without station approval.
The Pena Belisana, in a pleasant voice, confirmed the commands.
Ilika and the others could feel the tension, almost fear, that filled the room, so they stayed in the visitors’ area of couches, planters, and low tables with racks of station maps and retreat pamphlets.
“We need to put them somewhere on the ground,” Teina said.
“Somewhere . . . they can’t infect anyone.”
“Kemlo,” Jimox proposed.
With sweeps of his wings, Rrr’tana caused the continental map on the large display to zoom in until it showed just a small expanse of barren desert.
Sand dunes and eroded badlands surrounded one labeled location at the
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center.
Jimox tapped at the console before him. “No guests right now, just a pair of equine hosts.”
“Too close, biologically,” Teina asserted.
Jimox looked at her and nodded.
Ilika whispered to Kibi, she tapped Mati on the shoulder, and the two slipped out the door.
Rrr’tana added overlays of current and historical surface winds, and all three hosts studied the display.
The avian pointed with his wing. “The wind can sometimes be from the southwest, but it’s usually the same as today, straight off the ocean in the west. Never from the east.”
“So there’s no way it can get here,” Teina observed, “and no one to infect for three thousand kilometers to the east. Let’s do it.”
Jimox turned around. “Captain, we need to evacuate the equine hosts and take them up to Deep Valley Springs, then return to Kemlo and deal with . . .
what appears to be an outbreak of the disease that destroyed our civilization.”
At that moment, the Manessa Kwi settled onto the ground just outside Fairy Castle.
The equine hosts of Kemlo Desert Retreat were fairly young, not very experienced, and quite shocked that they had a mere eight minutes to prepare to evacuate.
The male was mostly concerned with the retreat, but the female grabbed a bag, stuffed a few things in, and nudged her partner outside just as the deep-space response ship appeared over the range of mountains in the west.
Under ion drive, Mati had the Manessa Kwi over the retreat’s landing area in seconds, and on the ground seconds later. Kibi raised the big table and re-arranged the seats to make room for two horses.
The hatch opened and the ramp appeared. The male looked back with worry at the tile roof, thick walls, and rounded arches of his desert retreat, his first assignment as a planet station host. His partner nipped him, and he bolted up the ramp and into the waiting ship.
The hatch closed, and two passenger seats swiveled to reveal Jimox and
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Teina, both working at knowledge pads with most of their attention, even as they greeted the young equines.
The hosts of Kemlo Desert Retreat had seldom had the honor of sitting with the legendary first hosts of Siminia Three Planet Station, so they instinctively bowed their heads in respect.
The elderly monkey mammals appeared not to notice. “Deep Valley Springs, please, Captain,” Jimox said, looking up from his knowledge pad.
“Chart is up,” Sata announced.
“Clear weather with mild thermal updrafts,” Rini said.
“Ion one,” Mati requested.
Green gardens and a swimming pool seemed out of place among endless kilometers of sand dunes, salt flats, and rocky hills.
The crew of the Manessa Kwi would have loved to linger, but Jimox and Teina were anxious to get back to Kemlo. The two equine passengers thanked Kibi, clopped down the ramp, and stood looking around, wondering what they would do here besides worry about their primary assignment, now a disease quarantine station.
As the little ship rose back into the air, a large spider emerged from the nearest tile-roofed building and offered to give the horses a tour.
“I haven’t been able to get a coherent word out of the crew,” Rrr’tana said, still working at the control desk back at the planet station. “The ship is on a slow final approach — let me know if you need more time.”
“We’ll be there in less than a minute,” Sata reported.
Jimox shuddered for a moment and gripped Teina’s hand tightly until he recovered. “Steward, please help us get every med kit on the ship into the airlock,” he said firmly. “We don’t yet know what we’ll have to deal with.” He stood, and helped Teina do the same. Their eyes held a mixture of excitement and fear.
Kibi turned and looked at Ilika. “Shouldn’t someone else go, or just wait for healers from Satamia?”
Ilika let Teina answer.
“Kibi, we’re immune to it, and we’re the only two people in Satamia who
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can make that claim. We think felines and canines are also immune, but that theory hasn’t been confirmed.”
Kibi frowned, but followed them down the lift to help with medical kits.
Just as she was descending, she heard Sata announce that the other ship was landing, and Ilika ordered Manessa to switch to internal air.
The avian host back at the planet station landed the plague ship just a few meters from the front door of Kemlo Desert Retreat. As soon as the hatch opened, a reptile staggered out, supporting an avian in even worse shape.
Next, an ursine crawled down the ramp, and with Jimox’ help, dragged himself in through the door. Finally a monkey mammal, somewhat different from Jimox and Teina, tried to come out alone, but collapsed halfway down the ramp. Teina moved as quickly as she could, but the sick crew member hit the ground hard.
As soon as Jimox settled the ursine inside, he rushed back out to help Teina with the monkey mammal, now only half-conscious.
That was the easy part, Jimox realized, as he stepped into the little research ship. Six specialists were under blankets in the passenger area, shivering and moaning, and two more crew members were found in their cabins on the lower deck, wishing they could die to end the terrible burning sensation racking their bodies.
The two elderly hosts, believing themselves immune to the disease, gave each crew member or researcher a stimulant, then helped them, one at a time, into the retreat.
As soon as the planet station host moved the plague ship, a small cargo carrier took its place and unloaded more medical supplies and equipment with a mechanical arm through the airlock.
For the next hour, the crew of the Manessa Kwi sat in their ship feeling completely useless.
Jimox and Teina reached inside themselves for reserves of energy and courage they had forgotten they possessed. They helped the sick crew and specialists into beds, attached nutrition feeds and medical monitors, paused to slurp down energy drinks, then went back to work. Jimox felt his blood
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pressure swinging wildly, and ignored it. Teina turned from her patients just long enough to cough until she nearly turned blue.
The medical monitors relayed their data to the nearby ships, and it flew instantly to Satamia Star Station. A team of healers studied it and sent back instructions for nutrition adjustments and further tests. Soon, they began to arrive at some conclusions.
The healers at the star station, and the pair of elderly hosts, began to realize the truth at about the same time.
The disease was virulent, airborne, highly-contagious, crossed from one species to another easily, and was quite deadly without intensive medical care.
It could easily become a plague.
But the victims had spoken of burning because of the painful fevers they were enduring, not because of any urge to set fire to things.
It was not the plague that had destroyed the former monkey-mammal civilization of Siminia Three.
And neither Jimox, nor Teina, were immune.
A ship full of healers and assistants dashed out of Satamia Star Station and jumped into star transit. Their destination: Kemlo Desert Retreat, direct.
