Brain Ships - Anne McCaffrey [92]
Some were obvious; geologic instability that would uncover or completely bury the caches unpredictably. Weather that did not include snow, weather that did not include rain. Occupied planets with relatively thick settlements, or planets with no continents, only tiny island chains.
Some were not so obvious. Terrain with no real landmarks or landmarks subject to change. Terrain with snow and rain, but with snow piling up twelve feet thick in the winter; too deep to dig in. The original trove must have been uncovered by accident—perhaps during the construction of a rudimentary base—or by someone just outside, kicking around dirt.
Places with freelance mining operations were on the list; agri-colonies weren't. Places marked by the Institute for investigation were, places with full Institute teams weren't. While Tia would not have put it past someone with problems to sell out to smugglers, she didn't think that they'd care to cover up a contagious disease this hideous.
As soon as they finished mapping a cone, it went out to a team to cover. They had another plan in mind for themselves: covering free-trade ports, looking for another victim. They could cover the ports a lot faster than any of the AI or softperson-piloted ships; the only one faster would have been someone with a Singularity Drive. Since those were all fully occupied—and since, as yet, they had only one victim and not a full-scale plague in progress—there was no chance of getting one reassigned to this duty. So AH One-Oh-Three-Three would be doing what it could—and trying to backtrack the "freighter" to its origin point.
They were running against the clock, and everyone on the project knew it. If this disease got loose in a large, space-going population, the chances of checking it before millions died were slender.
* * *
"Alex," Tia called for the third time, raising the volume of her voice a little more. This time he answered, even though he didn't turn his dark-circled eyes away from his work.
"What, m'love?" he said absently, his gaze glued to a topographical map on the screen before him, despite the fact that he could hardly keep his eyes open.
She overrode the screen controls, blanking the one in front of him. He blinked and turned to stare at her with weary accusation.
"Why did you do that?" he asked. "I was right in the middle of studying the geography—"
"Alex!" she said with exasperation. "You hadn't changed the screen in half an hour; you probably hadn't really looked at it in all that time. Alex, you haven't eaten anything in over six hours, you haven't slept in twenty, and you haven't bathed or changed your clothes in forty-eight!"
He rubbed his eyes and peered up at the blank screen. "I'm fine," he protested feebly.
"You're not," she countered. "You can hardly hold your head up. Look at your hand shake! Coffee is no substitute for sleep!"
He clenched his fist to stop the trembling of his hand. "I'm fine," he repeated, stubbornly.
She made a rude noise and flashed her screens at him, so that he winced. "There, see? You can't even control your reactions. If you don't eat, you'll get sick, if you don't sleep, you'll miss something vital, and if you don't bathe and change your clothes I'm turning you over to Decontam."
"All right, love, all right," he sighed, reaching over and patting her column. "Heat me up something; I'll be in the galley shortly."
"How shortly?" she asked sharply.
"As long as it takes for a shower and fresh clothes." He pried himself up out of his chair and stumbled for his room. A moment later, she heard the shower running—and when she surreptitiously checked, she discovered that as she had suspected, he was running it on cold.
Trying to wake up, hmm? Not when I want you to relax. She overrode the controls—not bringing it all the way up to blood-heat, but enough that he wasn't standing in something one degree above sleet.