The Prisoner - Carlos J. Cortes [56]
“Rats …?” Laurel turned to Floyd.
“Weil’s disease?” he asked.
Henry nodded.
Floyd settled down on his haunches. “It’s a much-named horror, transmitted through contact with urine from infected animals. It’s biphasic. First, flulike symptoms, which soon disappear. The second phase may involve renal and liver failure and often meningitis. It’s a complicated disease to cure even with ample resources.” Floyd looked around, then lowered his eyes. “Here, she wouldn’t have a chance.”
Metronome’s head continued its slow sway.
Unconsciously, Laurel drew her legs tight to her body when a frantic scratching issued from the box at the boy’s feet. “What’s that?”
Henry rubbed his hands. “Our friend here has agreed to help us. She’ll get the heat off our backs by carrying the locators away.”
Laurel focused on a noise to her left. Floyd had stepped over to Russo’s stretcher and picked up something from the floor. Then he returned with a crumpled lump she recognized as the wraps they had worn around their necks.
“Don’t worry. I tucked the locators into the lead strips,” Floyd said.
With his foot, Metronome pushed the box into the circle of light. Something huge moved inside.
“Shit, is that a rat?” Laurel asked.
Henry’s beard parted to reveal a dark hole she supposed was his mouth. “Not just a rat. A very rare specimen.”
She reached for her bag of rice, tore its top, and fished inside for the plastic fork.
Henry nudged the box with his foot. “Beautiful, isn’t she?”
The rat shifted, its pointed nose trembling, and let out a tiny cry. Laurel cringed. “She’s enormous.”
“Yes, she is. They seldom grow larger than twelve inches or weigh over a pound. She’s an exception—heavy, almost two pounds, and pregnant. You know anything about Rattus norvegicus?”
Silence but for the muted whisper of voices echoing from the station dwellers.
“They live for about twelve months, and females reach sexual maturity in ten weeks. That leaves them four-fifths of their lives to reproduce. Since their gestation period is twenty-two days, they can have four to seven litters in a year. At eight to ten offspring a litter, a pair of rats can produce forty or fifty descendants.”
“That’s horrible.”
“Not really.” Henry nudged the box again. “That’s the mechanism of an advanced survival machine. The horrible bit, as you put it, is their yearly waste: fifty pounds of pellets, a gallon of urine, and a million hairs—all of it laced with rare germs. They are territorial, you know? They seldom move out of an area of one hundred feet around their lair.”
“I don’t understand,” Laurel muttered, her mouth full of hot rice. “Does that mean the thing can carry the sensors only a hundred feet away?”
“I told you, she’s special. Not from this area but from a maze of crumbling old sewers a mile away, unconnected by foot to these tunnels. Since she’s pregnant, she will do her damnedest to get back home; it will take her an hour. There’s a shortcut, but she can’t take it. Rattus norvegicus are poor climbers.”
“Norvegicus? Does it mean these horrors are from Norway?” Laurel asked.
“No, it doesn’t. Someone christened the species and the name stuck.” Henry shifted to produce a set of rusty wires from his pocket and started pulling and adjusting them into a large hollow bracelet.
Floyd leaned over. “How’s your neck?”
“Sore.”
“I kept the cut to the same size the machine made to insert it. Half an inch. It should heal well, and any cosmetic clinic will remove the scar for next to nothing.”
Laurel nodded and dug back into her rice—warm, firm, and with a nutty flavor.
“Let’s get this beauty loaded,” Henry said.
Raul drew near and offered Henry the bundle of lead apron strips.
Metronome’s hands, encased in a butcher’s mesh gloves, moved into the light. With uncanny dexterity, he