Flight of the Maita Supercollection 3: Solving Galactic Problems Collector's Edition (63 page)

"The labs have
created NSV five, which was supposed to be the way to make rodents
AND primates produce positive antibodies which could be purified
into a serum to immunize people. It would have been the serum we
need. It would have saved Kroon.

"An electric
cart backed into the glass wall of the isolation room and let the
rodents infected with the virus escape onto the islands! They are
all over the place! We can't hope to get them! They will spread it
to any other rodents already here and to our people, too! This is
horrible!

"Dok, it's the
virus that can infect BOTH! We are all doomed! There is no way to
gather those rodents and they are probably already infecting all
the islands. The waternesters swim to all of them. There is no way
we can...." He broke off, scraped a nail over the fine screening of
the mouthpiece and hung up. He called the operator and ordered her
to shut down all sending from the islands. It was a matter of
security.

"Wait for
orders from Mi Yinn herself before allowing ANY further
communications with the mainland. Do not answer incoming calls
except on the special secret line to Enn Far. None. Be very clear
about that. This is critical."

He strolled
over to the labs where his first duty was to tell Mi what he had
done and to suggest she tell the operator to stop transmissions for
three days, then to allow another short message, then to open com
again. They would have to explain to all here what they had done
and why.

He was right
about her purpose in calling him. She looked her pleasure at him
for his taking these steps without waiting for instructions. He
would have to show he DID have intelligence and value here. It was
important to him. Her look took a large load from his mind. He had,
frankly, come here in selfishness, but had spent time reevaluating
his motives. He was getting some self-respect. THAT was different!
He had come with expectations of having a long and bitter argument
about who was in charge here, but she simply said when he knew
beyond question it was the thing to do, do it. She would have his
ass if he was wrong. Never forget that!

There was
little progress at the labs, but some handyman had come up with the
idea of putting microwave generators in each of the rooms where the
actual living virus was used so they could irradiate the places
regularly. The single thing they must not have was any kind of
truth to the escaped deadly virus stories. It was simply another
precaution. It would guarantee that no accidents such as the ones
he fabricated would take place. There would be no escaped
virus.

He returned to
his room where he spent two hours composing the next message to
send, then again turned to the question of the constitution.

When he did a
thing he did it and passed on to other projects. The constitution
was not done so took all of his free time. He would stop working on
that document when it was completed, not before. He had the overall
method of setting up the first government fixed in language and
recorded. The rights section was complete and the preamble, which
would explain why the document was written, was ready.

That preamble
is very important, but there has to be a way to get across that it
is not the constitution itself. The language and power must be
expressed in the preamble. It will set the tone for the manner in
which the document will forever be interpreted.

The present
situation was what was causing the most problems to him. How could
one word the clause that would give the state the right to suspend
other rights in case of dire emergency, medical emergency to the
forefront? How could such a premise be included in a document that
was meant to guarantee freedom?

Damn! What
happened to the lights? This was the first such interruption of
power since he came here. Things had been perfectly smooth until
now.

When he still
had no power a few minutes later he went out to find that only the
one building was affected and only one person was in it at the time
– him. He used the com to inform Mi, who said she'd send
maintenance.

A tall thin
individual came who incessantly chewed a small glamp twig. Surely
he knew the damned things were as much as addicting! – and the
fellow moved so slowly! It would take him forever to get this
simple little job done!

He found the
trouble surprisingly quickly and repaired it in very little time.
Sop expected the job to take two hours, but it took exactly four
minutes. That was a switch!

He offered
refreshment to the fellow, who came to his room to check the
wiring. The problem had been a wire that had grounded and burned
out. There may be damage to the circuit that could cause a fire so
the fellow checked every wire in the place. It took a very short
time, all the while the fellow seemed to move like a slimetrailer
on a blotter. Sop could have sworn the job wouldn't be done for
hours.

The papers with
the constitution were laying right there in plain view on the desk
and the fellow, named Jak Tall, asked if he could read the notes.
Sop agreed that he could use the general public's reaction.

"This is pretty
good," Jak said half an hour later. "If the nation survives this
plague and will adopt it – and abide by it – it'll advance us to a
point where that alien empire'll respect us. Somehow it's important
we gain their respect. The way those asses treated them when they
were here I was ashamed to be a Kroon. I really was.

"You've got the
beginning and the end, but there's a space in the middle. It have
to do with situations like the plague?"

"You're a very
perceptive person," Sop replied. "I feel I have to include a
suspension of certain rights in cases of such vital importance, but
I must not make it an easy thing. It must not be something any one
person or small group can do. I can predict the horrors of abuse of
such a thing. Think what would have happened five years ago if
anyone had that kind of power!"

Tall nodded and
chewed the twig determinedly for a moment.

"Needs a sure
time limit, too," he suggested. "Something like 'the national
health officer can impose blah blah blah that must be approved by
the executive or the legislature or both within ten days or it's
automatically off. Judiciary has to concur' – or something."

Sop stared,
fascinated. This man was truly intelligent! Brilliant! He grasped
the problem in minutes – and his solution was pretty well what
would have to be. The wording was the thing.

"Suggest
something concrete."

Tall chewed and
thought a moment, then said, "Hmm-ummm. Something like 'A national
health emergency may be declared by the Chairman of the National
Health Agency should there be clear and immediate danger to a major
portion of the population of a given area from a health-related
cause.

"Suspension of
certain civil rights – maybe specified as assembly or acts that
would aid the spread of the disease – may be held regionally or
nationally.'

"That would
mean you'd have to include rights of movement, too. The order to
continue such suspensions would have to.... The chief executive
must sign the order to begin its implementation. The judiciary
would be required to extend the order every three days and the
joint legislature would be required to vote by majority of both
houses within ten days should the suspensions be deemed necessary
to extend beyond that time.

"Such
suspensions would be revoted every ten days or something on that
order. Automatic stop without the vote being taken."

"You know, I
think we can have something very close to that!" Sop cried. "Thank
you!"

"I always say
consider your words before you say 'em, then be short and to the
point," Jak answered. "Say 'em before you think and you spend all
your time lying about what you really meant."

This fellow grows on you,
Sop thought. I think I have found someone with an
enormous natural intelligence to talk to. I can bounce ideas off
his reactions and save a lot of time. He goes right to the heart of
a matter. What we call a "no frills" type.

Almost as
though Jak were reading his mind he said, "Smart people don't talk
to or at others. They talk with them. Nobody ever learned anything
while their mouth was flapping."

How true! That
is very much what the Mentan alien said!

* * * *

Hal Korr saw
the news story that there was suggestion of a horrible accident on
the islands that would kill everyone out there and would spread
through the rodents for years to come.

"... this
information being based on the very best of authority, a truly
unimpeachable source on Long Island where major research is in
progress. All communications both ways with the medical facilities
are now completely stopped. We have attempted since the initial
contact, but no response whatever has been forthcoming. We will not
cease in attempts to contact the people there. We have with us now
Dr. Nil Ponn who has stated that he has tested positive for the
virus or would be on the islands himself.

"Dr. Ponn, can
you tell us how truly serious this thing really is?"

Hal once met
Ponn and saw him as looking rather drawn. "IF, and I repeat, these
are only rumors at this point. IF NSV five was developed to survive
both in rodents and in primates and IF it has escaped into the
environs of the islands it will become a permanent thing there – or
long term enough that the difference IS no difference.

"You must first
understand that the virus as we know it now takes three years to
incubate in us and more than two to incubate in the rodents. The
rodents, the common types found on the islands, are known to begin
breeding at less than one year of age so there will be a
neverending supply of hosts for the virus. No one – and I mean NO
ONE – must ever go to those islands. Not even if we find a cure
here. We can't know all about what was developed there and it could
start the whole plague over again. I am begging my colleagues there
to contact me. We have been exchanging information through radio
and we MUST continue to do so. It is vital!"

Hal turned the
set off. He knew, of course, this was Sop's second stage, but why
now? The researchers weren't all here yet and this hadn't been
anticipated for another year, at least. Why was it happening so
fast?

The reports
stated the virus was spreading 93% faster than had been expected
and a slow swell of panic was beginning. People would soon begin
trying to come to the islands for treatment that didn't exist.

Hal sighed and
walked over to the labs. He'd stayed mostly in the background since
coming here, but it was obviously time for him to try to do
something. Mi Yinn could give him a role to play if only to help
retain his sanity. He had never been the type to twiddle. He must
be doing something.

Mi seemed
genuinely glad to see him. She explained contacts with the mainland
would be resumed in three days.

"I've found a
drug that slows the action of the virus a small bit in a test tube.
We've been trying to find something that will stop the thing from
reproducing. That will stop its spread and then we can concentrate
on cures for those who already have the infection. I'll take
anything at all right now!"

They talked
awhile about various aspects of the disease, but quarantine of
areas of the planet was all they could come up with. There was no
doubt such a scheme had no chance whatever of working. There was no
point in quarantining areas that already had the infection and
nothing could be more unlikely than being able to test the entire
population of even one city, much less a whole nation. That would
require a plan with a strict system composed of thousands of
doctors, which Mi Yinn had ready, but it would be futile in this
context.

“
Unless
we find something the only survivors in fifty years will be small
villages of virtual savages in areas like you make your digs in,"
Mi predicted. "I truly think this is the end of the Kroon. If we'd
spent ten percent of the money we spent on war toward research we
might have had a serum ready when this thing came along. We're too
much educated to kill each other to be able to stop now to fight
this. We've forgotten how to cooperate."

"Now Mi," Hal
chided. "Every nation on this world is working full time to beat
this thing. It transcends national borders and petty disputes."

"Oh, sure!
Exactly the same research we're doing, scientists in twenty other
countries are doing!"

"That's
bad?"

"You answer
that one! When we could each be working on a DIFFERENT angle?" Mi
returned bitterly. "If it won't work what least difference does it
make how many are researching it? When the duplications are
repeated ten thousand times for nothing? When that same time could
be used to try a thousand DIFFERENT things? You answer your own
question!"

"I see. We've
limited our ability to solve such problems in direct proportion to
our ability to get along with each other."

They were
silent for a few minutes, then Hal suggested they take awhile to
get a meal and talk about anything but the virus. They then called
Enn Far on the secret line to appraise him of the situation on the
islands and what the prognosis was at this point. It wasn't
encouraging.

Somehow Hal and
Mi both felt much better two hours later when they each went back
to their own researches.

*

Enn Far hung up
the com line and sat back. While he knew the group planned to do
this he was relieved to know it wasn't a real accident on the
islands. That was something he wasn't at all sure he could cope
with. Things were getting very serious now that it was sinking in
to the people how real an emergency this was. It would probably be
several years before the effects would fully begin to be felt, but
an underlying panic was building. One could feel it in the air.
People had a fear in their eyes. The damned thing was spreading
much faster than had at first been believed possible. All other
nations were now coming together to pool their researches so that
would possibly help. It would mean a million researchers instead of
twenty thousand. Why was Mi Yinn so unimpressed by that?