But the Children Survived (46 page)

“If I ever see you in here with a kid again, I will kill you, Gerald.”  Christie turned around and walked out the door. 

Gerald looked again at Martha's peaceful countenance.  Martha had been the only one who really loved him.  Christie reminded him of Arlene.  She was evil and manipulative.  She had managed to turn the team against him. 

Gerald got up and walked across the lab.  He took a hypodermic needle out of its plastic wrapper and pushed the plunger down.  He went to the cabinet where he stored the bottle of Nembutal.  He pushed the needle in the bottle and filled the tube.  He placed it in the drawer of his desk.  The next time that bitch came in here, he thought, he would have a surprise for her.

*****

Calvin turned onto US 19 heading south.  He was cruising at high speed so it didn't take him any time at all to get to St. Petersburg.  A few more miles and he would be at the 18
^th
Avenue exit. 

It was a beautiful summer day.  He wished he could take off the damned mask and enjoy the air.  Even if it was hot, it was real.  The biosphere was so, well, sterile. 

Calvin couldn’t get sunglasses on underneath the headgear.  The glare was very strong this morning and his eyes were playing tricks on him.  He thought he saw a flash of yellow up ahead.  Something big, like a bus, maybe?  But that was impossible, wasn't it? 

Calvin pushed the accelerator down.  He hadn't been seeing things.  There was a bus up ahead, no wait – two buses and what looked like a sedan.  He doubted very much that 10-year- old kids were driving them.  He tried to catch up but lost them. 

Calvin pushed the pedal down further and was going really fast now, over 90 miles an hour.  He could still see the buses, but they were turning off the highway.  They had exited at 22
^nd
Avenue.  He remembered taking his little lady there.  He decided to follow the buses. 

Calvin was close to the sedan now.  The driver wasn’t wearing any headgear.  He kept close as he didn't want to lose them.  He wasn’t so familiar with the area that he couldn't get lost.  They passed the school Mindy said she’d gone to so he knew they were close to her house.  He saw the buses slowing down.

They stopped in front of the little white house with green shutters and parked.  Calvin slowed down and pulled over.  He watched as the bus doors opened and dozens of children got off the buses.  He saw a man and a woman.  He also saw what looked like a teenage girl and an old man, and none of them was wearing a hazmat suit.

Chapter 57

Calvin sat watching the people milling around in front of Mindy's house.  He slowly exited the Mercedes and walked slowly towards the buses.  He could hear the laughter and screams of the excited children.  These children had to be just like the ones back in the biosphere.  Where had they come from?  Was it possible the little lady was right and her parents were alive?

Julius saw the spaceman coming towards him.  He decided to wait and see what the spaceman would say.  It was never a good idea to get too excited at the beginning of the day.  The spaceman walked right up to him.

“Mornin,” he said to Calvin. 

“Mornin,” Calvin replied.   “Where you all coming from?”  Calvin waved his arm to indicate the group of kids.

“Well sir, we were in Atlanta when these folks showed up with a bus.  I had eighteen kids I’d found.  They asked if we wanted to come to Florida and we said yes.  We got another bus and here we are.”  Julius said.  “I have to go find a chair, if you'll excuse me.”  Julius walked towards Mindy's house. 

“CALVIN!” 

He heard his name coming from the opposite side of the street.  He turned and saw his little lady running towards him.  She was followed by Mark and another boy, a tall boy.  He couldn't wait to hear that story.

“Little lady, you look real fine,” he said as she jumped up into his arms. 

“Calvin, where did these buses come from?” 

“The old man said they came from Atlanta.  Georgia, that is.” 

“This is my house.  Why did they come here?”  Mindy stopped.  Her face lit up.  She ran towards the house just as Dani was coming out the door.

“MOMMY!  Mommy, Mommy, Mommy!” 

She ran into Dani's arms and hugged her as tightly as she could.  “I waited for you.  I always said you were alive.  I knew it.  Oh Mommy, I missed you so much.” 

Mindy was crying hard now, sobs of pure joy.  She looked up into Dani's face.  Dani knelt down and she was crying too.  “Where were you, Mommy?”  Mindy asked.

“Daddy and I were stuck in a cavern.”  Dani was sobbing now too.  Mindy gave her a squinty face.  “There was a room inside, like a hotel.  Daddy thought it would be exciting to spend a night there.  The elevator got stuck, so we couldn’t get out for 9 days.  When we got out, we saw all the people.  They were....”

“Dead,” Mindy said. 

Dani looked at her little daughter and couldn’t imagine what her child had seen in all those weeks she’d been alone.  Just the trip down US 19 had been bad enough, and although someone had moved the bodies off the road, they were still visible and unsettling. 

Dani hugged and hugged Mindy.  Joe came out of the house and saw Mindy.  He ran over to her and she fell into his arms.  Joe cried so hard at the sight of her.  He never felt such love for anyone in his life.  She was his little girl.

“You got your hair cut!” he said.

“Pat did it,” Mindy said.  “He works at Wilmer’s.”

“I like it,” Dani said, and Joe nodded. 

Mindy took his hand and Dani's and walked over to Calvin. 

“This is Calvin,” she said. 

“How'd you do?”  Calvin said and put out his gloved hand. 

“You know dude, I don't think you need that anymore,” Joe was saying as he shook the gloved hand.  “We've been riding around for a week like this, and we aren’t purple babies.” 

Calvin stepped back from Joe.  “Purple babies?” he asked.

“Yeah, the reason these kids all survived.  They were purple babies.”  Joe forgot that not everyone had heard of the purple babies.

“Have you been walking around like that for long?”  Dani asked Calvin.

“We put these on when we leave the biosphere,” Calvin said and looked at Mindy.

“That's where I met Calvin, Mommy.”  Mindy was beside herself with happiness.  She couldn't stand still.  She then caught sight of Mark and Jason standing to the side waiting to be introduced. 

“Oh, sorry, Mom, this is Jason and Mark.  I've been staying with them at the beach.”  Dani raised her eyebrows at the sight of the two boys her daughter had been “staying with”.  Jason walked over and put out his hand.

“Hi.  I'm Jason Rucci.  And for the record, I was a purple baby.” 

“How?  You’re so much older than the others.”

“I think I was the first.  No, wait.  Ricky and Baby Girl were the first.  I was the second.” 

Mindy ran over to the car and let the dogs out.  They followed her back to her parents. 

“That's your mom's dog, Joe,” Dani said as she walked over to pet Baby Girl.  “And he looks just like her.” She said pointing to Ricky.

“Yeah, they're brother and sister.”  Jason bent down and ruffled Ricky's head. 

“No way.”  Joe said.  “We got her in Jersey.” 

“Yeah, well my folks came here from Jersey.  He was born a year before me.” 

Joe and Dani looked at the dogs.  They looked like adult dogs, but not old dogs. 

“How old are you, Jason?”  Dani asked.

“I just turned eighteen.” 

“So the dogs are over eighteen years old.”  Dani kept looking at the dogs.  “But these can't be the same dogs.  It's not possible.  They look too young.” 

“I think the purple stuff may produce longevity,” Jason said. “I have a notebook my father wrote that told the whole story, about how he got the plants to make it and how to use it.  He gave it to some doctor named Tomlinson, who screwed him over.” 

“That was my doctor, Michael Tomlinson.”  Dani looked at all the kids milling around the buses.  “He was busy, wasn't he?” 

“He gave it to over 300 women,” Jason said as he waited for their reaction.

“300!  We only found 80.  Where are the other 220?”

“There were 200 at Wilmer's.”  Mark had spoken for the first time. 

“But that leaves 20 unaccounted for.  Where could they be?”  Joe looked at Dani. 

“That's the thing.  I couldn't find a total list of names,” Jason said.  “I have one with 100 names on it.  Who knows where Tomlinson's records went after he died?” 

Jason saw something out of the corner of his eye that he was having trouble assimilating.  He turned and saw the prettiest girl he’d ever seen.  He turned back to Dani and Joe, but kept turning to see if she was real.

“Her name is Jenny” Dani was saying.  “She lost her family in Nevada.  Why don't you go introduce yourself?” 

Jason smiled and turned to walk over to Jenny.  When Jenny saw him, she blushed and looked in another direction.  It had been so long since she had talked to a boy, and a good looking boy at that.  She found herself suddenly shy.  She looked down at her clothes and her hand touched her hair.  She then looked up and smiled and they began to talk.

“They'll be fine,” Dani told Joe.  “They must be relieved to find somebody over 10 and under 30.”

“Really, man, you can take the suit off.”   Joe was talking to Calvin.  Calvin was looking at the kids.

“Was the old man right?  Did these kids come from Atlanta?” Calvin asked.  Dani and Joe nodded their heads. 

Calvin had been quiet during the little reunion the Lanes had enjoyed.  The mention of purple babies had set him thinking about his children.  He knew his wife had sought the help of a doctor in St. Petersburg when she had suffered two miscarriages.  If it was the same guy, then there was a real possibility that his kids were alive.  If they weren’t here, then they had to still be somewhere in Atlanta.

Calvin looked at Joe and Dani.  Then he put his hands to his head and pulled the zipper around his neck open.  It went almost all the way around his head.  He then lifted the headgear off.  He unzipped the front of the suit and let it fall to the ground.  He felt the hot breeze against his sweaty skin, and it was the most beautiful thing he’d ever felt.

“Man I didn't think anything could feel so good,” he said.  “I hate that damn suit.” 

Dani and Joe laughed. 

“Yeah, it really sucked.”  Joe said.  They all knew he wasn’t talking about the suit.  

Over the next few hours, Dani and Joe recounted the story of their trip across the country and how they kept finding children.  Jason and Jenny discovered they had a lot in common, and Mindy and Mark talked to the kids about how they had survived and what they’d had to do when their parents died.  When they were done, it was getting dark.

Calvin said he wanted to head back to the biosphere to tell them it was safe to come out.  He said he would be back in the morning.

“We won't be here,” Joe told him.  “We have a place we found in Largo, where we'll be spending the night.  Why don't you tell us where that biosphere is and we'll meet you there.” 

Calvin thought of Gerald.  He didn't know how old Gerry would take having all these strangers descend on his biosphere. 

“Ah, why don't we meet in the Big Mart parking lot in Palm Harbor?  It's on 19.”

“Sounds good.  What time?”  Joe had picked up a watch in Atlanta. 

“Around 10.”  Calvin said and waved.  He got into the Mercedes and drove away. 

Dani, Joe, and Mindy went into their house and packed up all the personal items they could fit into the car.  They could always come back another day to finish packing. 

“Well kids, has everyone gone to the bathroom?”  Dani asked the kids. 

They all yelled “YES” and she instructed them to get back on the bus.  She turned to Mindy and asked her to join them.  Mindy looked at Mark and Jason.  She felt like she was doing something wrong by leaving them.  She also felt a little guilty for having parents when everybody else didn't. 

“It's okay.”  Mark said.  “You go with them.  You should.”  He turned and walked back to Jason's car.  Jason and Jenny were standing by Jenny's car. 

“I guess I gotta take the kid home,” he was saying to her.

“Why don't you meet us at the Big Mart tomorrow?”  Jenny's eyes looked hopeful. 

“Sure, 10, right?”  She nodded her head and Jason smiled.  “I'll see you then.” 

He wanted to kiss her but it might be too soon, and everybody on the bus was watching them.  Instead he put his hand on her cheek and then walked back to his car.  He waved at her before driving away.  She sighed and got into the car.  Tomorrow couldn't come soon enough for her.

Chapter 58

Gerald's slow descent into madness had finally manifested itself.  He obsessed constantly about Martha and the fact that these children were unnatural.  He stayed in his lab, writing in his notebooks, which he kept locked in his quarters.  He had stopped looking for live people on the satellites.  He never slept and never washed.  He was beginning to look like a mad scientist. 

Gerald sat hunched over his microscope examining a slide of cells he had collected from one of the children.  He had grown tired of listening to Christie's objections and had taken matters into his own hands.  The night before, he had decided to collect specimens from 10 of the children while they slept.

He sneaked into their houses after they had gone to sleep, covered their mouths with the chloroform he’d held back from the team’s abductions, and cut a section of cells from their upper left thighs.  As a veterinarian, he had spayed and neutered animals frequently, so stitching the wounds afterwards was no problem.  He may not have been as sanitary as he should have been, but he was in a hurry - and this was science!  He did make sure the bleeding had stopped before he left them.