Margaret Atwood - MaddAddam

“What happened?” Zeb asked innocently. It was hard to look really innocent with shades on — he’d tried in the mirror — so he took them off.

“I’ve sent the girls to take showers,” said Katrina WooWoo. “They were so upset! One minute they were …”

“Peeling the shrimp,” said Zeb. It was the staff slang for getting a dink out of his clothes, the underpants in particular. There was an art to it, as to everything, said the Scalies. Or a craft. A slow unbuttoning, a long, sensuous unzipping. Hold the moment. Pretend he’s a box of candies, lick-a-licious. “Lick-a-licious,” Zeb said out loud. He’s shaken: the effect on the Rev had been far worse than he’d imagined. He hadn’t intended actual death.

“Yes, well, good thing they didn’t get that far, because he, well, he simply dissolved, according to the monitors in the video room. They’ve never seen anything like it. Raspberry mousse, is what they said.”

“Crap,” said Jeb, who’d lifted a corner of the bedspread. “We need a water-vac, it’s like a very sick swimming pool under there. What hit him?”

“The girls say he just started to froth,” said Katrina. “And scream, of course. At first. And tear out feathers — those are ruined, they’ll have to be destroyed, what a waste. Then it was no longer screaming, it was gurgling. I’m so worried!” She was understating: scared was more like it.

“He had a meltdown. Must be something he ate,” said Zeb. He meant it for a joke; or he meant it to be mistaken for a joke.

Katrina didn’t laugh. “Oh, I don’t think so,” she said. “Though you’re right, it might have been in food. Nothing he ate here though, no way! It has to be a new microbe. Looks like a flesh-eater, only so speeded up! What if it’s really contagious?”

“Where could he have caught it?” said Jeb. “Our girls are clean.”

“Off a doorknob?” said Zeb. Another lame joke. Shut up, pinhead, he told himself.

“Lucky our girls had their Biofilm Bodygloves on,” said Katrina. “Those will have to be burned. But none of the — none of what came out of — none of whatever it is touched them.”

Zeb was getting an incoming call on his tooth: it was Adam. Since when does he have tooth broadcasting privileges? thought Zeb.

“I understand there’s been an incident,” said Adam. He was tinny and far away.

“It’s fucking creepy having your voice in my head,” said Zeb. “You sound like a Martian.”

“No doubt,” said Adam. “But that is not your number-one problem right now. The man who died was our mutual parent, I’m told.”

“You were told right,” said Zeb, “but who told you?”

He’d gone into a corner of the room so the conversation would be semi-private, out of consideration for others: it was annoying to have to listen to a person talking to their own tooth. Katrina was in another corner with her intramural cell, calling in the Scales cleanup squad, who were bound to be taken aback. Similar things had been known to occur with older guys during the course of House Specials — the kick-tails could be overly powerful for those of diminished bodily abilities and functions — but nothing very similar. Usually it was a stroke or a heart attack. This kind of frothing was unprecedented.

“Katrina called me. Naturally,” said Adam. “She keeps me informed.”

“She knows he’s our …?”

“Not exactly. She knows I have an interest in anything concerning the Corps bookings — especially the OilCorps — so she notified me of the four-party reservation, and of the special surprise arrangements made by three of the clients as a gift to the fourth. Then she sent me the headshots generated automatically by the doorware at the front, and of course I recognized him at once. I was already on the premises, so I came to the front of the house in case I might be needed. I’m out in the bar area now; I’m right beside the glass shelves, where the novelty corkscrews and the salt shakers are displayed.”

“Oh,” said Zeb. “Good,” he added lamely.

“Which one did you use?”

“Which one of what?” said Zeb.

“Don’t play innocent,” said Adam. “I can count. Six minus three is three. The white, the red, or the black?”

“All of them,” said Zeb. There was a pause.

“Too bad,” said Adam. “That will make it more difficult for us to determine what exactly was in each one. A more controlled approach would have been preferable.”

“Aren’t you going to tell me I’m a fucking stupid fuckwit,” said Zeb, “for doing such a stupid fucking dickwit thing? Though not in so many words, I guess.”

“It was a little spontaneous of you,” said Adam, “but worse things could have happened. In the event, it was fortuitous that he didn’t recognize you.”

“Wait a minute,” said Zeb. “You knew he was walking in the door? You didn’t warn me?”

“I counted on you to act as the situation would dictate,” said Adam. “Nor was my confidence misplaced.”

Zeb was outraged: his cunning bastard of a big brother had set him up, the shit! But he’d also trusted Zeb to be competent enough to deal with whatever mayhem might result, so in addition to the outrage he felt all warm and vindicated. Thank you didn’t really fit the case, so instead he said, “You fucking smartass!”

“Regrettable,” said Adam. “And I do regret it. But may I point out that, as a result, that man is permanently off our case. Now, and this is important: get them to collect as much of him — of it — as they can. Put it in a CryoJeenyus Frasket — Katrina always keeps a few on hand for clients with CryoJeenyus contracts. The full-body model would be preferable to the head-only. Many Scales customers who are no longer young have made such arrangements. The protocol is that if they have a — what CryoJeenyus calls ‘a life-suspending event’ — and when speaking of those who have had their lives suspended, please do avoid the word death , as CryoJeenyus employees do, since you will shortly be impersonating one of them. If such a life-suspending event occurs, the client is flash-frozen immediately in the Frasket and shipped to CryoJeenyus for re-animation later, once CryoJeenyus has developed the biotech to do that.”

“Which is when pigs can fly,” says Zeb. “I hope Katrina’s got a giant ice-cube tray.”

“Use buckets if necessary,” said Adam. “We need to get him — we need to get the effluent to Pilar’s cryptic team, out on the east coast.”

“Pilar’s what?”

“Cryptic team. Our friends,” says Adam. “They have day jobs in the biotech Corps: OrganInc, HelthWyzer Central, RejoovenEsense, even CryoJeenyus. But they’re helping us at night, cryptic being a bio-term for camouflage in, say, caterpillars.”

“Since when are you so palsy with caterpillars?” said Zeb. “Are you warping your brain lurking in that dumb MaddAddam Extinctathon name-the-dead-beetle game site?” Adam overrode him.

“The cryptic team will find out what it was, inside the pills. Or is. Let’s hope it can’t go airborne; we don’t think it can yet, or anyone who was in that room will have been contaminated. It appears to be very rapid-acting, so they’d be showing symptoms. As things stand, we believe it’s contact-only. Don’t let any of the — of the residue touch you.”

And don’t stick my finger in the goo and then shove it up my ass, Zeb thought. “I’m not a fucking idiot,” he said out loud.

“Live up to that pledge. I know you can,” said Adam. “I’ll see you on the sealed bullet train, with the Frasket.”

“We’re going where?” said Zeb. “You’re coming too?” But Adam had rung off, or hung up, or logged out; whatever you did on the other end of a tooth.