Geoff Ryman - The Child Garden

Milena succeeded in pushing Root away from her. She stood up, and walked away as if she could escape from what had happened.

‘Because of you, we can all get old again!’ Root said. ‘We’ll see our children grow!’

‘I don’t want people to get old!’ exclaimed Milena, her back towards Root. ‘And I hate children. So why would I do something like that, eh? Eh?’

‘We can copy the new gene you made. We can put it in new retroviruses, we can cure everyone!’

‘After what happened the last time?’ Milena found her two fists were clenched together in rage and were shaking at Root. ‘You’re still going to muck around after what happened last time! Who knows, maybe you’ll kill everyone off straight away, this time!’ She was shouting. She turned back around, and hugged herself. ‘What’s going to happen to me?’

She heard Root rustle up from her feet and swish her way towards her. She felt the warm, plump hands on her shoulder. She was turned around and enveloped in the fatty tissues of Root’s arms and breasts.

‘Oh Milena, love, don’t be worry, don’t be fear. We got the genes that shut off the new blood vessels, we got the genes that stop the growing. We’ll give you those, we’ll make you well!’

‘Will you make me like Lucy, too?’ asked Milena, as cold as ice, and pushed Root away again.

‘We don’t know,’ said Root, shaking her head.

‘I don’t want to be like Lucy!’ Here was a new dark terror. To grow so old that you understood nothing of the world, except that everything and everyone you loved was dead. Milena’s fingers were dug into her hair.

‘Sssh. Sssh. If you don’t want it, then you won’t be. With what you can do? You can change your cells, move things round, cut, splice. Nothing will happen that you don’t want to. You’re Milena, who is immune.’

‘What cancers? What cancers do I have?’

Root looked helpless.

‘Well tell me!’

‘All of them,’ said Root very quietly. ‘All of them we ever knew of.’

The room seemed to hiss all around them, as if the walls were leaking air.

The merry viruses had already known where she was ailing. The merry viruses began to roll off a list.

Skin — squamous epithelium, basal, and pigment cells — squamous and basal carcinoma, malignant melanoma

Alimentary tract — squamous epithelium of lips, mouth, tongue, oesophagus — squamous carcinoma

Alimentary tract — columnar epithelium of stomach, small bowel, large bowel — carcinoma

Milena found she was chuckling.

‘Isn’t that a bit excessive?’ she said, shaking her head. ‘Wouldn’t one have been enough?’

No, replied the merry viruses. The whole balance had to be restored. All the cancers had to be brought back.

‘We’ll be with you, love, all of us.’ said Root, dismayed. ‘The Terminals, the Angels, we’ll be with you all the time, helping you fight, singing in your blood.

Nasopharynx, larynx and lungs — bronchial epithelium — carcinoma

‘I hope cancer likes music,’ said Milena. She was shaking, as if with laughter. She found that her hands were on her face, feeling the flesh. There were pimples on her nose.

‘Oh, Milena, if only you knew how much we all love you for this.’

‘That sure makes all the difference,’ said Milena. ‘I used to wonder why those Mayan maidens let themselves be thrown over the edge of cliffs. Now I know. Everyone loved them for it.’

‘No one’s throwing you over a cliff. You’re going to get well!’ Root exclaimed in anguish.

Urinary system including bladder — urothelium cells — carcinoma

‘Yah,’ said Milena.

‘You have to believe you are,’ said Root, warning her.

Solid epithelial organs — epithelial cells of liver, kidney, thyroid, pancreas, pituitary, etc — carcinoma

‘Shut down!’ Milena said to the viruses, to make them still. It was the viruses that would have told her the meaning of each gene, the function of each protein so that she could change them. There was a kind of hiccup, but the list kept scrolling up through her mind. Part of her wanted to know.

‘So how are you going to cure me?’ she demanded.

‘First, you move into the hospital, St Thomas’s. You live there, you and Mr Stone, he’s pregnant, it’s good for him, too. Then we start, site by site. We cut off the new blood supply. Then we have the retroviruses that infect the tumours with growth inhibitor. They start to regress.’

‘How long before I’m well?’

Root looked helpless again. ‘We’re out of practice with cancer.’

‘You don’t know.’

Root shook her head.

Milena began to feel sick and weak in her stomach. She needed to sit down. She dropped back down onto the one chair.

‘I want to see the baby,’ Milena said. Already life had bargained her down. ‘I never thought I would have a child, and I want to see her. I want to finish the Comedy. We’ve only got backgrounds for two of the books! I want to go up again and finish the Comedy!’

‘And you will,’ said Root, going a little harder. ‘You’ll do all those things and more.’

‘If I the and if Mike dies, then the baby will be an orphan. Just exactly what I didn’t want her to be!’

‘You are not going to the. Why do you think we asked you here? The Doctors, me, the Consensus, we’ve got it all planned, exactly how you’re going to get well.’

Milena looked up at her, bleakly. I’ve done it again, she thought.

I’ve done exactly what the Consensus wanted. I don’t even have to think.

Milena felt an undertow. It was as if she had something dark inside her, pulling her down. It was larger than she was and had different interests. Life had wanted cancer back, all of life, the ocean within her that was part of her but which she did not know and could not control. Milena began to be afraid.

Milena went up and Milena came down and Milena gave the world cancer. Hop skip and jump.

‘I could go to Antarctica,’ she said. ‘I could go to Antarctica and I wouldn’t be free.’

‘You take on too much,’ said Root, her lips heavy as if with sadness. ‘You always nipping about the place. It was like that with cancer. It always took the ones who did for everyone else. When they went, other people didn’t know how they could go on. Well, you going to have to let other people take care of you now, Milena. I know you don’t like it. You have to let yourself be the child, now.’

Milena was bullied by sympathy. She let Root keep hold of her hand.

‘Come on,’ said Root, patting her arm. ‘Come on, love, let’s get you home, let’s get you home and talk to Mr Stone. We’re going to fight this thing and we’re going to win.’

Central nervous system whispered the viruses. The list continued.

Outside, the Bees were gathered.

Their faces were rigid, caught in a rigour of ecstasy, washed in waves of thought. The forest of the Consensus rose up huge around them, dazzling them with the processes of photosynthesis and elimination. Beneath their feet, the thought patterns of over one million people pulsed.

The Bees were dazzled by it. Tears streamed out of their faces and they clutched each other’s hands.

‘Milena,’ they all whispered, like trees blown in a wind. They were caught up in the patterns of the forest of flesh. They were a forest of flesh. They wore curtains of vine leaves grown out of themselves. They were sheltered by a canopy of leaves growing out of their backs. People were becoming more and more like plants.

‘Milena. Milena Shibush,’ the Bees whispered over and over in love. ‘Garden.’

They grew fruit out of themselves, heavy human fruit full of human sugars. They grew roses. The rose was a symbol of Milena. It was a symbol of the cancer. The Bees loved them both. They formed a wall of love in front of her, transfixed, trembling under the skin. The tears on their faces tremored slightly as they crept down their cheeks.