John Barnes - Directive 51

Need to get off them? Weisbrod wrote.

Can palm/spit out. Somthn 4 DTs?

“I’m glad you’re feeling so much better. I’m pretty sure we can do something to help you get well; I’ll try to stop by more often.” He pointed at the note about DTs and nodded vigorously; Pendano extended his hand, and they shook.

They passed more notes, but Pendano was already exhausted. Weisbrod got him to drink as much water as he would hold. So much crap to wash out of him, I don’t know what else we can do.

He made sure all the notes and the pad they’d been written on were in his pockets before he left, after scribbling one more. Firmly, he told Roger, “I’ll be back, tomorrow if I can, but at least every other day and as often as I can. We’re going to get you well, Roger.” He wrapped Roger up in his arms, pressed his mouth to the man’s ear, and barely breathed, “You were my best. You were always my best. We need you again, Roger, do this for us.”

There were tears in the president’s eyes, but he nodded vigorously and his handshake was surprisingly firm.

On his way out, Weisbrod showed the Secret Service man a note folded to leave the top line visible: ABOUT GETTING THE PRESIDENT WELL.

The man took the note and it vanished; Weisbrod just had to hope he had picked the right guy to pass it to. Christ, Christ, it’s more like Imperial Rome than I could have imagined .

At the door, they issued him a.38 police revolver, and made sure he knew how to use it. Pity I didn’t have this, riding over with Shaunsen; I could have done the best thing I ever did for the United States. He checked his watch and the sun; if he pushed himself and if his sneakers didn’t fall apart on the way (he had a spare pair of leather shoes, not as comfortable but more durable in the new world, in his bag), he might make it back to St. Elizabeth’s with daylight left; the worst would be crossing on the Capitol Street bridge, with nowhere to run if he were ambushed.

As he hurried past the Capitol, he saw a familiar figure from many dinner parties and interviews in a long public life. He waved and shouted, “Hi, Rusty! I like the paper!”

“Hey, Secretary Weisbrod! I see you’re using Washington public transit like we all are. I’ll be sure to report the gesture.” He had thought she was walking dogs, but saw she had three goats with her. Seeing his start, she said, “I live close, and laugh all you want, this is a fair bit of cheese right here.” She grinned. “Say something quotable.”

He gestured at the Capitol building. “What better place to find a bunch of old goats supplying the press with cheese?”

“Dammit, you’re the fourth guy who said something like that.”

“We can’t afford just any old future!”

“That’s the Weisbrod I remember. Have a good night!”

He hurried on into the dark canyons between the office buildings, staying in the middle of the street and away from the abandoned cars where someone might jump out, and thought, Goats on the National Mall.

The only lights visible as he crossed the Capitol Street bridge in the dusk, looking up and down the Anacostia, were the Coleman lanterns of the sentries in the Navy Yard and at Fort McNair.

I guess it’s a good night at that. The gun I have to carry in my pocket while on official duties probably works. A bad night would be one when I needed it to and it didn’t.

I wonder if Romulus Augustulus had a futurologist, and what it was like for him to trot through the dark, deserted streets of Rome.

Roger Pendano looked down at the collection of meds in front of him and thought, All right, last week, I was taking two a day of the green one, for blood pressure. Now there are four of the green one, three times a day, plus two big whites. So that’ll be one green down the hatch, and the rest down the toilet.

He was starting to feel sweaty and sick, and he probably would not sleep tonight. So what? It would make it easier to act groggy and out of it tomorrow, and anyway, I have it coming.

For a former conference room with a bed from a nearby hotel dragged into it, and a coat of black paint on the interior window for privacy, it wasn’t nearly as bad as it might have been. With no water to spare for showers—there was barely enough for drinking, cooking, and periodic toilet flushes—Cam had lined up enough hydrogen peroxide and baby wipes so that she could thoroughly bathe Lenny and have enough left over to at least wipe herself down. “Cam said not to spare the wipes on yourself,” Lenny reminded her.

“One date fifteen years ago, and the man thinks he can tell me how I smell.”

“Actually, he said—”

“Yeah, I know, babe. It makes sense. I have to stay clean because you’re going to be touching me. I was making a joke.” She ostentatiously took one more wipe from the glass cookie jar and scrubbed herself carefully.

“What was so fascinating about that jar?”

“Oh, just thinking it’s like the ones in a little coffeehouse in Myrtle Beach, where I like to stop when I’m driving south—and realizing I might never travel that far again.”

“I think you’re clean enough down there, and I don’t have any plastic parts that are going to get close to it.”

“Hah. Only because you haven’t seen some of my favorite tricks.”

“Well, whose fault is that?”

She liked his smile a lot, so it seemed like a good time to bring the big subject up. “I’m going to suggest something so stupid that I can’t believe I’m proposing it, so don’t laugh at me. It involves you and me being in love.”

“Then tell me. You know I won’t laugh.”

“I want to give up birth control.”

“You do remember I might die of plastic rot next week?”

“I can’t forget it. Or that I’m turning forty next year and a whole lot of things they used to be able to do so that a person could be a mother late in life are going to be impossible. Or that I’ve had one lover in my life whose genes I’d be happy to carry.”

He gestured across his whole body.

“Lenny, you told me—I know it’s not genetic.”

“They don’t think . You want to bet on some doctor’s opinion?”

“Shit, yes, and absolutely, Lenny. Now —while the knowledge is still current and you’re alive. You said all the tests show you have normal DNA. If you live—and I want you to, so bad, you know—well, you and I will raise a kid. If you don’t—over the last few thousand years, how many people got started because a soldier had only one more night at home? Or a gun-fighter, or a matador, or anyone in any dangerous occupation? Dad tells me his grandma was a coal miner’s wife, and she never missed a chance with her husband, figuring it could always be the last.” She looked at him a little sideways. “Uh, given how much care you’ve had to take of your health, just to ask—have you ever had the experience unprotected?”

“No, actually. Never had a relationship last long enough—”

“Well, this relationship is going to last the rest of your life, which ought to be long enough.”

“The rest of my life?”

“Three days or forty years, I’m the one that’s going to be there. And you really ought to experience skin-to-skin, more than once, and I’m getting old to start a family but, honestly, Lenny, what the hell? Now watch close, because I happen to love the way you look at me when I’m naked.” She ran her hands up her sides, delighted that he was too distracted to continue arguing.