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  10

  Kate came to on the couch with Jeanette next to her, holding her hand.

  What happened? was the intended question but Jeanette answered before she'd completed the thought.

  "You passed out."

  Kate looked around. "Where are the others?"

  "We… they left. A matter to attend to."

  Did it really happen? Kate wondered, squeezing her eyes shut against a blinding headache. Or was I drugged or hypnotized?

  "It really happened," Jeanette said.

  Kate snatched her hand free and slid to the opposite end of the couch. This wasn't Jeanette. And she was reading her thoughts.

  Could this be? Could a strange new virus change human brains and link minds? It was too bizarre. This sort of thing only happened on that Sci-Fi Channel that Kevin liked to watch.

  And yet, if it wasn't real, what had she experienced a few moments ago?

  And why this feeling now that her mind was no longer completely her own? Was it the power of suggestion… or real?

  "We know how you feel, Kate."

  "Do you? I doubt that."

  "Fear…"

  "More like terror."

  "… uncertainty…"

  "How about betrayal, Jeanette?" Anger heated her face. "Do you feel betrayed? I know I do. I loved you, Jeanette. I trusted you."

  She realized with a start she was using the past tense. "And you… you…

  "You'll thank us, Kate. In a few more days, when you're fully integrated, you'll bless that little pinprick in your palm."

  "Never! And bad enough you infected me, but my brother as well! I'll never forgive you for this!"

  Kate rose unsteadily. Never before had she wanted to hurt someone, but Jeanette's true-believer complacency made her want to hit her. Or worse.

  "But you will. And so will Jack. In a few days you'll come to see—"

  "A few days! Is that all? It took you much longer!"

  "A mutation in the virus lets it spread much faster now through a host system. We—"

  "'We'? 'We' who?"

  "Sorry. Once you're part of the Unity it's difficult to think of yourself as an 'I.' All of them are with me now and I am with all of them, even though we are miles apart."

  "You referred to yourself as T earlier when you walked in here with the others."

  "That was so as not to alarm you."

  "Maybe you should keep it up. Because right now I'm very alarmed."

  "Okay, okay," she said soothingly. "I've been where you are, Kate. I fought it at first. I was so frightened, but it was only fear of the unknown. Now that I'm fully integrated, it's wonderful beyond description."

  "But where are you going with this, Jeanette?"

  "You know. We showed you. A transformed world."

  "But what I saw was not all that transformed."

  "What you saw was not the important part. It was what you didn't see that truly matters."

  "You're talking in riddles."

  "Think back, Kate. Did you see cattle farms? Did you see streets full of cars? Did you see jet contrails marring the skies?"

  "So?"

  "The Unity will change the way we live. Humanity will have a healthier lifestyle in a healthier environment. The first things to go will be the animal farms. Existing livestock will be consumed while we convert all the fields now devoted to feed grains to vegetable farms for humans."

  "A race of vegans!" Kate preferred vegetables to meat but liked to have the option of fried chicken once in a while.

  "Not at all. Wild animals that are caught will be consumed, but cattle, pig, and chicken farms will be a thing of the past. Too inefficient. It takes seven pounds of feed corn and soy to produce one pound of pork. So much simpler and healthier to eat the grains directly. Less waste that way. And speaking of waste, the cattle required to feed the average American family its annual supply of beef produce a pile of manure larger than that family's house. The methane released and the manure runoff into streams pollute the environment. All that will stop."

  Now this was consistent with the old Jeanette—she'd often railed against what she called "the institutionalized animal cruelty of agribusiness," but her objections had always been on ethical grounds; this sounded more like simple pragmatism.

  "There will be no need to travel within the Unity. You are everywhere everyone else is. And the environmental benefits from that are as enormous as they are obvious. Clothes, food, building materials will move on the rails and highways, but not people."

  "But you showed me factories, so I assume there'll be industry."

  "Only certain ones, the ones that provide the necessities: agriculture, clothing, housing."

  "But what about business—banking, finance, international trade?"

  "For what purpose? To sell stocks? To lend money? No family, no matter how large—and in the world of the Unity, families will be very large—will go without sufficient food, clothing, or shelter. What more will they need?"

  "How about art, literature, and entertainment for starters?"

  "No one will feel a need for those things. After all, what practical purpose do they serve? Whatever artistry you wish to express will be instantly appreciated by the entire Unity."

  Kate felt her exasperation, growing. "What about relationships?"

  "The Unity is the ultimate relationship. You felt just a hint of it. The closeness, the 'oneness'—you've never felt such an intimate bond; it far surpasses what can be experienced with a mere individual."

  That stung. "Meaning me?"

  "This is different. This goes beyond what an unintegrated mind can grasp."

  "Then what you and I had is gone?"

  Jeanette nodded. "What we had was a procreative dead end."

  "What?" Kate couldn't believe she'd heard correctly. "What did you just say?"

  "There is no homosexuality in the Unity. It does not serve our purposes."

  If she'd had any hopes that the Jeanette she'd loved might still exist somewhere, this quashed them. Kate backed away from her, toward the center of the room. She didn't want to ask but she had to know.

  "What purposes?"

  "To bring all minds into the Unity, of course. And then to create a perpetual flow of new minds to keep expanding the Unity. Since homosexuality is not procreative, it is counter to that goal."

  "And so you wipe it out?"

  "Nothing is wiped out. It simply is not a consideration that will arise within the Unity."

  "Never mind considerations, what about feelings? What about love?"

  Jeanette gave her a quizzical look. "Love? The Unity is love, complete and unconditional. It is bliss that increases every time a new mind is added. No one will need love outside the Unity. The only need will be the craving to add new minds, more and more, expanding our billions."

  Kate backed further away from this puppet that had once been Jeanette, edging toward the kitchen. But something within wanted her to stay close to her and was making it difficult to move, the same something that was trying to soothe her riled emotions, calm her fears, ease her anger.

  But she forced her legs to move, to inch toward the kitchen.

  "That's not a human agenda, Jeanette. That's a viral agenda. It's aimed at one thing: more hosts in which to replicate. A virus is a parasite—the ultimate parasite. It can't even reproduce on its own. It enters a cell, co-opts the cellular machinery, then reprograms it to create copies of itself so it can go occupy more cells. That's what this whole plan is about, Jeanette: creating more hosts for the virus."

  Jeanette followed her, a missionary trying to convert a heathen. She reached out but Kate avoided her touch.

  "You don't understand, Kate. An outsider cannot possibly understand the Unity."

  Kate felt as if she were wading against a current in chest-high water as she fought her way into the kitchen toward the microwave, and fought the anger-and fear-numbing tranquillity forcing its way through her mind.

  "Oh, but I do. I understand perfectly: t
he Unity is the virus. In taking over your brains it's imprinted its agenda on your minds—or on your uber-mind or whatever it is. Be fruitful and multiply… and multiply… and multiply—and create nothing else. That's a virus's code of ethics, and that's what you're spouting."

  Jeanette moved closer, her expression intense.

  "Think of it, Kate. No nations, no borders. No me and not-me, no mine and not-mine—the sources of all conflict. Nothing can belong to anyone when everything belongs to everyone. The Unity future—"

  "—is a sterile existence, Jeanette!" Hard to speak now. Her words slurred, her thoughts sludged. And Jeanette was closer, still reaching for her. "You want to turn humanity into a homogeneous mass of content, well-fed, healthy bodies in a healthy environment where we can breed like rabbits. You say you'll do away with livestock, Jeanette, but the truth is you'll become livestock!" Kate whirled, punched random buttons on the microwave over control panel. "And I refuse to live like that!"

  Kate hit START.

  And suddenly her mind cleared, her limbs freed up.

  "Thank goodness!" she said. She turned to Jeanette. "Now we can really talk."

  But Jeanette stood facing her, shaking her head and smiling ruefully.

  "If you're looking for the old me, that won't work anymore. Not on me. I'm fully integrated now. The old me is gone, shucked like a worn-out skin. There's only the new me now."

  Kate felt her breath clog in her throat. "Oh, no."

  "The Unity doesn't understand why, but the vibrations caused by microwaves interfere with oneness in the unintegrated, causing the Unity to become blind to you. But it's only temporary. Once you're fully integrated, nothing can come between you and the Unity."

  Kate's vision blurred as tears filled her eyes. Jeanette was gone, replaced by this… drone.

  "Don't cry, Kate. I've never been happier. And you'll be happy too. Don't waste tears on the old me, and don't fight for the old you. The battle is already won. In a few more days the new, better you will emerge triumphant. And as for this…"

  She reached past Kate, unplugged the microwave, then slid it off the counter and let it smash on the floor.

  "… don't waste your time."

  Immediately Kate sensed that her thoughts were again no longer completely her own.

  "Jeanette—"

  The phone rang. They both stared at it, waiting for the fourth ring when the answering machine would pick up. Kate heard a beep, then a woman's voice.

  "Oh, Kate. I was hoping you'd be there. I—"

  Kate snatched up the receiver. "Yes? Who is this?"

  "Oh, I'm so glad you're in. This is Gia. We met—"

  "Yes, of course. I remember you. Jack's friend." She sensed the strain underlying the other woman's voice. "Is something wrong?"

  "It's Jack. He's sick."

  Her gut clenched. "How sick?"

  "A hundred-and-four temperature. Delirious. Shaking chills alternating with drenching sweats. I don't know what to do."

  "I'll be right over. Wait—I don't know where he lives." Gia gave her an Upper West Side address. "Don't leave him. I'm on my way."

  "Your brother is sick," Jeanette said—a statement, not a question. Her expression was troubled.

  "Yes. No thanks to you and your virus."

  "But… this is not right. The virus does not make one sick. It slips past the immune system and—"

  "Well, my brother's has thrown up a roadblock."

  At least Kate hoped that was what it was. Those symptoms could indicate any number of infections, pneumonia among others.

  She hurried to the bedroom where she changed into khaki pants and a chambray shirt. She gathered up the stethoscope and diagnostic kit she'd brought along in case she needed them for Jeanette—that was a laugh—and stuffed them into her oversized shoulder bag.

  "Good-bye, Jeanette," she said, more from reflex than anything else, as she headed for the door.

  Jeanette said nothing. She still stood where Kate had left her in the kitchen, staring at the wall, her brows knitted.

  11

  "Take another breath, Jack," Kate said. "Deeper this time."

  Clad only in damp boxer shorts, he lay sprawled on a rumpled double bed. Jack didn't respond so she had to be satisfied with listening to his tidal respiration.

  Kate pressed the diaphragm of her stethoscope more firmly against the perspiration-beaded skin of his mid back. She hadn't realized how sleekly muscular her brother had become. His almost total lack of body fat left the muscles close to the skin. The way he dressed gave no hint that this sort of body moved within his clothes. Men in Jeanette's end of town who had bodies like Jack's tended toward tank tops and skintight muscle shirts; their object was to attract attention; Jack's seemed to be to deflect it.

  She strained to hear the crinkling cellophane rales that would signal fluid in the alveoli. She heard none.

  "No sign of pneumonia," she said.

  Gia sighed. "Thank God."

  Not necessarily good hews, Kate thought. Means we're dealing with something else. And if Jeanette had told the truth, that something else was most likely the contaminant virus.

  "What do you think it is?" Gia said.

  Kate looked at this pretty blond woman and thought back to the night—Lord, had it been only two nights ago?—that she and Jack had come over. Kate might have found herself attracted to her if not for everything that had been happening. She remembered how she'd been struck by the easy camaraderie between Jack and Gia, the way they laughed with each other and, when listening to Gia speak of Jack, how deeply she cared for her brother.

  And now she saw the near panic in Gia's eyes, and thought, You're so lucky, Jack, to have someone who loves you this much. Don't ever lose her.

  She decided to tell Gia part of the truth. "It's most likely a virus."

  "Is it catching? Vicky's been in and out, helping me. Bad enough Jack's this sick. But Vicky's so little. What if—?"

  "She should be fine."

  Kate had met the dark-haired, blue-eyed child on the way in and her pigtails had made her ache for the days when Lizzie had been that age. Life had seemed so simple back then.

  "I hope so," Gia said. "I've had to change his T-shirt three times. Finally I stopped. He pulls the covers over himself when he chills and throws them off when he sweats."

  "That's part of the infection-fighting process."

  But why is his system fighting it when mine didn't?

  Kate felt a tug in her mind, a nanosecond of scrambled thoughts, and then a question leaping out before she could stop it.

  "Has he ever been sick before?"

  "This sick? Yes, once."

  "When?"

  She couldn't control her voice!

  "Last summer. After…"

  Kate tried to lock her throat, succeeded, but not before she said, "After what?"

  "I don't know if I should go into that. Maybe Jack should tell you."

  Now Kate herself wanted to know what Gia was talking about but was determined not to let the Unity hear the answer. She sensed fear and uncertainty in the Unity and that worried her. What might they do to wring the answer out of Gia?

  She fought to regain control of her voice, and squeezed her eyes shut with the effort.

  "Kate, are you all right?"

  She felt beads of sweat pop out on her forehead… and then suddenly she was back in the driver seat… but she could still feel other hands reaching for the wheel.

  "I'm okay. Just a bad headache."

  "Oh, I'm sorry. Can I—?"

  "You know what?" Kate said. "On second thought, it might be better, for Vicky's sake, if you go."

  "Oh, no." She was shaking her head. "I couldn't leave Jack. I'll just keep Vicky in the other room and—"

  "I'm concerned that if you catch whatever this is you might pass it on to her, and then…" Kate let the sentence hang and watched Gia chew her upper lip. She added, "I'll look after him, Gia. I've had a bit of training in this sort of thing."
r />   "I know." She shrugged, her expression unhappy. "But I still feel like I'm abandoning him."

  "I promise to watch over him as if he were a member of my own family."

  This earned a smile. "Yes, I guess I can count on that, can't I." She sighed. "Okay. I'll take Vicky home. But you'll call me as soon as he comes out of this, won't you?"

  Kate sensed increased efforts in her head to make her stop Gia from leaving but she beat them back.

  "Of course."

  Gia started for the door, then stopped and turned. Keep going! Kate wanted to shout. She didn't know how long she could hold out.

  "Just one thing."

  "You really shouldn't stay here any longer."

  "I know, but I just want to warn you that Jack might not be too happy to find you here."

  "I don't understand."

  "It was my idea to call you over. When I told him he didn't respond, so I'm not sure it got through."

  "Why would that be a problem?"

  "He's a little quirky about this place. He… well, he doesn't like anyone to know where he lives. Hardly anyone does. And as for being here, Vicky and I are the only regulars. This is his sanctum."

  "But I'm his sister."

  "But you didn't know the address, right? I had to give it to you. See what I mean?"

  "I think so."

  "So if he's upset that you're here, don't take it personally."

  Kate glanced at the sprawled sleeping man. "Strange guy, my brother."

  Gia's lips said, " 'Unique' is more like it," but her eyes seemed to say, If you only knew.

  Minutes later, when the door had closed behind them, Kate felt the pressure ease. The Unity was still desperate to know how Jack was reacting to the virus, but must have realized it could only watch and wait right now.

  Was this what it had been like for Jeanette—fighting minute to minute, losing ground inch by inch? Maybe not. At least Kate knew she was in a war. Jeanette had probably had no idea. Most likely she wrote off any early alien feelings or thoughts as part of the healing process, a side effect of the tumor's shrinking. And when finally she'd realized that her mind was being usurped, it was too late.

  When will it be too late for me? Kate wondered.