The Jupiter Plague

Nothing happened; the controls were dead and the inner door was sealed. Sam tried all the buttons, but there was no response. He turned to the telephone and found a list of numbers mounted next to the screen. There was the ping of a bell when he dialed 211 for the control room and the screen came to life.

“Hello, is there anyone there? I’m calling from the air lock.”

An empty acceleration couch almost filled the screen, and behind it, out of focus, were banked racks of instruments. There was no answer, nor did he see any movement. Sam dialed the engine room next, with the same negative result. After this he went to the top of the list and dialed every number on it, one by one, hearing his voice echo in compartment after compartment. There was no answer. They were all empty. The sick man must have been alone in the ship.

When Sam started back down the ladder he saw that more cars had arrived, but all of them were keeping their distance. A policeman started forward from one of the cars and at the same time an amplified voice boomed out.

“Dr. Bertolli, your hospital wants to talk to you. The officer is bringing you a radiophone; would you please pick it up.”

Sam waved that he heard and, after setting down the medical kit, went to pick up the phone where it had been left midway between the spaceship and the cars. “How is the patient?” he asked Nita when he returned.

“He seems to be losing ground, pulse weaker, breathing shallower and his temperature is still high. Do you think he should have an antipyretic, or antibiotics—?”

“Let me talk to the hospital first.”

An image appeared on the small screen when he switched it on, divided in two for a conference call. On one side was a heavyset, gray-haired man, whom he had never seen before, on the other was the worried face of Dr. McKay, the head of the Department of Tropical Medicine and former head of the team who had developed the treatment of Topholm’s pachyacria.

“We’ve heard about the man from the ship, Dr. Bertolli,” McKay said. “This is Professor Chabel from World Health. Could we see the patient, please.”

“Of course, Doctor.” Sam held the phone so that the pickup was focused on the unconscious spaceman and at the same time gave the readings from the telltale and described what he had found in the ship. He then showed them the message the spaceman had written.

“Are you positive that no one else is in the ship?” Chabel asked.

“I’m not positive, because I couldn’t get in. But I called every compartment that had a phone; no one answered my calls nor did I see anyone — alive or dead — in any of these compartments.”

“You said that you couldn’t operate the space lock controls.”

“The power was off, they seemed to be deactivated.”

“That’s good enough for me,” Chabel said, coming to a decision. “The controls worked when the man came out, so he must have turned them off himself. That, along with his warning about sickness in the ship, is enough reason to act. I’m going to quarantine that spaceship at once and have it sealed and sterilized on the outside. It’s going to be isolated and no one will go near it until we find out what the disease is.”

“Bring him to the hospital,” Dr. McKay said. “All the patients in the tight quarantine ward have been transferred to other hospitals.”

“Should I administer any treatment first?”

“Yes, our experience has been that normal supportive treatment is recommended. Even if the disease is an alien one it can only affect the patient’s body in a limited number of ways. I would suggest antipyrine acetylsalicylate to bring the fever down, and a broad spectrum antibiotic.”

“Megacillin?”

“Fine.”

“We’ll leave in a few minutes.”

Nita was already preparing the injections when he hung up. They were done quickly while the ambulance backed toward them, the rear door gaping open. The first vertijets appeared as Sam was rolling out the stretcher. They must have already been on their way during the phone call and were just waiting for the go-ahead signal from World Health. There were two of them that circled the spaceship slowly, then vanished behind its bulk. A bellowing roar broke out and clouds of dense black smoke appeared.

“What’s happening?” Nita asked.

“Flamethrowers. They’ll cover every inch of the ship with them and the ground around. Every precaution must be taken to see that the infection isn’t spread.”

When Sam turned to latch the door he saw the starling on the ground nearby, dragging its wing in circles. Human beings weren’t the only ones who had suffered when the “Pericles” landed — the bird must have been hit by a piece of flying debris. And there was another bird, injured too, lying on its side with its beak open.

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