Marked Cards Read online

  Embarrassed looks were exchanged as his words were translated. Even Horvath looked sheepish.

  "Senator Hartmann has been neutralized," Pan went on. "As for the rest, the questions you've all raised need to be resolved, but now is not the time. I've summoned you here for a specific purpose." He paused. "This is a critical time for us. The forces that oppose us have struck some serious blows, and everything we have striven for so long to accomplish is in danger of coming to naught. We must combine our efforts now for a decisive strike, before they can stop us.

  "I have summoned you here to reveal to you the existence of a secret weapon - one which promises to put success within our grasp."

  That got their attention. Uncle Pan glanced briefly at Clara. She gave him a nod.

  "To describe this weapon," he said, "which will wipe out the curse of the wild card, I give you the woman who has developed that weapon: the weapon that will trump the wild card once and for all, and put an end to the contamination of the human race. Ladies and gentlemen, one of the world's leading virologists, Clara van Renssaeler."

  A delay while interpreters whispered. Then a murmur rose. The rumors about her father had spread, then. The color came up in Clara's cheeks. She gathered her notes and stood.

  ♥ ♦ ♣ ♠

  Eight pairs of eyes. All held in a net of wrinkles. Why does power always come with age? Normal human eyes. Widen the focus to include the faces. Seven men and one woman. An expanse of aged white skin wrapped tenderly in expensive fabric. Power also surrendered slowly to the fretful demands of equality.

  Dr. Bradley Latour Finn shifted uncomfortably. He was standing, an unruly schoolboy called before the assembled faculty of an expensive boys' school, but of course that wasn't the case. He was standing because the tall leather chairs which surrounded the oval table had never been designed for centaurs, not even pony-sized ones.

  The Board of Governors of the Blythe van Renssaeler Memorial Clinic shifted, too, and exchanged glances. The chairman rose, and extended a soft, manicured hand. Finn stepped forward to accept it. His own hand was equally well manicured, and, he noticed with some distress, as soft.

  "Thank you for coming in today. It's clear some kind of permanent arrangement must be made. Although the requisite seven years hasn't passed to consider Doctor Tachyon deceased, the patients and staff of the Jokertown Clinic need a leader. In these troubled times the ad hoc administration which you cobbled together just won't do."

  "Like I said, Mr. Wily, I'm a joker. I'm a doctor. And I'm your guy."

  There were polite smiles around the table, and Finn felt a presentiment of danger. Dismissed it. Of course he would have preferred to have them leap up and anoint him on the spot, but it was only in movies (and not the kind his dad made) where that happened. Bradley nodded politely, reared slightly so he could execute a sharp spin on his hind feet, and exited.

  ♥ ♦ ♣ ♠

  Clara started out with a primer on xenovirus Takis A, the wild card. With a few graphics and two or three scanning electron microscope photographs, she described how the virus incorporated itself into the human genome and commandeered the cell, causing changes that led to the now-well-known outcomes: death, deformity, or, for a lucky few, a great psychic or physical benefit.

  "I have developed a virus," she said "that penetrates the human cell wall and seeks out the wild card initiator sequence in the DNA - the location where the wild card first insinuates itself into the human genome. If my virus finds the wild card, it will destroy the cell and spread to others, leading to the death of the person infected."

  "What effect does the virus have on non-wild cards?" one man asked. It was Casaday. "Is there any risk?"

  "Absolutely not. My virus will attack the DNA only if the wild card is present in the genome. People untouched by the wild card are safe. The virus will be carefully engineered so as not to harm anyone but the intended target." She sensed Uncle Pan's gaze on her and avoided a wince; the "will be" was a slip-up. Perhaps no one else would notice. "The scientific name for my virus is necrovirus Takis. In the lab, we've dubbed it the Black Trump."

  Loud voices broke out, and Uncle Pan had to call twice for silence before she was able to continue.

  "Now," she went on, "your next question might be, why is such a drastic solution necessary?" She looked around at the several dozen eyes focused on her, and wondered whether these people cared at all about the lives that would be lost.

  Hartmann's allegations on Peregrine's Perch had shocked her. She'd known that things like that went on, but she couldn't believe all of what he'd said was true. For every Etienne Faneuil or George Battle in the organization, there were ten dedicated, principled people like her father and Pan Rudo and herself.

  "Any humane researcher would seek to cure the wild card," she said. "Not kill those poor souls who are already suffering from its effects."

  The young Meta-Green with his boots on the table made a scornful noise, which she ignored. She put her hands behind her back and gazed out at her audience, waiting for the interpreters to catch up. She thought of the stories she'd heard, the violence against those afflicted. Some of these people were responsible for it. How could they possibly understand?

  "My years of research in the field - and let me set aside modesty long enough to state that I am considered the preeminent expert on the wild card virus today. Other than Tachyon, of course." A pause as her words were translated; laughter rippled through the room. "My twelve years of research have led me unavoidably to a terrible truth: the wild card cannot be cured.

  "Tachyon is the only researcher who has even come close, in four decades of feverish efforts by thousands of researchers. With a wealth of advanced alien knowledge and technology at his disposal, he developed his xeno-virus Takis B. The Trump virus. And look at the latest statistics on the Trump." She brought up a graph, and used her ruby laser arrow to point at the bars on the projector screen behind her.

  "A cure is only successful in about twenty-four percent of attempts. Forty-seven percent of the time it doesn't work at all, and an appalling twenty-nine percent of the time, it outright kills the patient. In other words, it's more likely to kill than cure.

  "In short," she said, "the wild card is such a complex virus, and modifies the genome in such an insidious variety of ways, that it not only defeats our science, it defeats the science of those who developed it, the Takisians. And meanwhile" - she flashed a chart onto the screen, showing the current rates of infection in the population - "as you can see, the wild card virus spreads ever more rapidly through the population. The numbers seem small now: barely seven hundred thousand jokers and aces, worldwide. But remember, they are only a small fraction of those infected. For every joker or ace you see, nine others have died of this disease.

  "And complicating the picture are the latents. We estimate that the number of newly infected latents each year - the 'invisible' wild cards, if you will - is thirty percent of the total number infected. In other words, for every joker or ace, another four or five people have the disease lying in wait in their DNA, to someday go off like a timed charge."

  She changed the slide, and pointed. "Last year we saw one-point-two million new infections. This was a sharp increase from the year before. Many of these were as a result of inhalation of the wild card spore, but the number of cases caused by genetic transmission is on the rise. Perhaps two million people now carry the wild card trait as a recessive in their chromosomes. They themselves won't become wild cards, unless they are infected by spores, and are counted separately in my totals. But they can pass it on to their children, if their partners are wild cards or carriers. In the same way that sickle cell anemia or hemophilia is passed on.

  "Though the rate at which wild cards successfully bear or father full-fledged wild card children is comparatively low, they are responsible for the birth of a large number of carriers. And the average latent harbors the wild card gene for between five and fifteen years before it expresses itself - plenty of time to re
produce and pass the gene on.

  "Thus, as you can see," she changed slides again, "we are on the heel of the wild card growth curve." She pointed with her laser arrow. "These three lines represent the projected cases of infection due to spores, due to genetic transmission, and the sum of the two. As this line shows, the rate of infection from spores will remain roughly flat for the next one hundred fifty years or so, at about six to eight hundred thousand new cases a year, and then begin to taper off, as the concentration of spores in the upper atmosphere is depleted. The rate of genetic transmission of the virus, on the other hand, will continue to accelerate. Dramatically.

  "Using conservative assumptions, I estimate that by the year 2050, the number of people infected annually, worldwide, including latents and Black Queens, will surpass ten million. This means that in the year 2050 we will have" - she ticked them off on her fingers - "six hundred thirty thousand new jokers a year, most of whom will suffer gross deformities and greatly tax our nations' resources. Seventy thousand new aces, with their unpredictable and potentially threatening powers. Over three million new latents. And approximately twelve million new carriers born.

  "And of course, in that one year, six million three hundred thousand dead."

  Several listeners gasped. She propped herself on the edge of the table. "A portion of those deaths will occur in utero, so in one sense the impact is not as great as it sounds. We estimate that roughly seventy percent of all wild card-infected fetuses spontaneously abort or undergo transformation at some point during pregnancy. However, many of those are second- and third-trimester miscarriages, or transformations during delivery, often threatening the mother's life. So this is not a trivial loss. And it also means decreasing fertility among our populations, as more and more carrier and infected couples mate.

  "By 2100," she went on, "the annual number of infections climbs to forty million, and the number of carriers climbs to seventy million. By the end of the twenty-second century, one seventh of the world's population will either be infected, or a carrier."

  She paused and faced the audience again.

  "That translates to over two billion infected. One-point-two billion dead, every year. One hundred twenty million jokers, and twelve million superhuman aces. Six hundred million latents. And another fifth of the world's population, or almost three billion, will be carriers."

  Shock hung thick in the silence. Even the Meta-Greens seemed taken by surprise; the young man had removed his feet from the table and sat upright.

  "In short," she said, "the wild card threatens the human race. In a few hundred years our population will be reduced to a small, enormously powerful elite, a large pool of carriers, and another large population of those physically deformed, many of them barely able to function.

  "Nearly every pregnancy, every birth will be a time of dread and suspense, as parents wonder whether their child will be one of the very few lucky ones, or one of those who must spend the rest of their lives suffering. Or one of the vast majority who must die. The human race as we know it will have ceased to exist."

  She turned off the projector and perched on the table again, waiting for the murmurs to die down. Auras sparkled around the edges of her vision; nausea clutched at her stomach.

  "I've heard enough." Eric Fleming stood. He spared a glance at Clara, and she thought she read disapproval in it. Then he faced Pan. "If this Black Trump virus of yours is such a wonderful thing, destined to save us from the wild card, how is it the girl's own father doesn't support it?"

  And several heads nodded around the room, as the interpreters whispered.

  "My father doesn't oppose me," Clara said, but the Meta-Green smirked and spoke over her. "There must be some reason - everyone knows he's always been Rudo's lap dog."

  Loud voices broke out. Clara came to her feet, stiff with rage. Hallucinatory flashbulbs burst around the Meta-Green. Pan's warning stare - and a wave of nausea - were all that kept her from lashing out.

  Pan came to his feet in a fluid movement. All gazes went to him as he moved to the front of the room.

  "Van Renssaeler has been careful to take no official position on this effort. But it is true he has reservations." His voice, calm and thoughtful, settled over the room, and the murmurs stilled. "I believe that his reasons are personal. Clara is taking a great risk in developing this virus. Imagine what will happen to the creator to the Black Trump, if our efforts are uncovered prematurely."

  She blinked, surprised. Perhaps that was it.

  "Clara has made her peace with this," Pan was saying. "It is my belief that her father has not. So." He spread his hands. "If she chooses to offer this means to decisively solve our dilemma, will you, Mr. Fleming, refuse it?

  "Consider. You've told me yourself that the wild card threatens your nation's stability even now. Think how much worse it will be in ten years. In twenty. We must act now."

  Fleming shook his head, with a dense and stubborn look on his face, exactly that of a bull refusing to be herded. "Well, mate, it still smells wrong to me, and I'm not having any of it. Until I hear van Renssaeler's backing this plan, you can count me out."

  He gestured, and his two aides stood. Clara saw a glance pass between Uncle Pan and Johnson; she thought for a moment they'd stop him, but the guards let them pass.

  Uncle Pan surveyed the room. Clara shivered at the look on his face, and felt glad he was on her side.

  "Anyone else?" he asked, softly.

  After an uncomfortable silence, Daniel Mkonda, an African political leader, addressed Clara. "How certain are you of those numbers?" He glanced at Pan. "These aces are a threat and a nuisance. My nation will be well rid of them. But for the rest ... you are talking many deaths on our heads. I have family who are jokers."

  "Sentimental ass," someone murmured. Faneuil.

  "Waziri Mkonda," Uncle Pan said, "it is a great tragedy what happened to your daughter last year - "

  The African cut him off. "No, no, you don't understand. Many of my people suffer, and not just from the wild card. I have several wives and many daughters; if I must lose a child so that my children's children may be spared, then - " he paused as if words had been snatched from him, and looked around at the wall of silent faces. Clara wondered what he read there.

  "Then so be it," he said finally, and his voice was like sandpaper. "But I would not pay such a terrible price unless I were certain that what she" - gesturing at Clara - "says about the future is true."

  Clara nodded slowly. Taking a deep breath against the nausea, she gripped the table edge. It was almost as if she were alone in the room with him.

  "I'm as sure as anyone can be. All my calculations have used very conservative assumptions. Believe me, sir, I understand your dilemma. It haunts me that history will remember me as the woman responsible for the deaths of over a million people. But I'm willing to pay that price. Because the alternative is unthinkable, and the Black Trump is the only means within my grasp to prevent it."

  "But perhaps someone will discover a cure."

  Clara shook her head. "We could gamble that sometime in the next two hundred years our science will advance that far. But it's a fool's bet. How can I explain this?" She paused, framing her thoughts. "Takisian biogenetics are several hundred years beyond ours. Maybe more. I've seen this with my own eyes. And I've studied Tachyon's work in depth. He was not merely a good researcher; he was brilliant.

  "In other words, a brilliant researcher, after two decades of effort, with the aid of a science half a millennium beyond ours, couldn't find a cure. That tells me it could be a millennium before our science is advanced enough to produce a cure. Or never. And I think you'll agree, that is far, far too late."

  Uncle Pan, seated next to Faneuil, spoke. "And I think you'll also agree, Waziri Mkonda, that it is better we lose some kin - who are already suffering, most of them - than to sacrifice the future of the human race. The future depends on our courage. Our ability to stay the course and see this through to completion."

&
nbsp; Clara spoke again, to the room at large. "The wild card must be stopped. At all costs. Now, before the population affected gets any larger. And the only means within our grasp is a simple killer virus that targets the wild card in the DNA.

  "The loss of life will be minimal. Not much more than the number of people who will die of the wild card this year alone." She broke off. Pain stabbed her behind the eyes; her hands trembled. She gave Pan a desperate look. He studied her, and comprehension dawned on his face. He stood.

  "Dr. van Renssaeler has another commitment and must be going. If you have further questions, I'll be glad to relay them to her and get back to you. In the meantime, it'll be a few weeks before we're ready to mobilize efforts to disperse the virus, so I will keep you informed."

  Lights exploding before her eyes, she found her way to the door and slipped out.

  ♥ ♦ ♣ ♠

  Back at the Clinic the other members of the triumvirate which had run the hospital since Tachyon's departure were waiting impatiently. Doctor Cody Havero, a tough, one-eyed cutter who had honed her skills in Vietnam, and traded that war zone for the "no man's land" of Jokertown. And Dr. Robert "call me Bob" Mengele, ("no relation to the other Dr. Mengele," as he was always quick to add). Dr. Bob had a reason for waiting. He too had applied for the position of Chief of Medicine at the Blythe van Renssaeler Memorial Clinic. Finn had kind of resented it, but in fairer moments realized that having one of their own - even if he was a nat - was better than some outsider.

  A surprising addition to the mix was Howard Mueller, known affectionately to everyone as Troll: nine feet of horny overlapping plates, metahuman strength, and metahuman kindness. He was the Clinic's Security Chief, and his skills had been getting a workout in the past two years as acts of violence against jokers, and their Clinic, had increased. He usually didn't put himself forward in this way, but it dawned on Finn that every joker on the staff was anxious to really have one of their own running the hospital. Mrs. Chicken-Foot had followed Finn into the office, and Finn didn't have the heart to shove her out. She mothered him like the Jewish mother she was, and her position at the front desk was a thankless, and sometimes dangerous, job. She deserved to hear what news he had.