Lost Worlds (1/3)
by Douglas Neman
"Mr. Blalock will see you now." Blalock's secretary hadn't even paused from the letter she was typing, much less smiled or looked up. This didn't bother Sarah Wallen a bit - they were both highly efficient professionals, after all. She rose out of her chair and stood in front of the retinal imager at Blalock's door.
Keeping her eye open, she waited for the laser to confirm her identity. She wasn't absolutely positive, but she was willing to bet that Blalock's secretary would trigger a defensive mechanism to kill her on the spot if the retinal scan failed - and she probably wouldn't pause from her typing to do that, either.
The light flashed green, and there was a soft *click* as the door unlocked for a few seconds. She walked into a lavishly decorated office, one wall of which was a bay window looking out into space. Every few hours, Earth drifted past.
"Sarah," Blalock said with that polite smile of his. "Glad you could make it! Sit down. Coffee?"
"No thank you, sir." She sat in one of the two plush chairs in front of his desk.
"Sure? It's the real stuff. Might be your only chance for a long time."
"I'm sure."
He poured himself a cup, plopped a file folder on the desk in front of her, and sat down.
The file folder was an amazingly old-fashioned way of keeping information. But in the late 22nd century, keeping classified data on a piece of paper was the only way of totally insuring no computer hacker could ever touch it.
She opened the file and glanced through it. "Adair? Eden Project?" she asked. "Sick children? What, is some bitter parent blaming you and threatening to blow you up?"
"Metaphorically, that's *exactly* what's going on. Devon Adair is really causing a lot of trouble."
He sighed. "A few children have gotten sick with some mysterious disease, and the whole thing wouldn't be worth a fart in the wind if it weren't for the fact that one of those children is hers. Because she's a celebrity, she has the power to raise a stink about it, and she's blaming us for her child's sickness."
Sarah looked up in surprise.
"She says it has to do with the fact that we're not on Earth any more," Blalock continued. "She says the stations are killing her son."
Sarah was incredulous. "Her family *built* the stations! What's her problem?"
"The problem is that she wants to leave for another system, and we don't want her to."
"Why not?"
"Because when the human race expands outward to take our rightful ownership of the stars, it will be on *our* agenda, on *our* terms. *We* found the planet Adair wants to colonize, and *we* have plans for it, big plans. And they don't involve her. We have such great ideas, such incredible possibilities before us, and she's going to ruin everything by pushing colonization before we're ready to tackle it!
She's acting like a stubborn Earthowner. You know the type, the one who's the only one in the whole area who won't sell to the air-purification realtors, even though it would benefit everyone? She's single-handedly standing in the way of so much progress, and there's a lot of people who don't like it."
"What do you want me to do?"
"First and foremost, I want you to keep tabs on Eden Project, and investigate and report anything which will be of interest. Second, I want you to actively sabotage their ship or equipment if they actually show signs of departure. Cause a malfunction in a row of cold-sleep chambers, or rupture a part of their engines - something which will force them to delay launch in order to repair.
"Devon Adair is really whacked out about this whole affair. Just between you and me, I think her son being sick has sent her over the edge and she's desperately looking for someone to blame instead of looking for a solution. The woman hates me, and considers me her enemy. Normally, I'd trust her, but with the way she's been behaving lately, I wouldn't put it past her to try something."
"Something like what?"
"I don't know," he smiled. "That's your job - to find out what and prevent it."
"One other thing." He pulled out another folder and handed it to her. "I also want you to keep tabs on this woman."
The file read "Dr. Julia Heller." Sarah opened it up, and saw photographs and HOLID's of a thin, blonde woman, who evidently never smiled, by the look of things.
"She's an agent two grades lower than yourself, attached to Dr. Vasquez's team. I'm worried about her. She was assigned to Eden Project because we felt it was something she could handle, and her medical background made her the perfect choice. But if push comes to shove, I'm not sure she can shove back. Her psych-eval reveals a weakness in her resolve - there's a chance she'll become emotionally attached to the people she's assigned to cover. We can't risk that. This is her first assignment, and you are to keep tabs on her as much as you are Eden Project. You'll be her performance evaluator. Under no conditions is Julia to know that you are also a Council agent - just watch her."
"How do I get in?"
"You're going to become a mother."
Sarah raised a sardonic eyebrow.
"A number of these sick children were understandably abandoned by their parents when they were found to have the Syndrome. One of these was Alex Williams." Blalock handed her a third file. "You, Ms. Williams, are going to show up with a horrible conscience, crying about how you abandoned Alex, begging to be reunited with him, apologizing all over for leaving him in the first place. You'll cause a stir, I'm sure, and attract the attention of Devon herself. Once you're one on one with her, you can earn her friendship, and her trust. Go from there."
"Sounds like a plan. Start immediately?"
"Absolutely. Do you need any more time? "No. I'm ready." She handed all three files back, having already memorized them. "I'll head straight for the hospital from here."
"You'll find your kit assembled and waiting outside," Blalock smiled. Sarah smiled back and left. Sitting on the countertop which surrounded Blalock's secretary was a bag, resembling overnight luggage. Sarah smoothly picked it up on her way out without breaking stride. The secretary did not look up.
***
"That's wonderful!" Devon exclaimed.
"What is?" O'Neill asked as he entered the room, looking between her and Dr. Vasquez.
"The mother of one of the abandoned children has returned!" she said. "Four years after just leaving him in the hospital corridor in front of his office!"
"Oh, yeah?" O'Neill asked. "Did you shoot her, doc?"
"Ha!" Vasquez laughed. "I didn't know whether to shoot her or pin a medal on her!"
"Yeah, well, in today's world, you could probably do both. It wouldn't even matter which one you did first." O'Neill sat down. "Why'd she leave the kid, and why come back?"
Vasquez shrugged. "She didn't elaborate. She just said it had always bothered her, and she finally couldn't stand it any more."
"Who is it?" Devon asked.
"Angela Williams. Says Alex is her son. We've always known who the child was because of station records, but the parents disappeared, and couldn't be traced. I asked her about him, and everything she says rings true. A DNA test confirms she's his mother. I also asked her about the boy's father, but he died about a year ago."
"Do you think she might be mentally impaired in some way?" Devon asked. "The fact that she left him anonymously and then returned so suddenly might mean she has an emotional disorder of some sort."
"She might," Vasquez shrugged, "but what can you do? I'm not *her* doctor, just Alex's. As time goes on, I can only intervene if I think she's harmful to the boy in some way, which is my main concern."
He sighed heavily. "Alex himself is pretty quiet about all this, which worries me. He won't even talk to *me* about it. This sudden reappearance of his mother has really shaken him."
"Well, I imagine it would," Devon said. "What's Ms. Williams' situation? Will she be able to help out around here with any time or money?"
"She certainly owes it," O'Neill muttered.
"Not my department," Vasquez smiled and stood up. "I just tend the sick. Management's your bailiwick, and I'm outta here. I've got to get to the lab."
"Is she still here?"
"She's down in the ward," he nodded in one direction as he pushed open the door and left.
"Well, I would very much like to meet her," Devon said to O'Neill. "Just don't bite her head off."
"I don't even want to lay eyes on the woman," O'Neill said. "I gotta check up on the colony ships, see why those work crews are lagging behind again."
***
Devon pushed open the doors to the ward, but found no adults there. Two of the children were talking quietly on the far side of the room, and one was actually sitting up in bed reading, but most were asleep, including her own son, Ulysses. She didn't try to wake him.
She smiled brightly at the ones who looked up at her, and waved her fingers at them. All of them were terminally ill, and she'd gotten to know them all during her years planning the Eden Project with Dr. Vasquez. Every day, seeing them and being with them taught her so much, touched her so deeply, and challenged her so much more than the day before. Even though she was an adult, she was the one who felt small and inadequate every time she was in their presence - dwarfed by their courage, their wisdom, their friendship. Their very lives.
She sometimes wondered how the universe could be so paradoxical. She would give anything - her entire fortune, her life, her dignity, her freedom, *anything* - for Ulysses to be free of the disease which wanted to claim his life before his tenth birthday, which no Syndrome child had ever reached.
But if Ulysses hadn't developed the Syndrome, she would never have met Dr. Vasquez, or become a part of all that she had found here. And she knew perfectly well she would forever have remained someone who heard about the Syndrome children every now and then on the news, and dismissed them as nobodies who didn't matter.
She would have missed out on so much. Halfway down the left side of the room she found Alex, awake but staring nowhere.
"Hey, there!" she sat down beside his bed and took his hand. "A lot of attention surrounding you today!"
"Yeah, I guess," he said.
"Must be pretty exciting to have your mother back, hmm?"
He just shrugged.
"You wanna tell me what's wrong?"
"I don't know," he said. "It just...doesn't seem real."
Devon paid close attention. Working with these children, she had learned that kids picked up a damned sight more than most people ever gave them credit for, sometimes more than the adults around them, who were rushing around with busy thoughts cluttering their brains. They just sometimes couldn't put their feelings into words, or sort out the important ones from the trivial ones.
She had also learned that the Syndrome children usually spoke their minds freely. It wasn't just the way children say whatever comes to their minds with brutal honesty because they don't know any better - it was more than that. It was as if, forced to look death in the face at six years old, nothing else frightened them, and not much slipped past their sharp minds.
They were wise before their time. And Devon had learned fast, and she had learned hard, not to be fake around them - they wouldn't put up with it. They demanded total respect.
"Alex," Devon said, "if there's anything you want to tell me, anything at all, I *will* listen, and I *will* believe you. We care about you very deeply, and if you have any misgivings about your mother..."
"She's not my mother," he said.
Devon looked at him softly. "Now why do you say that?"
"Because she doesn't act like you."
"What do you mean?"
"I see the way you play with Uly sometimes, and the way you hold him, and take him for walks, and read to him, and the way you look at him. She just came in here, asking me to forgive her, crying over her lost child." He was silent for a moment. "I just wanted to tell her that *she* was the one who was lost. Not me."
He toyed with her fingers in his hand. "But I didn't tell her. I don't know why."
Devon said, "It's not easy when someone who abandoned you comes back into your life. Sometimes courage comes slowly, and you've been given an opportunity that not everybody here has. She hasn't been a good mother so far, I won't deny that. But she's probably not going to turn into a wonderful one overnight. You're still here with us, and we all love you very, very much. She hurt you by leaving you. You can bet if she tries to hurt you again, in any way, we'll protect you, and we *will* give her a piece of our minds. You can count on that!"
"I wish you were my mom."
She smiled and stroked his hair. "That is so sweet of you. You know, in a way, I've been your mother all this time. And we're still going to get you to New Pacifica, and you won't have to worry about being laid up in this bed any more. In the meantime, why don't you give your real mom a chance, okay? She may not be as bad as you think."
Alex managed a weak smile. "Okay, I'll try. But only if you still come by and tell me you love me."
"Of course!" she said. "Of *course* I will."
"Because she never said that. She didn't say she loved me. She cried a lot, and said she was sorry, but she never said, 'I love you.'" He started to cry. "I kept waiting for her to say it, but she never did!"
Devon squeezed his hand and stroked his head some more, but her face hardened, just the tiniest bit. "Where is she now?"
"She went with Julia, just before you got here. I think they're in her office."
She leaned forward and hugged him. "Well, *I* love you. We *all* do. And I'm sure she does, too, even if she didn't say it in so many words, or she wouldn't have come back to you. You just rest for a while, okay?" She pulled back and smiled at him. "You've had a lot of excitement today, and it's not even lunchtime yet. Things may not feel good now, but everything will turn out fine. Okay?"
"Okay," he smiled. His eyes closed and his body relaxed, more at peace. His head rested on the pillow. He still clutched her hand tightly in his.
Devon gently laid it on the bed next to him and kissed him on the forehead. Then she stood up and quietly left the ward.
By the time the doors swung shut behind her, she was halfway down the hall.
Story Notes:
Hello,
Several months ago, Shannan Palma proposed a contest which she called, "A Spy on Board." She wanted people to explore the possibilities of other spies amongst Eden Project.
As a general rule, I don't like conspiracy plots, and I have trouble writing spy stories. However, I didn't want to back down from a challenge. I decided to try it -- maybe I could come up with a spy *slant* on a story which was more my style in the first place.
I didn't have the time to write it, but she then extended her deadline in the hopes that someone would actually enter! With the new deadline, I had the time, and I sent her a story five minutes before time was up! I don't know if she was counting seconds or not.
I never heard from her. The "Who" list says she's still subscribed to the mailing list. I sent her a follow-up message, but it has gone unanswered. Shannan, if you're out there -- I hope everything's okay. I've just decided I can't wait any more, that's all. I'm posting my story.
It's called "Lost Worlds." (No, it's not a crossover!) I never would have written it if it hadn't been for Shannan's challenge.
Have a happy day! Doug
Disclaimer: All characters, names, and trademarks are the copyrighted property of Amblin/Universal. No copyright infringement is intended.
I never heard from her. The "Who" list says she's still subscribed to the mailing list. I sent her a follow-up message, but it has gone unanswered. Shannan, if you're out there -- I hope everything's okay. I've just decided I can't wait any more, that's all. I'm posting my story.
It's called "Lost Worlds." (No, it's not a crossover!) I never would have written it if it hadn't been for Shannan's challenge.
Have a happy day! Doug
Disclaimer: All characters, names, and trademarks are the copyrighted property of Amblin/Universal. No copyright infringement is intended.