Sporting Chance

Chapter Ten

“This is the craziest idea I ever heard.” Ronnie glared at Brun. “You want to take a sick, paralyzed old lady up in a hot-air balloon, then bang around in a shuttle, then—and what are you going to do when you get to Rockhouse Major?”

“I’m not going to Rockhouse Major.” Brun glared back. “Dad’s yacht is at Minor; that’s all you need to know.”

“A balloon—dammit, you can’t fly a balloon like a plane. They just drift. How can you possibly be sure you’ll even get there—or do you expect me to chase you across country on foot with Aunt Cecelia over my shoulder?”

“No, of course not. And yes, I can aim a balloon—there are ways. They’re clumsier than planes, but quieter and much more difficult to find on scans designed for planes and shuttles. I can be there within fifteen minutes of a set time, and close enough that you won’t have to run any races.”

“So what do you want me to do?”

“You visit her—you have a regular pass.”

“Yeah, but they’re still watching me.” Less warily since Serrano had run off with his aunt’s yacht, but still watching.

“That’s fine. They can watch you all they want. What’s your regular visiting day?”

“Saturday, of course, when I have a half-day off. You know this already—”

“Yes, but I’m checking my own plans. Your mother visits on Tuesdays, and your father on Thursdays, and you on Saturdays—and you almost never miss—”

“I liked her,” Ronnie said. He noticed the past tense, and wished he had said “like” even though it wasn’t true. No one could like that limp, unresponsive body in the bed. And he had only Brun’s conviction, formed in that one visit, that Cecelia—the-person still lived inside her inert shell, to give him hope.

“So while they watch you, and her, it’s just routine. They expect you.”

“I still can’t walk out with her—”

“You won’t have to. All you have to do is get her unhooked from the bed, and outside. Like this—” Brun flipped open her notecomp and showed him the plan. She had it all down, all the medical background, sketches of wires and tubes and things he didn’t want to look at. What to do in which order, what he would have to take with him. Suggestions for making sure the bothersome attendants didn’t interrupt—he thought of another way himself, and realized he was being drawn in. It still looked ridiculous, but Ronnie didn’t argue. He didn’t have anything better to offer. He didn’t have anything at all. And the longer they left Aunt Cecelia trapped in her helplessness, the worse for her . . . he could hardly believe anyone could stay sane month after month.

“When, then?”

“Festival of the Air, of course.” He felt himself flushing. He’d been so miserable he’d forgotten that annual celebration was almost upon them. “Plenty of confusion in the air—for some reason the wilder sorts are thinking of dropping in on the starchier resorts and sanctuaries in the area. Can’t think why.” She grinned. “And no, it’s not traceable to me. Now—let’s get busy. You’ll have to practice getting a flight suit on me when I’m lying limp.”

Oblo had managed to load the yacht with a surprising number of amenities. Toiletries, leisure clothes, entertainment cubes, and a cube reader. Music disks and players. Despite the bare bulkheads and naked decks, the lack of furniture, ample bedding, and bright-colored pillows made comfortable nooks for lounging and sleeping. Heris asked about the pillows—she could not imagine Oblo sneaking through the docks with big puffy orange and puce and turquoise pillows under his arms—and he gave her his best innocent glare.

“Bare decks get cold, Captain. You know that.” Then a sheepish grin. “And besides, these pillows . . . they were sort of . . . lying about somewhere . . .”

“Somewhere?” She could feel her eyebrows rising.

Now he stared at the overhead. “To tell you the truth—” which meant it would be his fiction. “They belonged to someone Meharry and I kind of blame for that girl Amalie’s death.” Possibilities ran through Heris’s mind, and she settled on the obvious.

“That therapist?”

He grinned as if he was glad she’d figured it out. “Yeah. Had this big room with lots of pillows in it. Needed cleaning, they did. Cleaners picked them up, delivered them. We sort of . . . liberated them on the way back.” As a specimen of Oblo’s vengeance, this was mild. Heris decided to let it go.

“You know it was wrong,” she said.

“So was getting Amalie killed and Sirkin hurt,” he said, with no remorse. “Captain, it was the least we could do.” About what she’d expected; she managed not to laugh until he was out of her office.

So far the voyage was going well. Skoterin had not protested when she realized they were not, in fact, ferrying the yacht a short distance. She had been glad of a longer job, she said, and she trusted the captain. Heris found that amazing, but then so were the others trusting her. She got along well with the others, though she was younger by some years than anyone but Sirkin. Heris wondered if that would turn into anything. She couldn’t remember what Skoterin’s preferences had been—if she’d ever known. Not that it mattered, really. As long as they both did their work. Sirkin she saw on the bridge; she was happily absorbing all Oblo and Guar could teach her about the new navigational equipment. Haidar reported that Skoterin was as efficient as he remembered. All she had to worry about was the mission itself.

“I wish there were a way to be sure the Crown offer was faked,” Heris grumbled. “Then we wouldn’t have to bother with this ridiculous rendezvous. What if the prince doesn’t show up?” She had never enjoyed covert ops, and didn’t now. Petris ignored that, and kept rubbing her shoulders. Oblo had the bridge, with Arkady Ginese to second him; nothing would get by those two. She and Petris had retired to her cabin, where they turned up the thermostat and lowered the lights so that they could enjoy the rest of the shift out of uniform. Surely this time nothing could interrupt them, not in FTL space.

“What kind of job do you think we can get as cover if we need it?” he asked. His hands slid lower; she wondered if he really meant to continue a serious conversation or if this was just another form of teasing. She was almost afraid to try the response she was eager to make; the obstacles to their pleasure had gone far beyond a joke. What would happen this time if they started something? She felt she would die of frustration if they didn’t.

“Soft side of legal, I expect.” Heris did not meet his eyes, and leaned back against him. Maybe he would take the hint and continue without talking about it. Petris shifted her in his arms, and she quit thinking about future problems. Present pleasure was enough for now. Apparently he thought so too; he quit asking silly questions. And nothing interrupted them, though she didn’t think of that for some time.

But afterwards, they came back to it. A small tramp cargo ship couldn’t simply idle along from place to place; it had to have cargo, and destinations. Otherwise, as they knew well, the authorities would have questions, backed up with force.

“It would be simpler if we had two ships,” Heris said finally. She rolled over and stretched. “We could transfer cargo from one to the other, as if—what is that?” Her convulsive lurch upset Petris, who had been curled over watching her stretch; they collided, and then Heris was out of the bed, clutching the sheet, and pointing at the bulkhead above him.

“What?” Petris glared first at her, then at the bulkhead. Then his gaze sharpened. “I—don’t have any idea.” He edged away from the bulkhead, and got off the bed.

“It’s alive,” Heris said. She was aware that her voice had squeaked, and still hadn’t returned to normal. The thing was just lighter than the bulkhead, a dull creamy white, as long as her hand. It had long antennae; she could just see them wiggling.

“And there’s more than one of them,” Petris said. He pointed. Out of the crack between bulkhead and bunk, two more of the things crept.

Heris had wrapped the sheet tightly around herself; now she leaned closer. “Six legs . . . antennae . . . you know what it looks like? It looks like an albino—” Something skittered down her leg, from under the sheet, and tickled her toes as it ran over them. “COCKROACH!” She was out of the sheet before she knew it, and across the room. Shuddering, she looked back. Petris, on one foot, looked around like someone who had forgotten what the other leg was for. Neither of them had anything handy for whapping a cockroach, because ships didn’t have cockroaches. Ships were routinely cleaned out before and after each trip; everyone feared vermin.

“Albino cockroaches?” Petris said, still on one leg like some kind of exotic bird. “Do they . . . I mean, what do they eat?”

Heris headed for the shower. “I don’t know, but they’re filthy. It’s disgusting. On my ship!” She strode into the shower and bounced back out. “They’re in there, too!”

“They like warmth, I recall,” Petris said. He was back on two feet, but looked anxious. “We turned up the heat in here—”

“And what if they’re all over the ship?” Heris asked. She had a nightmare vision of a full-bore inspection arriving to find her and her first officer and lover stark naked amid swarming albino cockroaches. Could she claim they’d eaten her uniform? And would they?

“They probably are,” Petris said gloomily. He shook out his shirt before putting it on. “And they probably breed. Where could they have come from? None of us had been out of Station quarantine.”

“That’s why the redecorators didn’t want us on the ship,” Heris said. She remembered the frightened look on the woman’s face. It made sense if she was afraid of being caught with illegal biologicals. “They put them here.”

“But why?”

“I . . . don’t know. But we had best find out. Perhaps they’re used in some stage of the process.”

“It can’t be legal.” Petris shook out his shoes, one by one, before putting them on. “It’s against all the regulations I ever heard of to have biologicals on a Station or a ship. Except for the registered ones, like you told me Lady Cecelia had.”

“I wonder.” Heris checked her own clothes carefully before getting back into them. “At least we now have a cargo.”

“These? They’re not cargo—they’re a reason to quarantine us.” He sounded horrified at the thought. Heris felt the same way but struggled to think past her revulsion.

“Yes, but . . . let’s assume the decorators keep them, and put them here. That means they’re valuable to the decorators. That might mean they’re valuable to another firm doing the same work somewhere else.”

He looked dubious. “I don’t see how. First we’d have to catch them, confine them somewhere, take care of them. We don’t even know what they’re for.”

“Can you catch one?” Heris asked, pointing to the cluster that still clung to the bulkhead over the bunk.

“Me?” He looked at her. She looked back, pointedly. “Oh, all right. If they’re poisonous or something, though, you had better figure out how to save my life, or I’ll haunt you.”

“I should figure out first what to keep it in . . . let me think—something in the galley should hold it. And we’ll turn the temperature down, in case they’re more active in warmth. If I remember, most insects are.”

Once clothed, she found the pale cockroaches just as disgusting, but less frightening. If they attacked, they’d hit her clothes and not her skin. She shuddered, remembering the touch of those legs. With the thermostat down, she had an excuse for shivering.

“I suppose you want me to stay here while you fetch a cage?” Petris didn’t sound happy about that.

“I can stay,” Heris said. “Get a food container with a tight lid—except we’ll have to ventilate it somehow—I wonder what size holes these things can crawl through.”

He came back with a canister whose top had a dozen perforations; Heris wondered why, then it occurred to her it looked like a giant salt shaker. Perhaps that was how Cecelia’s cook had covered pastry with powdered sugar.

“We had similar things back home,” Petris said, as he smacked the open end of the canister down over the nearest cockroach and carefully slid a flat piece of metal under it to trap it. “Farmers hate ’em too—those ate crops, clothing, pillows, rugs—”

“Rugs?” Heris stared at him. “Like—the carpet that used to be here?”

“We didn’t have real carpet; we had rugs woven of plant fiber and animal hair. Some handwoven, and some factory-produced. But yes, they ate holes in rugs. And upholstery. Old-fashioned books, too, especially the bindings. My uncle said it was the glue. And they’d make a mess of data cubes left lying around, even though they couldn’t eat them. They’d leave their . . . mess . . . on them, which glopped up the cube readers. Why?”

“Because . . . that may be why the decorators have them. I hadn’t really thought about it but . . . the stuff the decorators take out of a ship—all the wall coverings and carpet and upholstery—has to go somewhere. They’d pay to have it processed in the Station recycler, and then they’d have to pay to replace that with new material. Imported or fabricated, either one. Let me run the figures . . .”

This was something she could work out, once she thought of it. And the specifications were in the contract she’d brought along. She called them up. “Look—here’s an estimate of square meters, times minimum thickness of carpet, of wall covering, of upholstery. Which comes to—” She looked at the volume result. “—And they’re required to give chemical composition—organics—so in case anything’s volatile, what kind of outgassing the ship’s environmentals will have to handle. Interesting.”

“What?”

“If they’re honest, given the density and composition, the volume of material they’d have to have processed onstation or transport would cost them—” She called in the financial subroutines. “Too much. Plus replacement. I’ll figure that both ways, local processing and importation. No, three ways—from planetary sources and importation from more distant sources.” The result exceeded the bid on Cecelia’s job.

“Can’t be,” Petris said. “You’ve made a mistake somewhere.”

“I might have,” Heris said. “But if I didn’t, and if these disgusting insects were put here for a reason—and if they eat rugs and pillows and upholstery—”

“They eat them,” Petris said, with distaste. “They certainly don’t manufacture their replacements. It might be cheaper to have them gobble up the client’s old stuff, but unless they can be cooked into delicious banquet meals, I don’t see how that helps.” Then his face changed expression. “Unless, of course, they’re cooked into something else—the new furnishings.”

“That’s sick,” Heris said. “Besides, how could you get them all back out?”

“It would explain why they risk breaking the vermin laws, if it did work.”

“And it gives us something to sell,” Heris said. “Both the information and the . . . er . . . samples.”

“It certainly establishes us as outlaws,” Petris said. “Selling vermin—carrying them loose on a spaceship?”

“Not loose if we can capture them,” Heris said. “I don’t want any more surprises.”

Capturing the clots of pale cockroaches in Heris’s cabin turned out to be easy, but everyone soon knew that those had not been the only ones aboard. Although their pale color made them hard to spot in some locations, they were obvious in the galley when someone flipped the lights on and they scuttered for dark corners. They swarmed to every food spill, and for a while food spills were more common. Even Heris, who had convinced herself they were harmless, dropped a mug of soup when one ran up her arm. Eventually the crew learned to tolerate the sight of them—or at least not drop things—but no one liked it.

“What’s this thing?” asked Nasiru Haidar one day, carrying the tiny object gingerly between thumb and forefinger. “And I already know it’s not a dropping—I’ve learned to recognize those.”

Petris peered at it. “Egg case, and it’s already hatched. Or they have. So they’re fertile.”

“How fast do they reproduce?” Nasiru asked.

Petris shrugged. “I have no idea. Where I grew up, the entire life cycle of some insects was only 20 planetary days—and our days were close to Old Earth days, they said.”

“And these insects were mature when introduced—possibly more than ten days before we undocked. So they could have laid eggs immediately they came aboard—”

“It’s possible that we undocked with only egg cases,” Petris said, “and all the cockroaches on the ship are those who came with us as eggs.”

“So I couldn’t have seen them,” muttered Oblo. Everyone had pointed out that he’d been aboard the ship, stashing supplies. He’d insisted there were no cockroaches then.

“Possible.” Heris grimaced. “What doesn’t seem possible is getting them all. I wish we knew how long ago that had hatched. Are the ones we see now first or second generation? Or worse?”

Haidar and Skoterin, with their specialty in environmental systems, seemed the logical ones to devise living quarters for the captured cockroaches, and ways of eliminating those still loose. Heris hoped Cecelia would never need to know that she had had cockroaches running loose all over her ship.

Brun waved at her friends as her balloon tugged on the mooring lines. Dozens of other balloons obscured her view of the hills. She signalled her handler, who released the line; she kept a steady burn as the balloon rose. A few were already high above her, bright colors hardly visible; a dozen released within a second of her release, and still more waited for a last passenger. The Festival of the Air . . . she remembered how she’d gasped the first time she saw all the balloons and kites and gliders and parasails. She’d had to learn to pretend disdain, even while learning to pilot a balloon; she’d claimed her father made her do it. But she’d always loved it.

Surface winds pushed her back over the taller hills, away from her goal. She didn’t hurry to rise above them. Half a dozen balloons she knew well were drifting as she was, toward the course marker on the highest hill ten kilometers away.

“Racing, are you?” called a Kentworth, from a yellow balloon striped with purple. “I thought you declared noncompetitive this year.”

“Declarations are secret; the wind doesn’t lie!” she yelled back. Every year some people pretended not to be racing until the race itself; it was one of the things she’d counted on. She let the balloon sag as it approached the next ridge of hills; with the wind behind her, she’d gain altitude here anyway, and she didn’t want to be pushed into the contrary winds aloft. Not yet.

She was still a couple of kilometers short of the first marker when she turned on the burner. She had let herself sag below most of the competitors, but that was her style. Now the burner’s roar drowned out the sound of others, and the hooting and cheering of watchers below. Slowly at first her balloon steadied, then lifted . . . then surged upward, as if yanked by a string.

“Damn!” she yelled. The nearest balloon might or might not hear her over the burner, but anyone watching or recording her on cube could see her mouth moving. “Burner’s stuck on; I’m going to lose my wind—” She hauled herself up onto the basket rim, and banged noisily at the burner with a wrench as the balloon surged upward. Her stomach protested; she ignored it. It was no worse than a fast elevator ride. Around her, then below, the others receded to multicolored blobs. When she felt the wind shift, she whacked the burner control in the right place, which she’d been studiously missing, and turned it off. In the silence, she heard laughter from below, and one bellow asking if she needed help. “No,” she yelled back down. “Fine now.” The balloon kept rising; it had plenty of heat in it, and the air at this level was cooler.

She leaned out, watching all the other craft in the air. She knew what the winds aloft had been when she launched, but winds changed . . . she was drifting back now, away from the course marker, back past the launch site where balloons just launching looked like overstuffed sofa pillows. Half a dozen balloons were higher and ahead, well on their second race leg, having passed the first course marker before gaining altitude to ride the other wind direction.

The morning’s mist had cleared, and now the remnants thickened into clouds defining the boundaries of different air masses. She pulled the burner control and sent the balloon up another several hundred feet. Up here somewhere she should find a current angling in from the approaching low pressure . . . over there where the clouds thickened into murk.

Ronnie craned his head to look over the guardhouse at the first of the balloons. Of course it wasn’t time for Brun’s yet . . . He looked at the guard, who smirked at him.

“Festival of the Air . . . you like it, sir?”

Ronnie allowed himself to look abashed. He had practiced the expression for two days now. “I know it’s childish, but—it’s always been my favorite seasonal festival. If I hadn’t had to come visiting today, I could’ve been up there too . . . not that I don’t love my Aunt Cecelia, of course.” He put on what he hoped was a contrite but haughty look. The man nodded.

“A bit dull, visiting elderly relatives. They tell you all about their childhoods—”

“Well . . . not my aunt,” Ronnie said. He was sure the man knew already; he had to assume that. “She . . . she can’t speak, actually. She had a stroke.”

“Ah.” The man nodded again. “Sorry to hear that, sir. Makes it harder to visit, I expect. Although perhaps she can hear you, give some sign that she knows you’re there?”

Ronnie felt cold. He wanted to smash the man’s head on the ground. Instead, he shook his own head. “No . . . they say not. She’s just a vegetable, just lying there. But Mother says . . . I mean, I would come anyway, she’s my aunt, but . . .”

“But not today, if you didn’t have to? No shame in that, sir; at least you came. It speaks well of your family.”

Ronnie nodded without speaking as the man held out a stamped visitor’s pass. He could feel the man’s eyes watching his back as he walked up the beautifully landscaped lawn. Could the man tell that he had something under his clothes? In his pockets? He glanced up, and walked on with his head thrown back as if he could not resist watching the balloonists.

As required, he checked in at the main desk, where he was told his aunt’s room number—the same as always, he was relieved to note. Her condition was unchanged, the receptionist said; he would please observe the rules of the facility, including . . . His mind tuned the voice out. He could have recited them by heart. No smoking, no alcohol, no eating in the room, no tampering with equipment or medication. He was free to use the toilet, or drink from the water fountain; if he required something else, he could ring for an attendant. He could stay two hours, but he would have to leave immediately if his aunt required active medical treatment. He nodded, as always, and exchanged his entrance pass for a unit pass that gave him access only to his aunt’s treatment unit. The receptionist, safe behind her counter, hardly looked at him except for a quick glance at his face.

“And no flowers,” the receptionist said to his departing back.

Sometimes they offered an escort; if they were busy, they didn’t. This time no staff member came to check on him, and he strode along a neat stone pathway edged with flowers, free to think without interruption.

If they failed, his aunt would die. He was sure of that—either they made a clean getaway, or whoever had done this would kill her. Or you, his mind said suddenly, forcing on him an image of himself in Cecelia’s state. He shuddered; sweat ran cold down his back. He saw, without registering them, other people walking on other paths: family members of other patients, staff in the cheerful, bright coveralls they wore. The treatment units, low stone-faced buildings scattered among trees and lawns and flowerbeds, looked like expensive apartments. The path led him around one, then another. He saw a terrace outside one, with someone in a hoverchair talking to two people in normal clothes. Off to one side, on a smooth stretch of lawn, a patient struggled to walk from a hoverchair to a picnic table spread with food.

At last he came to the final row of buildings, to Cecelia’s treatment unit. Like the others, it was stone-faced and low, with a covered terrace on this side. The terrace on the far side had no roof; that should make it easier. He put his card in the door, which slid open. Inside, the expected staff member, this time the gray-haired man in yellow, who checked his pass, his ID, and reminded him again of the rules.

“She’s having a good day,” the man said with a wide smile. “And I’ve just finished toileting and bathing her; she’s all fresh and sweet for you.” Ronnie wanted to gag, but managed to thank the man. “If she could see,” the man went on, “she’d have a perfect view of the Festival . . . at least you can enjoy it.”

Ronnie wondered whether a fake sulk or a pretense of boredom would be better. “I wish I could,” he said, letting his anger edge that. “If I hadn’t—I mean—my regiment’s got a contestant up.”

“Ah—balloon or glider?”

“Both, of course.” Ronnie pulled himself up and tried for pompous. It had been easy last year, when he still thought the regiment’s place in the air races mattered.

“Well, you can see them through her window . . . or, if you wish, open the sliding door onto the west terrace. It won’t bother her.” Again, that faint cynical edge.

Ronnie shook his head. “I’d better not. If Mother found out I was neglecting Aunt Cecelia to look at the Festival, she’d skin me.”

The man laughed. “I won’t tell. Go ahead.”

“I think she gets the tapes or something; she knew last week when I read for half an hour.” He had read for half an hour, setting up this situation; his mother hadn’t mentioned it, but he was sure tapes were being made, and someone at this level shouldn’t know how many people got copies.

Now the man looked uneasy. “Oh . . . ah . . . that’s easy to arrange. I can put it on a loop, for . . .”

Ronnie took the bait. “Would you? I’d be terribly grateful. It can’t matter to Aunt Cecelia; you’re all very tactful about it, but the doctor said her brain was gone. And if I have to spend all today cooped up in here, just looking at her and pretending to talk to her—” He held out his credit chip. “I’d like to buy a fruit punch, too . . .” The man fed the chip into the unit reader, flicking the buttons, and handed it back to Ronnie when it popped free. The cash—how much Ronnie couldn’t tell—never actually changed hands.

“What you do,” the man said, “is go in there and act normal for about ten minutes. Don’t just sit still: pour some water, touch her hand, sit down, stand up, talk to her softly. Then come out, and go to the toilet; I’ll loop the tape at that point and only an expert will know you’re just repeating things for the rest of your visit. See this button? Push it when you leave, and it’ll put the tape back to realtime.”

“Thanks,” Ronnie said. He had no idea if the man was honest, or honestly dishonest, but it was worth a try.

He went in and for ten minutes that felt like ten years acted like a bumbling, nervous, miserable nephew . . . as near as he could, the same he’d acted in all his visits. The bed’s automatic movements still made him nervous; it looked and sounded as if some animal were rolling and twisting under the covers. He stroked Cecelia’s cool, dry brow, and her thin, wrinkled, flaccid hands; he murmured to her, then turned away to wipe his eyes and pour himself a glass of water. Finally he left, and went into the toilet in the outer room. When he came out, the man in yellow stood by the outside door, gave him a final thumbs-up, and left.

Ronnie went back to Cecelia and sat there a little longer before letting himself look outside. Behind Cecelia’s unit, the clinic land ran down to the river, a meadow mowed just too high for comfortable walking. He could see four or five balloons from inside the room, one quite low . . . but it was the wrong color. A parasail slid across, a long low glide that ended with a landing at the far end of the meadow. Ronnie gave Cecelia a kiss on the brow, and then walked over and opened the glass door to the terrace.

Balloons crowded above him, the whoosh of the burners much louder now. The air smelled fresh, the scent of mown grass mingling with a faint tang of smoke from the burners. He heard laughter, shouts, shrill cries of excitement or dismay. People hung over the edges of baskets and waved; he waved back. Some balloonists could indeed steer, he saw: not all used the same method, but he saw balloons wallowing across the wind with the aid of propellers, compressed-air jets, and even oddly-shaped “rudders.” All in brilliant colors, in stripes and stars and plaids . . . he took a quick look at his watch, then tried to peer upwind. She ought to be here soon.

And he had to unhook his aunt from her monitors, praying that the attendant had been honest, that the tape was on a loop, that the loop included her monitors. He ducked back inside, and put on the thin surgical gloves he’d brought. Inside his own shirt and slacks were clothes for her—pants and shirt, socks, soft slippers. Folded flat between his jacket and its lining was a thin balloonist’s coverall with garish stripes. Bubbles was supposed to bring something to cover Cecelia’s hair.

Quickly, with a murmured apology, he threw back the covers. The sight of her thin white legs, her feet strapped into braces “to prevent contractures” nearly broke his concentration. As gently as he could, he unstrapped them, and struggled to put her socks on. He had never dressed even a child; he had no idea how hard it was to put socks on without cooperation. Then he lifted her legs and worked each foot into one leg of the slacks. She seemed so much heavier than she looked; he was having to tug and yank at her. He hoped it didn’t hurt.

Bubbles had warned him what he might find next. The tubes, the bags . . . he didn’t want to think about it, let alone look at it or touch it—but he had to. He glanced, feeling the blood rush to his face even though he was alone with an unconscious woman. Nothing. His breath came out in a gasp. She must have had—his mind, avoiding the present, struggled for the phrases—that surgery which implanted a programmable sphincter control. Without really looking, he wrestled the slacks up to her hips, and with a skillful lift he’d practiced on Bubbles, all the way up to her waist. He wouldn’t have made it without that practice; he should have practiced all the dressing, but he’d assumed it would be easier. Perhaps the attendants who cared for her did more than guard against intruders.

His eyes registered the scars on her belly, but he refused to stop and stare at them. Now for the rest. He risked another quick glance outside, and saw the rose and silver balloon in the distance. He ducked back inside; he had to work quickly.

The bed sighed and gurgled, arching against his knee. He wished he knew how to turn it off. Of course it had saved Cecelia from pressure sores, but he couldn’t lean against it without his skin crawling. Trying not to feel anything at the sight, he pulled open the front of the clinic gown. He had to find the ports through which she was fed, suctioned, medicated. A flat, peach-colored plastic oval on her upper chest must be one; three little caps stuck up like grotesque nipples, one blue, one green, one yellow. Behind her right ear, another plastic oval, this one with a silver nipple.

If the monitors don’t use external wires—and most don’t these days—they’ll have built-in transmitters to either the bed, with relays to a nursing station, or direct to the nursing station. He remembered that, the quiet voice of the specialist. Either sort can transmit up to thirty meters. Which meant that nothing should show on the monitors—even if they were being watched—until Cecelia was more than ten meters from the bed. He had that much time to get well away from the unit, before the alarms went off.

No external wires today, and nothing connected to the ports. It should have been simple, but the feel of his aunt’s flaccid body, as he pulled her forward, pulled off the gown, and worked her arms into the shirt, made it difficult. Now the coverall . . . this was quicker, since it had been designed to fit loosely over clothes, and since he had practiced how to put it on Brun. Of course, she wasn’t as limp, even when she tried to lie still. He rolled Cecelia up on one side, fighting the wavelike motion of the bed, and got foot and hand into the loose sleeves. He worked the coverall close under her, then rolled her back over, tugged—and fitted the second arm and leg in. Then the pressure seals . . . and now she looked like a fallen balloonist, a normal person, a real person.

It must have taken hours; Bubbles would have drifted past. He was vaguely aware of sounds from outside, hoots and cries and angry voices back toward the main buildings, laughter and shouts from the meadow. He picked his aunt up, again surprised at how heavy she was, and moved near the door. The rose and silver balloon blocked his view upwind; he looked up to see Bubbles’s white face staring back at him. The balloon sagged heavily, the basket scraping through the ornamental hedge between the next unit and this; it tilted half-over before breaking free. Then it dragged along the ground, and bumped the edge of the terrace.

“Now!” Bubbles said. “I can’t stop it—”

Ronnie lunged outside, clumsy with the weight in his arms. He staggered into the side of the basket; Bubbles grabbed his aunt by the shoulders and pulled. Together, they got her over the basket’s rim and in, although she landed heavily almost on her head.

“Straighten her out!” Ronnie said urgently, as the balloon pulled the basket along. “Get her head up—”

“Get back inside!” Bubbles snarled. He wanted to protest, but her hand was already on the burner control, and the roaring flame drowned out anything he could say. He looked around. Bubbles’s balloon had blocked his view of the meadow and the air overhead; he hoped it had blocked others’ view of the basket for that critical few moments. Now that it was past, he could see that the meadow roiled with balloons, parasails, even two gliders being hastily dewinged for transport.

When he went back into the empty room, the open bed seemed to stab his heart; his eyes filled. Forcing himself to be calm, he checked the IV pump and stripped off the medicine label—it might or might not help, but it was worth a try. Then he pulled the covers up and went into the unit’s front room. He badly wanted to use the toilet, but didn’t dare take the time. Now he had to get out—to be seen leaving, with nothing in his hands, and no aunt slung over his shoulder. He reached for the outer door, and remembered that he still had on those gloves. He was supposed to have put them in the basket for Bubbles to take away. Instead, he’d have to have them in his pocket, along with the medicine label.

On the east terrace, he could see more of the confusion wrought by the Festival of the Air participants. Someone’s balloon had caught its basket solidly in a large tree, and attendants and balloonist were having a loud argument about it. Several other balloons had apparently dropped baskets of confetti and party toys, which littered lawns and walkways.

“We’re just having a picnic!” he heard someone say—someone over his head, in the tree-trapped basket. “And we thought your old geezers might like to see a little color and life—”

“It’s trespass,” said a dark-coated man that Ronnie recognized as an administrator.

“Hi, Ronnie!” called a girl in the same basket. He peered up; the administrator, he knew, was watching him. “Come to our picnic.”

He made himself laugh. “Picnic? In a tree? What are you idiots doing this time?”

“We’re headed down to the shore, but Corey had a bet with George on who could drop a marker square in the middle of the administration building—”

“Why?” Ronnie asked, amused in spite of himself. It was the sort of thing George would think of. All they had told him was that they needed lots of balloons hanging around the nursing home on some ridiculous pretext.

“I don’t know.” The girl, whom he vaguely remembered from last Season, had dyed her hair in streaks of green and blue, and wore a tan coverall with one blue and one green arm. “Somebody said this would be a good place. Cheer up the patients who couldn’t come to the Festival. Anyway, why not climb up and come along?”

“Because you’re not going anywhere,” Ronnie pointed out. “Not until you get out of that tree. Besides, your balloon is deflating—haven’t you noticed?”

“Oh.” The girl looked and shrugged, then turned on the young man. “I told you you were too low, Corey. We’ll be stuck here for hours, and the others will have all the fun.”

“You could ride with me,” Ronnie offered. “It’s not as much fun as flying there, but more fun than hanging in a tree like an ornament.”

“No!” The administrator looked angrier than ever. “Unauthorized persons cannot just wander around unsupervised. You—” He turned on Ronnie. “Where’s your pass?”

“Here.” Ronnie held it out. “I’m on my way out; couldn’t I escort Andalance? It’s not her fault.”

“She’s an intruder. A trespasser—”

“Oh, come on. It’s the Festival—” Corey sounded both angry and slightly drunk. “She’s my date—”

“She didn’t trespass intentionally,” Ronnie said. The longer he stood here arguing, the more obvious it was that he didn’t have his aunt hidden on his person. He told himself that the gloves in his pocket didn’t really glow bright yellow, either. “And it would get her out of your tree. Or I could help free the basket—it looks like you’ve got other problems, too.”

“No,” the man said again, handing Ronnie’s pass back. “It would be most helpful if you would simply check out now. If we clear the property of legitimate guests it will be easier to deal with these—” He glared upward. Corey made a rude noise.

“Well—if that’s what you want—” Ronnie shrugged, and turned away, looking he hoped like someone reluctant to leave. He gave a last glance up to the trapped basket. “I’ll take your place, shall I, Corey? Sing by the bonfire and all?”

“You can’t go; you aren’t flying,” Corey yelled back.

“I can pick up a parasail at home—there’s still enough daylight. Enjoy your treehouse.” Ronnie walked on, ignoring the jeers behind him. He made himself walk slowly, looking up when a balloon’s burner whooshed overhead, grinning and shaking his head when a shower of glittery confetti covered him in blue and turquoise. At the main desk, a crowd of visitors clustered, complaining about the noise and confusion, about being forced to leave early. Ronnie handed his pass to the harried receptionist with a shrug and smile, and accepted the gate pass she gave him.

Someone tapped his shoulder and said, “Isn’t your aunt in that last row?”

“Yes, why?” Ronnie said without flinching.

“All that noise—and I saw one balloon land almost on top of that row, dragging the basket along—”

“Must have been after I left,” Ronnie said. “It won’t bother her, I’m sorry to say.”

“Oh?” The avid curiosity of the other man annoyed Ronnie, but he knew he must answer.

“She’s in a coma,” he said. “Has been for months.”

“Oh, well, that’s not so bad. But still. My father nearly had another stroke, when he saw someone fall out of a basket and have to climb back in.”

“It’s just the Festival,” Ronnie said vaguely and turned away. He had to get out of here. He made it out the door, down the long walk to the gatehouse, in a clump of departing visitors. Another low-flying balloon nearly scalped him—someone behind yelled a warning—and the guard at the gatehouse was shaking his head when he collected the gate passes.

“Every year or so they get wild like this. No, madam, I don’t know why. The administration sends warnings out to all the Families and the Clubs, but every so often they take it into their heads to ignore the rules. Can’t explain it. I don’t think it’s so bad myself; patients might enjoy a bit more color and excitement, but I can see why it riles the staff. Like this young gentleman here, with that blue confetti—what fell on the ground, someone’s got to clean up.”

He had made it to his own vehicle; he had started it up. Others crowded the exits; he glanced behind, half-expecting to see someone running to stop him. But nothing. He was on the road home; no one signalled him, no pursuit appeared. At home he faced the tricky part. While his parents had agreed that “something must be done” it had been clear that whatever was done must be done secretly. None of them ever discussed possibilities. For all he knew, they had their own plans to rescue Cecelia, and he had just ruined them. Then again, maybe they’d given up. But they certainly had no idea what he’d been part of. Suddenly the casual self-invitation to the beach party sounded like just the thing.

He left a message on the house board, and went to get his parasail out of storage.