I waited for her to go on, but when it was pretty clear she couldn’t, I let her off the hook.
“You don’t have to do it again,” I said. “Nobody should have to watch someone they…”
“Love,” she said.
In spite of myself, I smiled. We’d been together for eight years by then, but that was the first time either one of us had said that word.
“You shouldn’t have to watch me die more than once.”
“No,” she said. “I’ll be there. Dying … even if it’s temporary, you shouldn’t have to do it with nobody around for company but that little bitch Arkady.”
I reached across the table. Our fingers intertwined.
“Anyway,” she said, “somebody’s got to be there to make sure you don’t sneak away.”
* * *
AS IT HAPPENED, it was almost a week before they sent me back into the chamber. I spent most of that time with Nasha. We talked sometimes, we played a few rounds of a card game she’d brought down from the Drakkar. Mostly, though, we held each other. There wasn’t much else to do.
After four days, Burke came into the tiny, curtained-off nook where I’d been sleeping, had me pull up my sleeve, and gave me a half dozen injections with needles that looked like sawed-off water pipes. Halfway through he had to switch arms because my left shoulder was already turning purple. When I asked him what they were, he gave me a look that said clearly that he didn’t think he should have to explain himself to the guinea pig. When I asked again, though, he rolled his eyes and said, “The first two were immune boosters. The other four were vaccines against the microorganisms that killed your last iteration. We’ll give it two days for them to take effect, and then try again.”
“Great,” I said. “So you think I’ve got a chance this time?”
He looked at me, then shrugged and turned away. “You never know,” he said, then added after he’d let the curtain swing back behind him, “… but probably not.”
* * *
I DON’T REMEMBER what happened to Mickey4. I know that he died in Nasha’s arms, more or less just like Mickey3, because they made me watch the surveillance video later. I don’t remember it, though, because the first thing he did when they opened the vents in the isolation chamber was to unplug the leads from the scanning helmet and take it off.
“Hey,” Arkady said. “What the hell are you doing?”
He rolled his eyes. “What does it look like?”
“You need to put that back on,” Arkady said. “You’re breaking protocol.”
Four shook his head. “Sorry, Arkady. If the inoculations work, we can do a full recording as soon as you let me out of here. If they don’t…”
“If they don’t, we’ll be losing valuable data.”
He rolled his eyes. “Valuable data? What the hell are you talking about? You didn’t ask me a single question about what happened to Three.”
“We know what happened to your last iteration, Barnes. He bled out through the lungs. We didn’t need to ask any questions about that. What if what happens to you is more interesting?”
Four stared at him through that little window for a solid ten seconds, then burst out laughing.
“Interesting?” he said when he’d finished. “Interesting? I’ll tell you what, asshole. If anything interesting happens to me while I’m in here, I’ll be sure to let you know. Fair enough?”
“Barnes,” Arkady said. “Put the helmet on. Now.”
Four folded his arms across his chest and smirked out at him.
“Those biohazard suits are fragile,” he said. “It’d be pretty easy to knock a hole in one of them, wouldn’t it? Give that some thought, and then come in here and make me.”
* * *
AS IT TURNED out, what happened to Four was not particularly interesting. He lasted a lot longer than Three did—over twenty-four hours before he started showing any symptoms. When the bug that killed him got going, though, it worked quickly. It cleared out his GI tract first, with fluid pouring out of both ends in great, bloody torrents. When there wasn’t anything more to be done on that front, it went to work on his liver and his kidneys. He was septic at thirty-two hours, and unconscious at thirty-six. By hour forty, he was dead.
* * *
I WOKE UP on the floor again. This time, there were eleven needles waiting for me.
“Wow,” I said. “That was quick.”
“Not really,” said Burke. “It’s been eight days since the last trial. Dugan told us not to bring you back this time until we were ready with the next round of inoculations. No point in wasting resources feeding you when you’re just going back in the hopper anyway, right?”
He worked his way through the injections. Four in the right shoulder, three in the left, and the rest in my right thigh.
“Oh,” he said when he was done. “Dugan also said to tell you that Marshall says you’re wearing the helmet this time.”
“No,” I said. “I’m not.”
“Yeah,” he said. “He thought you’d say that. He also said to tell you that if you don’t, we’re authorized to throw your next iteration into the chamber without any shots, and to keep doing that as many times as we need to until you get with the program.”
He walked away then, and left me sitting naked on the edge of the tank to ponder which is worse: an infinite loop of torment that you don’t remember a bit of, or a single bad death that’s stuck in your head forever.
* * *
IN THE END, I put on the helmet. Nasha came to see me off again. This time, when she kissed me, she wrapped her arms around me and didn’t let go until Arkady pulled her away.
“This is the one,” she said as I stepped into the chamber. “You’re coming back out this time.”
“What do you think?” I asked Arkady as he was hooking up the leads to the helmet. “Is this the one?”
He shrugged. “Stranger things have happened.”
* * *
AFTER A DAY in the chamber, I felt fine.
* * *
AFTER TWO DAYS, I felt fine.
* * *
AFTER THREE DAYS, I was cranky and stiff from trying to sleep in that stupid chair, and my snack drawer was running low. Otherwise, though, I felt fine.
* * *
ON THE MORNING of the eighth day, Arkady told me to strip naked, stand spread-eagled, hold my breath, and close my eyes. For the next thirty seconds, I was doused in a series of increasingly caustic and almost definitely toxic sprays.
“Breathe,” Arkady said when that was done, “but keep your eyes closed.”
Even through my tight-clenched eyelids, the glare of the UV disinfectant was painful.
That cycle repeated three times.
By the time it was done, I was bloodred from head to toe and felt like I’d been flayed alive.
But I was alive.
For the first time, I walked back out of the isolation chamber.
“Get dressed,” Arkady said, “and get down to Medical. You’re not out of the woods yet, friend.”
“Hey,” Nasha said. “Can I go with?”
Arkady looked at her for a long moment, then shook his head. “Best not. If he checks out there, you can have at him. Until then, he’s still a potential vector.”
* * *
MY EXAM WAS almost perfect.