The Garden of Rama(Rama III)

EPITHALAMION Chapter 4
The hamburger stand in Central City was completely run by biots. Two Lincolns managed the busy restaurant and four Garcias filled the customer orders. The food preparation was done by a pair of Einsteins and the entire eating area was kept spotless by a single Tiasso. The stand generated an enormous profit for its owner, because there were no costs except the initial building conversion and the raw materials.

Ellie always ate there on Thursday nights, when she worked at the hospital as a volunteer. On the day of what became known as the Mishkin Proclamation, Ellie was joined at the hamburger stand by her now bandless teacher Eponine.

"I wonder why I've never seen you at the hospital," Eponine said as she took a bite of a French fried potato. "What do you do there anyway?"

"Mostly I talk to the sick children," Ellie replied. "There are four or five with serious illnesses, one little boy even with RV-41, and they appreciate visits from humans. The Tiasso biots are very efficient at operating the hospital and performing all the procedures, but they are not that sympathetic."

"If you don't mind my asking," Eponine said after chewing and swallowing a bite of her hamburger, "why do you do it? You are youngf beautiful, healthy. There must be a thousand things you'd rather do."

"Not really," Ellie answered. "My mother has a very strong sense of community, as you know, and I feel worthwhile after I talk to the kids." She hesitated a moment. "Besides, I'm socially awkward... I'm physically nineteen or twenty, which is old for high school, but I have almost no social experience." Ellie blushed. "One of my girlfriends in school told me that the boys are convinced I'm an extraterrestrial."

Eponine smiled at her protegee. Even being an alien would be better than having RV-41, she thought. But the young men are really missing something if they're passing you by.

The two women finished their dinner and left the small restaurant. They walked out into the Central City square. In the middle of the square was a monument, appropriately cylindrical in shape, that had been dedicated in the ceremonies associated with the first Settlement Day celebration. The monument was two and a half meters tall altogether. Suspended in the cylinder at eye level was a transparent sphere with a diameter of fifty centimeters. The small light at the center of the sphere represented the Sun, the plane parallel to the ground was the ecliptic plane that contained the Earth and the other planets of the solar system, and the lights scattered throughout the sphere showed the correct relative positions of all the stars within a twenty-light-year radius of the Sun.

A line of illumination connected the Sun and Sirius, indicating the path that the Wakefields had taken on their odyssey to and from the Node. Another tiny line of light extended from the solar system along the trajectory that had been followed by Rama III since it had acquired the hutnan colonists in Mars orbit. The host spacecraft, which was represented by a large, blinking red light, was currently in a position about one third of the way between the Sun and the star Tau Ceti.

"I understand the idea for this monument originally came from your father," Eponine said as the two women stood beside the celestial sphere.

"Yes," said Ellie.."Father is really extremely creative where science and electronics are concerned."

Eponine stared at the blinking red light. "Does it bother him at all that we are going in a different direction, not toward Sirius or the Node at all?"

Ellie shrugged. "I don't think so," she said. "We don't talk about it very much... He told me one time that none of us was capable of understanding what the extraterrestrials were doing anyway."

Eponine glanced around her in the square. "Look at all the people, hurrying here and there. Most of them never even stop to see where we are... I check our location at least once a week." She was suddenly very serious. "Ever since I was diagnosed with RV-41 I have had a compulsive need to know exactly where I am in the universe... I wonder if that's part of my fear of dying."

After a long silence Eponine put her arm on Ellie's shoulder. "Did you ever ask the Eagle about death?" she said.

"No," Ellie replied softly. "But I was only four years old when I left the Node. I certainly had no concept of death."

"When I was a child, I thought like a child," Eponine said to herself. She laughed. "What did you talk to the Eagle about?"

"I don't recall exactly," Ellie said. "Patrick told me that the Eagle especially liked to watch us play with our toys."

"Really?" Eponine said. "That's a surprise. From your mother's description I would have imagined (he Eagle was much too serious to be interested in play."

"I can still see him clearly in my mind's eye," Ellie said, "even though I was so young. But I can't remember what he sounded like."

"Have you ever dreamed about him?" Eponine asked a few seconds later.

"Oh, yes. Many times. Once he was standing on top of a huge tree, looking down at me from the clouds."

Eponine laughed again. Then she quickly checked her watch. "Oh, my," she said. "I'm late for my appointment. What time are you due at the hospital?"

"Seven o'clock," Ellie said.

"Then we'd better be on our way."

When Eponine reported to Dr. Turner's office for her biweekly checkup, the Tiasso in charge took her to the laboratory, obtained blood and urine specimens, and then asked her to take a seat. The biot informed Eponine that the doctor was "running behind."

A dark black man with sharp eyes and a friendly smile was also sitting in the waiting room. "Hello," he said when their eyes met, "my name is Amadou Diaba. I'm a pharmacist."

Eponine introduced herself, thinking that she had seen the man before.

"Great day, huh?" the man asked after a brief silence. "What a relief to take off that cursed armband."

Eponine now remembered Amadou. She had seen him once or twice in group meetings for the RV-41 sufferers. Someone had told Eponine that Amadou had contracted the retrovirus through a blood transfusion in the early days of the colony. How many of us are there altogether? Eponine thought. Ninety-three. Or is it ninety-four? Five of whom caught the disease through a transfusion...

"It seems that big news always happens in pairs," Amadou was saying. "The Mishkin Proclamation was announced only hours before the leggie things were seen for the first time."

Eponine looked at him quizzically. "What are you talking about?" she asked.

"You haven't heard about the leggies yet?" Amadou said, laughing slightly. "Where in the world have you been?"

Amadou waited a few seconds before launching into an explanation. "The exploration team over at the other habitat has been in the process of widening their penetration site for the last few days. Today they were suddenly confronted by six strange creatures who crawled out of the hole that had been made in the wall. These leggies, as the television reporter called them, apparently live in the other habitat. They look like hairy golf balls attached to six giant, jointed legs, and they move very, very quickly... They crawled all over the men, the biots, and the equipment for about an hour. Then they disappeared back into the penetration site."

Eponine was about to ask some questions about the leggies when Dr. Turner came out of his office. "Mr. Diaba and Miss Eponine," he said. "I have a detailed report for each of you. Who wants to be first?"

The doctor still had the most magnificent blue eyes. "Mr. Diaba was here before me," Eponine replied. "So - "

"Ladies always go first," Amadou interrupted. "Even in New Eden."

Eponine went into Dr. Turner's inner office. "So far, so good," the doctor told her when they were alone. "You definitely have the virus in your system, but there's no sign of any heart muscle deterioration. I don't know why for certain, but the disease definitely progresses more rapidly in some than others."

How can it be, my handsome doctor, Eponine thought, that you follow all my health data so closely but never once have noticed the looks I've been giving you all this time?

"We'll keep you on the regular immune system medication. It has no serious side effects, and it may be partially responsible for our not seeing any evidence of the virus's destructive activities... Are you feeling all right otherwise?"

They walked back out to the waiting room together. Dr. Turner reviewed for Eponine the symptoms that would indicate the virus had moved to another stage in its development. While they were talking, the door opened and Ellie Wakefield came into the room. At first Dr. Turner ignored her presence, but moments later he did an obvious double take.

"May I help you, young lady?" he said to Ellie.

"I've come to ask Eponine a question," Ellie replied deferentially. "If I'm disturbing you, I can wait outside."

Dr. Turner shook his head and then was surprisingly disorganized in his final comments to Eponine. At first she did not understand what had happened. But when Eponine started to leave with Ellie, she saw the doctor staring at her student. For three years, Eponine thought, I have yearned to see a look like that in his eyes. I didn't think he was capable of it. And Ellie, bless her heart, missed it altogether.

It had been a long day. Eponine was extremely tired by the time she walked from the station to her apartment in Hakone. The emotional release she had felt after removing her armband had passed. She was now a little depressed. Eponine was also fighting feelings of jealousy toward Ellie Wakefield.

She stopped in front of her apartment. The broad red stripe pn her door reminded everyone that an RV-41 carrier lived inside. Thanking Judge Mishkin again, Eponine carefully pulled off the stripe. It left an outline on the door. I'II paint it tomorrow, Eponine thought.

Once in her apartment, she plopped down in her soft chair and reached for a cigarette. Eponine felt the surge of anticipatory pleasure as she put the cigarette in her mouth. I never smoke at school in front of my students, she rationalized. I do not set a bad example for them. I smoke only here. At home. When I'm lonely.

Eponine hardly ever went out at night. The villagers in Hakone had made it very clear to her that they didn't want her in their midst - two separate delegations had asked her to leave the village and there had been several nasty notes on her apartment door. But Eponine had stubbornly refused to move. Since Kimberly Henderson was never there, Eponine had much more living space than she would have been able to afford under normal circumstances. She also knew that an RV-41 carrier would not be welcomed in any neighborhood in the colony.

Eponine had fallen asleep in her chair and was dreaming of fields of yellow flowers. She almost didn't hear the knock, even though it was very loud. She glanced at her watch - it was eleven o'clock. When Eponine opened the door, Kimberly Henderson entered the apartment.

"Oh, Ep," she said, "I'm so glad you're here. I need to talk to someone desperately. Someone I can trust."

Kimberly lit a cigarette with a jerky motion and immediately burst into a rambling monologue. "Yes, yes, I know," Kimberly said, seeing the disapproval in Epo-nine's eyes. "You're right, I'm stoned... But I needed it... Good old kokomo... Artificial feelings of self-confidence are at least better than thinking of yourself as a piece of shit."

She took a frantic drag and exhaled the smoke in short, choppy bursts. "The a*shole has really done it this time, Ep... he's pushed me over the brink... Cocky son of a bitch - thinks he can do whatever he wants... I tolerated his affairs and even let some of the younger girls join me sometimes - the threesomes relieved the boredom... but I was always ichiban, numero uno, or at least I thought I was - "

Kimberly stubbed out her cigarette and began to wring her hands. She was close to tears. "So tonight he tells me I'm moving... "What,' I say, 'What do you mean?'... 'You're moving,' he says... No smile, no discussion... 'Pack your things,' he says, 'there's an apartment for you over behind Xanadu.'

"That's where the whores live," I answer... He smiles a little and says nothing... "That's it, I'm dismissed," I say... I flew into a rage... "You can't do this," I said... I tried to hit him but he grabbed my hand and smacked me hard on the face... "You'll do as I order," he says... "I will not, you motherf*cker."... I picked up a vase and threw it. It smashed into a table and shattered. In seconds two men had pinned my arms behind me... "Take her away," the king Jap said.

"They took me to my new apartment. It was very nice. In the dressing room was a large box of rolled kokomo... I smoked an entire number and was flying... Hey, I said to myself, this is not so bad. At least I don't have to cater to Toshio's bizarre sexual desires... I went over to the casino and was having fun, higher than a kite, until I saw them... out in public in front of everybody else... I went wild - hollering, screaming, cursing - I even attacked her... Somebody hit me in the head... I was down on the casino floor with Toshio bending over me... 'If you ever do anything like that again,' he hissed, 'you'll be buried beside Marcello Danni.'"

Kimberly put her face in her hands and started to sob. "Oh, Ep," she said seconds later, "I feel so helpless. I have nowhere to turn. What can I do?"

Before Eponine could say anything, Kimberly was talking again. "I know, I know," she said. "I could go back to work at the hospital. They still need nurses, real ones - by the way, where is your Lincoln?"

Eponine smiled and pointed to the closet. "Good for you." Kimberly laughed. "Keep the robot in the dark. Bring him out to clean the bathroom, wash the dishes, cook the meals. Then, whoosh, back in the closet..." She chuckled. "Their dicks don't work, you know. I mean, they have one, or sort of, anatomically perfect after all, but they don't get hard. One night when I was stoned and alone I had one mount me but he didn't know what I meant when I said 'thrust.'... As bad as some men I've known."

Kimberly jumped up and paced around the room. "I'm not really sure why I came," she said, lighting another cigarette. "I thought maybe you and I... I mean, we were friends for a while..." Her voice trailed off. "I'm coming down now, starting to feel depressed. It's awful, terrible. I can't stand it. I don't know what I expected, but you have your own life... I'd better be going."

Kimberly crossed the room and gave Eponine a perfunctory hug. "Take care, now, okay?" Kimberly said. "Don't worry about me, I'll be all right."

It was only after the door closed and Kimberly left that Eponine realized she had not uttered one word while her ex-friend was in the room. Eponine was certain that she would never see Kimberly again.