Marcie's Day
Only the bulkhead now between Marcie
and what remained of the rest of the crew, which had expanded to fill
three quarters of the ship, and it oozing under doors, through vents,
and through the tiniest holes.
Seventeen people she'd worked with for
months, amalgamated as a malignant mass, a composite entity retaining
no visible trace of humanity, its exterior a palimpsest of colors
that shifted and transformed ceaselessly: vermilion, gold, a myriad
shades of green and blue.
Why had Lon drunk the liquid they'd
found in the stoppered flask? Yes, the characters they'd decoded had
referred to a miracle cure, yes, he was facing a painful death from
the infection he'd picked up on the abandoned station and yes,
Federation medicine could do nothing for him, so perhaps he'd thought
he had nothing to lose. Well.
The bulkhead creaked, forcing her back
to the present, as a voice vibrated through the decking, calling her
name.
*
She wrung her hands, stared wildly
around the hold. Spacesuits: no; escape pod: ditto. She had nothing
to work with, nothing, nada, zilch, etc. Suddenly her eye was drawn
to the probability generator. How could she have forgotten?
Dangerous, yes, but she'd nothing to lose either. She raced to the
machine, removed the lock they had bolted down over the control
panel. The bulkhead screamed and polychromatic gel flowed out around
it and dripped in globs onto the floor. The scent of lemons mingled
with chocolate (or was it burnt roast?). She grabbed the probability
dial and gave it a strong twist. Wheels spun and clacked, lights
flashed, and peripheral vision overwhelmed her sight. It was more
distracting than being blind. She couldn't actually see anything,
but she couldn't ignore anything either.
A moment later she could see again.
She could see, but for some reason, she could not take a step. She
looked down, then, at the glistening multicolored sausage that had
been her legs; at the squirming polyps that were ballooning from her
flesh like chewing gum bubbles, separating, and drifting away,
tendrils waving au revoir, on the stiffening breeze; and at the roots
that her fused limbs were sending out through the quivering ground at
ever-increasing speed. She shook her head, smiled, and extended her
arms, which burst into bud. She stood at the center of a rapidly
Marcifying plain. It was going to be a good day.
Publ. Daily Cabal 2007
