"Arinn Dembo - Between the Lines" - читать интересную книгу автора (Dembo Arinn)

Between the Lines
Arinn Dembo


Eventually, after many months of work, the investigators from Naval Intelligence were able to piece
together the story from the beginning.

I.

Galen Navarek, a boy from the colonies, is brought to Earth for the first time at the age of eight. A
luxurious vacation for his parents; nostalgic for their homeworld, they assume that the trip will also be a
treat for their son.

In fact, the visit to Earth is a miserable experience for a child raised in the domes. Natural gravity is a
crushing weight on his body. The thick, unfiltered atmosphere attacks him in several ways; he develops a
dozen minor infections and allergic reactions, none of which seem to respond to the standard treatment.
The climate and the crowds oppress him. He complains constantly of noise and headaches.

One morning the Navareks wake to find Galen sprawled unconscious on the bedroom floor. Panicked
by his rapid, shallow breathing and unresponsive pupils, they call paramedics. He is taken to the
childrenтАЩs hospital in Los Angeles, but the emergency room is flooded by a recent outbreak of Mombasa
Fever. Since his condition is judged stable at the time, the boy is placed in a recovery ward with nearly
two hundred other children and left until the following day.

In the next bed, a local girl is struggling to breathe. Thera Mendosa has been lucky, according to the
doctors; her fever has not entered the toxic phase. They predict a full recovery, with very little organ
damage and scarring-only the nerve damage is irrecoverable. As she lies on her side, panting beneath an
oxygen mask, she sees the orderlies put Galen down beside her, his mattress only inches from hers in the
crowded room. His thin white arms dangle, boneless, from the bed.

For hours he lies with his face turned toward her, his strange wide-open eyes never blinking. Sometime
during the night, the older girl reaches out toward him and takes his hand, entwining his fingers with her
own.

The next day, Galen is tested by staff from the division of clinical immunology. A senior resident quickly
recognizes his symptoms and places a call. Men in black uniforms come to take him away, packing his
inert body into a coffin-like case.

Later that day, a homeless boy dies of Mombasa Fever in the same hospital. His coloring and build are
roughly similar to that of Galen Navarek, and his features are a red ruin-sixty percent of his skin surface
has been ravaged by the angry burst blisters of the terminal fever. The grieving Navareks are guided to a
leaded window and shown the corpse lying on a slab. A sad-eyed, weary intern tells them that they
cannot have the body for burial at home; his remains are still considered contagious, and quarantine
procedures are strict. The boy will be cremated the following morning.

Sasha and Mariid Navarek return to their homestead with a sealed canister of ashes. Galen Navarek is
remanded to a training academy on Mars. Thera Mendosa is released from the hospital a few days later;
her father and brother roll her out of the hospital in a wheelchair, which will be her only means of
locomotion for nearly seven years.