"Ken Jenks - Vectors" - читать интересную книгу автора (Jenks Ken)

"Go ahead, Trent."

"I'll let Victoria explain it." He handed me the phone.

I summarized the situation. There was a moment of silence, then James replied, "What does Houston say?"

"I'm working with them on confirmation. In the meantime, I wanted to talk to Bear about what I've found."

There was another brief pause. "I'll get him to the phone. We'll call you back." He disconnected. A few minutes later, the phone chirped, and Trent motioned for me to answer it.

"Griffith."

"Victoria, my friend," said Bear, "how - where - when would I get this third-world cootie, this cholera disease?"

I winced. "I don't know, Bear. I'm not even sure you have it. But if you do, you're in grave danger."

"I know I feel terrible, but it's just space sickness, n'est pas?"

"I don't think so, Bear. Space adaptation syndrome doesn't usually include diarrhea. You have been having loose stools, haven't you?"

"Yes, but it's probably just nerves. I sometimes get this way when I'm under stress."

I frowned thoughtfully. "Well, let's run through everything you've done over the last week, and we'll see if we can figure out what happened."

"But, my dear, as you know well, I've been confined to quarantine with the rest of the astronauts for the last week! And before that, our delightful 'Health Stabilization Program.' What could have happened to me?"

"Cholera can be spread by seafood. Did anything unusual happen when you were cooking dinner before launch?"

"Non, I don't think . . . wait, I did prick my thumb on a crawdad claw."

I paused. "That's probably not it. Cholera is an enteric disease, which means that you can only get it by ingestion. If cholerae got into your bloodstream, your white blood cells would kill it. Boiling kills it, too. Were any of those mudpuppies undercooked?"

"I swear, Victoria, I made them Holy Crawdads."

I blinked. "Holy?"

"Ouэ, I boiled the Hell out of them!"

I grimaced at the phone, then continued seriously, "Bear, let's go over all of the details and see if we can find out what happened. In the meantime, Houston is working out our options. We'll also go over my lab procedures to make sure I didn't make a mistake."

"Victoria," said Bear, "I hope you won't take this the wrong way, but I fervently hope that your laboratory technique stinks."

"Thank you, Bear," I said with a thin smile, "I hope so too."
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Kathy stopped me in the hab module. "Can I talk to you for a minute?"

"Sure, Kathy. What's up?"

Kathy grimaced at the old space joke. "I've been having . . . diarrhea, so I got on a private medical conference with Houston. Dr. Rogers said you may have found cholera in the potty."