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pawed at the tabletop, eager to be down on the floor with the cat, who was
openly flaunting his freedom. Shona stroked Saffie's back and made her sit
down. The dog complied, obedient but unhappy. Harry turned with tail high, and
stalked provocatively out again.
"Drat that cat, he's insufferable," Shona said.
She took a scraping of skin from the dog's mouth, and very swiftly drew a
blood sample from a paw pad.
"There, that didn't hurt, did it, sweetie?" She took two glass slides and
smeared them with fixative.
"That'll take a moment to set. I might as well start lunch."
None of her swiftly dwindling supplies looked particularly appetizing, Shona
thought, as she went through the storage cupboard. Wait, there was a can of
chicken flavoring. "What about a nice bowl of soup for lunch?" she asked
Chirwl.
"I say yes," Chirwl agreed. "I wish you would find out what is the cause of
the age plague so soon. It is difficult to visit the heart-tree when there is
cooking, because so much smells good, I am tempted."
"I know just what you mean," Shona said. She opened a can of nutri, poured
three servings into a flask with the flavoring, and put it on to heat.
"Maaa-ma!" Alex said, coming up to tug on Shona's pant leg.
"Ooh, I can smell you from here, right through that suit," Shona said, picking
up her son. "When are you going to be toilet trained, eh?" She carried him
into the bathroom and slipped into her own environment suit. After swabbing
the changing table with disinfectant, she undid Alex's fastenings and looked
down at him with dismay. "You've made a real mess of this one.
Congratulations. I've never seen so much&
effort in one diaper." Alex crowed at his mother's mock dismay.
"My friend Saffie is so much more energetic than is usual," Chirwl noted from
his perch on the countertop. Shona glanced out at them. The dog was lying down
with her head on her paws, but her
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Jody Lynn Nye - Medicine Show limbs and tail kept twitching. Chirwl was
watching the manic activity with concern. "She is not yet like the ones who
have become used up."
"Used up?" Shona looked up from buttoning Alex into a clean playsuit. "Used
up? What an interesting expression."
"Well, it is seems so to me," Chirwl said. "First all have said they have much
power of life, and then it is all gone after a time, leaving them husklike."
"Empty& and dry& Yes, I guess that's a good de-scription of the effect of the
bio-bomb." Shona set
Alex down in the sleeping room and closed the curtain. Absently, she turned on
the Babytime Play Unit, and handed him a few favorite toys. Alex took them and
went into a corner to play. "I only hope Saffie can throw it off. She's
showing high levels of certain hormones, glandular secretions like thyroid and
adrenal. Remove them, and& you know, all those things in combi-nation would
give the impression of premature aging, and what would logically have created
the sensation of being superhu-man, or super-
ottle, in the beginning."
"What makes glandular secretions?"
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"Well, glands," Shona said. She sat down at her computer and started to bring
up file after file. "So something in those glands is probably what's being
affected. But everything looks normal. I've taken cells of the adrenal gland,
and a few others, too, and there's nothing there."
"Nothing big small, perhaps," Chirwl said. "Is there such a thing as the cell
that makes up a cell? What makes glands?"
"Well, molecules, of course," Shona said. "But the genes on the chromosomes at
the nucleus of a cell are what program its activity. Like wheels within wheels
within wheels." She looked at Chirwl, whose whiskers were standing out the way
they did when he didn't understand her. She ought to have known better than to
use a technological metaphor. "Like a nut with one shell inside another, and
another inside that, until you get to the kernel, which is very small."
"Ah."
"Hello?" Doln Hampton stepped in, carrying a covered tray.
"What's this?" Shona said, looking up at the delicious smell coming from
underneath the cloth.
"Lunch," Doln said, whisking the cover away to reveal two glass-domed dishes.
Shona smiled at him.
Hampton had been a lot nicer since the day she stalked out of his cave. He
hadn't made another pass, but was trying to form a real friendship with her,
for which she was grateful. He frequently stopped by her lab in the evenings
to chat, or escorted her on her rounds. Alex liked him, and Saffie, especially
in her
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someone to frolic with.
"That is so kind of you, Doln, but you know we can't have any local food. Mmm,
that looks delightful."
Under each dome there was a filet of some kind of white meat covered with a
pale green sauce and flecks of light brown, surrounded by a veritable garden
of very handsome miniature vegetables. "Oh, those are adorable."
"
Mange tout"
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