Prey by Michael Crichton

Author:Michael Crichton [Crichton, Michael]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi, azw3, pdf
ISBN: 9780061750236
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2002-06-03T14:00:00+00:00

Everybody filed out. I was the last to leave. To my astonishment, Ricky pulled me aside, blocked the door with his body. “I’m sorry, Jack, I didn’t want to embarrass you in front of the others. But I just can’t let you do this.”

“Would you rather have somebody else do it?” I said.

He frowned. “What do you mean?”

“You better face facts, Ricky. This is already a disaster. And if we can’t get it under control right away, then we have to call for help.”

“Help? What do you mean?”

“I mean, call the Pentagon. Call the Army. We have to call somebody to get these swarms under control.”

“Jesus, Jack. We can’t do that.”

“We have no choice.”

“But it would destroy the company. We’d never get funding again.”

“That wouldn’t bother me one bit,” I said. I was feeling angry about what had happened in the desert. A chain of bad decisions, errors and fuckups extending over weeks and months. It seemed as if everyone at Xymos was doing short-term solutions, patch-and-fix, quick and dirty. No one was paying attention to the long-term consequences.

“Look,” I said, “you’ve got a runaway swarm that’s apparently lethal. You can’t screw around with this anymore.”

“But, Julia—”

“Julia isn’t here.”

“But she said—”

“I don’t care what she said, Ricky.”

“But the company—”

“Fuck the company, Ricky.” I grabbed him by the shoulders, shook him once hard. “Don’t you get it? You won’t go outside. You’re afraid of this thing, Ricky. We have to kill it. And if we can’t kill it soon, we have to call for help.”

“No.”

“Yes, Ricky.”

“We’ll see about that,” he snarled. His body tensed, his eyes flared. He grabbed my shirt collar. I just stood there, staring at him. I didn’t move. Ricky glared at me for a moment, and then released his grip. He patted me on the shoulder and smoothed out my collar. “Ah hell, Jack,” he said. “What am I doing?” And he gave me his self-deprecating surfer grin. “I’m sorry. I think the pressure must be getting to me. You’re right. You’re absolutely right. Fuck the company. We have to do this. We have to destroy those things right away.”

“Yes,” I said, still staring at him. “We do.”

He paused. He took his hand away from my collar. “You think I’m acting weird, don’t you? Mary thinks I’m acting weird, too. She said so, the other day. Am I acting weird?”

“Well …”

“You can tell me.”

“Maybe on edge … You getting any sleep?”

“Not much. Couple of hours.”

“Maybe you should take a pill.”

“I did. Doesn’t seem to help. It’s the damn pressure. I’ve been here a week now. This place gets to you.”

“I imagine it must.”

“Yeah. Well, anyway.” He turned away, as if suddenly embarrassed. “Look, I’ll be on the radio,” he said. “I’ll be with you every step of the way. I’m very grateful to you, Jack. You’ve brought sanity and order here. Just … just be careful out there, okay?”

“I will.”

Ricky stepped aside.

I went out the door past him.

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