Wild Cards 15 - Black Trump by George R. R. Martin

Author:George R. R. Martin
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Published: 2012-08-03T15:04:22+00:00

♥ ♦ ♣ ♠

Mark fanned the STM pictures on the black tabletop like a hand of cards. Dr. Carter Jarnavon leaned over his shoulder to peer at them. The smell of his hair cream was like fingers poking up Mark's nostrils.

Mark had a single straw to cling to, to keep his sense of self afloat. If only this jerk doesn't see it.

"We're making progress," he said, tasting bile at the back of his throat. "Cobbling together the BT virus without the transposon is reducing the DNA recombination rate, just the way the lab notes say."

Jarnavon bent close to peer at the images. Mark felt sweat bead along his hairline. "And how are the cultures doing? Is this really leading to more viable strains?"

Mark struggled. "Sometimes." He tapped a computer screen aglow with tables. "Some variants survive as long as seven generations. But it's, like, a crapshoot, man. They're more likely to die out after one or two, or even fail to reproduce; the average is two generations. Which isn't what you're looking for."

"No," Jarnavon said, shaking his head gravely. "Mr. Casaday wants no limits at all."

Mark sighed and swiveled his chair to face him. Inside he was just a big bag of wet matted blackness. Since Quasiman's visit to the lab Mark had replayed the ace's parting words over in his mind daily. Hell; hourly, more like it, awake or asleep.

And every iteration drove another nail of certainty through his skull: He's not coming back. He thinks he already has, thinks he's rescued Sprout, thinks he's brought the drugs so I can whistle up one of my friends and save the day. By the time Quasiman got his jingle-jangle time-sense squared away, all the world's wild cards were likely to be just another odd historical interlude, like communism, but even briefer.

"Like I've told him," Mark said, not forgetting to whine, "he can just shoot me now, then. It's like the nature of this thing to instable. An average generation span of six, seven, maybe ten at the way outside is the best we can shoot for."

His lips twisted. "That should give him what he wants, anyway. After seven generations, the only wild cards left will be the ones isolated from the rest of humanity. Out on mountaintops and stuff." Like Fortunato. Can he avenge us? Will he bother?

"Or quarantined, of course," Jarnavon said. "As you will be, Doctor."

Mark turned away.

Jarnavon shook his head. Pungent cream slimed down his brief rusty-brown hair, but a cowlick poked stubbornly up in back.

"Doctor, Doctor," he said, "you're a good man. You want to do the right thing. That's one of the things I've always admired about you."

"I guess we admire those who are what we aren't," Mark said.

It was as if a shutter slammed shut before the youthful face, like a Navy signal lamp. You bloody fool! Trav chimed from the back of Mark's skull. Don't bait him! He can expose your whole mad scheme! I told you no good would come of this....

The researcher recovered quickly, smiled.

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