Psychicians Read online

  Maybe someday, somebody will read these words.

  Maybe they’ll even be useful.

  Arlee

  Tarc couldn’t stifle a shudder of horror. He looked down at the skeleton admiring the man or woman who’d invested a few moments at the bitter end of their own life, thinking of people like Tarc, someday in the future.

  He looked around, wondering once again whether the virus still resided in the facility. Whether he might have disturbed it. Whether it might only have faded out back then because everyone left alive had been able to develop immunity, an immunity no one alive today would have, never having been exposed.

  Or, whether the virus might’ve killed all but the very few who’d managed to hide in isolated locations, avoiding exposure to it. People who’d eventually come back out into the world and repopulated it. And now that Tarc had disturbed residual virus in this facility it’d spread again.

  Or, optimistically, whether the flu had killed everyone except those few who lacked some receptor for viral attachment, or some cellular mechanism involved in its replication.

  He sincerely hoped it was the third possibility. If so, it might be that no one alive today was susceptible to it.

  We’ve got enough problems of our own without my breaking loose remnants of the one that defeated the ancients in all their glory.

  Tarc carefully restacked the papers and left them on the desk, closing the door to keep them from being disturbed.

  Just in case someone was interested in studying them someday, sometime in the future.

  He went back to the room across the hall. When he’d come to the facility that day, he’d brought a box he’d commissioned from one of the carpenters. First, he took out the rags that were stuffed into the box. He carefully lifted the microscope off the bench and gingerly lowered it into the box, greatly relieved that it fit with little room to spare. The microscope seemed to be mostly made of metal and glass, but some parts were of the ancients’ ubiquitous plastic. He dreaded the possibility that it might come apart while riding back to the tavern on the back of a mule.

  When he’d described the thing to Eva—not knowing what it was—she’d insisted on coming out to look at it. How she’d suspected the device was actually one of the microscopes they occasionally read about in their books, he didn’t know. Nonetheless, after cleaning the dust off the lenses and looking through them, it’d become obvious that it truly magnified what was under it.

  And Eva really wanted it.

  So, Tarc really wanted to get it home without breaking it.

  He carefully packed the rags back in the box around the microscope, then tied the lid firmly back in place and started back out to the entrance. The collapsed buildings thoroughly blocked the facility’s original entrances so they still used the opening the toddler’d fallen through to get in an out.

  Though Eva hadn’t wanted to take anything out of the ancient facility, she’d first taken home some of the duplicate medical books in the library. Then she’d agreed to allow the removal of some stainless steel cabinets. After all, the stainless steel was valuable and didn’t do anything wooden cabinets wouldn’t do. Selling the stainless had gotten them out of debt for the purchase of their tavern.

  They’d also taken some of the ancient glass and ceramic items like dishes and drinking glasses. Selling them to the antiquity dealers had provided the Hyllises with some of the financial cushion Daum wanted.

  Now, though, Eva was putting her foot down. She wanted to preserve the facility as it was for the future. She had dreams of finding ways to light it and turning it into her dream medical school and hospital—with some parts set aside as some kind of museum.

  For that to happen though, she needed to use of some of the equipment to further their ability to practice medicine. Her theory was that if they became famous for curing people, more patients would come. She was convinced that if they became truly successful, healers would gather to learn what they knew.

  Then, at last, she’d have her school. And she could spread her knowledge to others, thus helping even more patients, even patients elsewhere.

  Therefore, the microscope. She hoped to learn to use it to recognize the bacteria causing infectious diseases. She’d need crystal violet and safranin dyes to perform the most basic stains of bacteria and so far had no idea how to find them or even if it were possible to make them with current tech. Assuming she solved that problem, Tarc wondered what she thought she’d do once she’d diagnosed an infection. Bread mold, he thought. But I’ll bet there’re a lot of steps between finding a mold that kills bacteria and turning it into penicillin.

  Steps that aren’t in any of our books…

  Chapter One

  Daussie trotted up the stairs from the cellar under their tavern. She stepped into the kitchen, “We’re out of sausage!” she said, loud enough that everyone would hear. Being out was a disaster to learn about shortly before the lunch crowd. Spicy sausage pizza was their customers’ favorite dish.

  She groused, “Somebody used the last of it yesterday without telling Tarc.” Then, trying to sound put upon, even though she thought a trip to the butcher would be a nice break, she said, “I’ll have to go get some.”

  She turned to leave, but Norman Soh, Vyrda’s young cousin who helped serve customers at lunch, was obstructing the doorway. He shook his head and said, “You shouldn’t be out on the streets by yourself. I’ll go with you.”

  Daussie took a breath to tell him she didn’t need a nursemaid, but then saw Kazy giving her a look. Kazy thought Daussie needed a social life. And, after all, she couldn’t tell Norman she could protect herself. Still feeling a little irritated, Daussie glanced at the handsome young man and decided she shouldn’t object. Still not willing to completely concede she needed him, she shrugged, said, “Fine with me,” and strode for the door.

  Though Daussie moved quickly, Norman still beat her to the door, pulling it open and ushering her through. She kept moving fast, so he had to run a few steps to catch up again. Beside her, he said, “My cousin Vyrda thinks you’re an amazing healer.”

  Daussie turned a smile on him, thinking, Well I guess he knows the way to my heart. She shrugged, “I’ve just been lucky with some of the patients she brought to us.”

  “She thinks it’s a lot more than luck,” Norman said, lifting an eyebrow and looking impressed. “Is it true you came from somewhere down to the south of us? Walterston, or something like that?”

  Daussie grimaced, “It was named that after its previous sheriff, Sheriff Walters. The new sheriff’s arrogant, so he’s probably named it after himself by now.” She pulled her lip, “Though, ‘Farleyston’ doesn’t have much of a ring to it.”

  “But still,” Norman asked, “you traveled with the caravan for quite a while, right? And you saw more towns and cities between your home and here?”

  Daussie nodded.

  Norman sighed, “I’ve never been anywhere. My dad wants me to take over his store, but I want to travel with a caravan for a while. I want to see what’s out there before I settle down.”

  Daussie hadn’t expected anyone to be envious of her travels. She spoke slowly, “Life on the road’s hard, but if you think you’d like it, you should go for it.”

  Norman frowned, “What’s hard about it?”

  Daussie’s eyes were on the street in front of her. “You’d be trying to buy cheap and sell dearly. Not so different from working in your dad’s store… Except you’d have to pack everything you own into a small space in a wagon, then unpack it and repack it every few days. You’d be walking all day while you traveled from place to place, all the while worrying about being attacked by bandits—”

  “It’d be worth it,” Norman interrupted enthusiastically. “I’d be seeing something besides Clancy Vail.”

  Deciding that she shouldn’t poke any more holes in his dreams, Daussie said, “That part is pretty interesting.”

  A man they were approaching on the street suddenly focused his eyes on Daussi
e, “Oooh, pretty lady!”

  Saying, “Shut up!” Norman immediately stepped forward so he blocked the man’s line of sight to Daussie.

  “Just enjoying the view,” the man said with a laugh. “Surely you’re not saying she’s ugly, are you, sonny?”

  Daussie touched Norman’s elbow, softly saying, “Just ignore them. Reacting only makes it worse.”

  He gave her a wide-eyed look, “Really? Stuff like that doesn’t make you sick?”

  She shrugged, “In his own fumbling way, I think he’s trying to give me a compliment. Unfortunately, he just doesn’t know how to do it without coming off rude.”

  Norman looked back at the man, “Well, I think someone should thrash him.”

  Quoting her mother’s words, Daussie said, “Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me.”

  Norman stared at her, “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “That I shouldn’t be upset about what he says, only about what he does.” She gave Norman a grin, “For instance, your actions in trying to protect me say you’re a nice person. Your words, saying ‘someone should thrash that poor man,’ makes me think you’re not as nice as I thought.”

  Norman was silent for a moment, then he laughed resignedly. “Well, I’ll be sure not to say anything to anyone else who offers an ugly compliment. But, if they seem like they’re about to… undertake some kind of ugly action, that’s when I’ll step in.”

  Daussie laughed, miming applause, “Well said.”

  ***

  Eva focused on reading about infectious diseases in the new books Tarc had found in the facility. The books she’d inherited hadn’t covered infections in much detail, so she was using her new materials to try to remedy that deficit in her understanding. After all, bacterial infections were a huge problem. A problem the Hyllis’s talents couldn’t solve. Well, they could drain abscesses and milk the fluid out of pneumonia, but little else.

  Now that she had a microscope she was trying to find more information about a dye called crystal violet. Crystal violet was extremely important in the staining of bacteria, helping differentiate the major classes. Well, first she needed it just to be able to see them with the new microscope. Then it’d be helpful in differentiating major types.

  And, not only was it an important stain, it had antibacterial and antifungal properties useful for topical treatment of skin infections.

  It even killed worms!

  Excitingly, as a dye, crystal violet had also been used to color textiles and in blue inks. That meant Eva could hope someone still made it since people still wore blue clothing and wrote with blue ink. I’ve got to go shopping tomorrow, she thought. But how am I going to know if any of the blue dyes I find are actually crystal violet?

  One of the new books had a diagram of its molecular structure. A structure which had a number of hexagons she thought were “benzene rings.” But the chances that anyone would know the chemical structure of present-day blue or violet dyes seemed vanishingly small. Still, she’d copied down the formula.

  At the very least, she planned to buy samples of every violet dye she could find and try staining bacteria with them.

  There was a knock on the doorframe. Kazy stood there with a frightened-looking man.

  The large red area on his forearm suggested the problem even before he blubbered, “I’ve got a boil. It’s been lanced again and again. But it keeps coming back! I’ve been hoping…” He paused to stare at Eva desolately, “I’ve heard you can work miracles.”

  Eva said, “I can’t promise miracles, but we’ll do what we can. Lie down up here,” she said, patting the gurney, “and we’ll look at your arm.”

  He gingerly climbed up onto the gurney, continuing to hold the arm protectively against his side.

  When he didn’t extend it, Eva patiently said, “You’ve got to lay it out here so we can see.”

  Trembling, he slowly straightened his elbow, though not all the way. Extending it appeared to hurt. “Please, don’t touch it until you lance it. It really hurts.”

  “We’re just going to look,” Eva said as she and Kazy leaned down over his arm to give their ghirits better definition. As expected, the redness was associated with heat. He had a large collection of pus around what Eva thought was a remaining fragment of wood. It extended up just beneath the skin—skin that was densely scarred and thickened from being repeatedly lanced.

  Kazy leaned very close to whisper her findings. “He’s got an abscess around a splinter. That’s why it keeps coming back. Do you want me to send for Tarc so he can pull out the splinter after you lance the abscess?”

  Eva thought for a moment, shaking her head. “Tarc’s too far away,” she whispered back. “The splinter seems to be floating in the pus. It might float out by itself when we drain the abscess. If it doesn’t, Daussie can port it out before she flushes the wound with saline. Can you get her while I explain things to him?”

  Kazy nodded and left the room.

  When Kazy and Daussie arrived Eva’d just finished explaining how Kazy was going to talk to him until he’d relaxed and gotten sleepy. The man looked doubtful, though not as anxious as he had been.

  Daussie had a pan in her hand. Eva went around the corner into the alcove and returned with one of their lances. When she got there and looked at the arm again, she thought the boil didn’t look as tensely swollen. Her ghirit sensed the pressure was lower too. She looked at the patient. Seeing he was almost under, she turned to Daussie, “You ported some of the pus out of the abscess,” she said, almost accusingly.

  Daussie shrugged, “Yeah, it’s disgusting when there’s so much pressure it squirts everywhere.”

  “But I was hoping when it squirted it’d carry the splinter out with it.”

  She shrugged, “If it doesn’t, I’ll port it out. No disgusting squirts required.”

  Eva snorted a laugh. She handed a rag soaked in moonshine to Daussie and said, “Clean the skin while I unwrap the lance.”

  “Wait,” Daussie said, sounding surprised. “If you’re going to use a lance, you should have Kazy do it. That way, someday if she has to do it when you’re not around, she’ll know how.”

  Eva felt a little disappointed because she’d always enjoyed doing procedures herself. But, you keep telling everyone you want to be a teacher, she thought. “You’re right. Kazy, this’s a perfect procedure for you because it’ll only take you away from anesthetizing him for a second.”

  “But Mom,” Daussie said, sounding exasperated, “I’m here. Why would we use a lance?”

  Eva closed her eyes and sighed with frustration, “Yeah, I guess if you can cut stone and steel, you can cut tissue without a lance, can’t you? Seems like I wouldn’t have to be reminded of things like that by now.”

  Daussie nodded. She moved her pan so it was under the man’s arm and leaned down. A wound suddenly appeared in the scarred area over the abscess. A little spurt of pus came out, though not the fountain that would have squirted out if it’d still been under a lot of pressure.

  They all sent in their ghirits. The splinter had moved a little way, but then the tissue’d collapsed down around it. A moment later the fragment of wood vanished from the wound and reappeared in Daussie’s pan. Daussie reached for the jar of saline and set it near the arm.

  She ported several pulses of saline into the wound to wash it thoroughly but their ghirits showed a layer of slime on the surfaces inside the wound. There was some unhealthy or dead tissue in a couple of areas.

  Eva walked over and got one of the little sterile bundles that had a clamp and some gauze in it. She laid it next to the man’s arm, then walked around to Kazy. “Feel up to reaching in and swabbing out the wound?”

  “What if I struggle to get the clamp in and he wakes up while I’m doing it?”

  Eva shrugged, “Then you’ll put him back to sleep and I’ll do it. You’ll make him forget waking up the same way you’ve helped people forget things that give them nightmares.”


  “Okay,” Kazy said nervously. She stepped around to the man’s arm and started unwrapping the bundle.

  Eva leaned down to stroke the man’s head in an effort to help keep him relaxed but then spoke to Kazy, “Remember not to touch the part of the clamp you’re going to put in his arm. You don’t want any new bacteria carried into the wound on the forceps or the gauze.” She focused back on murmuring to the man, quietly urging him to stay asleep.

  Kazy carefully grasped a small piece of gauze in the tips of the clamp, then slid it into the wound twisting and swabbing to scrub out the slime and any dead tissue. Eva was tempted to send her ghirit down and make sure Kazy was doing it right, but Kazy seemed to be moving slowly and carefully. Instead, Eva made herself focus on talking to the patient.

  Eva was just beginning to think Kazy was taking too long when Kazy pulled it out and picked up another piece of gauze. Suddenly she looked toward the head of the table, evidently thinking she’d been away from their patient long enough that he’d be waking up. Dropping the clamp in Daussie’s pan, she started that way. She slowed and stopped, staring, “He’s still asleep?!”

  Eva looked down at him. His eyes remained closed. His face looked peaceful. He should be awake! she thought urgently…

  His eyes snapped open.

  He blinked a couple of times, then all the fear was back in his eyes, he lifted his head, “Are you about to do it?!”

  Eva smoothed his hair with her hand and said, “Relax. It’s already done.”

  His face softened and, with great relief, he sighed, “Thanks.”

  Astonished, Eva looked up at Kazy and Daussie. Kazy grinned and pointed at her, “You’re a telepath too!” she whispered as if she were accusing her.