While Gloria had been talking, J.B. had noticed a sudden expression of surprise and then rapt concentration come over Mildred’s face when the queen had mentioned the fine mist that had been rained upon them; and he had also noticed Mildred glance at Doc, and the almost imperceptible nod that the old man had given in acknowledgment. Meanwhile, Gloria was finishing her story. “It seemed like we were there for hours, and then suddenly the sec door lifted and there was the outside world. We got the fuck out, away from the rain, as we were all soaked through and it was starting to finally have an effect. Oh, sweet goddess, it was good to see the outside world. There was no way they were going to let us back in, so we left to make camp and wait. Since then, we’ve done some trading, some hunting… but not the one thing we want to hunt—those Illuminated scum fuckers. Our people have heard stories of them coming out, too, but we haven’t caught any of them yet…yet,” she added venomously.
“So you know where they are?” Ryan asked.
Gloria looked at him as though the one-eyed man were a stupe child.
“Of course we know, stupidworks,” she said slowly, as though spelling it out. “Why d’you think we’re here? It’s because it’s near to their redoubt. And I’ll tell you as much as this, too—we’re going to get back in there and chill those fuckers once and for all. For us—for the Gate—it’s part of our destiny. We’ve come this far, and we’re near the ultimate goal. There’s no way they’re gonna stop us. But now it seems that’s there’s even more of a reason. If we don’t stop this disease, then there won’t be any land worth our inheriting when our destiny is fulfilled. No riches have meaning without people to use them.”
“Glad you feel that way,” Ryan commented.
“Speaking of that,” Mildred said carefully, “have you had any problems with the way you’re all feeling?”
Gloria eyed her suspiciously. “In what way d’you mean that?” she asked sharply.
Mildred kept her gaze level with that of the Gate queen. “The mat-trans jumps can have a bad effect on the body. It isn’t supposed to go through the stresses it does with each jump. Jak always suffers very badly, and most of your people have the same type of body build.”
Gloria considered this. “Some of the guys have got little blisters, and feel like they’ve got some kind of bug. You know, like a winter sickness or bad food. But that’s it, really. None of the women felt anything.”
Mildred forced a smile. “That’s good. We all need to be a hundred percent for this.”
“Too right, honey,” Gloria replied, “and you need to rest a little more after that landslide. We should take a few days—recon the redoubt with both us and yourselves. That way we can really work out a strategy.”
“That sounds good. We should get that together as soon as possible. But first we should rest,” Ryan said.
Gloria agreed, and the companions were shown to a part of the camp that had been prepared for them. Ryan was relieved when Jon and Tammy left them alone, as he needed to question Mildred urgently, and did not wish them to overhear.
But it was J.B. who spoke first, as Tammy and Jon moved out of earshot.
“What is it, Millie? I saw you and Doc look at each other,” he said in an undertone.
Mildred shook her head, plaits gently shaking around her. “I can’t be sure. It was when Gloria mentioned the Gate being trapped and then being soaked by such a gentle rain. It sounded to me like some use of a saturation technique—”
“No, back up a little,” Ryan interjected. “Run that one by me again.”
“It seems to me likely that the Illuminated Ones used the virus in a solution of water to soak it into the Gate, and try to spread it that way. There were too many of them to inject or infect individually, as they seemed to do with the baron’s daughter. This way they hit the whole tribe in one go.”