of the ship to the stern, then grinned at Randy. “See? We didn’t put in enough tiles on the deck. That’s why there’s no room for the lifeboat.”
And then, as Randy began examining the model, an odd, choking noise came from Eric. Randy looked up, then frowned.
Something was wrong with Eric. His eyes were opened so wide, they seemed to bulge from his face. His mouth hung slack, and a strange gurgling noise bubbled from his throat.
“What’s wrong?”
But Eric made no answer. Instead, as Randy watched, his arms began to flail, and the color drained slowly from his face. In a moment, his flesh had taken on a bluish hue, and he had toppled over onto his side. His legs jerked spasmodically, and then he was still.
“Eric?” Randy’s voice suddenly grew into a scream of fear. “Eric!”
Leaving his friend lying on the floor, Randy ran from his room, his terror translating into a scream that echoed through the entire building.
Louise Bowen was sitting moodily in her tiny office, trying to decide what to do. She knew she shouldn’t have lingered outside Dr. Hamlin’s door, knew she shouldn’t have listened to his conversation with Paul Randolph. In fact, she hadn’t heard the entire conversation, but when Dr. Hamlin had suddenly raised his voice and begun shouting about the children, she couldn’t help but overhear him.
So now, after three years at the Academy, she knew that all her suspicions were true. To Hamlin, the children simply weren’t human. And in a way, Louise suspected he might be right. These children were different from other children. Yet they still had names, they still had personalities, they still thought, and felt, and reacted just like all the other children she had ever known.
And deep in her heart, Louise reacted to them as she always had to children. She cared about them, loved them. Every time one of them died, she felt as if she’d lost a baby of her own.
It was time, she reluctantly decided, for her to leave the Academy.
The decision made, Louise pulled a pad from her desk and began composing her letter of resignation. She wrote out the first draft quickly, and was about to begin rewriting it when Randy Corliss’s scream rang through the house. Reflexively, she dropped her pen and dashed out of her office into the foyer just as Randy Corliss, his face pale and his eyes wide with fear, charged down the stairs. He looked wildly around; then, seeing Louise, he hurled himself into her arms.
Louise dropped to her knees, holding the boy close. “What is it, Randy?” she asked. “What’s happened?”
“It—it’s Eric. He’s—I think he’s dead!” Randy’s words dissolved into a choking sob as his body heaved with emotion. And even while part of Louise’s mind accepted his words and began to make all the decisions concomitant to yet another death at the Academy, a voice sounded deep within her.
He’s human, it said. This little boy is human.
Slowly, she disentangled herself from Randy, and, holding him by the hand, began leading him back upstairs.
“Where is he?”
“In—in my room. He’s on the floor, and he’s all blue, and—” Randy broke off, his sobs overcoming him once again. Louise said nothing more until they were in Randy’s room and she had checked Eric Carter’s body for any signs of life. As she had expected, there were none. She pulled the spread from Randy’s bed, covered Eric’s body, then led Randy out of the room.
Keeping the terrified little boy with her, she moved to the desk at the head of the stairs, picked up the telephone, spoke into it for a moment, then started down to the first floor.
Randy hesitated at the top of the stairs. “Aren’t we going to do anything?”
“There’s nothing we can do, darling,” Louise said quietly. Taking Randy by the hand once more, she led him down the stairs and into her office. She closed the door, then took Randy to a sofa, sat down, and drew him into her lap. Randy, despite his size, made no move to resist His arms slipped around her neck, and he rested his head against her breast. For a long time, neither of them said anything, and when Randy finally broke the silence, his voice was shaking.
“What happened to Eric?”
Louise wondered how to answer the boy. She knew that she should make up a story. Eric has been sick for a very long time, she would say, and his death wasn’t unexpected; what happened to him certainly wasn’t