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"Sheila!" he yelled. "SHEILA!!" She didn't respond.
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Goddamn it, he thought. Goddamn it! If I want to go out and save somebody,
here's somebody right here in front of me. Dodd walked over to her, standing
in front of the TV and looking down at her. What a mess, he thought. You're a
zombie. Dodd reached down and shook her violently, and her head lolled to one
side and her eyes closed. She had passed out.
Dodd took a step back, staring at her. Then he turned and went down the hall
to the bathroom and started filling the large round tub with water using the
temperature Sheila had preset for herself long ago. He put his hand into it,
swirling it around; she liked it cooler than he did. Dodd contemplated the tub
as it filled, then went into his bedroom, removed his clothes, and turned and
walked naked out to the front room and turned the television off.
Getting Sheila's clothes off was a little difficult. It was a good thing she
didn't wear too much clothing. He carried her limp, nude body into the
bathroom and carefully stepped into the tub, and then lowered her into the
water. She stirred. He stroked her wet skin with a soapy wash cloth, washing
off her long legs and her pelvis and her stomach. She was semi-conscious when
he reached her breasts, and made a low M sound, "mmmmmmmm . . ."
"Feels nice?" Dodd said.
"Mmmmmm-hmmmmmm."
"Sheila?"
"Hmmmmmm?"
"We have to have a serious discussion."
"Mmmm."
"You've been going days at a time without food."
"Mm."
"Aren't you hungry?"
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"I'm hungry," she said vaguely. Her eyes flickered open, and she took a deep
breath. "How did we get in here?" Her eyes closed again. "I don't remember . .
. getting in . . ."
Dodd was rubbing his index fingers over her nipples. "Do you remember the last
time you ate?"
"It was a few hours ago," she mumbled.
"It was a day and a half ago."
"No."
"Yes."
She didn't say anything. She was enjoying him rubbing her nipples. Dodd
abruptly stopped. "Let's wash your hair," he said.
Later, when they were drying each other off, Dodd said, "I'm worried about
you."
She blinked, glancing at him. It had registered in her mind, but she was still
half-asleep. Her movements were clumsy, her voice vague. He continued drying
her as she slowly dragged a brush through her hair. Her body was suffering; it
was getting thin and sallow, and she'd developed a rash on her behind and
between her legs. Dodd applied some MultiSpec creme on it, hoping that would
do.
"Do you know why I'm worried about you?" he asked.
". . . no."
"Do you remember anything about Jesus returning?"
She stopped brushing in mid-stroke. "Yes."
"Do you?"
She looked at him uncertainly in the mirror. "It's in about a week, isn't it?"
"Try four days ago."
Her head jerked. She woke up! he thought.
"Four days ago?"
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"Yes, four days ago. Do you understand why I'm worried?"
"Jesus didn't come four days ago. You're lying."
"I'm not lying. Go pull up a calendar. This is the nineteenth."
"No."
"I'm not lying, Sheila. You've been watching Travels all this time."
"No, that's . . . weeks."
"It has been weeks. Do you understand why I'm worried, yet?"
"I don't believe you."
"Well then, Sheila, go look for yourself. This is the
Thursday after the Second Coming. You've been going days without food, you've
been pissing and shitting in your pants . . . Sheila, you've got a problem.
You're going to have to face it."
"I feel sick."
"You're starving."
"I am hungry-feeling. I don't have any energy."
"You're starving, Sheila. Starving." He took the brush from her hand and
finished brushing her hair for her, then took her robe off the back of the
bathroom door and put it over her. "Let's go fix you something to eat, and
we'll talk about it." He put on his own robe and lead her out the door.
On their way to the kitchen Sheila paused, looking into the living room at the
blank TV screen. "No Travels right now, Sheila, you have to eat." She
wordlessly followed Dodd into the kitchen and sat at the kitchen table. He
started the autochef going, then called the apartment manager's computer and
ordered a robot maid to come down to dry-clean the couch and gather laundry.
Within a few minutes Dodd had a simple, wholesome soup made and he served two
bowls of it. He put one down in front of Sheila with a spoon
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file:///G|/Program%20Files/eMule/Incoming/Jerry%20Davis%20-%20The%20Code%20of%
20the%20Beast.txt and then sat across from her with his own as she began
hungrily slurping it down. She finished before he'd eaten a forth of his, and
got up and served herself some more.
The robot arrived and began cleaning. "What is the date, today?" he asked the
robot.
"Today is Thursday, June nineteen, twenty-forty-two," it replied without
pausing in its duties.
"Do you think I programmed the robot to say that?" he asked
Sheila.
"No."
"Then you believe me."
She swallowed a spoonful of soup, and took another. "Yes,"
she said finally, "I believe you."
"Do you agree that there is a problem?"
She was silent, staring at a spot on the table in front of her.
"Look, Sheila, I don't want to do this, but I'm worried. I
think there is a very big problem, here. I've tried alerting you to it before
but you've either been ignoring it or you've been unable to understand it.
I've decided I'm going to have to be tough with you. You're going to either
have to face this or you're going to have to get out of my life."
Sheila was still silent, but fear shone in her eyes. This gave Dodd some hope.
"Do you understand what I'm telling you?" he said.
She nodded slowly. Her eyes were starting to tear up. "You think that, that,
Travels . . . you think that Travels is doing something to me?"
"Yes, Sheila. I do. It effects me, too, if I sit down and watch it. Don't get
me wrong, this isn't against you, this is against Travels. I'm going to fight
Travels because I don't like what it's doing to you. Understand? And I want
you to fight
Travels too, because if you don't, it won't matter shit what I
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do."
She was silent.
"I'm thinking about buying time on the Politico Network, on the Free Speech
Forum, and telling the world about you --- what
Travels is doing to you. It can't be just you, there may be others. I'm going
to fight it."
She remained silent. The fear still shone in her eyes.
"I have the day off tomorrow," he told her. "I'm going to stay home, and for
once and for all I'm having Travels disconnected from this apartment."
"You don't have to do that," she said. "I won't watch it."
"I won't watch it either, so I'm not going to pay for it."
"It, it doesn't hurt you if you, if you just watch it for a little while."
"There's no such thing as watching it for just a little while."
"I can set the timer on the TV to go off in an hour----"
"No Travels on this television," he said firmly. "Get that through your head.
No more Travels. If you want to watch Travels, you move out and you never come
back."
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