The Donor
Chapter fifteen
The first two times that Terry tried to dial
Jack's number his fingers tripped on the buttons and he tapped in gibberish.
He dropped his hands briefly, closed his eyes and let his hand dive to the job
without thinking about it, and that time he got i right.
Jack didn't sound displeased to hear from him.
"What's up?" he asked lightly.
"Nothing much," he said, just as lightly.
"Just called to share a joke from work."
It was a stupid joke. But it was long, because
after the first memo about incentive bananas went through the place, there were
addenda from all over, elaborating on banana demands and monkey business and
being made a monkey of.
Jack approved. "A sense of humor might even
lead to a sense of outrage, who knows," he said. "Beats acting like
zombies."
"No need to be so harsh," Terry teased.
"I've checked out everyone there, at least the guys, and so far as I can
see, they can' be zombies: they don't have any body parts falling off. Though
come to think of it, Marcia dos seem interested in eating my brains . . ."
This was so hard. He had to hit the right tone,
and why did he feel like he was lying about something?
Jack sounded careful too.
Terry found a movie for both of them. Bunuel,
old enough to interest Terry, and eccentric enough to interest Jack. But the
expedition did not serve the purpose. Jack kept frowning at his coffee cup afterwards,
almost starting to say something and then stopping.
"If you have something unpleasant to say
to me, maybe you should just say it," Terry finally whispered. "Then
it will be said."
"No. I don't have anything to say. Nothing
new, I mean. But I'm afraid I'm being unfair."
"What?" How many conversations were
they having at once? "I thought it was pretentious too. I was just giving
it slack because Bunuel didn't have Bunuel for a precedent."
"No, I mean us. I mean I'm dragging you
around with me like this and I probably won't keep it up. I mean this
is fun. I like you a lot. But well, you know what I mean. I've said it
before."
"And I really don't care," Terry said.
"You don't have to be fair. I cherish your ambivalence, I really do. And,
you know, if -- when you decide you've had enough, just be polite on
the way out and you'll have been fair enough." He squeezed back something
sentimental that wanted to be said, and said instead, "You didn't promise
me anything, you don't owe me anything, I didn't ask for anything. But as long
as you want to hang out I want to too."
Jack shook his head. "You settle for so
little."
"I'd settle for a lot just as easy, you
know that."
September had brought with it a virulent flu,
a harbinger of a dreadful season. It decimated the cubicles, taking out the
workers one by one. Except for Terry. Others were out for a week or even two
at a time, returning ash-faced and mumbling, blinking their glassy eyes against
the ceiling lights. Terry earned their resentment for his unbroken good health,
even as he ran around the floor putting out fires in their projects in their
absence and picked up overtime hours when they could not last the whole day
in their convalescence.
Marcia grumbled about Terry's own work taking
more time.
The disease was not limited to adults. Dylan
brought home his own nasty case of the flu. Terry could hear him through the
walls, whining about his headache in the afternoons. The next day Terry brought
him two sets of finely-molded plastic predators, one contemporary and the other
extinct.
Mary had dark circles under her eyes when she
opened the door. "He's actually doing kind of okay right now," she
said. "But his fever goes so high at night I have to run him baths at midnight,
and everything hurts."
Dylan was propped up in his bed. For once the
room was dimmed instead of being flooded with light. Eurick was sitting on the
bed, reading to Dylan from a book called The Time Garden. He looked as luminously
weary as Mary. Terry's wrist throbbed twice at the still-tender little scar.
Later, Terry asked Eurick, "Do you have
the flu too?"
"No," Eurick said. "I don't get
the flu."
"Then what's wrong?" Terry asked, sensing
the answer in Eurick's hungry eyes But it shouldn't be like this so soon, and
Terry shouldn't like the idea so much.
"I'm doing a little experiment," Eurick
said, and then gave Terry a look which prevented more questions.
The chain around Terry's neck felt heavier than
it had in a long time.
Mary dragged herself through Dylan's illness,
and barely got him out the door on his way back to school when she collapsed
herself. She pulled herself out of bed and crept around the house, weakly batting
at her work and getting none of it done. The time for her turn came and went,
and Eurick had obviously not been fed though Halloween was right around the
corner.
Eurick was almost as disturbing to be around
as he had been last winter. His hunger was like a magnetic field, attracting
and repelling, and Terry felt like a lump of lodestone, stroked day by day into
alignment with it. till he was pointing right at him.
Jack liked to take Terry home to his own place,
and Terry was glad of it,m because he thought that the distance lessened the
effect on him. As it was, his hands shook when he took off his talismans and
when he put them on. And Jack noticed Terry was different.
"Are you all right?" Jack suddenly
interjected into a conversation which had been about snow, and winter camping
in the Sierras.
"I'm fine, why?"
"You seem tense. Upset about something?"
"Maybe I'm getting Dylan's flu. I feel fine
though."
Jack studied him. "You should get more rest.
Your eyes are funny. Are you sure you feel okay?"
"I could do with people asking me that less.
Other than that I feel fine."
"Here, lean your head back. Close your eyes."
Terry complied, but Jack's hand on his forehead
did not help him find his way back to the conversation about the Sierras.
The next day Terry approached Mary huddled in
a torn blanket staring unblinking at the pages of a novel.
"Can't make any progress with my work,"
she said. "Should really try to read either with this headache but I'm
tired of staring into space."
"Where's Dylan?"
"Down at Juan's. Spending the night, thank
god."
Terry hesitated. "I need to ask. What are
you planning to do about Eurick?"
She pulled the blanket closer around her. "I
was planning to get well very fast but that's a little obsolete now."
"I could take your turn for you."
"I wouldn't ask you to do that."
"I'm not asking you to ask me. I'm fine,
and you're both wrecks. He looks terrible."
Mary hesitated. "I'd be grateful,"
she said with careful dignity. "But only if you promise to take care of
yourself."
"It will be better all around," Terry
urged. "It's insane to have him so hungry."
"I know what you mean. It shouldn't be so
bad. He's waited longer before."
"He says he doesn't get the flu."
Mary shook her head. "Go work out the details
with him. And thanks."
"Whay are you here?" Eurick asked,
harshly. He lay flopped back in his chair, the screen before him bright and
empty. His eyes were the same as the screen: bright and empty. His skin was
flaccid and discolored, and his brooding manner was almost malignant.
Terry. startled, struggled to begin. "I
just -- I came to talk about, to make arrangements with you -- maybe later."
Eurick's head snapped up. "What do you mean?"
"I talked it over with Mary. She needs to
let this one go, she's sick, I'm fine." Now, he thought, he could do it
now, he could tear off the necklace right now. There was no reason not to.
"I'd plan on waiting until she was well.
Or when it was closer to the time you'd normally take your turn." It cost
Eurick to say that. It cost him to put Terry off, and it cost him to openly
acknowledge what he was accepting.
"You're really a wreck, Eurick, you're hard
to be around." Terry bit his lip. "You're so hungry all I can think
about is how hungry you are."
"That's my probelm," Eurick said.
"No. It's our problem. Please. Tomorrow
night would be good. Jack will be busy."
Eurick wiped his long fngers across his full
lips. "All right," he said, in bare acquiescence, but "Tomorrow
night," sounded much more eager.
"After soccer practice."
Terry started to leave.
"Thank you, Terry."
Terry nodded. Outside the door he took a deep
breath. He kept telling Eurick and Mary there was nothing to fear. Now he repeated
it to himself. It would be all right. Eurick wouldn't hurt him. Eurick couldn't
hurt him.
He was careful. If Jack's plans should change
-- if he shoudl decided to drop by on his way home -- Terry locked the door.
He was careful too about setting the alarm clock. He had to work the next day.
He put a shoebox next to the coffee table so he could sweep all the evidence
into it and hide it with a minimum of effort.
He hugged himself closely as he watched the pressure
cooker gauge rock. When he turned off the flame he went to unseal the livingroom
in the minimal way he had worked out with Mary. It should be getting easier,
he thought, not harder, as he gazed at the scalpel he fished out of the pressure
cooker. He didn't want to do this, to cut himself. He did want to give Eurick
blood. He wished it was tomorrow. He wished it was just later, when Eurick would
be partaking and he would be calmer.
"Okay," he said softly. Then, louder,
"I'm ready for you. Eurick, please hurry."
Terry felt his mind slowing, but he wasn't calmer.
His pulse was thumping everywhere. Eurick took the scalpel from hius hand. Terry
opened his mouth, but Eurick scowled. "Wait."
"What?"
Eurick turned Terry's arm over and for a second
Terry breathed relief, thinking Eurick was going to make the puncture for him,
make it all easier. But instead Eurick traced the blue paths of the blood vessels
with his fingers, just looking at them.
"Remember what you said, Terry? You said
I'm stronger than the thing. I can wait as long as I decide to. I can stop when
I've had enough. Right?"
"Yes."
"So if I decide to I can leave tonight without
taking any."
"You shouldn't."
"I would prove what you said, though."
"You don't know what it feels like to be
around you when you're like this." It seemed to take a long time to say
anything. "Please."
Eurick laughed bitterly.
"Why are you so hungry already?"
"I'm trying to adjust to a different schedule.
I almost made it."
"What?"
"You and Mary make the choice. Everytime.
It's your generosity. The rabbits don't have any choice. And they die. Either
I kill them, or Mary does. They're help[less. They're victims." He paused.
"I'd like to do without victims."
"You haven't had any since --" He was
taking too long to say things. Eurick finished for him.
"Since a couple weeks aster your last time.
I wasn't counting on the flu. I thought four weeks was not so long for someone
like me. In the stories they lie around for years sometimes."
"But they don't live. Like you do."
"Right. And also I realized they take more
each time."
Terry shook his head. Not more. He put his hand
out for the scalpel.
"I'm going to take a little more. Only a
little more than last time. It will be okay. But if it feels like too mich,
tap me and I'll stop." Eurick murmured gently, encouragingly, but Terry
knew that it Eurick did take too much there would be no way Terry could do anything
about it. He had to trust to Eurick's sensibility.
Terry tied off and pumped up the blood, holding
the scalpel lightly as if it were a living thing. He had to work to get his
veins to rise from the flesh.
"No more rabbits" he asked as he prepared
to make the cut.
"I wish. It's not so easy. I have to wean
myself. I feel bad about it."
Terry looked up, saying, "I bet the rabbits
aren't as much fun, either." Eurick grimaced. "I bet they don't taste
so good." He plunged the scalpel in.
"Don't talk about it like that."
Terry pulled the scalpel out slowly as his nerves
screamed at him. Drops of blood collected around the edge of the wound. "It's
the silver lining," he said, offering his arm, letting the scalpel fall
into the box at his feet. Eurick glared at him and accepted his arm. Terry snagged
off the tubing and dropped it in too.
"It is good," he whispered as Eurick
began to take the blood. "It is," in spite of the ache that grew as
Eurick pulled fiercely at the wound.
Eurick really was hungry. He sucked at the blood
with real force. A wash of fear rolld over Terry right under the wave of satisfaction.
But it didn't seem to be so much. Terry was able
to tape the wound and to ask Euirick to take the box away and unlock the front
door before he left.
The alarm was going off, far away. Terry was
still on the couch in yesterday's clothes. It was hard to stand, to stumble
across the house and to fumble for the button on the clock. He had plenty of
time to clean up and get to work if he was efficient. But how could he be efficient?
Everything took too long. His head was achey
and dull, and he felt dessicated and weak. He gulped a quart of water and took
stock of the devastation in the mirror. The worst thing was the way his eyes
were dilating as if he were on some drug. A pity a person couldn't wear shades
to work all day. He stared into the light, meaning to shrink his pupils, and
planned to stay out of everyone's way.
He made it down the hill to the bus stop, feeling
his old familiar sense of well-being in spite of fatigue, and the thirst, and
a scary shortness of breath. Clearly, he thought, Eurick hadn't really taken
too much, otherwise he wouldn't be here walking on the bright street, crunching
the loud leaves under his feet. It wasn't that hard for the body to make blood,
anyway. He'd drink a lot of water and bounce right back.
But it was a difficult day. Standing up was difficult.
He nearly fainted a couple of times. He felt as if he'd never get enought to
eat or drink. He caught himself staring stupidly at his hands hovering over
the keyboard. Never again on a weeknight, he told himself.
Near the end of the day Marcia has to ask him
about some work he had submitted for another person the day before. By the look
on her face Terry knew he wasn't putting up such a good front. He made sure
to rub his eyes and to remark on the flu that had run through the place the
month before. "I almost never get sick," he said. "I hope this
ins not my turn."
"I hope so too," Marcia said. "I
have three people waiting on your product."
"So far I'm ahead of schedule. I'm pretty
confident that I wouldn't cause any big delays even if I did get sick."
He lost the time after he signed out, floating
down the stair to the lobby. He barely recognized Jack's car on the sidewalk.
He hadn't been expecting it. He didn't want Jack to see him subpar, but it was
a relief not to have to look forward to standing up on the streetcar. He fell
into the seat, cracked a grin, and hoped he wouldn't black out or call attention
to himself.
"What's wrong with you?" Jack asked.
"You sure say that a lot," Terry said.
"I have a headache. I have aspirin at home."
Jack took him home in silence. As they walked
in Jack kept scanning the house for signs. Terry was confident he wouldn't find
anything. Even the wound was in a new place, well covered up by his long sleeves.
Terry moved painfully into the bathroom, downed a handful of pills with three
glass of water.
In the livingroom Jack was at the phone, gazing
at the copy of Dr. Loria's letter. Terry leaned dizzily against the door jamb.
"I'm all right," he said. "You don't have to do that."
Jack didn't answer him. He spoke into the phone.
"Yes, I'm a friend of Terry Revier. He's a patient of Dr. Loria's. I wonder
if he can be seen tonight? Or tomorrow? No, I don;t think he can come to the
phone himself. He's not in good shape."
"I can too," Terry said, though he
could hear himself that his voice was very weak. "There's no emergency."
"Thank you, yes. My name is Jack Kagan.
Yes, a friend of Terry Revier. You saw him in August. Yes, that one, It seems
to me to be just like that, only worse. I'm scared for him."
"Be fine in the morning," Terry said
softly, picturung himself crossing the room, taking the phone from Jack and
hanging it up before the conversation could continue. But it was more work than
he could do to move away from the wall.
"Yes, that would be even better," Jack
said, and gave Terry's address.
Jack hung up and turned to Terry. "He's
going to drop by after his last appointment leaves."
"They don't do that. He doesn't have to."
Terry hauled himself away from the wall and made for the phone. "I'll call.
Make a regular appointment. Not in my house."
Jack touched him on the shoulder. "Just
sit down and rest."
Terry slid to the floor where he was, not a foot
from the doorway. Some time passed, he didn't know how much, and a bowl of rewarmed
soup appeared, smelling richly and comfortingly of garlic.
"Here's some other stuff," Terry said,
placing a plate on the floor next to him. "You've got a little automat
in there, all pretty little dishes wrapped up and ready to go."
Jack squatted and started in. "It's the
same thing, isn';t it? Yopu look the same, you sound the same, I even think
you smell the same. You cut yourself again, didn't you?"
"It's going to pass. You don't have to worry."
"You're worse than before."
"I don't need the shrink."
"He's a doctor too, right? You can hardly
stand up. Just see him. Make me feel better, okay?" That calculating look.
Jack knew what his trump card was. Terry sighed.
"Okay." He would have to begin assembling
a story for Dr. Loria.
Jack was certainly not giving him time to get
used to losing him.
Terry didn't get his story assembled, though.
He dozed off, waking up thoroughly disoriented on his couch. He had been dreaming
something about a conversation between Jack and Dr. Loria, but it was really
going on in the kitchen. He listened, not moving.
"And what explanation does he give?"
Dr. Loria was asking, not, Terry thought, for the first time.
"None at all. Or the explanations are so
bad they might as wel be nothing. I want to respect his privacy. But scary things
keep happening and I can't ignore them."
"You feel responsible."
"I suppose."
"Why? You say you haven't known him that
long. That your relationship is a tnetative one. Many people would back off
from a situation like this. Nobody would blame them."
Terry lay very still. He waited. Disappointed
when Jack said, "I suppose I always feel responsible for things."
Dr. Loria murmured something and then said, "Let's
go see if's he's ready to waken."
Terry opened his eyes when he heard the footsteps
come close. Quick -- what would he say? Dr. Loria bent over him, calling his
name, sweetly.
Terry started to sit up. "No, don't bother
yourself," the doctor said. "In fact -- Jack, could you bring those
pillows for under his feet? terry, how are you feeling? Do you know why I'm
here?"
"I'm fine. I guess I look like shit, because
Jack was worried."
"Well, let's see how you really are, then,"
Dr. Loria turned to Jack. "By this time I think it's unlikely he's in shock,
at least."
The doctor's toolkit looked like an oversized
overnight shaving kit, not like the satchels in old picture books. He directed
the floor lamp right on to Terry and had Jack turn on the overhead light. He
took Terry's hand and examined it all over, touching the skin, feeling at the
wrist for the pulse. He seemed to reluctantly decide that he liked Terry's pulse
and blood pressure. He tested Terry's reflexes, took his temperature, and shone
a light into his eyes. Jack stood behind the doctor, his hands in his pockets,
frowning at the notepad on Loria's knee.
"Do you always leave these objects on display,
or only when you need them for rituals?" Dr. Loria asked.
Terry looked around and decided that he must
mean the cluster of talismans that hung from the overhead light cover.
"It's just artwork of my upstairs neighbor.
She does that for a living."
"The same who made that interesting necklace?"
Terry nodded.
"Do you remember what you told me when you
came to my office?"
"Yes," Terry said reluctantly.
"Was it the same last night?"
Terry didn't answer.
"I should start over. Can you tell me what
happened last night?"
Terry shook his head. "I don't want to talk
about it."
"Would it help if your friend left the room?"
Terry shook his head.
"Okay, let's talk about how you feel right
now."
"I had a headache but it's gone."
"How about your vision? Any changes?"
During the day he had had that light sparkly
stuff ar the edge of his sight, but he wasn't going to say that.
"Hearing?"
"No. I'm not hearing any voices."
"Ringing in the ears?"
"No."
And suddenly, "Where did they bleed you
from this time? Where did they make the cut?"
Protectively, Terry's hand moved to the inside
of his elbow even as he said,. "I don't know what you're talking about."
Pressing his lips together, Dr. Loria nodded.
"I need to look at the wound," he said. "You need to take your
shirt off."
Terry didn't move.
Apparently, he had created an impasse that easily:
Dr. Loria didn't say anything. There was a slight movement from Jack, but when
Terry looked at him, he was just closing his mouth as if he had opened it to
speak and changed his mind. He looked miserable. He caught Terry's eye, and
mouthed what was on his mind: "Just let him look at it."
Terry sat up, blinking his eyes against the shift
of weight in his head, and unbuttoned his shirt, slipping it off in slow motion.
He let Dr. Loria turn his arm over and pull the bandage off the little incision
inside his elbow. The wound came open also, leaking quite fast for such a small
wound. Dr. Loria dabbed at it with cotton from his kit, inspecting it closely
and nodding his head with satisfaction.
"Somehow they think it makes them more civilized
to use scalpels and antiseptic. Or as it a scalpel? It could have been a razor
knife, or even a specially-made ritual knife." He flicked a glance back
at Jack, who was suitably horrified. "What did they use, Terry? How did
they prepare you for it? Where were you?" He turned around, said to Jack,
"Sometimes they get very elaborate about it. Altars. Restraints."
"Nothing like that," Terry said, surprising
himself. He thought he had decided not to speak. "Just me by myself right
here."
"All alone? And what did you do with the
blood? Of which there is not a trace here. What became of the blood? There appears
to have been a lot of it. You seem to have lost almost enough to go into shock.
Do you know what that means, Terry?"
Terry looked away, feigning indifference. Loria
was exaggerating about how much blood Eurick had taken. Too much, yes. But not
that much too much. Terry had put in a day's work.
"If you had lost just a little more blood
and no-one had intervened, you would have died."
Jack stepped forward. "Why? What is this
for?"
Terry allowed his head to float up so he could
look Jack in the eye. He kept his mouth closed and shook his head.
"He may not be able to tell you," Dr.
Loria said as he studied the wound. "Besides the blood loss, there may
be other things. . . ." He put on a new bandage. Terry couldn't believe
a psychiatrist would have bandages in his shirt pocket like that. Not normally:
he must have put them there before he came over. "His consciousness seems
to be a little off -- maybe a post-hypnotic state. Could be drug induced, or
partly so. But he's possibly acting under suggestion."
He paused, gauging Jack's reaction, and Terry's.
"An ironimc word for it. More like command than suggestion."
"Nobody tells me to do anything," Terry
said.
Jack laughed.
Terry frowned. "What's funny?"
"You saying that. 'Nobody tells me to do
anything.' You asked me to tell you what to do. Not just once,. a lot of times.
You said you'd do anything you anted me to do."
"That's not the same thing. I was talking
about you and me. He's talking about something else."
"That's different how?"
Dr. Loria stood up. "Well, I'm satisfied
well enough on the physical front. A little rest, some warmth, and a lot of
fluids ought to be enough. We should do a hematocrit in a week or so to see
if iron pills would be helpful. " He reached for his sportcoat . "But
the state of Terry's mind is a much bigger concern. Terry, you know you are
doing something dangerous, not only for your body, but for your mental well-being
also. All the pills and fluids in the world won't help you recover from the
primary problem here. Unless and until you decide to make the changes you have
to make you will still be very much at risk."
"But what is it?" Jack asked. "What's
been happening to Terry's blood? What's he doing?"
"We'll never know. Unless and until Terry
tells us his version of events. But in my line of work -- you meet a lot of
people. Doctor-patient confidentiality forbids me to say much. But I have met
people who have ideas about blood. Some of them formed by superstition or popular
culture. Some of whom actually fancy themselves to be vampires. You can imagine
what they do. Sometimes quite theatrically. Their donors may be willing or unwilling.
Terry's attitude suggests complicity, but his physical state suggests that unusual
means may have been used to secure his cooperation. A narcotic, maybe with or
without hypnosis, or emotional or maybe physical coercion. Or maybe more subtle
coercion, taking advantage of and playing on his more specific needs? Emotional,
maybe sexual, perhaps?"
Jack's expression was rich with everything Terry
didn't want to find there: nausea, pity, fear.
"You're crazier than I am," Terry said.
"Get out of here."
Jack laid a hand on Dr. Loria's arm to keep him
from leaving. "Terry, I know it's your house," he said. "So you
get to say that. But I think you need to let the guy have his say. Unless you
have a better explanation."
"Bullshit," Terry said, standing up,
shaking his head to clear away the stars. "I can't believe you're even
listening to that crap. Doped up by vampires, rituals, rope, perverts and hypnosis.
That's what's crazy."
"You bleeding yourself into a faint for
no reason is crazy."
Dr. Loria demurred. "I haven't said that
those things are happening," Dr. Loria said reasonably. "Only that
vI have know those things to happen and that they fit the evidence at hand.
I'd be pleased if you had a different story to tell. What can you tell us, Terry?"
"Go away."
Jack shrugged into his jacket and picked up his
bag. Jack looked from one to the other, torn.
"You too, if you're buying into that crap,"
Terry said.
Jack waled the doctor out. By the time Terry
had gotten into his bathrobe and turned on the television Jack returned.
"Did you forget something?" Terry asked
morosely.
"No." Jack came very close, but Terry
kept his eyes glued to the television. "I'm sorry."
"What for? Going along with that insulting
garbage? Believing the worst of me?"
"Maybe. I don't know. I just feel sort of
sorry about everything."
"You don't trust me."
Jack stood a long moment, hands in his pockets,
before he said, "I would like to. I would, if you gave me a reason."
"You know what? Loria gets to you because
he knows what you really want," Terry said, exhilirated suddenly by the
certainty that he was speaking a dangerous truth. "You want a liability,
not a lover."
"That's not remotely true," Jack said.
"You think you know something because you heard about Mickey. I so do not
want a repeat of that. If I'd suspected you were going to be another crazy-boy
invalid for me to take care of I'd have stayed away from you from the beginning."
"You could always start staying away now.
I don't need a keeper." Terry bit his lip. It wasn't the sort of challenge
you ought to be making when you are not confident of the outcome.
"Is that what you want?" Jack's low
voice made the question another challenge.
"No, of course not," Terry said, seizing
the chance to take it back. "I just don't want to be your responsibility.,"
"People are responsible for each other.
What eklse could you have in mind?"
The woman on the television climbed on to the
hood of a luxury car, throwing her head back, laughing deeply, and the camera
pulled back and around so that she seemed to spin off into space.
"You could just love me. Everything else
would be all right then." Appalled that he had said it aloud, Terry covered
his mouth with both hands. "You don't even have to do that," he said.
"Really."
--
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Donor index
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Crystal Egg