Nirgal felt dizzy and bleak. The whole big room had gone a glossy dark, except in the exact spots where there were streaks of bright glare. Everything a chiaroscuro of jumbled objects, Brueghel in black-and-white, and so loud. “I remember the spring flood of thirteen, the North Sea in me living room—” “Ah no, not the flood of thirteen again, will you not go on about that again!”

He went to a partitioned room at one corner of the chamber, the men’s room, thinking he would feel better if he relieved himself. Inside the rescued sailor was on the floor of one of the stalls, retching violently. Nirgal retreated, sat down on the nearest bench to wait. A young woman passed him by, and reached out to touch him on the top of the head. “You’re hot!”

Nirgal held a palm to his forehead, tried to think about it. “Three hundred ten K,” he ventured. “Shit.”

“You’ve caught a fever,” she said.

One of his bodyguards sat beside him. Nirgal told him about his temperature, and the man said, “Will you ask your wristpad?”

Nirgal nodded, asked for a readout. 309 K. “Shit.”

“How do you feel?”

“Hot. Heavy.”

“We’d better get you to see someone.”

Nirgal shook his head, but a wave of dizziness came over him as he did. He watched the bodyguards calling to make arrangements. Bly came over, and they asked him questions.

“At night?” Bly said. More quiet talk. Bly shrugged; not a good idea, the shrug said, but possible. The bodyguards went on, and Bly tossed down the last of his pint and stood. His head was still at the same level as Nirgal’s, although Nirgal had slid down to rest his back against the table. A different species, a squat powerful amphibian. Had they known that, before the flood? Did they know it now?