"No," St. Clair replied.
He hadn't been to the greenhouse in months. The trees stretched up from a series of squat rectangular boxes filled with chemically treated soil. The tallest was now almost thirty feet high. The last time St. Clair had seen them, the biggest was less than ten feet.
St. Clair was struck by the beauty of the trees. "Only God can make one of these, my ass," he said under his breath.
They were breathtaking. Absolutely breathtaking. The instant the word formed in his brain he realized how true it was. On every level.
"They're growing faster with each passing cycle," Schumar was saying. "Frankly, the growth spurts in a tree this age are incredible. And even a little disconcerting when you think about it." As he looked up at the soft blue leaves of the trees, his face was grave. "I'm glad we have them under lock and key. There's no telling what might-"
"Wait a minute," Hubert St. Clair interrupted all at once. "What the hell is that?"
Even as he pointed up under a tightly bundled knot of leaves, he was scrambling onto the edge of a planting box.
It became more difficult to breathe the closer he got to the trees. He had been told they needed to be spaced far apart in the beds. If they were any closer together, it would be impossible to breathe while standing between them.
Head tipped back, St. Clair examined the underside of the leaf cluster.
Some kind of blue growths had sprouted up on the branches. Hidden beneath the leaves, they looked almost like bumpy beehives. He didn't see any insects.
"Dammit, you've got some kind of infestation here," St. Clair snapped. "Get some DDT before we lose these blasted things altogether."
Brice Schumar didn't move. He just stood there on the greenhouse floor, an idiot's grin plastered across his face.
"Look closer," he suggested.
Nose crinkling, St. Clair peered more carefully at the cluster of abandoned hives clinging together on the underside of an overhanging branch. When he realized what he was looking at, he nearly fell off the raised plant bed.
It was the sheer number of them that had thrown him. But he saw now that they were all identical to the one he'd seen just a few minutes before in Schumar's lab. Seeds. Tons of them.
"Are these all seeds?" Hubert St. Clair croaked.
"They came with the latest growth spurt," Schumar said. "Thousands on each tree. It was in my report."
St. Clair slipped around the far side of the tree. Another cluster of seeds clutched a branch on the other side. Still others were visible higher up.
A second tree grew a few feet away in the same bed. St. Clair saw more of the teardrop-shaped blue seedlets clinging all over the branches.
Numbly, he climbed down from the bed. His mind was reeling.
"What about the seed coats?" St. Clair asked. "They look like leather."
"Not a problem," Schumar said excitedly. "They're tough-looking but easily penetrated by water. We had a lingering of some chemical inhibitors prior to germination, but that's been eliminated. Now the growth inhibitors are easily bleached away by the introduction of water."
"Just regular water?" St. Clair asked.
"Tap water, rainwater. It's all the same," Schumar said. "Of course, that's not going to be good enough for all alien climates. And at this point it wouldn't even work for some of Jupiter's moons or Mars, since we've got ice to contend with there. The next generations of the plants will have to be weaned from water."
"Weaned?" St. Clair asked, coming back around.
"Why?"
"Well, that was the whole point of growing them," Schumar said. "Eventually developing an oxygen-producing strain that could help terraform an alien world."
"Yes, yes. Of course," St. Clair said gruffly. He stabbed a finger at a seed cluster. "Get me a bunch of these. I want to dissect them in my office."
Schumar was surprised and relieved by St. Clair's sudden interest in legitimate scientific inquiry. Maybe with this one, great project the Congress of Concerned Scientists could return to its founding principles and finally put to eternal rest the destructive ghost of Sage Carlin.
"Yes, Doctor," Schumar said. He scurried obediently onto the nearest raised plant bed.
As he happily picked seeds, he saw Hubert St. Clair hurry out the open door of the greenhouse. Probably the ammonia smell. Most people couldn't take it for very long. Even the little seeds he was slipping into the pocket of his white lab coat smelled vaguely of the stuff.
His hand was snaking for another clutch of tiny seeds when he was startled by the sound of the overhead alarm.
Dr. Schumar thrust his face out through a bundle of blue leaves. The red light was flashing a warning even as the greenhouse doors were sliding slowly shut.
Of all the people on the face of the planet, Dr. Brice Schumar understood best what it meant to be on the wrong side of those closing doors.
The seeds in his hands slipped from his terrified fingers. Jumping down from the plant bed, he ran for the door, lungs burning from the ammonia in the air.
The thick plastic doors clicked shut just as he reached them. There was a hiss as the automatic seal inflated to prevent vapor from seeping out of the greenhouse to where Hubert St. Clair sat uncomfortably.
The warning alarm switched off.
"Dr. St. Clair!" Schumar shouted, pounding on the door.
There was an environmental control panel in the alcove between the two sets of double doors. As Schumar watched helplessly, Hubert St. Clair began picking at the buttons. The very act of touching them seemed to bring him pain.
Schumar heard a rumble from above. Spinning, wild-eyed, he saw the skylights begin to slide remorselessly shut. Like the thick greenhouse doors, they clicked then hissed, becoming airtight. Even as the skylights were sealing, St. Clair was switching on the interior speakers.
"You've done a good job," St. Clair said, his voice distorted by the speaker next to the door.
"Let me out," Schumar begged. "Please." The air was already growing thin. Panic flooded his chest as he struggled to breathe.
Carlin shook his head. "Can't," he said. "I know you've done a lot of tests, but there's really only one we're interested in. And you're the perfect subject. You never really fit in around here, Schumar. You and your scientific method and your facts this and facts that. Always looking down your nose at the rest of us like we weren't real scientists." His expression suddenly grew as cold as ice. "Do I look like a real scientist to you now, Dr. Schumar?"
There was touch of madness deep in his red eyes. Brice Schumar began beating his fists against the plastic door. His lungs were on fire, his throat raw. The air was evaporating.
His hands and wrists ached. He stopped hitting the door.
"Please," Brice wept. The word was inaudible. Beyond the pane, Hubert St. Clair watched, growing more disinterested with each passing minute. He seemed more concerned with the equipment he was using. As if there were some infection he could get just by touching it. He wrapped his finger tightly in his handkerchief to avoid direct contact with the buttons.
Brice Schumar didn't know how long it took him to die. With each labored breath he felt the air grow thinner. Slipping out until the last oxygen was gone. Until all that was left was poison.
The air was thick with ammonia and methane. The worst was the carbon dioxide. The colorless, odorless gas flooded the interior of the greenhouse.
His lungs were lead as he sank slowly to the floor. A crimson rash decorated his face around his nose and mouth. With dying eyes, Dr. Brice Schumar gazed over at the small grove of trees. Trees he had helped create.