Children of Steel (12 page)

"I don’t think I want to kill some kid for
just being stupid, even if there was a gun involved.” To me that
just sounded really excessive. “So what do you suggest I do next
time?"

"Try not to break any arms, at least not if
they can identify you," he said with a wink. "But I wouldn't worry
about it too much. After all, you'll be off planet in a week or two
and we sure aren't going to supply him with your names. He's also
got a bad reputation and the judge will probably throw out anything
he tries to file."

"But if he's dead can't his family sue?" I
was still a bit bewildered.

"Nope, nobody can sue for another here. Also
while a human can sue an animan, you can't sue him back," put in
Kathy.

"Not exactly fair I guess," I sighed.

"No," said the officer, "But we're working on
it." He had finished taking Gabe's and my information. We told him
Dave's and he said goodbye and left.

"What was that all about?" Asked Dave
sticking his head out of the bathroom once the officer was
gone.

"Oh, just about our little run in last
night," answered Gabe.

"Do we have to go until the heat dies down?
Or do we get to enjoy our leave?"

"We stay. See Dave I keep telling you this
place is alright."

"Wait a second," I was still confused. "That
was alright? What's bad then?"

"Bad is where we have to beat feet for the
ship in orbit, and usually out of the local police's jurisdiction."
Said Dave.

"Real bad is where they stick you in jail or
worse," added Gabe making like he had a noose around his head.

"You guys have been in trouble like this
before?" asked Karen.

"Not me I'm new to the game," I said.

"I've seen it some before," said Gabe. "Dave
here's the one with the most experience. Right Dave?"

"Well," he said toweling off in the doorway,
"I've been around a few more places than these two and in a lot of
places we'd have had to have left town last night. Or we wouldn't
be leaving at all."

"I can't believe that," said Karen.

"I can." Kathy said quietly.

We all turned and looked at her. She looked
around the room at us.

"My father hates animen, won't even allow
them on the farm he owns." She looked at me and smiled softly, "if
he knew that I spent last night with one he'd disown me at the very
least. And he'd kill you."

"You didn’t sleep with me just to get back at
your dad I hope!" I said.

"That was why I went to the bar, you won on
own your own merits last night though," she admitted. "But he was
against my going to college at all. Wouldn't even help me pay for
it, said it was a waste to send a woman to college. I think I know
now why my Mom left him. Too bad the court awarded him
custody."

"Sorry to hear that," I said putting my arms
around her and pulling her closer.

"How do your folks feel about animen?" I
asked Karen.

Both her and Gabe started to laugh at that. I
even heard Terry and Dave giggling in the bathroom.

"Yes? What gives?" I asked when the noise
died down.

"Well, you see ..." Karen started and
hesitated.

"Her dad's a Wolf," Dave called out from the
bathroom.

"Actually he's just my Stepdad," she
continued. "You see, he was the manager of my parent’s farm and his
family lived on the property. His wife was a soil specialist and
one day her and my Dad were flying out to one of the fields to
check on some new crop he had decided to try. Unfortunately the
copter crashed killing them both.

"Anyway, our families had always been close
and over the next couple of years we got closer and closer. One
morning my Mom comes into the kitchen and tells us that they're
getting married. So at the age of twelve I gained two brothers and
a sister, the later of whom I shared a room with for quite a few
years."

"I remember when my father heard about that,
he was fit to be tied!" Grinned Kathy. "Especially as your Mom has
a lot more land and money than he does. The thought of an animan
being richer than him was just too much."

"Well that's both ends of the spectrum, what
about Terry?" I asked.

"Oh, my parents would be scandalized to find
out I was sleeping with a man 'Out of Wedlock'. I don't think the
who of it would make that much of a difference," she answered from
the bathroom. "You have to remember that a lot of the people who
colonized this part of the planet were escaping a society that
believed in persecution, and most of us haven't forgotten
that."

I found all of this very interesting and food
for thought. I really didn't know that much about the greater
society I was now a member of, even if I wasn't a full member. They
had taught us back at the crèche that we would face some
resentment, but that it would mostly be from fringe groups. They
also said that people would distrust us because we were engineered
and that it was just the old 'Master Race' syndrome.

But here I am on what is a fairly accepting
planet and yet when accosted in the street, I almost get into
trouble for defending myself. Of course on the other hand I had
just spent the night sleeping with a human, while my friends had
done the same. I looked at Kathy and smiled while I thought of last
night. Obviously they hadn't told us the whole story at school, I
wondered if that was intentional, or just due to the many varying
laws and customs of the different planets? It was going to take
time to figure this all out.

"What are you thinking about?" asked Kathy
smiling back at me.

"Last night," and gave her a kiss.

Dave and Terry walked into the room then.

"Let's go folks, we're ready," announced
Dave.

We headed down to the corner cafe and got
breakfast. It was a nice place and quite a few of the customers
were animen, so we didn't stand out. The sight of the six of us
didn't even seem to turn any heads.

"This is the border between the college and
the ani quarter of town," Kathy said quietly in my ear when she
noticed my looking around. "So mixed couples like us are pretty
common. There are parts of town where we would draw looks."

"Let's avoid those; I don't think I need
anymore trouble."

"You know what's really funny?" She asked
with an amused expression on her face.

"What?"

"If our sexes were reversed, most of those
same people who would object to us wouldn't even think twice about
it."

"You're kidding, aren't you?"

"Nope, my Dad thought nothing of the fox my
older brother was screwing when he went to school. He couldn't
bring her around the house of course, but it didn't bother him at
all. But let him see a human girl with an animan, he'd blow up for
sure."

"I thought women were supposed to be equal in
human society?"

"Not everybody thinks so it seems. But at
least the law says so, and he can't change that!"

This was a really strange thought, I didn't
know that humans could be so divided amongst themselves, at the
schools and the corporation they’d always seemed to put on a united
front. I could understand about countries, and different
corporations. There people were competing for resources and the
rewards that control of those things could bring. But why say
somebody couldn't do something because of their sex? I was
beginning to wonder just what had been left out of my
education.

"If I told Herza that she couldn't do
something just because she was a female, she'd mop the ship with
me." I told Kathy as we sat down.

"Who's Herza?" She asked me.

"One of the Leopards in my clan on ship," I
replied.

"And one of his girlfriends!" Gabe chipped
in.

"Oh?" replied Kathy her eyes sparkling, "Just
one?"

"No, four actually!" Gabe said with a laugh,
"Raj is very popular with the ladies'."

Did you ever try to blush with a furry face?
I did.

"Really Raj? Four girlfriends!" Kathy
asked.

I looked up from my feet and at her face,
realizing she wasn't mad, just teasing.

"Uh, it's something like that," I admitted.
True I’d never slept with Herza or Terease, but I wasn’t going to
tell Gabe that.

"You know, you never did answer that question
last night, how old are you anyway?"

"Weeell," I looked around the table, Gabe and
Dave knew but I could she the girls were all interested. "Fifteen
actually," I sort of mumbled.

"Kathy, you cradle robber you!" Laughed
Karen.

"Don't talk," I said pointing at Gabe, "He's
only sixteen."

"What?" that stopped her, and Kathy started
laughing then.

"Hey, thanks Raj!" Gabe glared at me.

"Payback's a bitch Gabe," I smiled.

"You earned that one Gabe," Karen said
smiling. "Anyway I like 'em young."

"And how old are you?" Terry asked Dave.

"Oh, I'm an old man of twenty five; they just
send me out to keep an eye on all these kids."

"Fifteen Raj?" asked Kathy, "What about all
that schooling you had to go through?"

"If I hadn't opted for the shuttle training I
would have been sent out at fourteen, like the rest of my group. As
for school they started me at two and we don't get that much. I
thought you knew that."

"I guess I did, I just never really gave it
any thought. You sure don't act like fifteen."

"It's like you said last night, we mature
faster. Designed that way I guess so the corporations can get us in
to work sooner. I'm almost at my full growth now," I explained.

"You mean you're going to get bigger?" Said
Karen. "You're already the largest leopard I've ever seen, and I've
seen a few," she smiled at that last part.

"I've just got a few more pounds to fill out
here and there; I don't think I'll get much taller."

At this point the waitress came by and we
made our orders, I surprised everybody by ordering two breakfasts,
which I blamed on Kathy and last night. Kathy promptly blushed.
After the waitress had left Gabe picked up where we had left
off.

"Really though Raj, was everybody in your
group so big?"

"Actually no, I was the only one." I really
wasn't too happy about the direction the conversation was
taking.

"So why are you so big anyway? Do you know
why?" He continued.

"Umm, I would really rather not talk about
that right now," I said quietly, "maybe later."

It got quiet for a second then he changed the
subject.

"So where can we rent a copter for our trip?"
he asked Karen.

"There's a heliport just down the road from
here. We can grab a taxi after we eat."

The talk changed then to where to go and what
to see. I kept pretty quiet, as Gabe's question had brought back
some unpleasant memories. Kathy snuggled up closer and put her hand
on my leg, and we ate breakfast like that.

I felt better by the time I had started on
the second plate and everybody was amazed I could shovel away so
much. I just smiled and ate, it was the first non-ship meal I'd had
in months. It tasted delicious.

We finished then paid the bill and left,
stopping back at the apartment to grab a few things. It didn't take
too long to get a taxi and a short while latter we were at the
heliport.

Gabe and I went inside to show our licenses
and take care of the paperwork. We got a small dual control six
passenger job, and gave it a good once over before letting
everybody board. When Karen asked about that Gabe answered, "This
wasn't maintained by anybody we know, so I'm not getting into it
without a good look first."

We both passed on it and everybody climbed
in. The copter is a pretty simple device in theory; it's a little
trickier in practice. It's not a true helicopter, as the rotors are
mounted on wings which rotate ninety degrees for forward flight
like a plane. It can land damn near anywhere though, and is pretty
fast at cruise. It not only combined the best parts of the
helicopter with a plane, but some of the worst as well. They only
got to be a headache if you lost an engine.

Gabe let me have the pilot's seat for the
outbound trip, and after Karen said where we should go, Kathy
grabbed a map and played navigator. We cruised around the city
twice with the girls pointing out some of the local landmarks,
before traffic control asked us politely not to go for a third
circuit. Then we headed out to the mountains they had talked
about.

On the way out we first passed over the
factories that ringed the city, this quickly gave way to a green
belt of parks, and then farms. When we had gotten up to ten
thousand feet, Karen got our attention and pointed out to the
northwest.

"See those fields out on the horizon there?"
everybody looked where she was pointing, "That's the beginning of
my family's farm, it goes on for another two hundred and fifty
miles. It's one of the biggest farms in the area."

I was pretty impressed by that. What I also
found interesting was that there weren't any highways like I always
saw on earth when I had been flying. But then the next nearest city
was a thousand miles away. Hobson's planet still had a lot of
growing to do.

We traveled on for another hour heading
towards the mountain range that cut across the continent. I
followed Kathy's directions to a place that Karen had marked on the
map. We ended up over a lake that was pretty secluded, but not too
high up. I asked Karen where I should land, and she pointed to a
clearing by the lake's edge and I landed there.

By the time I had everything shut down and
secured, everybody had already piled out, so I followed them. It
was a nice warm day outside with a pleasant breeze.

"I've been coming to this spot on and off for
years. There's a lean to, with a fire pit and some other things
just over that rise and in the trees. Come on I'll show you," Karen
said as she led the way down along the shore of the lake.