Flesh and Gold (16 page)

Lebedev had not even had time to be afraid. He paused again in the doorway long enough to think that the woman had not been his daughter Nadezhda, and that he had pushed her out of his mind, like the earache, since Roza had died.

Lyhhrt and Kobai

When the door irised behind Lebedev, the Lyhhrt pressed a place in his neck and his abdomen opened. He reached in and removed a glastex globe, twenty-five centimeters in diameter, containing his actual self, which he placed on a table top in a gold basket. Holding a tiny remote in one pseudopod he directed his shell to unplug the globe and siphon off the liquid he was swimming in, then replace it with a fresh mixture of food and oxygen from a jar stored in the wall refrigerator.

He splashed around in this for a moment, and pushed a pseudopod through the globe's opening to taste the air. When he withdrew it, the plug was replaced, and he used the remote to open a cupboard door and summon a different hominid shell of dull brushed silver in plain features considered, by Lyhhrt, to be less intimidating than their displays in gold and bronze.

Once nested in it, he connected up the sensors of the seven electrocardiographs, four electroencephalographs, and fifteen sphygmomanometers—all installed in clients—which he had been monitoring by remote. When he was satisfied with their reception he stepped into an almost invisible circle on the floor and stood with his hands at his sides while a
plasmix tube descended around him from the ceiling, withdrew its air, sealed itself, dropped him down three levels without a sound. The place where it freed him was alongside the shaft that was wound about by the ramp Lebedev had descended; the tube shut and rose back into its recess.

He went down the ramp and into the anteroom where Lebedev had watched the robots attending the lattices of embryos under the infrareds. He did not look at them but elongated his silver arm to pluck down the spy-eye Lebedev had not noticed, removed the spool recording that showed Lebedev watching, reduced it to an inert pellet in a flash of his personal autoclave, refilled the capsule with a fresh wire and replaced it. His signal opened one of the doors Lebedev had found locked and he went through.

A third of the room beyond was taken up by a tier of bunk beds, one occupied by a snoring Solthree guard. Next to the bunks was an office table with an ordinary medikit opened on it, and beside it a squatting Varvani woman crocheting a long scarflike piece in purple silk with an ivory hook.

All other space in the room was occupied by the cylindrical tank of water bubbling with tiny streams of oxygen where Kobai hunkered at the bottom under the cold white light with her arms folded and her tail curled up like a roll of parchment. Her face was sullen. She grimaced at the Lyhhrt and turned her head away.

He stood with his silver hands and forearms against the glastex wall and regarded her the way he saw things, as an electronic image, for a moment before he engaged the mind back of those furiously sparkling eyes and began to tell her how babies are made.

ME? A BABY? WHAT IS A BABY??? Inside ME?? ALIVE? like the lugworm crawl in the dung-fish belly?
NO! come out of me like SHIT? I want to puke. NO!! NO NO NONO!! Take it away from me, I don't want this BABY!!

From when I let Siko or Pers or Om make the in-out it gives me this THING?
Everybody
makes in-out. I'm the very first? First of whats? Folk that make the New One in the belly! Let me out of here! Why you ask where I think the Folk person come from? Everybody know a New One fall down from Upthere when an Old One die.

I want to die. I am like dead in these walls with this thing inside feed off my meat! All my old Folk in the free water forgot me, you bet. You machine man you don't know what is to be in a cage and no one of the same breath with an arm around you to say Wake up, Kobai, new day, come work with me, come eat, let me kiss you, come make love, come sleep. Not even one friend.

:I am trying to be your friend,:
said the Lyhhrt.

:Then let me out! Please, let me go home and pick the gold!:

:I cannot let you out.:

:You gather of all those cold hard pieces, you don't know what is a friend!:
Face twisted in a snarl, she was on her knees, fists beating on them and her tail rippling as in a windstorm.

Inside the gathering of machine parts the Lyhhrt was nearly as cold as the salt seas Kobai swam in, and somewhat slimy, not one who would be attractive to her. He considered words carefully; it was rare for him to speak his mind as an independent person. He esped the others: the Varvani with her skein of silk was thinking of home, and the fellow on the bunk was dreaming of being somewhere in the universe that was warmer and sunnier than Fthel V; he made sure they would not esp him.

Finally he said,
:I am a fleshly being who needs these
metal parts to work in as you need water, and they are a kind of cage.:

He opened his mind to her, as far as he thought she would understand a person who wanted only to be lying in a layer among his fellows with pseudopods entwined under the wet and grey-green skies of his world.
:I know what it is to be alone and lonely far from home.:
He added,
:When you have this baby it will be outside of you and taken care of, you will be free of it.:
He dared not promise her that she would be truly free, or that no one would ever again force her to bear a child.

She pulled herself back and down into a hard knot, with her arms wrapped around her legs and her tail rolled up again.
:Free is not what you want to say to me, Lord jelly-in-the-Machine. I will die before I have this Baby-thing, and then I will be free.:

FIVE  

Khagodis:
Skerow and Evarny

Port Manganese is the star-shaped main feature on the map of Southern Vineland, a desert tract belying its name. Although the Port is as vital to Khagodis as Starry Nova is to Galactic Federation, it is a simple and homely facility, where travelers debark from their shuttle capsules into a huge round stone building to be sorted into conveyances according to their world of origin and local destination.

Khagodi, along with Varvani and other weighty outworld travelers, board railway flatcars shaded by umbrellas and drawn by steam engines; the tracks form the star that shapes the Port. Kylkladi run the airship lines that carry lighter passengers. Their helium balloons are decorated with colorful advertisements in symbol
lingua
for establishments like Ygglar's, in Kylklar's Port Na'at, where discriminating shoppers may buy gifts of fashion and refinement.

Threyha had boarded the transworld shuttle that hooked on to the solar-sailer
Yankee Clipper
, and after saying goodbye, Skerow spent the afternoon waiting for the intercontinental
train that led to the ferry. She had rented an alcove with bath, and drowsed there for a while; now, wrapped in a white flax
aba
against the heat, she was resting on the balustrade looking down into the great round courtyard; people of many worlds were buying tickets at the railings that encircled the communications center built around towering antennas that rose far above the roof. Every once in a while some official would dash about with a banner to summon a group for boarding.

A muted roar, like that of a far-off crowd, reverberated around the stone walls, a comfortable sound, and the skylights were covered with dust that softened the afternoon glare. But Eskat, who did not like noise, shrank fearfully against Skerow and sucked his bead. She was not at ease either; her mind was still echoing with the conversations of the last few days, and she longed above all to do the forbidden: take a side trip to Nohl's estate and pin him to the wall. She dared not try it for fear of prejudicing any case against him.

As she watched she sensed something else familiar and very old: a mind resting along hers, as if someone were sharing a bath with her. Her heartbeats tangled for the moment in which she found the eyes meeting hers: those of Evarny, who had been her husband. Who had divorced her when their daughter had died and they were left childless.

She had not seen him for more than thirty-five years.

:Blessings,:
he said.
:In spite of your terrible experiences you seem in good health.:

He was still sharp-colored; she said,
:I am. You look as I remembered you.:

:Perhaps. Will you come down? I want to talk to you.:

:Very well.:
She could not think what he would have to say to her. But he seemed to know more of her than she knew of him. After she had descended by the lift she waited
near the entrance way because Eskat was trembling so hard in fear of the crowd, and watched Evarny working his way around the knots of people toward her. He stepped briskly, like a true Northern man, but as he came to face her it was strange to find how short he seemed, compared with the big Southerners she had become used to, like Thordh and Commissioner Erha; they were just her height, and Evarny was half a head shorter.

He led her past the lifts and outside through an arcade into a gazebo, where a failed garden was struggling in the hard-baked earth under the hot sun. Eskat had crept under her arm, and clung to a fold of her aba, sleeping. “You still keep that detestable little beast,” he said, a remark not meant to be ill-natured.

She did not answer it. “I hope there is no bad news. I trust your family is well?”

“I have one son.” She knew that his fertility was as weak as her own, but the new wife with whom he had hoped to strengthen it had evidently not done this. He added quickly, “No bad news, but there is a change of plans.”

“What do you mean? Have you been sent here to tell me this?”

“I have been living here. Last year I was appointed Head Galactic Federation Representative for Khagodis. I have tried to reach you ever since I heard of Thordh's death, but you had left no address.”

“My sisters have it—but go on.”

“I want to ask if you might possibly change your itinerary and take over an important case of Thordh's.”

“Thordh! There is no getting away from him! And I have hardly been home!”

“It is an Interworld Trade case. One of the witnesses is ill of poisoning and may die, half the parties are outworlders, and we cannot keep them here forever.”

“I knew of that case, I was to sit on it as Thordh's understudy. Poisoning? It must have been brought forward then. But Evarny, I am not qualified.”

“You not qualified? You were his understudy—now you are a senior interworld judge.”

“Yes, and there are many others at least as competent as I.”

“May be, but their appointment books are full, and this case came up too quickly to be put on the quarteryear calendar.” He reached into a carryall looped around his neck and shoulder. “Here is the seal of order, and this is your ring of office.”

She recognized them both. The heavy silver thumb ring was set with an opal. “This is too sudden for me.”

“Frankly, it is far too sudden for the attorneys and clerks. They have only now gathered all the principals together because of this endangered witness. Of course I told them I meant to approach you, but your presence is still something they did not expect.”

She grimaced slightly. “I imagine so. This sort of promotion is no favor to me. Thordh died very strangely, and I am sure the
Zarandu
unloaded a heavy freight of gossip and rumor along with the passengers. His friends and well-wishers in court will look at me cross-eyed, believe I coupled with him, the way his wife Thasse did, implicate me in his death, try me in their minds, and find me guilty.”

He had raised his hand as if to touch her, and pulled back. “Blessed Skerow, you have reached a powerful depth of cynicism!”

“I have nearly killed and nearly been killed, by one of my own people, who are so deeply respected for justice and morality.”

“That does not disqualify you from dispensing justice. You rode circuit with Thordh for over twenty years without
being stained by the rumors that clung to him. I have followed your career.”

“I still feel too close to Thordh, in an unpleasant way, to want to have much to do with his cases, and I don't care to face a court that is inimical to me—but yes, I am sure I may still dispense justice. I took the minor cases, when I worked with Thordh, but I did not resent it, because he was the senior, and I learned much from my travels. I am simply not feeling very strong.”

“You know everything Thordh did and there were never ugly rumors about you.”

“There were not. Tell me, Evarny: you say you followed my career, and yet you never once sent me a message. Why?”

“Perhaps I thought you might despise me.”

“You were right. Perhaps I did, then. I hope I have got over that.”

He was a little taken aback. “Will you stand on this case, then? I confess I have bought you berths on the train and ferry to Burning Mountain in the hope that you would.”

“Yes, I will.” He had had the grace not to mention that it would go ill with him in the eyes of his government superiors if he failed to persuade her. She was experienced enough to know that.