To Kiss or To Kill

by Jean Lorrah

  “Tonyo,” warned Zhag, “quit while you’re ahead.”

  Jonmair looked into Tonyo’s puzzled blue eyes and told him, “They only did what was expected of them.”

  Tonyo paled, and Zhag drove the point home. “That is what it means to be junct.”

  Tonyo stared at his partner over Jonmair’s shoulder for a moment. Then he shook his head. “Not everyone did that,” he said firmly. “Not you. You tried to take your brother to the border. My mom’s parents did get her to the border, or I wouldn’t be here. Not all junct Simes stop loving someone just because they turn Gen.”

  He looked back to Jonmair. “Please forgive me. I didn’t know—”

  “And you don’t know that Zhag and your grandparents are the exception, not the rule,” said Jonmair.

  “I don’t think so,” said Tonyo.

  “You didn’t live here before Unity,” she told him. “Zhag and I did.”

  Tonyo shook his head. “I can believe most people obeyed the law. Out of fear. I understand why the law had to punish them if they didn’t turn over their Gen children—as long as the Kill continued. But I can’t believe that most people didn’t suffer for it—and are suffering still.”

  Jonmair met Zhag’s eyes in the mirror, and saw kinship. He understood, as she did, what Tonyo could not. At least not yet. Culture shock, he had called it. This one appeared to be his worst yet.

  “Tonyo,” said Zhag, “we’re on in ten minutes. Are you going to be all right?”

  “Of course I am,” his partner replied. “Jonmair?”

  “I’m fine,” she said, forcing a smile that she knew fooled neither man, but they accepted it. “Let me make sure your costumes are all in order.”

  They were now wearing the identical black trousers they had purchased at the Keon Emporium and—because it was stiflingly hot with both the native heat of midsummer and the crowd—just the shirt-vests that Jonmair had made for them, without shirts.

  The effect was to emphasize their Sime/Gen differences, especially as Zhag was still too thin, his tentacle sheaths making cords down his forearms with no flesh to hide them. Jonmair noticed that Zhag’s ronaplin glands seemed far too swollen for his negligible state of Need.

  “It’s normal for me,” he insisted.

  “It is,” Tonyo agreed. “You’ll see why when he performs.”

  Jonmair went out to the table near the stage where Baird and Treavor Axton were talking to people being seated at the front tables. The big salon was nearly full already. She saw Robert and Conta seated with two Simes in dress uniform several tiers back. Another table of soldiers made a dark patch amidst the bright clothing toward the back of the room.

  The Post’s efficient staff were serving drinks, and people talked and laughed while waiting for the show to begin. A stir went through the crowd, though, as six people entered: three Simes and three Gens, all in formal floor-length capes with the insignia of Householding Carre.

  Jonmair recognized the channel Thea and her Companion Janine; the Sectuib in Carre, whom she had met only once when he spoke to her training class; his Companion; and two other women she didn’t know but assumed one of them to be the Sectuib’s wife. As they were Householders, she did not know whether it was the Sime or the Gen!

  People stared and whispered as the Householders were escorted to a table next to the Axtons. As they removed their cloaks and introductions were performed, Jonmair learned that the Sime woman was the Sectuib’s wife. Like the Sectuib, she and her Companion were of Baird’s father’s generation. But the Sectuib’s Companion was hardly more than a girl, in a sprigged muslin dress, bursting with excitement at being here. “This is our daughter Laweez,” the Sectuib introduced her, “performing her first public duty as my Companion this evening.”

  “She just established three months ago,” her mother said, beaming with pride. “But she has already given transfer, and is developing into a fine Companion.”

  Jonmair fought down jealousy of this young woman whose parents not only loved her despite her becoming Gen, but would never think of it as “despite.”

  Laweez smiled at Jonmair and asked, “Do you know Zhag and Tonyo? I’ve heard so much about them. I know they’ve been at Carre, but I’ve never had the chance to meet them.”

  “I’ll introduce you after the show,” said Jonmair.

  “If it doesn’t interfere with your work,” Treavor Axton said warningly.

  Jonmair did not reply because Baird’s father was capable of sending her to her room for talking back. He was already annoyed at having Householders in the best seats, but they were Zhag and Tonyo’s guests.

  The lights dimmed, and the huge room hushed expectantly. Then they went out entirely, a few throbbing chords of music played, and when the stage lights came on to a gasp from the audience, Zhag was seated behind his shiltpron in the spotlight, Tonyo sitting tailor-fashion on the floor just at the edge of the light.

  * * * *

  BAIRD WONDERED WHAT THE GENS IN THE AUDIENCE MADE of the beginning of the performance. Were they aware that to Sime senses, Tonyo Logan wasn’t there?

  It was a common Companion’s trick, of course—even Jonmair knew how to disappear from the ambient. But translated into showmanship the simple function was highly effective: the Simes in the audience had to remain duoconscious in order to absorb the nageric nuances of Zhag’s playing and at the same time see what the Gen performer they had heard so much about was doing.

  Which for the moment was nothing at all.

  Zhag performed solo for only a few bars, however. Then Tonyo rose to his feet, remaining near the back of the stage beside Zhag, and began to sing.

  Using only his voice, without words, Tonyo sang harmony with the melody Zhag played. They exchanged parts, Tonyo taking the melody and Zhag the harmony—and then moved on to counterpoint, a performance of pure sound.

  It was elegant, it was beautiful, and it was totally unexpected—absolutely nothing like the raucous songs they had performed at Milily’s. When the piece ended, the audience sat in rapt appreciation for a moment before exploding into cheers.

  Tonyo bowed, and gestured toward Zhag, who gave a shy grin, settled his hands over the strings, and plucked the opening notes of an old saloon song. The audience recognized it, cheered louder for a moment, and then quieted as Tonyo began to sing—this time with nageric accompaniment.

  “Taxes goin’ higher,

  Last month I sold my horse.

  Border’s too far for raiding—

  How could things get worse?

  Ol’ Mizipi rising—

  Flood and hurricane—”

  It was one of the songs Tonyo could not get right when he had first started performing with Zhag. By now, though, he had developed enough understanding of what it meant to be Sime to produce a realistic nageric accompaniment. He soon had every Sime in the room shuddering at the specter of frustrated Need.

  The song might have been traditional, but where Zhag and Tonyo then took it definitely was not. Baird sensed growing concern at the next table as Tonyo began to project quintessential Gen—Wild Gen, at first merely wary, then frightened.

  Zhag played variations on the melody, Tonyo again vocalizing. They had run out of lyrics, for this was never part of the original song. Zhag picked up mallets, hammering as well as plucking strings, keeping time with the Gen’s increasingly frenzied heartbeat. He began to project a Need Baird knew he did not really feel—a channel’s trick, he reminded himself, wondering if it were possible for Zhag to become so wrapped up in his own performance as to lose control. Ronaplin dripped from his extended laterals as if he were in hard Need.

  The Sectuib in Carre slid quickly over to the Axton table. “Mr. Axton,” he whispered sharply, projecting urgency with his nager, “you have to stop the performance!”

  Clearly annoyed at having his own concentration broken, Treavor Axton looked around. Every Sime in the room was spellbound.

  “Why should I?” he growled. “This is what folks’r
e paying for.”

  “Because if it continues,” the Sectuib replied, “it’s going to provoke a Kill!”

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  POSTSYNDROME

  BAIRD, WHO HAD SEEN ZHAG AND TONYO CONTROL MOBS of rowdy juncts at Milily’s without provoking so much as a fist fight, said, “Hush. They know what they’re doing.”

  The Sectuib insisted, “They can’t. Zlin the ambient!”

  “Shut up!” Treavor Axton whispered. “If you disrupt the performance, I’ll have you and your whole gang thrown out!”

  For a moment, Baird thought the channel would walk out, but then he moved back to his table and gathered the attention of the Householders, preparing to act if there was trouble.

  On stage, meanwhile, the performance became a musical chase. Zhag’s playing took on the sound of running water—first metaphorically, then as close to the actual sound of a rushing river as the shiltpron could produce. The Gen apparently took to a boat—and suddenly the Simes in the audience felt as if they’d been doused with cold water! The frustrated Sime was left floundering.

  The sensation lasted only for a second or two, followed immediately with the triumphant relief of the escaping Gen fading into the distance.

  The audience burst into laughter.

  The music went back to the chorus, the poor Sime wondering, “How could things get worse?”

  The laughter, Baird realized, was relief. Although the Sime in the song was a stereotype, there had frequently been people in that very situation...and whole Territories faced it if the Pen system collapsed. There, but for the grace of God—

  The cheering for this unique performance was even stronger—the junct audience loved Zhag and Tonyo, whatever the Householders might think. The musicians next launched into traditional barroom songs, sung pretty much as they had done them at Milily’s. Tonyo stepped down off the stage, wandering from table to table, focusing his attention on each member of the audience in turn.

  As they brought their medley of songs to an end, Tonyo moved to the Axton table, laved them with his field as he had been doing for all the Simes, and after the song ended took Jonmair’s hand and drew her to her feet. “I want you to meet someone,” he announced. “This is Jonmair, who has a lot more talent than just a beautiful nager. She designed these great costumes for Zhag and me.”

  Jonmair blushed. Baird felt proud of her, and it occurred to him that he had never questioned his father’s assigning her to menial tasks. What other talents might she have?

  After a pause to drink some water, Tonyo took center stage, saying, “The next songs may not be familiar to some of you. They’re Gen songs—Wild Gen songs, if you prefer.”

  Some uncertain giggles.

  “Oh, I know what you think about Wild Gens,” said Tonyo. “Used to be a Wild Gen myself, you know.”

  Derisive snorts.

  “Hey—what you’ve heard about Wild Gens is true!”

  Skeptical chuckles.

  “I guess I’ve been tamed now. All his fault,” he added conspiratorially, pointing at Zhag from behind his hand.

  The laughter became a bit uneasy, as Simes wondered where this monologue was going.

  “The songs we’re about to perform are about what it’s like to be a Wild Gen. Which I will be again in about—” He began counting on his fingers, looking puzzled when he had used them all up. Then, with a flick of his nager as if he had just had an inspiration, he went to Zhag, lifted one Sime arm, and finished counting on Zhag’s handling tentacles, concluding triumphantly, “—about thirteen days from now!”

  The audience exploded into laughter.

  Tonyo’s humor was crude, but it was effective. Baird wondered how many Simes realized that Tonyo was playing on all the stereotypes of Gens, always post, not very intelligent? Did they realize how he was manipulating them?

  No matter what level they got it on, he zlinned that everyone enjoyed it. Even his father was laughing.

  “This next song is supposed to have come down to us from the Ancients,” Tonyo continued. “I’m not so sure about that, though—because it’s pretty obviously about being post!”

  Zhag’s shiltpron exploded with pounding rhythm and wailing chords. Tonyo met it note for note, his voice sailing through sounds like nothing human, his field berserk with raw sexuality.

  Baird knew enough of the Gen language to recognize that he was not distorting the meaning of the song—it was about raw sexuality! He zlinned Jonmair responding to the primitive Gen rhythms. Finally, she was becoming post.

  So was everyone in the salon.

  It would not last, Baird knew, for anyone past turnover, but by far the majority of their patrons had had transfer within the past couple of days. With Zhag and Tonyo performing this way, he realized, The Post could once again live up to its name.

  To rousing cheers, the musicians bowed, and took a brief break. In the interval, people came to the Axtons’ table to congratulate them. Treavor Axton told everyone, “My son found them. He has a fine lateral for talent.” Baird basked in his father’s rare approval, and traded smiles with Jonmair, thinking of getting away with her—

  But just then a woman approached…and spoke directly to Jonmair!

  “You designed the performers’ costumes? And the dress you’re wearing, too?”

  “I made them,” Jonmair replied, “but they’re all based on patterns I got at the Keon Emporium.”

  “May I?” the woman asked, and turned back the edge of Jonmair’s sleeve to examine the stitching. “Fine workmanship,” she said. “Perfect fit. Are you interested in another commission?”

  Baird restrained himself, hard, to keep from threatening another Sime touching his Gen.

  But his father had no such compunction. “The Gen works here, Miz Delancy. It has plenty of work.”

  The woman gave him a smile. “Well, you can’t blame me for asking, Treavor. You can’t keep all the best talent in Norlea tied up forever.” And she turned once more to Jonmair. “If you’re ever looking for work, I own Delancy’s Dresses.”

  Jonmair’s field glowed with both pleasure and confidence, and for once Baird blessed his father’s competitive spirit. The more he realized the woman’s potential value, the harder he would hang on to her. After tonight Baird could dismiss the threats to send Jonmair to the other end of the Territory.

  * * * *

  JONMAIR COULD NOT BELIEVE IT! Miz Delancy had approached her as if she were Sime, able to choose whom to work for. Despite Treavor Axton’s warning, “Don’t you get any grand ideas!” she indulged in grand ideas indeed. The new laws were not completed—but when they were, surely they would include some way for Gens to choose their work. She could have her long-cherished dream of becoming a fashion designer! And if she could do that…then it might even be possible to marry someone like Baird Axton.

  As Jonmair sat thinking of how she could turn her dream into reality, Zhag and Tonyo came back, and Zhag spoke to the audience for the first time as he carefully disconnected the central stringed part of his shiltpron—the essential instrument—from its peripherals and amplifiers. He sat on a chair Tonyo set out for him near the front of the stage to one side, his instrument on his lap.

  “Now we’re going to perform a song that Tonyo wrote,” said Zhag as he tested the tuning of his shiltpron and tightened a string.

  “Just the lyrics,” Tonyo said. “Zhag wrote the melody. It’s a real Sime/Gen collaboration.”

  Jonmair had had no idea Zhag and Tonyo were this talented. Not only were they brilliant performers, but they could compose new music, too. Just as I can not only sew, but design, she thought. People will learn that Gens can be just as talented as Simes.

  The music began with Tonyo seated cross-legged on the floor again at the far side of the stage as Zhag played a soft, haunting melody. Then the Gen began to sing.

  “My brother, he turned out wrong—

  Had to run for the border.

  And I will never see his face again—

  N
ever see him again.”

  People gasped, listening to a story every Sime knew, but never, ever talked about.

  “My sister, she turned out wrong,” Tonyo sang next.

  “The Sheriff came to shoot her—

  And I will never see her face again—

  Never see her again.”

  The realization that turning out the wrong larity had been equally a death sentence on the Gen side of the border rang through the room—Jonmair could almost zlin it.

  “My daughter, she turned out wrong—

  I don’t know where they took her,

  But I will never see her face again—

  Never zlin her again.”

  Jonmair wondered if there were indeed parents who had cared when they allowed their Gen children to be taken. Had her own parents felt a twinge of loss?

  “My son, he turned out wrong—

  And I dared not to touch him.”

  The musicians remained on opposite sides of the stage as the song continued with variations on the sweet, sad melody, voice and instrument taking different, clashing paths that mimicked the poignant reality that had existed until so very recently. Then, melody and counterpoint began to move toward one another as Tonyo rose and moved toward Zhag, circling, backtracking, hesitating—and finally moving behind him to stand with his hands on the Sime’s shoulders as once again he sang without words, instrument and voice meshing in beautiful, soaring, blended chords of hope.

  When the music ended, there was total silence. Jonmair tried to swallow the lump in her throat, then dared to look around. People all over the room were wiping their eyes.

  A voice from the back called, “Again!”

  “Sing it again!” someone else cried in a choking voice.

  “Again!” “Again!”

  Zhag and Tonyo looked at one another in amazement—clearly they had not expected this reaction. Then Zhag nodded, and Tonyo, after taking another drink of water, moved once again to the far side of the stage.

  No one in the audience moved. The waiting staff retreated to stand by the bar. Utter stillness reigned as Zhag and Tonyo performed the song again.