A Large Anthology of Science Fiction

by Jerry

  He stood up straight, arms still around her, and looked into her green eyes, level with his own. She was a dryad, a part of the forest in her tunic and sandaled feet, and it seemed that she might suddenly release him and vanish. He held her more tightly.

  He felt his penis stiffen. Startled, he let go of Kira and stood awkwardly in front of her, arms dangling at his sides. She did not move away but continued to stand with her arms around his shoulders. Her face was pale in the moonlight. She tilted her head to one side. Don’t move away, her eyes seemed to say. Don’t retreat. She moved closer to him and kissed his lips gently.

  The park had grown silent. He was paralyzed, rooted to the ground as surely as the tree against his back. He strained to hear the sounds of the forest, but there was only a thundering in his ears.

  She released him and they faced each other, silent and still. He tried to raise his arms. They trembled slightly as he reached out to her.

  She unfastened the sash around her waist and let it flutter to the ground. She grasped her tunic with both hands and pulled it over her head. Then she slipped off her pants, balancing first on one leg, then the other. She moved slowly and as precisely as a dancer. She stood in front of him, and at last she met his eyes again.

  He saw apprehension and fear on her face, as well as love and concern. He moved toward her, taking one step, then a second one—and he was in her arms, holding her tightly. He was afraid to speak. Kira, too, was trembling. He began to stroke her hair.

  He loosened his shorts with one hand and dropped them on top of Kira’s rumpled tunic. He ran his hands along her smooth back to her buttocks, only slightly wider and rounder than his own. She was no longer trembling.

  They knelt, then lay on the ground together. He reached out, held her breasts gently as she watched him. Her face looked like Ed’s in the moonlight, ascetic and austere. Then she suddenly smiled, reminding him of Mike in one of his playful moods. She touched his penis, running her thumb lightly over its tip, then grasped him firmly.

  His fear faded. She thrust her hips up, pulled him to her. He thought of the uncertainty he had always felt with Moira, the lonely climaxes. There was no uncertainty with Kira. She was his female self, reaching for him now with the same urgency and impatience he felt. Her hand held him and guided him inside her.

  She drew up her knees and they lay on their sides, facing each other. Still gazing into his own green eyes, he thrust with his hips, ran his hand along her thigh. Her lips parted and he heard a soft sigh. He continued to move and was conscious of her response; she was moaning now, clutching his shoulders tightly. He saw himself as a woman, receiving a man, opening to the hardness that plunged inside her, and knew that she was seeing herself as a man, moving inside the wet and welcoming orifice. They moved together, grinding their hips in perfect rhythm, and he felt the core of his excitement increasing, threatening at any moment to hurl him outside himself for a few timeless seconds.

  This has never happened before. He suddenly realized that as he moved inside her, sighing his responses to her moans. Never before. He saw generation after generation evolve, become more differentiated, genetic structures changing and mutating. He saw millions of men and women seeking mates, trying to find those who would complete them, make them whole again, yet always separated from them by the differences passed on to them by eons of change. He saw Kira and himself, reflections of each other, able to move along their individual paths and yet meet in perfect communication. She was no longer his sister, but his other self, closer to him than a sister could have been, merging with him so completely and perfectly that they were one being.

  He moved with her, breathed with her, sensitive to every movement of her hands on his body. Then he stopped, held his body absolutely still, prepared himself for the final thrust. She was still also, waiting, watching him with wide eyes. Her lips were parted and swollen, the warmth inside her body had grown even more intense.

  At last, unable to bear it any longer, he thrust again, and she moved to meet him, gasping quietly at first, then crying out, shattering the night silence. He felt himself spurt inside her, and he trembled, moving with her, suspended in a pocket of timelessness. He was adrift with her in a universe contained by the skin of their bodies, and he called out as his pleasure compressed itself in his groin, then erupted throughout his body. He cried out again, could no longer tell which cries were his and which were Kira’s.

  Then it was over and he realized with a tinge of sadness how short a time it had actually been. He withdrew from her slowly but remained beside her, resting his head in her arms. He became aware of the sweat that covered their bodies, the warmth of the night. Now he kept his eyes from meeting hers.

  Kira, as if responding to his fears, held him more closely. “Don’t. Jim,” she whispered. “Don’t feel ashamed. I love you. I’ve known it for a while. How could I help it?” She was right, of course, the old codes and ancient prohibitions could not apply to them, had not even allowed for their existence.

  He looked at her face. She lay at his side stroking his hair. It was Paul’s face that watched him, smiling, gently reassuring him with love. He curled up next to her.

  The thunderstorm had passed by morning, leaving behind it cool air and large fluffy clouds. The sun, previously a malevolent eye peering balefully at the earth, was now a friendly presence, occasionally hiding behind one of the white clouds as if ashamed of its former fit of temper. Jim had carried the light plastic chairs off the porch and placed them on top of old newsfax sheets and computer print-outs in the front yard. Aiming his spray can at one, he began to cover it with a surface of gray paint.

  He glanced at Ed and Kira. They had moved two of the three cars out into the road and were washing them down with the hose. Their shorts and shirts were plastered against their bodies. Kira hooted as she aimed the hose at Ed, drenching him completely. He grabbed the hose from her and began to spray her with water. Kira danced on her toes, laughing loudly.

  Jim moved to spray the next chair. He had been trying to accept and understand his new relationship with Kira. He turned it over in his mind, trying to view it objectively: It wasn’t harming them, it affected no one else, it gave him pleasure. It seemed cold and somehow negative to think of it that way.

  “Is it so strange, Jim?” Kira had asked. They were sitting on her bed, legs folded in front of them, elbows on knees, head in hands, perfectly matched. “It would be stranger if we didn’t feel this way, weren’t drawn to each other.”

  He continued to spray the chairs. How do I feel about it? he asked himself. I’m able to reach someone else, able to love and communicate without rejection. He thought of Moira. His love for her had been nervous and feverish, an uneasiness that was always with him occupying his entire mind, refusing to let go. With Kira he was at peace, except for the occasional guilty doubts that nudged him from time to time, then retreated under the onslaught of his rationalizations. With Kira, he could work at his poetry or talk, easily sharing his thoughts and feelings and understanding hers as well.

  Kira and Ed were walking toward the house, leaving the hose on the lawn. They seemed to be discussing something. Ed gestured with his right arm as they climbed the steps to the front porch and disappeared into the house. Jim finished spraying the last chair, then glared at the hose. All the clones had inherited an almost obsessive tidiness from Paul, and he was annoyed that Ed and Kira had not rewound the hose. It was not like them.

  The chairs would need a little time to dry before he moved them back to the porch. He ambled to the front door, depositing the can on the porch, and went inside.

  The house was silent. Al and Mike had gone to the university earlier to do some lab work. Jim wandered through the living room, which was furnished with old overstuffed chairs and sofas. Two learning booths stood in the corner. They resembled large transparent eggs; their screens were blank and their earphones were lying idly on the writing surfaces next to the chairs. Paul had installed two more booths upstairs in the room
he had once used as a study. Few people had that many booths in their homes, but Jim knew that few people used the one booth they usually had, preferring to watch the large vidscreens on their walls. Al had left several print-outs on the writing surface of one booth. He was the “pack rat” of the clones and would gather piles of neatly folded printouts until someone, usually Mike, threw them out. He continued through the living room to the kitchen.

  The kitchen was empty. Jim was surprised, having assumed Kira and Ed had come in for a sandwich. He left the kitchen, went back through the living room and up the stairs, and decided he would ask them if they wanted help with the hose and if they wanted to have some lunch with him. He walked past Ed’s room. The door was open and there was no one inside. He went past Mike’s room, then his own, stopped at Kira’s door.

  It was closed. He knocked, heard the sounds of someone moving in the room. “Kira?” he said. He knocked again, then opened the door.

  Kira and Ed were sprawled on the bed. Both were naked. Ed turned and looked at Jim and appeared startled. Kira seemed calm. “Oh, no,” said Jim. He clenched his hands into fists. “Oh, no.” He felt himself shaking. The twin faces on the bed were watching him.

  He wanted to pound his fist into the wall. He turned and fled down the hall to his own room. He stood there, alone, trying to sort out the thoughts that tumbled through his mind. He heard soft footsteps coming down the hall. They stopped at his door. “Jim.” He did not move. “Jim.” He turned and saw Kira standing in the door, a long red robe draped over her shoulders.

  He gestured at the robe. “Your one concession to modesty,” he said bitterly. She came into the room and closed the door.

  “Why are you so angry, Jim?”

  He turned from her and sat on the chair at his desk. “There’s no reason to be angry,” he muttered. “I found out that we’re interchangeable to you too, that’s all.”

  “No, Jim,” she said softly, leaning against the door. “That’s not what you found out. Do you think for one moment I confuse Ed with you? Forget about yourself for one minute and think about him. He’s just about given up trying to reach out to anyone, including us. He’s so quiet about his problems, it’s easy to pretend he’s just shy or not that interested in people. You know how you felt, how lonely you were, but at least you kept trying with Moira, and you could reach me. Ed gave up trying, and about all you’ve accomplished today is reinforcing the way he feels. Now he’s sitting in my room feeling guilty.”

  Jim looked over at Kira. She was looking at the floor, folding her arms across her chest. “Oh, Jim, I don’t know. Maybe I have my own problems too. Don’t I have a right to solve them, or at least try? Or am I supposed to limit myself to you, or ignore Ed? Has this business really changed anything you might have found out through me?” She sighed. “Maybe it’ll be harder for us, Jim. We have to find our own answers in our own way, and we don’t even have the rough guidelines everybody else has. Some people would look at us and talk about incest taboos, and others would probably find it strange if we loved anyone else but the other clones. The point is, we have to try, and maybe we’ll make mistakes, but . . .”

  She turned and opened the door. “I still love you, Jim, just as much as I did before. Maybe none of us will ever feel the same way about anyone else. Maybe we really can’t, being the way we are, and that means that Ed needs me too, and maybe Al and Mike will if they ever look beyond each other.”

  She left the room but did not close the door. He sat at the desk trying to sort out his thoughts. He considered himself and the other clones, turned over their problems and relationships in his mind, and wondered what he should do now.

  He was with Kira, hands on her belly. She looked up at him as he hovered over her, guided his hand between her legs. He felt her wetness with his finger, moved forward and embraced her, embraced himself, and sighed as they merged.

  Jim lifted the suitcase and put it in the back seat of the car. Al leaned against the open car door. “We’ll miss you,” he said.

  “I won’t be gone long,” he replied. He turned to Kira. Her brow was wrinkled with worry. He reached over to her, grasped her shoulders. “Come on, cheer up,” he said. “I’ll be back in a month or so. I’m not running away. I know what I’m doing, and I know why.”

  She smiled at him tentatively, and he kissed her lightly on the forehead. Then he climbed into the car, waving his arm at the porch where Ed and Mike sat.

  He had explained himself to them as best he could, and he was satisfied that they understood him as well as could be expected. He would drive up to Moira’s home first. He would not make demands of her, would not force himself on her. He would not give up if she drew away from him. He would leave and go to a poetry workshop in Minnesota he had heard about, meet people there, be like anyone else.

  Kira had come to his room the night before. They lay on his bed, arms and legs entwined, as he told her about his hopes and his plans.

  It would be easy to stay with Kira, easy to give up on other people. He would not let himself do it yet, not until he had tried and failed many times.

  He started the car and drove away from the house slowly. When he got to the end of the narrow road, he turned his head and saw Kira and Al walking to the front porch. Suddenly he felt doubtful about his actions, wondered if he should leave, asked himself if he really wanted to go.

  He continued to drive until the house was out of sight and he was on the road leading to the automated highway. He thought of Kira again, saw her head resting on his shoulder, and wondered if he were making a mistake. Will I love anyone else as completely? The image of Kira faded from his mind. She had given him as many questions as answers.

  The world out there was just as worthy of his attention as his own personal problems. It was a world very different from the sheltered enclave of the university, a world of neatly organized cities inside pyramids and under domes, and disorganized cities that sprawled across the landscape. It was a world of people who looked beyond the earth to the stars, and people who sought to preserve old customs and ancient ways. It was a world of abundance for many and starvation for some, of green and fertile reclaimed wildernesses and eroded deserts. It was time that he tried to understand his own place in this world.

  He drove the car onto the bypass, punched out his destination, and leaned back as the highway control took over, guided his car around the curved bypass, and shot him forward into the stream of cars on the highway.

  JOHN’S OTHER LIFE

  Joe Haldeman

  Remember, John. He stole the bicycle.

  I know, I know. Cant think with that light flashing in my eyes, though.

  It’s only there to help, John. You know that.

  (He stole the bicycle.) Cant you turn it down a little? (He was running away.)

  (That’s right.) There. (Continue the story.)

  In spite of the light gravity of Farbis, Jon was breathing hard by the time he reached the inn at the top of the hill. He pulled the bicycle into the grassy court fronting the inn and leaned it up against a shade tree. Pressing sweat from his face with both hands, Jon heard children laughing. Across the road was a scene that had become familiar.

  On Farbis they used even the children’s play to advantage. Across from the inn was a playground with rough-hewn swings and go-rounds and teeter-totters. Each of them, by means of wooden peg-gears and pulleys, supplied power to a shaft that led to a small millbox. It was all old, gray, weathered wood, and made a comfortable creaking and clacking. The older children took turns keeping the millboxes supplied with grain. At dusk a wagon would come by and take the meal thus ground to a public granary.

  Jon, an atypically tall and coal-black native of Nurhodesia, had been on too many planets to be terribly impressed by the alien rustic feel of Farbis. But in the past month he had come to enjoy the leisurely pace, the good natural food, sweet air, low-industrial quiet . . . and even the knee-jerk amiability that often got in the way of his work.

  Becaus
e Jon came here to make enemies.

  (You came here to cure yourself.)

  “Welcome, brother.” The innkeeper swept hair back with a meaty hand. “You’re an offworlder, no?”

  “I am an offworlder, yes,” Jon mocked him. “Beer.”

  The bartender filled a large cup with warm brown beer, decanted foam and refilled. As he passed the cup to Jon, he opened his mouth to speak, then caught Jon’s expression and merely smiled.

  Jon took the cup and laid a square brass penning on the rough bar, knowing it wasn’t enough. He turned and carried the brew to the farthest corner of the room.

  “Uh . . . thank’ee, stranger.” Jon sat without responding, his back to the wall. He sipped the beer and waited.

  He had drunk half the cup when three men hurried into the place; two stood by the door while the largest went over to whisper with the innkeeper. After a minute he walked over to Jon’s table and stood facing him, flanked by the two others. He had a stout leather-wrapped club and looked quite angry enough to use it.

  “I am Fels Larsen, elected sergeant of this town. This man,” he gestured with the club, “Rudy Strauss, claims you stole his twowheeler. Indeed, people saw you ride it up to this inn, and it’s standing outside right now. If you can’t explain, I’m taking you to town hall for trial.”

  “Oh, was that Mr. Strauss’s bicycle?” Jon looked mildly from the sergeant to Strauss; both understood the foreign word. “On my world, such things are considered public property if they are not locked up. I was tired of walking, so I took it.

  “I’ll be glad to have trial with Mr. Strauss over his bicycle,” he said, drawing his dueling stiletto from its boot sheath, “but I don’t see why we have to go all the way to the town hall. We can have trial right here. Or on the street, if the innkeeper objects.”