The Sopaths

by Piers Anthony

  In fact it occurred to Abner that this could be a prime reason he had been selected for the position. He and his new family were a living example of how well it could work. They were a model family, Pariah style.

  They returned to the camper that evening. “Several people snooped around,” Nefer reported. “But nobody tried to get inside.”

  That was just as well. They did not expect any suspicious behavior in the towns they visited, but had to remain alert. They would continue the watch roster at night. A Pariah organizer could be distrusted by outsiders.

  “We seem to have had a successful contact,” Bunty reported. “May it continue.”

  “So that no one will suspect the real mission,” Nefer said.

  “Exactly. We’ll need to get you involved, to be sure no sopaths have infiltrated any of the chapters. The children say you can spot them more readily than they can.”

  “But I have to be hidden.”

  “Yes,” Abner agreed. “But when we get well away from our home town, the chances of anyone knowing you will become remote. Your clothing, wig, and attitude further conceal you. I believe you can pose as a very shy friend of the children.”

  “Me, shy,” she agreed, smiling. Shyness was a function of caring what others thought of a person, and sopaths didn’t care, and weren’t shy or reticent, as Nefer’s references to wanting sex with him showed. Sopaths were unusually candid. Not because they had any reservations about lying, but because they didn’t understand the concept of shocking others. They lied only to gain an advantage or protect themselves, never for social status.

  In fact it occurred to him that Nefer was an ongoing lesson in the nature of the enemy, and as such was invaluable.

  They kept Nefer out of sight while in the next two towns, but when they were far enough distant they had her substitute for Dreda, who kept watch behind. They were a family of four, and it was easy for Nefer to emulate the fourth. It seemed to work well enough. They helped set up a local church, and demonstrated a choir, and Nefer’s evocative voice was persuasive.

  “You’re such a pretty child,” a woman said appreciatively. “Do you really like your new family?”

  “I adore them,” Nefer replied shyly. “They really helped me after I lost my own family.” Which was technically true, though she would readily have lied as persuasively had she needed to. So, for that matter, would have Clark and Dreda.

  “You can make up similar temporary families,” Abner reminded them. “If they don’t work out, you can exchange members. Remember, every member of Pariah has had a similarly horrible experience, and will understand.”

  They wrapped up in good order, leaving behind another grateful Pariah chapter. When Abner called in to make his report, he was informed that prior chapters had spoken very well of him and his family. He was a success as an organizer.

  “They’re so naïve,” Nefer remarked after her first such contact. “They don’t question your family at all, really.”

  “And it is to safeguard us from similar unconscious naiveté that we have you along,” Abner said. “If there are sopaths among them, we need to know, without alerting them that we know.”

  “I’ll do anything you want, including that,” she agreed, with a little flirt of her hip, a gesture she had picked up from Bunty. Abner reflected again how dangerously fascinating she would have been had she had an adult body.

  As they traveled farther away, they started behaving more like a family of five, since no one knew of their origin. No one seemed to notice. They were a common-law married couple with three common-law children. Pariahs knew how it was, especially when Abner recommended that they form similar families to facilitate care of their orphaned children without social assistance from the larger normal communities. Because of course those communities tended to discriminate against Pariahs, leaving them to their own resources.

  Then it happened. After a routine organizational session in a new town, Nefer spoke. “One of those children was a sopath.”

  “The leader’s boy,” Dreda agreed immediately. “He’s going to rape some girl.”

  “The pretty little redhead,” Clark said. “I saw him eying her.”

  “I wondered,” Bunty said. “He reminded me of mine. I thought it was just a physical resemblance.”

  Yet Abner had not picked up on it. His sopath had been a girl. But he suspected it was more than that: the women and children of any age were more sensitive to the personal nuances, perhaps because they had more to fear from sopaths. Abner had been busy making his presentation, so really had not been looking; maybe he would have picked up on it otherwise. Yet the local Pariahs had been deceived, so it was more than merely gender or age. Abner’s whole family was more attuned, especially the girls.

  Abner put it into his daily report to Pariah, identifying the family and the boy. Pariah would handle it, probably by officially ignoring it. But they would be aware, and no really private information would go to that group, unless it was something they wanted sopaths to know.

  It confirmed that sopaths could and did infiltrate Pariah groups without their knowledge. That could be mischief.

  “Probably he’s just hiding, to keep a good family,” Clark said. “Stupid sopaths wreck things. Smart ones hide.”

  “Exactly,” Nefer said, smiling at him. And Abner suffered another quiet shock: the boy tried to mute his reaction, but her smile had the impact of a kiss. Clark was beginning to like Nefer, despite knowing her nature.

  Bunty had picked up on it too, as she murmured later that evening. “She’s openly courting you, knowing we see it as futile. But she’s not ignoring Clark. If she ever really wants something from him, she’ll get it.”

  “By seducing him,” Abner agreed morosely.

  “We may once have thought that children have no interest in romance or sex. Now we know better, at least where sopaths are concerned. I don’t think we can prevent it except by banishing her from the family. Do we even want to?”

  “You mean, let her seduce him?”

  “It would probably amount to no more than intimate peeks and feels. Hand on penis, finger in vagina. I did it as a child, and surely you did too. It’s part of normal childhood curiosity, learning about the naughty parts. Maybe kisses. Pretending that she cares. That’s how she gets her way with boys when she trades for information. She’ll be doing that foraging for us, when we need her to. We know her nature; why not let her exercise it in positive ways?”

  “But they’re children!”

  “We were speaking of naiveté.”

  She was right. He was being naïve. If Nefer was going to seduce anyone, Clark was probably better than Abner himself. “Maybe our best course is to give her reason to keep it positive. To support the family, though I’m not sure how.”

  “If another sopath girl tried to seduce Clark, that could be lethal. Nefer could distract him from that worse threat.”

  “Maybe so,” he agreed reluctantly. “Because Nefer probably won’t hurt him. She’s just shoring up her base.”

  “True.”

  They let it rest there, but Abner remained uneasy. They really did have a savage animal in their midst, behaving for now, but if that changed it could get extremely ugly in a hurry.

  After a month on the road, during which they thoroughly polished their technique and identity as organizers, they came to the twin towns of Sweetpea and Sauerkraut. Abner felt an anticipatory chill, and knew the others did too.

  “Remember,” Abner said. “Officially we are nothing more than an organization advice group. Participate, observe, and do not react if you see something relevant. They may be testing us.”

  “Is there danger?” Clark asked, interested.

  “There may be. Stay close to Bunty and me; don’t get separated from us.”

  “But we doubt there’s real physical danger,” Bunty said reassuringly. “More likely we just won’t find what we’re looking for.”

  “What about bugs?” Nefer asked.

  “Go
od question,” Abner said, and saw her flush with pleasure. “If there is something going on, they could have mikes and cameras concealed everywhere. So from the time we enter either of those towns, assume someone is spying on us. Act normal. If you identify a sopath, ignore it until we’re out of there.”

  “That’s too late,” Nefer said. “You need to be warned while it’s happening.”

  He sighed. “Right again. Okay, let’s set up a code. What can it be?”

  “If we call you father and mother, instead of daddy and mommy,” Dreda said enthusiastically.

  “And whatever we say next will be a lie,” Clark said.

  “I’ll do it too,” Nefer said. “I’ll call you father and mother.” She smiled almost wistfully. “I’d almost mean it. I like being with you, and not just because I want to get hold of Abner’s penis.”

  “Daughters generally don’t want to get hold of their father’s penises,” Abner said.

  Now there was nothing wistful about her smile. “You think? If you could read Dreda’s mind, would it be there?”

  Dreda blushed. She was only five years old, but she knew. She must have had thoughts, and Nefer had picked up on them.

  Abner exchanged a glance with Bunty. Nefer had set them back again. How many girls had Electra complexes to outgrow? How many boys similarly had Oedipus complexes? Did they really outgrow them, when so many married partners who resembled their opposite-gender parents? It was a sobering notion.

  “So we have the code,” Bunty said firmly. “No need to discuss it further.”

  Could that work? It was so simplistic as to be idiotic, but that might enable it to pass below the radar. “Okay.”

  “And I will call you Abner,” Bunty said. “Instead of ‘dear.’ You can call me Bunty, similarly.”

  “We seem to have it,” Abner agreed, bemused.

  They reached Sweetpea in midafternoon and drove into a convenient motel. But when Abner sought to register at the front office, the clerk shook his head. “You are the Pariah organizer,” he said. “There are better accommodations awaiting you at the Sweetpea Hotel.”

  “Oh, we don’t seek anything special,” Abner said, taken aback. Normally they were anonymous despite being open about his name, Abner Slate, because few in the larger community paid much attention to Pariahs, and generally avoided them anyway. “We can’t afford anything fancy.”

  “The cost is covered by the town,” the clerk assured him. “We want you to feel welcome here.”

  Abner distrusted this, but didn’t want to make an issue. “Then we will gratefully accept, hoping it is not a case of misplaced identification. We’re really pretty ordinary folk.” What a whopper!

  Soon enough they were ensconced in a luxurious suite complete with hot tub; kitchenette stocked with wine, beer, crackers, and chocolate milk; and a television in all five rooms. The children plunged into the hot tub while Abner and Bunty showered and changed. “It does seem like mistaken identity,” Bunty murmured. “Somehow they got the notion that we’re important.”

  “I hope there isn’t a horrendous bill when they discover otherwise.” They were being careful to be completely normal in their mild confusion, because if there was a reason for this treatment, it might be that the local authorities had caught on to their real mission. There was no sign of any electronic spying devices, but of course there wouldn’t be.

  In due course they all dried and changed into their good clothing, ready to contact the local Pariah chapter. Nefer was one of the children, perfectly emulating the excitement of the other two. None of them said anything important.

  The phone rang. Abner answered it. “Mr. Slate, this is Mayor Jonathan Jones of Sweetpea Pariah. May we come to your suite to talk with you?”

  “By all means!” Abner said warmly. “Maybe you can explain why we are being treated so much better than we deserve.”

  The man laughed. “Perhaps. Fifteen minutes?”

  “Sure.”

  “If you need to use the bathroom, do it now,” Abner told the children sternly. “We don’t want to be fidgeting when company comes.”

  “We won’t fidget,” Dreda promised.

  “Much,” Clark said. “We’d rather watch that adult channel.”

  “No,” Bunty said firmly. It was all part of their act for the cameras. The children were as curious as the adults were about this unusual treatment.

  Jonathan Jones arrived promptly and was ushered in to the audience chamber. He was a large, bluff man with an ingratiating smile, a typical politician. Abner disliked him on sight, but suppressed his reaction as unreasonable.

  Jones got straight to the point. “I instituted a local Pariah chapter because the sopath question is serious and we want it competently handled. We have no native sopaths here, but we do have survivors who fled from our neighbor town Sauerkraut. They can certainly use your help, and you will be meeting them soon. But I have a private concern.”

  “We will keep your secret,” Abner said with a smile.

  Jones did not smile in return. “I said private.” He glanced meaningfully at the children.

  “Our children are part of our family,” Abner said. “They are survivors. They have experienced the worst. We do not hide things from them.”

  “You are unusual.”

  “We are united.”

  Jones looked uncomfortable, but proceeded. “I assume that your itinerary will take you next to Sauerkraut.”

  “It does,” Abner agreed.

  “Do not go there. It may be dangerous for you.”

  Well, now. “How so?”

  “They have many sopaths there. In fact they pretty well run things. They desire to remain anonymous. If your visit threatens to compromise that anonymity, they would hardly hesitate to kill all of you.”

  Bunty made a sharp intake of breath, and the children began to cry. All part of the act. They knew that sopaths were dangerous, especially when challenged.

  “I did request privacy,” Jones reminded him. The man saw his caution vindicated.

  “But we mean neither you nor them any harm,” Abner protested. “All we want to do is help their local Pariah chapter get organized.”

  “Please do not play cute with me, Mr. Slate. You want to know what’s going on there. They can’t afford to be exposed. Unless you can convince them, or allow me to convince them, that you do not intend to report to Pariah, entering Sauerkraut would be suicide. I will answer any questions you have, to the best of my ability, on the condition that our situation is not publicized.”

  “You are protecting the privacy of sopaths?” Abner asked.

  “We have an understanding, and get along well with them. In fact, we handle the connections to the outside world, as they lack responsible adults. In return they provide labor and other services.”

  “Services?” Bunty asked, frowning.

  “Maid services, mainly, by their teens. Sauerkraut has some older ones, but younger ones participate too.”

  “Sopaths?”

  “They work for pay, just as others do.”

  “Others call it prostitution,” Bunty said. “Just how old and young do they come?” Because of course the maids had to be underage. That didn’t bother sopaths, but should have bothered the employers.

  Jones spread his hands, embarrassed. He glanced at the children, but they did not move and neither Abner nor Bunty yielded. “Our children know about sopath sex,” Abner said.

  Jones shrugged and continued. “They are generally uneducated, and proffer what they can. Some are, um, aesthetic. There is a market. We do not inquire about the details.”

  “We are beginning to appreciate why you don’t want your association of towns publicized,” Abner said dryly.

  “We are dealing with sopaths,” Jones repeated. “They are not ordinary folk. We relate in what ways are feasible. It is mutually beneficial.”

  Abner was growing increasingly annoyed. The man was a stuffed shirt, covering for a reprehensible trade in young flesh. But t
here was no point in trying to make an issue. They were indeed sopaths, who had to be dealt with on their own terms, or killed.

  “If I may,” Bunty interposed, flashing a smile to melt the hardest heart. She was good at that. “We have a policy of not prying into sopath details either. But I am curious how you as mayor could have been victimized by a sopath.”

  Jones grimaced. “No secret. My son was an incorrigible brat. I thought he would grow out of it. I did not know about sopaths then.”

  “We, too,” Bunty said. “My son burned down our house.”

  “We were driving to a key meeting. He refused to remain in the child harness. I rebuked him, then spanked him when he sassed me. I thought that would be the end of it, but when I resumed driving, he tore loose and attacked me. It was like having a vicious wild animal in my lap. I lost control of the car and we crashed. The boy was killed. So was my wife.” He shook his head. “Then I learned about sopaths, thanks to Pariah. I hate them all.” He took a breath. “But there are practical considerations, and the sopaths of Sauerkraut are disciplined and useful. As long as they remain that way, we tolerate them. In fact we do not need the participation of the national Pariah. We did not invite you here.”

  So the lavish welcome was indeed a way to try to buy them off, so they would depart without prying further.

  “Nevertheless we of the national Pariah are dealing with sopaths too,” Abner said. “We do understand. We are not here to expose titillating interactions. We want to tackle the larger picture, the very existence of sopaths, hoping to find a way to stop further sopath births. We will depart without awkwardness if you can clarify certain questions, so as to make further exploration unnecessary.”

  “Ask,” Jones said tightly.

  “How do you arrange to have no sopaths born in Sweetpea?”

  “I can’t answer that.”

  “Can’t, or won’t?”