"Mmm, yes, I suppose you would be." Chandler grinned suddenly, and the fierceness came back sharply. "I'm not looking for a father confessor, thank you, not from a man a third my age. Ready for dinner?"
"Yes."
"For the record, young man, I did--largely--invite you to dinner so that I wouldn't seem too forward with Miss McConnell." Chandler spoke briefly to the waitbot at the tableside, and the 'bot glided away. "A concession to the morals of another time, perhaps. Nonetheless, you're welcome in your own right. I have wanted to talk to you, though. Carl, when you get to be as old as I am, the opportunity to talk to someone with a truly new perspective is not something you pass up. My god, do you know how long it's been since I've heard an original question? To say nothing of answers."
Carl laughed aloud. "You're probably talking to the wrong person." He stood abruptly, went over to the windows and looked out at the city again. "This is really stunning...I don't have any answers, Frank. I'm just this guy who got stuck with a talent I didn't ask for. You want the Great Truth about Humanity? Most people are pretty decent. They try to be nice guys but they're too lazy or sometimes too tired and they do things they feel sorry for later. A lot of people, most of those who ever make it into a position of power in the real world, are basically pricks. A huge number of them are sociopaths. A fairly small number--and fortunately for us all, a disproportionately large number of these end up in power also--are kind, decent, just people who are also very, very tough. Also," he said without pausing, "if you invite Jany to dinner alone, she'll come, but she'll almost certainly turn you down if you proposition her."
"Dinner is served. You're wrong, you know, about not having answers." Carl turned away from the window and the incredible panorama. Chandler was sitting at the stone table; a gentle spotlight shone down over the tableau. "I've often thought that what you say might be true; in terms of what people are like, and in what numbers--but I didn't know. You do know," he said softly. "You do."
Carl returned to the table, sank into the furs before it and twisted his legs easily into lotus. "Maybe not knowing would be better. I think so sometimes." He glanced down at the dishes on the table. His plate held Veal la Luna in a thick, pale blue whipped semi-sweet sauce, with blueberries sprinkled over it. Hot bread and butter and a small serving of green salad were placed next to it. Chandler was dining on what looked like broiled chicken breast. Carl took a bite of the room temperature veal and nodded in appreciation. Veal la Luna was an unlikely dish, but it worked for some; the flavors of the false Lunar veal contrasted well enough with the blueberries and cream that in some circles it was considered a delicacy. "Thank you. This is quite good. Not what your diet is generally thought to consist of."
If the man had not been physically incapable of it, Carl suspected that Chandler might have blushed. He did laugh. "Ah, yes. That's reputation, mostly. I try to keep up appearances. Unfortunately, my doctors haven't let me eat that sort of thing since my eightieth birthday. My private doctor--he's died since--told me that I wouldn't live to see my eighty-first birthday if I kept ingesting drugs and fats and sugars in the proportions I was used to. I wasn't hard to convince; I felt horrible. I'm in better shape today than I've been in, oh, twenty years. Since I turned sixty-five, at least. Why do you think Jany would turn me down? She's behaved graciously--" he hesitated "--as though she were interested, when I've spoken with her."
Carl tore a hot chunk of bread from the loaf beside him. "She is. Interested, I mean, in you as a person. She was the worst spook you ever saw; the Peaceforcers almost never used her, even when she was the only telepath they had except me. She understands people quite well, but she can't help empathizing with all but the sociopaths. Sitting across the table from you, she'd be fine. As I am. But Frank, if I touched you, it would hurt me. If I made love to you, not that I would, I'd probably have nightmares for a month. That sort of closeness...it's hard. It's hard even with those rare humans who have relatively clean consciences. The least bit of guilt, God, a telepath might as well get out a knife and start carving. The pain would be less and it'd heal faster."
"I knew you would be fascinating."
"Thank you." Carl ate in silence then, digging into the false veal with gusto.
Chandler ate absently. "Carl, men who don't feel guilt--I don't mean sociopaths--are there people like that?"
A voice announced out of nowhere, "There is a call for Carl Castanaveras."
Carl half twisted in his seat, scanning the room. "I'll take it." He did not see what he was looking for. "I'm sorry, sir, where are your holocams?"
"There are none," said Chandler. "This is my home, son. I don't want people looking into it."
"Oh." Carl raised his voice. "Command, accept call." He paused. "Hello?"
A holograph flared into existence, immediately to his right. He turned to face it; Jany McConnell.
"Carl?" He heard the tension in her voice.
"I'm sorry, Jany, there are no holocams here. What is it?"
"Can you come home?"
"What's wrong?"
"We have a problem here, Carl. Can you come home quickly?"
"Jany, I'm here with Mister Chandler. You can talk."
"Trent's not a telepath."
"What?"
"Trent's not one of us."
"What?" Carl could not remember coming to his feet.
"Oh, God, Carl, he hasn't talked to anybody in hours. He won't talk to us. I--" She took a deep breath, and Carl saw that she had been crying. "I went inside him once. I can't do that again."
"I'll be there as soon as I can. Hang tight. Command, comm off." Carl turned to Chandler. "I'm sorry, sir. I have to go home. Thank you for the dinner."
Chandler was up already, escorting Carl to the front door. "I understand, certainly. Can I help? I can have my man drive you home. He's a Class A operator; he'll get you home quickly."
"Haven't talked to Tony Angelo lately, have you?" asked Carl at the door.
The question obviously meant nothing to Chandler. "No, I've not. Why?"
"No reason. I'll take the MetalSmith home, thanks. It's pretty fast."
Chandler smiled at that. "So it is. Drive carefully."
"Thank you for dinner."
"Thank you, young man. Take care."
Carl left him there, the wealthiest and one of the most powerful men on Earth, standing alone and almost forlorn in his doorway.
He ran to his car.
The Complex was quieter than Carl had ever seen it. He parked the MetalSmith in the garage, next to the cherry-red Lamborghini Andy had finally purchased for himself. The sound of the MetalSmith's gyros, spinning down, was the loudest noise he heard all through the Complex. He passed children in the halls on his way up to the small office from which they conducted what business was conducted at the Complex; none of the children spoke to him.
Jany and Doctor Montignet, Malko and Andy and Willi and Johann were talking when Carl entered; they broke off at his appearance. He spoke to Doctor Montignet. "What's wrong with him?"
"There's nothing wrong with him," she said with a trace of asperity. "He's a perfectly healthy young boy, and more or less normal except perhaps for being a bit too bright for his own good. We didn't assemble our genies from genejunk. His third and eighth gene complexes are unique to your people; he's that much like you. His seventeenth gene complex, the third gene you all have in common, is completely different. Eye color is located in that strand of DNA, and quite obviously, so is some key portion of the telepathic ability. I suspect some degree of temperament is also; he's considerably calmer, and has a rather better sense of humor, than most of the children. I haven't had the opportunity to compare the rest of his gene structure at the detail level, but I'm fairly certain there aren't any major flaws in the genome. Our donors were quality genetic material."
Carl stood silently through the explanation. "Thank you. What does he think is wrong with him?"
"It's fairly obvious, surely?" When she saw it was not, she explained.
"Carl, his identity, his sense of who he is and what he's worth, is based on being one of the Castanaveras telepaths. That's been taken away from him. He doesn't know who he is, right now." Her smile seemed genuine. "Though I think he'll find out quickly. He's quite a remarkable eleven-year-old."
"How did he find out?"
"He can't see infrared light. He learned that when the Peaceforcers returned the children and everyone else did. When I examined him yesterday, I found that he had pubic hair and that his testicles were functional." She shrugged. "I took a blood sample with me when I went home last night. Genetic analysis takes a while; I called in to my systerm earlier this afternoon and had it check to see if the tests were done. They were. Trent's not a telepath. He's not going to be."
Carl found his mouth dry. "Where is he? In his room?"
"In the park," said Malko. It was all he had said since Carl entered the conference room. "Somewhere. I can't find him."
Carl left the lighted tunnel and went out into the dusk. Night was falling as he entered the grounds, and the huge transplanted trees the garden was designed around were heavy with shadow. He reached with the Sight and was stunned by how strongly the grief struck him. The boy sat high in the branches of the tallest tree in the park, watching the sunset. The sky was clear that night, and it was very cold.
Carl spoke without sound. Trent, come down.
There was a visible flicker of movement at the top of the tree, and a rustling sound as leaves were displaced. Trent vanished into the denser growth around the center of the tree, and while Carl was still looking up, appeared in the lower branches, paused, hung by his hands, and dropped two meters to the ground. He landed crouching, and straightened slowly. "Hi."
Carl blinked. "Hi." Trent was barefoot, wearing old jeans and a green shirt that could not possibly be keeping him warm. Carl felt almost alien in comparison; he was still dressed formally, in the black suit, and the blue-inlaid black cloak for warmth. He gestured back toward the lighted Complex. "I was just in with Suzanne. She said--"
Trent nodded. "Yes."
"I'm sorry, Trent. I...don't know what else to say."
"Me too." Trent paused. "Me neither. This has been such a bad day," he said conversationally. "I can't believe it."
Now, standing there faced with the boy, Carl had difficulty finding words. "How can I help?"
"I've been thinking about that." Trent shivered, perhaps from the cold. "I have to leave."
"I don't understand."
"I have to leave here. Doctor Montignet will take me, I think."
"Leave?" said Carl stupidly. "The Complex?"
Trent said simply, "Yes."
"Why?"
"I'm not a telepath. I don't want to live with telepaths." In the darkness Carl was not certain of his expression. "I can't."
"Trent, why?"
Trent said slowly, "Father...I think the day will come when you--when telepaths--will be normal, and the rest of us will be out in the cold because we can't compete. You're better than we are." He averted his face and did not look at Carl. With a sort of amazement Carl saw a smile touch his lips. The almost insane grief never ceased for an instant, and the boy made his lips move in a smile. "For most people it's going to be a while before that happens--you don't breed that fast." The smile faded. "But if I stay here that happens to me now." He turned and looked straight at Carl, eyes pooled in shadow. "I've been webdancing across the water, in Capital City's InfoNet. They don't touch me, you know. When I get an inskin, I don't think there's anybody on Earth who can touch me." Trent gestured toward the Complex, partially visible above the fence around the park, looming white under its floodlights. "If I stay here I'm nothing. I love you all but I will not choose to be nothing."
Carl shook his head slowly. "Trent, that's crazy. Malko lives here with us."
"Malko has experience and knowledge and connections that make him valuable." The boy shrugged. "I'm a Pla--a webdancer. Father, there are lots of webdancers."
It stunned Carl, how helpless an eleven-year old boy could make him feel. He touched the boy with his mind and went reeling back again from the numbing hurt. He reached with one hand toward the boy and was startled to see Trent draw back.
Trent said flatly, "Don't touch me."
Carl stared at him. He said helplessly, "Trent?"
"I don't belong here." Carl was shaking his head no, not in negation but in pained disbelief, and Trent said softly, "Let me go."
And Carl Castanaveras, for a brief, time-wrenching moment, saw the future twisting itself about the boy, heard his voice say with the hollow echo of prophecy, "I think you are right. You do not belong here. I think you will never belong anywhere."
Trent packed, alone in his room.
The next morning Suzanne Montignet would take him from the Complex, and he would go to live with her, away from his friends, away from Carl, and away from Jany. To live without Willi or Ary or Heather.
To live without David, who was his best and finest friend, and without Denice, whom he loved as truly as he knew how.
He moved through his room like an automaton, occupying his mind with the task of choosing what to take and what to leave. Of all his computer equipment, he took only his Image coprocessor and traceset. Doctor Montignet would have the rest of what he needed; he knew, better than anyone else in the Complex, what the inskin at her temple meant.
Johnny had come up with a suitcase for him; not large, but Trent did not own much, after all.
He would travel light.
Carl sat alone in the center of the big bed. He was not sure where Jany was; with the children, probably. Many of them were having nightmares.
He knew how they felt. He was himself.
He sank back on the bed, lying flat on his back, and drank smoke whiskey until he could no longer feel the pain eating away at him from the outside.
And, after a while, from the inside as well.
Incredibly drunk, as drunk as he had ever been and managed to stay conscious, at the end Carl found himself weeping helplessly, without reserve, crying alone in his room, crying for the first time since Shana de Nostri's death.
Trent looked at the sunglasses on his bureau dresser. There were eight pairs, two of which fit him. The other six pair were sized for adults. Gifts, from Denice. Every time one of the elders took her shopping in the city, she bought him sunglasses. He'd lost several pairs that had fit to the other children, and only the two pair were left.
He had been staring at them blankly for longer than he could remember. He picked up all eight pairs and dropped them into his suitcase. There was room. Without hurry he made his way to the bathroom and threw up for the third time that night. Dry heaves; there was nothing left in his stomach.
He rinsed his mouth and returned to the bedroom, and examined his suitcase. He caught sight of himself in the mirror and was not surprised at how calm he looked. He smiled at himself.
It was easy.
Malko, Suzanne, and Johnny spent the night in Malko Kalharri's bedroom, talking. Johnny could not sleep, and Malko and Suzanne were disinclined. Every now and then Johnny would wince visibly; he had Malko worried. For hours he could not even sit down for any stretch of time. They talked of politics, of the fiscal status of Kalharri Ltd.; Johnny told them about the Lamborghini Andy had bought, and how he was tempted to get something like it for himself. He froze once in mid-sentence and shuddered all over.
Malko watched him in silence for a moment, then asked, "How bad is it?"
"It's not good." When the shakes ceased, Johnny rose from the chair he'd been sitting in and moved restlessly across the room, pacing like a caged animal. "God, it feels like he's dying."
Suzanne Montignet brushed a strand of hair away from her eyes with an impatient motion. "Yes. It would."
"What?"
"He is."
Trent found himself standing motionlessly in the middle of the room. He tried to remember if there were anything in particular he should be doing at this point. No, he d
ecided later, probably there was not. His legs shook; how long had it been since he'd moved?
An hour?
He let himself drop to the floor, so swiftly it might have been a collapse had the movement not been so graceful.
He moved into lotus and began breathing deeply and evenly.
His eyes closed only once, and Trent opened them again immediately.
Trent prepared to outwait the night.
Mandy Castanaveras bolted upright in the darkness, tears streaming down her cheeks. It was dark and she was alone, terrifyingly alone, and then Jany was there and Jany was holding her, and she clung sobbing to the older woman as though she were the only stable thing in the world. "I had a dream, Jany, and--" She could not finish the sentence, and buried her head in Jany's shoulder. I was so scared. After a time the tears ceased coming, and she whispered, It's not a dream, is it?
No, Jany murmured, it's not.
Something hurts.
I know.
* * *
7.
In the Quad at the center of the Complex, was a garden.
From the streets outside the Complex one would never have guessed at its existence. The Complex was two stories high, two stories of glowing monocrystal, and the tallest of the ash trees in the garden did not yet reach so high.
A row of suites, which the children had converted into bedrooms for themselves, faced inward onto the garden; on the level above, balconies ringed it, looking out over the loveliness. Because of the architectural layout, sunlight did not reach the garden except at high noon; sunlamps ringed the walls surrounding the garden. They glowed during the mornings and evenings; during the winter they'd been kept on all day.
Near one corner of the garden was a small spring, large enough for three or four adults to swim in at once. It flowed over into a brook that ran swiftly through the center of the garden, and disappeared underground at the far end. Clover and grass underlaid everything; violets and orchids and roses grew in wild, untended abandon. Genegineered perennial cherry trees grew among the ash, and the leaves of their blossoms fluttered in the breeze.
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