by Peter David
“Witnesses claim the suspect—this giant—fell off the overpass onto a produce truck,” said George briskly. “I’m compiling a list of all food transport companies that route through Little Tencton.”
Sikes nodded. “I was just about to suggest we do that.”
George “harrumphed” noncommittally as Sikes sat down at his desk. Matt was pleased to see that, this morning at least, there was no sign of weasels—dunkable, jelly-filled, or otherwise. “How’d it go last night?” he prompted.
George did not respond, studying the computer with far greater intensity than was remotely required. This, in and of itself, was pretty much an answer to Sikes’s question. But he did not let up, because for once, he had the upper hand in a conversation with the knowledgeable, and sometimes self-satisfied, Francisco.
“Did you tell Susan about Albert and May?”
Finally George glanced up, “Yes. I did.” He went back to his work.
When no further reply was forthcoming, Sikes said impatiently, “And . . . ?”
George took a deep breath. Immediately Matt knew that he was lying. George didn’t realize it, but every time he told any sort of lie, he always took extra air into his lungs, as if a lie was far more difficult for him to speak. He looked up gamely, unaware that grave doubts had already been cast on his next words. “Sorry to disappoint you, but she wholeheartedly approved.”
Sikes sat back, putting his hand against his cheek in mock surprise, à la Jack Benny. “No kidding . . .”
In a wildly transparent move to change the subject, George said, “How’d it go with Cathy? Have you seen her since . . . your slippage?”
“Saw her last night, as a matter of fact,” Sikes said easily. Now he, on the other hand, considered himself to be a consummate liar.
Francisco looked at him from side to side. “No new bruises. I guess you’ve had to exercise some restraint.”
Studying his fingernails in as nonchalant a manner as possible, Sikes said, “Sorry to disappoint you, but we were hot and heavy last night.”
Now George was as skeptical as Sikes had been moments ago. “And you lived to tell about it?”
“Yeah. No big. Cathy just needed to get used to . . .” He paused dramatically. “. . . the human touch.”
Mimicking Matt’s Bennyesque approach, George put his hand to his face. “You mean you ‘went all the way’? ‘Got lucky’ to use your copulation euphemisms.”
“Luck had nothing to do with it,” said Sikes. “Y’know, George, the way you’re talking, we should really be discussing this over malteds down at the soda shop.”
“Hi, George. Matt.”
The voice that came from behind them froze Matt’s blood. It also froze his smile, as he turned and said, “Hi, Cathy.”
As opposed to the soft, approachable Newcomer he’d seen just last night, today Cathy looked dressed for business. She was carrying a black medical bag. It took the flustered Sikes a moment to remember that her showing up here was, in fact, at his request. Unfortunately, since he didn’t have the brains of a chicken (he decided), he hadn’t thought far enough ahead to anticipate that his remarks to George might get crossed up by Cathy.
He stood quickly, putting an arm around her shoulder and steering her in the direction of the nursery. “She’s, uh, gonna take a look at the baby,” he explained quickly to George while keeping Cathy moving.
“That’s very nice of you.” George’s polite tone did nothing to mask his curious expression as he saw Matt trying to hustle her off.
It didn’t do any good. Apparently oblivious to Matt’s haste, Cathy suddenly turned back around to face George. She bobbed up and down slightly on the balls of her feet, “Did Matt tell you?” she said cheerfully. “We’re signing up for a sex class.”
Through gritted teeth, Sikes said, “Cathy . . .”
George affected an air that successfully made it look as if he were surprised. “I thought you two already copulated.”
“Do we have to talk about this?” Sikes said, wanting to melt through the floor.
Cathy frowned at George. “What gave you that idea?”
And in a sudden burst of frustration, Sikes shouted, “You know, it’d be great if you guys learned that some things were private! I mean, you don’t just go around discussing people’s intimate lives in public! All this stuff about did we copulate, didn’t we copulate—it’s making me crazy! And I’m getting sick of that word, too! If you’re going to talk about it constantly, use some . . . some Tenctonese word for it, or at least some good old English word like fu—”
And he became abruptly aware that his voice was the only sound in the squad room.
He glanced around.
Every eye in the place was focused on him. Grazer had come out of his office and was staring. And, just to make it really exciting, a priest and two nuns were standing off to the side, looking at him with fish-eyed amazement. What they were doing there, Sikes had no idea, except that maybe God had stuck them there simply for the purpose of maximum humiliation.
“Fun,” he finished.
They were still staring.
And Cathy, to his eternal gratitude, said, “Matt, they’re going to need me back at the hospital soon. Can we look at that baby?”
“Yes,” he said very quickly, and hustled her out of the squad room before any further disasters could befall, although he was hard pressed to think of a greater one.
He waited for Cathy to say something as they walked down the hallway to the nursery. But she did not seem so inclined. Was she mad at him? Frustrated? Hurt?
He stole a glance at her face and saw that she was looking at him, with her mouth in a crooked, amused smile. Immediately he relaxed.
“A little premature in our boasting, aren’t we, Matt?”
He shrugged. “I like to think of it as aggressive wishful thinking.”
“Tell you what,” she said. “Next time, clear with me ahead of time what you’re going to tell people so that I can be sure not to contradict you. How’s that?”
“Next time it won’t be wishful thinking. Okay?”
“Fine.” She squeezed his hand slightly and they were still holding hands when they entered the nursery.
Then she saw the baby lying in the crib, and Cathy’s grip closed so tightly around Matt’s that he thought she might break his fingers. As delicately—and then, as firmly—as he could, he disentangled her grip from him. She barely seemed to notice, her entire attention on the child.
She walked over to the crib and stared down. The child regarded her with those calm eyes that seemed ancient beyond the infant’s years.
“She’s beautiful,” she whispered to Matt. Then she extended her medical bag and said, “Hold this.” He took it and she reached down, as if touching a soap bubble, and lifted the baby from the crib. She brought the baby over to the changing table so that she would have more room to examine her.
She paused a moment, taking a deep breath, and then her fingers ran lightly across the top of the child’s skull, tracing the general shape. Then she opened her medical bag and removed a tonglike device with a metered scale in the middle of it. She briskly used it to measure the length and width of the baby’s head. Then she shined a flashlight into the ear cavities of the child, and even shined the light in the baby’s eyes. The baby blinked rapidly against the light.
Cathy put down the flashlight, and then picked up the baby’s feet, pulling her finger across the bottoms. The baby’s legs bent reflexively.
Apparently having regained her professional detachment, she manipulated the legs a bit more, and then placed the flashlight in the baby’s hand. The tiny hand clamped around it immediately.
“Good Babinski reflex,” murmured Cathy, making a mental note to herself. Then she took the baby by her chin and moved her head from side to side, as if in wonderment. “Incredible,” she said.
As she was reaching into her medical bag once more, Captain Grazer entered. He barely looked at Sikes, apparently deciding
that if the business from before was going to be discussed, it would best be done at another time.
“What’s the verdict?” said Grazer to Cathy.
She didn’t reply, her attention still riveted to the baby. She was pulling a double-bellied Newcomer stethoscope out of her bag. So Sikes stepped in and said, “She’s not finished.”
Grazer nodded slightly, and then started to say something else when Cathy looked at him severely and said, “Shhh!!”
Taken aback, Grazer quieted down as Cathy put the stethoscope to the baby’s chest and listened.
Sikes watched carefully. This part should have been routine. Clearly, though, it wasn’t. There was bewilderment on Cathy’s face as she moved the stethoscope around on the baby’s chest. Then she removed it and placed it against her own chest, as if to make sure that it was working. She nodded, clearly satisfied with what she heard, and put it back on the baby. And then, after a moment, pure shock crawled across her face.
She stepped back, staring at the child as if the baby’s head had suddenly whirled around 360 degrees.
“What is it?” said Sikes, now extremely concerned.
“She . . .” Cathy looked as if she were trying to remember the words. “She has only one cardiovascular system.”
“What?!”
That last was from George, who had apparently finished with whatever he was up to at his desk and had followed them to the nursery. He was as shocked as Sikes would have been if, say, a human baby had been announced as being perfectly alive and healthy . . . but without a drop of blood in her veins.
“You mean she doesn’t have two hearts?” Sikes said in surprise.
Cathy was shaking her head as if disagreeing, but her words made it clear that it was from pure puzzlement. “No. Only one.”
Grazer, who fancied himself an expert on the affairs of all things Tenctonese, said firmly, “That’s impossible. She’s a Newcomer.”
“Maybe she isn’t,” said Cathy, clearly trying to sort it out as she spoke. “One heart, no spots. And the motor skills are more consistent with the development of a human infant.”
Sikes stared at the angelic infant girl. “This is not a human baby, Cathy.”
“No,” said Cathy, as if from a distance. “The ear configuration . . . the cranial shape . . . definitely Newcomer.”
Now Grazer was starting to get frustrated. Clearly there was doubt on his face that Cathy knew what she was doing. “You just said she wasn’t a Newcomer,” he said in a faintly patronizing tone.
Cathy ignored the sarcasm. “I meant not entirely a Newcomer.” She paused as if about to leap off a high dive into a pool drained of water. “I think she might be a hybrid.”
There was a moment of dead silence.
“A hybrid?” said Sikes, finally.
She nodded, having cleared her first major hurdle merely by voicing the word. “Half human . . . half Newcomer.”
“That’s impossible,” said George flatly. “A Newcomer would have just as much luck producing offspring by mating with a platypus as he would with a human.”
Cathy looked at him coldly. “Care to trot out your degree in genetics, George, to support that claim? The fact is, Tenctonese have been known to adapt genetically within a single generation. Interbreeding is just a matter of time.”
Grazer looked flushed with excitement. “You’re saying that I’ve got the first interspecies baby in my precinct?”
“I don’t know for sure,” said Cathy, starting to feel in a little over her head. “I’ve got to run some tests.”
Clearly, Grazer hadn’t even heard her. He was listening to those little voices in him that were screaming, Opportunity of a lifetime! He spun and faced Sikes and Francisco. “You find the parents!” he commanded, as if the idea had not already occurred to the detectives ages ago. Then he turned back to Cathy and bubbled, “I’m calling a press conference!”
Cathy blanched. “Wait! No.” She put up her hands as if trying to ward off a blow. “I can’t be sure until I run those tests.”
“It’s good enough for me!” he said. “Actually, I . . . had already come to the same conclusion. I didn’t tell you because I didn’t want to color your findings.”
“And besides,” Sikes put in, holding his thumb and forefinger an inch apart, “he was this close to inventing a cure for the common cold and didn’t want to split his attention.”
George looked extremely concerned. “Captain, with all due respect, I wouldn’t call any sort of conference. The ramifications could be profound. People are easily frightened, particularly when it comes to Newcomers, and I wouldn’t be surprised if violence were the direct result of any announcement of a possible hybrid.”
If Grazer heard him, he gave no indication. “Find those parents!” he said again, and then charged out the door.
Sikes, Cathy, and George looked at each other.
“We got a biiiig problem,” said Sikes.
When the press arrived, the problem became that much bigger.
Within hours, the police station booking area was absolutely crammed with reporters. When Grazer wanted to, he could be tremendously efficient. Unfortunately, those things that most caught his attention frequently were the least relevant to genuine police procedures.
Matt and George had been out for several hours, checking with child welfare clinics and pursuing a few leads that turned out to be utterly fruitless. They returned to find utter chaos. They had to elbow their way past the various television cameramen and print reporters just to find a small area of unoccupied space in their very own precinct station.
One newsman roughly elbowed Sikes out of the way. “Move it, fella,” he shouted over the din. “I have a press pass!”
“And I have a lousy temper,” snapped back Sikes.
“Now, Matt,” George said. “You promised. No more breaking the legs of newsmen.”
Sikes looked at George gratefully for the unexpected support. The newsman, looking a bit more apprehensive than before, carefully stepped around the two officers.
“Thanks, George,” said Sikes.
Francisco shrugged, looking very human as he did so. “There’s no excuse for rudeness,” he said.
A podium had been set up at the front, with an array of microphones clustered around it. After a few more moments of barely controlled pandemonium, Grazer emerged with a clearly uncomfortable Cathy in tow. He put up a hand to forestall any questions until he could get to where he wanted to be, namely center stage.
“Thank you for coming, ladies and gentlemen of the press,” he said pompously. He was so puffed up with himself that it was amazing that his feet remained on the floor. “I appreciate it, and I think you’ll find that your time is not being wasted. The LAPD has turned up something that, I feel, is going to have ramifications, not only on a local basis but quite possibly, worldwide.”
In the back, Sikes grumbled, “Here we go.”
“A routine investigation into an incident in Little Tencton,” said Grazer, “resulted in our recovery of an abandoned infant girl. The child is now in safekeeping here at the station, as we have endeavored to make do despite the crushing budget cuts inflicted on all aspects of the child welfare system.”
“Great, a political statement,” Sikes said. George nodded.
Grazer, however, was just warming up. “From the moment I laid eyes on her, I realized this was no ordinary baby. It seemed impossible, but I couldn’t help feeling I was looking at . . .” He paused dramatically. “. . . the first interspecies baby.”
Jaws dropped collectively through the room. Pleased at the initial response, Grazer pressed on. “I called in Dr. Frankel here, and she confirmed my suspicions.”
Now Sikes started to take a step forward. “He called her in?” he whispered angrily.
But George, wisely, put a hand on Sikes’s shoulder, stopping him. “Don’t mix in this, Matthew. Keep your distance. Believe me, you’re not going to want to be a part of what happens.”
He looked
at George. “ ‘What happens’?”
“Just watch,” was all that George said.
Cathy, for her part, was now trying to get a word in. “Please, if I may . . .” she began.
But Grazer cut her off. This was his show, and the ringmaster wasn’t letting on any other acts until he felt like it. “Of course, I have ordered further tests to be absolutely certain,” he said.
Now, though, it was Grazer’s turn to be cut off, as all the reporters began shouting at once. Questions overlapped each other into one large, loud, indecipherable mess. Grazer took a step back, looking momentarily stunned, like a surfer who’d just been knocked off his board by an unexpectedly huge wave. Then he smiled gamely, waiting for the din to die down so that he could field questions in a coherent fashion.
“Ain’t he in heaven,” Matt said.
George nodded. “Like a pig in chips.”
Sikes turned and looked at him. “In what?”
“Chips. Isn’t that the expression?”
He thought about it. “Close enough,” he decided.
Meanwhile, things had calmed down just enough for Grazer to select someone to toss him a question. “Any idea who the parents are?” called out the reporter.
“No, not yet,” said Cathy.
“But,” Grazer added, as if about to deliver the word from Mount Sinai, “we are investigating several promising leads.”
Matt said to George, “Promising leads. Dead ends. It’s the same thing, really. Just semantics.”
Then Grazer picked out another waving hand, and that’s when George said, “Here we go.”
“What do you mean?” asked Matt.
“I recognize that reporter,” said George. “His name’s McGee. His bias has been fairly evident in his reportage of previous Newcomer affairs.”
“Dr. Frankel,” called out McGee. “Doesn’t this confirm what the human Purists have feared all along? That the Newcomers will alter human evolution?”
Grazer looked as if he’d just been slapped in the face. This was not the kind of question he’d anticipated. Abruptly he was all too willing to let Cathy field a question.