Asimov's SF, October-November 2006

by Dell Magazine Authors

  Owen nodded, pretending to be in complete control, set his rifle to one side, looked at her, and said, “I guess it is."

  “You're what's important. You are essential."

  “You bet."

  “And for reasons bigger than a few locks."

  The young man had to smile.

  “What's inside the trucks?"

  He quickly summarized the wealth brought from the old world, then happily added, “It's a great beginning for our colony."

  “That does sound wonderful,” Claire replied, her voice dipped in sarcasm.

  Owen smiled, hearing the words but missing their color.

  “And if you could please tell me ... when do you intend to give us this good food and water? Does your generosity have a timetable?"

  “It does."

  “So tell me."

  Owen offered a smug wink, and then he sat back on the hard steps, lifting a hand, showing her three fingers.

  “Excuse me?"

  “Three girls,” he explained. Then the hand dropped, and he added, “You know what I mean."

  Here was another revelation: In every official Testament, the First Father unlocked every door and box in the first few minutes. Without exception, he was gracious and caring, and the girls practically fought one another for the chance to sleep with him.

  “You want three of my ladies...?"

  “Yes."

  Rage stole away Claire's voice.

  Again, Owen said, “Yes."

  “Are you going to select them?” the housemother muttered. “Or is this going to be a job for volunteers?"

  Every face was fixed on Owen, and he clearly enjoyed the attention. He must have dreamed for months about this one moment, imagining the tangible, irresistible power that no one could deny ... and because of that strength, he could shrug his shoulders, admitting, “It doesn't matter who. If there's three volunteers, then that's fine."

  “You want them now?"

  “Or in a week. I can wait, if I have to."

  “You don't have to."

  The smile brightened. “Good."

  “And you get just one woman,” Claire warned, grabbing the belt of her bathrobe and tightening the sloppy knot. “Me."

  “No."

  “Yes.” Claire touched him on a knee. “No other deal is on the table, Owen. You and I are going inside. Now. My room, my bed, and afterwards, you're going to get us into those trucks, and you'll hand over every weapon you brought here. Is that understood?"

  The young man's face colored. “You're not in any position—"

  “Owen,” she interrupted. Then she said, “Darling,” with a bite to her voice. And she reached out with the hand not on his knee, grabbing his bony chin while staring into the faint brown eyes that eventually would find themselves scattered across endless worlds. “This may come as news to you. But most men of your age and means and apparent intelligence don't have to go to these lengths to get their dicks wet."

  He flinched, just for an instant.

  “You don't know very much about women. Do you, Owen?"

  “I do."

  “Bullshit."

  He blinked, biting his lower lip.

  “You don't know us,” she whispered to him. “Let me warn you about the nature of women, Owen. Everyone here is going to realize that you're just a very ignorant creature. If they don't know it already, that is. And if you think you've got power over us ... well, let's just say you have some very strange illusions that need to die...."

  “Quiet,” he whispered.

  But Claire kept talking, reminding him, “In another few weeks, a couple months at most, you will be doomed."

  “What do you mean?"

  “Once enough girls are pregnant, we won't need you anymore."

  All the careful planning, but he hadn't let himself imagine this one obvious possibility. He said as much with his stiff face and the backward tilt of his frightened body.

  “You can have all the guns in the world—hell, you do have all the guns—but you're going to end up getting knifed in bed. Yes, that could happen, Owen. Then in another few years, when your sons are old enough and my Deltas are in their late thirties ... they'll still be young enough to use those boys’ little seeds...."

  “No,” he muttered.

  “Yes,” she said. Her hand squeezed his knee. “Or maybe we could arrive at a compromise. Surrender your guns and open every lock, and afterwards, maybe you can try to do everything in your power to make this mess a little more bearable for us..."

  “And what do I get?"

  “You live to be an old man. And if you're an exceptionally good man from here on, maybe your grandchildren will forgive you for what you've done. And if you're luckier than you deserve to be, perhaps they'll even like you."

  * * * *

  5

  When Kala was fourteen, her church acquired the means to send one hundred blessed newlyweds off to another world. United Manufacturing had built a class-B ripper specifically for them. Tithes and government grants paid for the machine, while the stockpiles of critical supplies came through direct donations as well as a few wealthy benefactors. A standard hemispherical building was erected in an isolated field, its dimensions slightly smaller than the ripper's reach. Iron and copper plates made the rounded walls, nickel and tin and other useful metals forming the interior ribs, and secured to the roof were a few pure gold trimmings. The ground beneath had been excavated, dirt replaced with a bed of high-grade fertilizer and an insulated fuel tank set just under the bright steel floor. No portion of the cavernous interior was wasted: The young couples were taking foodstuffs and clean water, sealed animal pens and elaborate seed stocks, plus generators and earth-movers, medicine enough to keep an entire city fit, and the intellectual supplies necessary to build civilization once again.

  On the wedding day, the congregation was given its last chance to see what the sacrifices had purchased. Several thousand parishioners gathered in long patient lines, donning sterile gloves and filter masks, impermeable sacks tied about their feet. Why chance giving some disease to the livestock or leaving rust spores on the otherwise sterile steel floor? The young pioneers stood in the crisscrossing hallways, brides dressed in white gowns, grooms in taut black suits, all wearing masks and gloves. One of the benefits born from the seventeen previous migrations was that most communicable diseases had been left behind. Only sinus colds and little infections born from mutating staph and strep were a problem. Yet even there, it was hoped that this migration would bring the golden moment, humanity finally escaping even those minor ailments.

  The youngest brides were only a few years older than Kala, and she knew them well enough to make small talk before wishing them good-bye with the standard phrase, “Blessings in your new world."

  Every girl's mask was wet with tears. Each was weeping for her own reason, but Kala was at a loss to guess who felt what. Some probably adored their temporary fame, while other girls cried out of simple stage fright. A few lucky brides probably felt utter love for their husbands-to-be, while others saw this mission as a holy calling. But some of the girls had to be genuinely terrified: The smartest few probably awoke this morning to the realization that they were doomed, snared in a vast and dangerous undertaking that had never quite claimed their hearts.

  Standing near the burly ripper—a place of some honor—was a girl named Tina. Speaking through her soggy mask, she said to Kala, “May you find your new world soon."

  “And bless you in yours."

  Kala had no interest in emigrating. But what else could she say? Tina was soon to vanish, and the girl had always been friendly to Kala. Named for the first wife to give a son to the First Father, Tina was short and a little stocky, and, by most measures, not pretty. But her father was a deacon, and more important, her grandmother had offered a considerable dowry to the family that took her grandchild. Was the bride-to-be aware of these political dealings? And if so, did it matter to her? Tina seemed genuinely thrilled by her circumstances,
giggling and pulling Kala closer, sounding like a very best friend when she asked, “Isn't this a beautiful day?"

  “Yes,” Kala lied.

  “And tomorrow will be better still. Don't you think?"

  The mass marriage would be held this evening, and come dawn, the big ripper would roar to life.

  “Tomorrow will be different,” Kala agreed, suddenly tired of their game.

  Behind Tina, wrapped in thick plastic, was the colony's library. Ten thousand classic works were etched into sheets of tempered glass, each sheet thin as a hair and guaranteed to survive ten thousand years of weather and hard use. Among those works were the writings of every Father and the Testaments of the Fifteen Wives, plus copies of the ancient textbooks that the Deltas brought from the Old Earth. As language evolved, the texts had been translated. Kala had digested quite a few of them, including the introductions to ecology and philosophy, the fat histories of several awful wars, and an astonishing fable called Huckster Finn.

  Tina noticed her young friend staring at the library. “I'm not a reader,” she confided. “Not like you are, Kala."

  The girl was rather simple, it was said.

  “But I'm bringing my books too.” Only the bride's brown eyes were visible, dark eyebrows acquiring a mischievous look. “Ask me what I'm taking."

  “What are you taking, Tina?"

  She mentioned several unremarkable titles. Then after a dramatic pause, she said, “The Duty of Eve. I'm taking that too."

  Kala flinched.

  “Don't tell anybody,” the girl begged.

  “Why would I?” Kala replied. “You can carry whatever you want, inside your wedding trunk."

  The Duty was popular among conservative faiths. Historians claimed it was written by an unnamed Wife on the second new world—a saintly creature who died giving birth to her fifth son, but left behind a message from one of God's good angels: Suffering was noble, sacrifice led to purity, and if your children walked where no one had walked before, your life had been worth every misery.

  “Oh, Kala. I always wanted to know you better,” Tina continued. “I mean, you're such a beautiful girl, and smart. But you know that already, don't you?"

  Kala couldn't think of a worthwhile response.

  With both hands, Tina held tight to Kala's arm. “I have an extra copy of The Duty. I'll let you have it, if you want."

  She said, “No."

  “Think about it."

  “I don't want it—"

  “You're sure?"

  “Yes,” Kala blurted. “I don't want that damned book.” Then she yanked her arm free and hurried away.

  Tina stared after her, anger fading into subtler, harder to name emotions.

  Kala felt the eyes burning against her neck, and she was a little bit ashamed for spoiling their last moments together. But the pain was brief. After all, she had been nothing but polite. It was the stupid girl who ruined everything.

  According to The Duty, every woman's dream was to surrender to one great man. Kala had read enough excerpts to know too much. The clumsy, relentless point of that idiotic old book was that a holy girl found her great man, and she did everything possible to sleep with him, even if that meant sharing his body with a thousand other wives. The best historians were of one mind on this matter: The Duty wasn't a revelation straight from God, or even some second-tier angel. It was a horny man's fantasy written down in some lost age, still embraced by the conniving and believed by every fool.

  Kala walked fast, muttering to herself.

  Sandor was standing beside the ripper, chatting amiably with the newly elected Next Father. Her brother had become a strong young man, stubborn and charming and very handsome, and, by most measures, as smart as any sixteen-year-old could be. He often spoke about leaving the world, but only if he was elected to a Next Father's post. That was how it was done in their church: One bride for each groom, and the most deserving couple was voted authority over the new colony.

  “It's a good day,” Sandor sang out. “Try smiling."

  Kala pushed past him, down the crowded aisle and out into the fading sunshine.

  Sandor excused himself and followed. He would always be her older brother, and that made him protective as well as sensitive to her feelings. He demanded to know what was wrong, and she told him. Then he knew exactly what to say. “The girl's as stupid as she is homely, and what does it matter to you?"

  Nothing. It didn't matter at all, of course.

  “Our world's going to be better without her,” he promised.

  But another world would be polluted as a consequence: A fact that Kala couldn't forget, much less forgive.

  * * * *

  The marriage was held at dusk, on a wide meadow of mowed spring fescue. The regional bishop—a charming and wise old gentleman—begged God and His trusted angels to watch over these good brave souls. Then with a joyful, almost giddy tone, he warned the fifty new couples to love one another in the world they were going to build. “Hold to your monogamy,” he called out. “Raise a good family together, and fill the wonderland where destiny has called you."

  A reception was held in the same meadow, under temporary lights, the mood slipping from celebration to grief and back again. Everyone drank more than was normal. Eventually the newlyweds slipped off to the fifty small huts standing near the dome-shaped building. Grooms removed the white gowns of their brides, and the new wives folded the gowns and stored them inside watertight wooden trunks, along with artifacts and knickknacks from a life they would soon abandon.

  Kala couldn't help but imagine what happened next inside the huts.

  A few sips of wine made her warm and even a little happy. She chatted with friends and adults, and she even spent a few minutes listening to her father. He was drunk and silly, telling her how proud he was of her. She was so much smarter than he had ever been, and prettier even than her mother. “Did I just say that? Don't tell on me, Kala.” Then he continued, claiming that whatever she wanted from her life was fine with him ... just so long as she was happy enough to smile like she was smiling right now....

  Kala loved the dear man, but he didn't mean those words. Sober again, he would find some way to remind her that Sandor was his favorite child. Flashing his best grin, he would mention her brother's golden aspirations and then talk wistfully about his grandchildren embracing their own world.

  Kala finally excused herself, needing a bathroom.

  Abandoning the meadow, walking alone in darkness, she considered her father's drunken promise to let her live her own life. But what was “her life"? The question brought pressure, and not just from parents and teachers and her assorted friends. Kala's own ignorance about her future was the worst of it. Such a bright creature—everyone said that about her. But when it came to her destiny, she didn't have so much as a clue.

  As Kala walked through the oak woods, she noticed another person moving somewhere behind her. But she wasn't frightened until she paused, and an instant later, that second set of feet stopped too.

  Kala turned, intending to glance over her shoulder.

  Suddenly a cool black sack was dropped over her head, and an irresistible strength pushed her to the ground. Then a man's voice—a vaguely familiar voice—whispered into one of her covered ears. “Fight me,” he said, “and I'll kill you. Make one sound, and I'll kill your parents too."

  She was numb, empty and half-dead.

  Her abductor tied her up and gagged her with a rope fitted over the black sack, and then he dragged her in a new direction, pausing at a service entrance in back of the metal dome. She heard fingers pushing buttons and hinges squeaking, and then the ground turned to steel as her long legs were dragged across the pioneers’ floor.

  Her numbness vanished, replaced with wild terror.

  Blindly, Kala swung her bound legs and clipped his, and he responded with laughter, kneeling down to speak with a lover's whisper. “We can dance later, you and me. Tonight is Tina's turn. Sorry, sorry."

  She was tie
d to a crate filled with sawdust, and by the smell of it, hundreds of fertile tortoise eggs.

  When the service door closed, Kala tugged at the knots. How much time was left? How many hours did she have? Panic gave her a fabulous strength, but every jerk and twist only tightened the knots, and after a few minutes of work, she was exhausted, sobbing through the rope gag.

  No one was going to find her.

  And when they were in the new world, Tina's husband—a big strong creature with connections and a good name—would pretend to discover Kala, cutting her loose and probably telling everyone else, “Look who wanted to come with us! My wife's little friend!” And before she could say two words, he would add, “I'll feed her from our share of the stores. Yes, she's my responsibility now."

  Kala gathered herself for another try at the ropes.

  Then the service door opened with the same telltale squeak, and somebody began to walk slowly past her, down the aisle and back again, pausing beside her for a moment before placing a knife against her wrists, yanking hard and cutting the rope clear through.

  Off came her gag, then the black sack.

  Sandor was holding a small flashlight in his free hand, and he touched her softly on her face, on her neck. “You all right?"

  She nodded.

  “Good thing I bumped into that prick out there.” Her brother was trying to look grateful, but his expression and voice were tense as could be. “I asked him, ‘Why aren't you with your bride?’ But he didn't say anything. Which bothered me, you know.” He paused, then added, “I've seen him stare at you, Kala."

  “You have?"

  “Haven't you?” Sandor took a deep breath, then another, gathering himself. “So I asked if he'd seen you come this way. And then he said, ‘Get away from me, little boy.’”

  Sandor began cutting her legs free. In the glare of his light, she saw his favorite pocket knife—the big blade made sticky and red, covered as it was with an appalling amount of blood.

  “Did you kill him?” Kala muttered.

  In a grim whisper, Sandor said, “Hardly."

  “What happened?"

  “I saved you,” he answered.