Analog SFF, January-February 2007

by Dell Magazine Authors

  If history teaches us anything, it's that knowledge will eventually be used. The whole “there are some things man was not meant to know” argument can divert this trend temporarily, but it will never stop it. The only question is how the information is used ... and by whom.

  Religious fanatics didn't want to change “God's blueprint for man.” Other, more moderate people claimed that God wouldn't have encoded this information if it weren't meant to be used once we had the means to retrieve it. Secular citizens were all over the map, not as easily categorized. It didn't matter. The historical trend rolled over all of them as though they weren't even there. Willing or unwilling, it didn't matter.

  The first high-profile case was the son of Evan Williams, the football player. He wanted his son to grow up strong and, presumably, to be the founding father of a dynasty of hulking players who would just as soon tackle a hippopotamus as look at it. His son, whimsically named Odd, indeed grew big and strong, but chose to use his abilities in pro wrestling. Sports, and yet not. A bittersweet victory for dear old dad, no doubt.

  By the time Odd was ten, he had a half-dozen other youngsters riding his coattails. An actress who wanted to pass on her looks actually succeeded. A race car driver tried to pass on his lightning reflexes without notable success. And so on for the next few years while they worked the bugs out of the process. Behind them came a crowd of others, sons and daughters of anyone who had sufficient discretionary income to enhance their child in any conceivable way.

  You would think that everyone would go for three things: looks, intelligence, and freedom from disease. It didn't work out that way. Not obvious enough. Looks are visible, of course, but how do you know whether it was natural or man-made? Intelligence? Far too subtle. Disease resistance? Forget it. When wealthy parents start dropping that kind of money, they want it to be obvious. And so kids started sprouting unusual but unmistakably designed enhancements like body hair that grew in zebra stripes, or cute little angel wings. The worst of the nonsense calmed down after ten years or so, simply because kids sprouting antlers are dangerous to have tearing around the house. Once things got a little less ostentatious, people started having more useful powers, like the girl I lived next door to as a child, who had fingers that looked like a cross between caterpillars and octopus tentacles.

  Granted, it looked bizarre but, man, she could sure play a piano.

  Social strata developed quickly. People who were filthy, stinking rich could easily afford to have two or three, sometimes more, enhancements for their children. Middle class folks could generally scrape enough money together to afford one of the easy modifications. Lower income people couldn't afford any. It was no more than the newest wave of conspicuous consumption: children as luxury possessions. The Mercedes in the driveway. The daughter with the five octave singing range. The son with the ability to dominate his school's track team, thanks to cheetah genes.

  That's where the manners thing came in. Since there was this undeniable undertow of money, it was tantamount to asking how much money someone's parents made if you asked about their power. If it was obvious, you knew. If you found out by accident, it was gossip fodder for the next month. If you couldn't tell, you didn't ask.

  The effect on the kids themselves was predictable, at least in hindsight. Since the modifications had to be made in utero, it was hardly possible to ask the fetus its opinion. As a result, a child might pop out of the womb with the ability to breathe under water, whether they wanted it or not. Some didn't. A statistical fraction were unable to adjust and committed suicide. The ones who did adjust—more or less—were subject to the usual childhood cruelties, amplified. Pecking orders arose based on the perceived value of their powers. Brutality perpetrated by those whose parents had thought it desirable to give their offspring something like tiger claws was rampant. Understandably, there was a strong tendency for kids like that to fall out of the mainstream and join gangs. As a result, claws were the subject of an ongoing legal tug-of-war as to whether they should be banned. Believe it or not, some parents actually did opt for brains. Test scores went haywire; grading on a very lenient curve became necessary if any substantial portion of students were to receive diplomas.

  Fair?

  No.

  But that's the way life is. You deal with it as best you can and go on. In a sense, it's the same thing that people went through before the development of powers. They got by. And we got by. It just added another layer of complexity to the already difficult process of growing up.

  * * * *

  With the economy crashing due to everyone's attempts to “help” it, there were fewer kids being born with powers, simply as a matter of economics. But that didn't mean that there weren't still people running around with the ability to change color like a chameleon.

  The teenager across the counter from me kept sweeping waves of color across his face as he ordered. I decided that it wasn't chameleon genes, it was more likely one of those squid sequences ... something that allows the creature to flash messages, if only you know how to read the code. “My girlfriend, she wants a Veggie Delite and a cup of water.” For no discernable reason, he suddenly flashed red, then purple. I wondered briefly if his girlfriend had learned to read his nonverbal messages. “Gimme a Number Six, with extra mayonnaise and ... uh ... let's see, a Pepsi."

  Don't ask me why some of the sandwiches have numbers and some have names. Some nameless nitwit at the corporate level passed down the nomenclature like Holy Writ, doubtless because a middle management focus group decided that a name made the product more “special” in the customer's mind, hence worth more money. Our top-of-the-heap sandwich, the Super, was obvious enough. More of everything on it. More cachet. More money. Nevertheless, the whole thing was dumb, if you stopped and thought about it.

  Psychology is a dimly lit corner of science. Throw in merchandising and the lights go out altogether. It becomes a dark and dangerous alley where people are always reaching for your wallet.

  I built the sub and handed him off to the cashier, trying desperately to smother the little nagging voice inside my head that kept insisting I was better than this.

  On break I went out to look at the stars, but the skies were overcast, reflecting the dull orange glow of the sodium lamps at the mall two blocks away. I perched on the metal rail and waited. I didn't know what I was waiting for. There was just this persistent pressure in the air that made me feel antsy. As I pressed my finger against the scanner to get back inside, a fat glob of rain splatted next to it, confusing the reader. I had to try again before the system would admit that I existed and let me inside.

  Barry is this tall, skinny guy who handles some of the back line preparation. As I was walking through the back, I swear I saw him using a claw to scrape gunk out of a groove around the edge of the prep table. I did a discreet second glance, but saw nothing out of the ordinary. I said nothing.

  Instead, I pulled on the green and white hat with the stupid little foam gyro sandwich poking out the front like a rhino horn and went to take the next person in line. The sandwich on my hat wore a mask and a cape, though the only power it had was to shrivel the souls of those desperate enough to try it on. I tried not to feel self-conscious. It didn't work.

  So far, we'd been lucky—even though the economy was falling apart, people were still eating out. Probably due in part to the recent trend toward building apartments without stoves or ovens. Why go to the trouble and expense to put them in when people never cook for themselves anymore? I didn't think that mindset would last much longer, but kept my opinion to myself. It was incompatible with my mantra: Pay the bills ... Pay the bills ... Pay the bills.

  “I want a—well, it's not for me, it's for my wife—she wants a ... a ... oh, hell, I can't remember what she told me. Can you hang on a second and let me go ask her?” Without waiting for a reply, he dashed back toward the dining area.

  The woman behind him stepped forward with a girl in tow. She didn't bother waiting for the forgetful man's return
, she just launched into her order. “I want a Number Three,” she said. “Nandy wants a Number Two."

  "Mooom!" her daughter said in that singsong way adolescents use when they feel that their parents are treating them as though they're younger than they perceive themselves to be. “Do you have to say it that way? It sounds like I've got to go to the bathroom or something. Besides, I don't want a Two, I want a Meat Lover's."

  The woman frowned at her and said, “You eat too much meat. It isn't good for you.” She turned back to me and said firmly, “She'll have the Number Two."

  I gave the girl an apologetic shrug as I pulled a bun off the rack behind me and slit it with the long, serrated bread knife before slathering Special Sauce on it. They fought and argued all the way to the end of the line, heedless of the fact that I was caught in the cross fire, then turned sweet for the cashier. There's something deep in human nature that causes that, but I have yet to figure out what it is.

  “You didn't wait for me,” the forgetful man began.

  “I waited, but the other customers didn't.” I gave him a smile, trying to make it a joke.

  He grunted. “Never mind, let's get this show on the road. My wife says she wants a Seven and I'll take a Super."

  Endless, mind-numbing, repetitive work anyone could do. Since I lacked a convincing reason for anyone to turn a paycheck over to me unearned, I had to endure smelling like Special Sauce every night when I went home. I was fast becoming convinced that the suicide rate in the fast food industry must be ten times the norm.

  The next guy was different. Some kind of attitude aura. Rain was dripping from his hair. His eyes were unnaturally bright.

  “May I help you, sir?” I asked.

  “I want a Number Two ... no...” he said, his eyes scanning the board above my head listing all the sandwiches we sell, “make that a Six. And a Bud."

  “Sorry, sir, we don't sell beer. But you can have the sandwich as takeout and pick up a beer at the store up the street."

  It is definitely not company policy to tell the customer to go somewhere else for their drink. We're supposed to suggest things that we sell, so that we can make the profit instead of someone else. The problem was that the guy was making the hairs on the back of my neck stand up. There was something wrong with him, and I wanted him out of the store as fast as possible.

  Something feral flared in his eyes, but he locked the inner beast away and said, “Nah, I'll just take an orange drink. Ain't had one of them in a while."

  The fellow behind him leaned around his shoulder and said, “I want the Number Five. And gimme a large tea. We been doing thirsty work."

  I hadn't realized that they were together, but it wasn't any problem to pull another bun, slit it, and start slapping ingredients on it.

  We made it halfway down the counter before the trouble started.

  “Hey, man, is that blood on your jacket?” the customer behind them asked.

  Suzanne was to my left, building that customer's sub. She looked up, concerned. “Wow! Sure looks like it. Are you okay, sir?"

  They were looking at the second of my two customers—the one who had ordered the Five. He frowned, twisting his neck, trying to stare down at his own back. It didn't work.

  “Turn around, Tom,” the first one said calmly. “Let me see."

  Tom turned his back. Sure enough, even with the rain, there was something that looked a lot like blood on the back of his right shoulder.

  “You idiot! I told you to clean that off,” the first one growled.

  After that things started happening very quickly. The first of my customers reached under his brown leather jacket and pulled out a gun. He pointed it at the first person he saw.

  Me.

  “All right, fella. Just stay calm."

  To show him how calm I was, I asked, “Would you like pickles on your sandwich, sir?"

  He rapped the butt of his pistol sharply on the curved glass sneeze shield above the counter. “No, I don't want any frippin’ pickles! Gimme the sandwich. Now."

  Tom had turned back and was reaching into his jacket, too. Given the way things were going, I wasn't at all surprised to see his hand coming back out holding an even bigger gun than the first guy had.

  Honestly, I think I preferred the boredom.

  Tom, the second man, was scaring me, and it wasn't just that his gun was bigger. It was his eyes. They were jittering in his head. His hand was shaking. His whole body seemed to be experiencing a personal earthquake. I was afraid that his gun would go off just from the way he was twitching. I hadn't really looked at him before. At first, he'd been behind the first guy, then I'd had my head down, making the sandwiches. Now I was looking at him and wishing I wasn't.

  Some small, panicky part of my brain wasn't locked in on what was happening. It was trying frantically to raise someone on the alien mother ship. Someone who knew which buttons to push on the console to get me out of here. A few sparkles in the air and I'd be gone, leaving behind a really, really uncomfortable situation. It wasn't working.

  Suzanne began, “Sir, I'm sure there's no need for guns. Just tell us what you want and we'll gladly—"

  The first guy whirled and held the gun at the end of a ruler-straight arm. "Shut—up." Two words. Clear and distinct.

  She blinked and her mouth shut.

  “Frank, I think there's someone in the back,” Tom said.

  The first guy, Frank, leaned across the glass towards Suzanne. I could see her eye reflected in the chrome plating of his gun, because the muzzle was pressed against the bridge of her nose. “Tell all the people in the back to come out now. Now!"

  “There's just the one guy,” she said nervously. “Uh, Barry, there's someone out here who wants to meet you."

  “Meet me? What are you talking about?” He came around the corner wiping his hands on his apron. He saw the guns. He froze on the spot. "Whoa!"

  “Don't move,” Frank ordered. He whirled and shouted, “Everybody pull out your phones and throw them on the floor! Do it now!"

  The woman who had argued with her daughter was already dialing frantically. Tom raised his arm, sighted, and pulled the trigger.

  Suzanne screamed at the same instant that the gun went off. Everyone else screamed just after. The woman's daughter shrieked so loudly that I thought the plate glass windows would shatter.

  “Everybody shut up,” Frank said. Everyone did, except the daughter, who was sobbing uncontrollably. “I said throw your phones on the floor, and I meant it."

  There was a plastic clatter as phones hit the tile floor. Two or three of them shattered, their owners threw them so hard.

  Tom smiled a crooked smile. “Now pull out your wallets and put them on the table tops. Money, credit cards, and all."

  Some obeyed instantly. Some were slower to react. They moved a little faster when Tom's gun started jerking and twitching in their direction.

  “Come on, people!” he shouted. “You came here to eat. I know you didn't expect to eat for free. You've got money ... now out with it!"

  Without anyone noticing, Frank had slid down to the end of the counter. He was behind it now, with the barrel of his gun pressed into the soft skin of the cashier's neck. “All right, you know what I want. Open the register ... that's right."

  Somehow, I knew what Suzanne was thinking. She was thinking about the small round safe set flush into the concrete floor in the tiny office in the back, under a small rug. It probably held a couple thousand dollars.

  But neither Frank nor Tom asked about a safe. This was a spur of the moment thing, precipitated by someone noticing blood on Tom's jacket, and they were making the whole thing up as they went along.

  Frank pulled a large paper takeout bag from the dispenser and stuffed the money from the register into it. “Come on, Tom, let's go. This ain't going to last long."

  “In a minute. I want—"

  But then he heard the siren. The woman must have dialed faster than I thought.

  "Now, Tom,” Frank
said urgently, but it was already too late.

  I saw the flashing lights pull into the parking lot. Tom saw them, too. He took aim and fired right through the window at the police cruiser. The plate glass shattered. The cruiser stopped instantly, as though it had hit a wall. All the customers who had been on their feet, feeling for wallets or looking in purses, dove for the floor, expecting a shootout.

  There were five of us still on our feet. The two bad guys, Barry, Suzanne, and me. Wendy, our cashier, was trying to make herself as small as possible in the cubby under the cash register. Every single one of the customers was prone on the floor. Strike that—there was one guy sliding along the wall to my left, hoping that Tom and Frank's attention stayed focused on the cruiser a little longer. I watched him out of the corner of my eye. He inched closer, stopped, took another step, stopped. His back was pressed against the wall so hard I could almost hear him squeak as he moved. All it would take was Tom turning a little to his left and the game would be over.

  Tom and Frank were staring at the flashing lights on the cop car as though they'd never seen such a thing before. I looked at Suzanne. She looked at me, frowning worriedly, and shrugged. I knew what she meant. Glowing fingernails weren't going to be of much use, here. She glanced past me down at Wendy, giving her a meaningful glance. Wendy shook her head fearfully and backed further into the cubby. No power, or at least nothing that would help.

  The customer made his move. He slipped in behind Tom and reached for his throat with both hands. I thought he was going for a stranglehold. Then his mouth opened, and I saw his teeth. Lots of teeth. Sharks dream of teeth like that.

  The dead woman's daughter screamed, anticipating carnage. It was the worst thing she could have done.

  Tom turned, but Frank whirled around faster. His gun barked twice, and the shark-toothed guy went down.

  The girl changed frequency and screamed again.

  “Tom, we need to leave right now. This isn't going to get any better."

  “It's not, eh? How about this?” He walked over and grabbed the poor child by her hair, jerking her to her feet. The screaming stopped as though cut off by a knife, replaced by whimpering. “How's about a little insurance? What do you say, Frank?"