Catspaw

by Joan D. Vinge

  “Yeah,” I whispered.

  “Tell me about your family,” she said, trying to change the subject. It struck her as odd and humiliating that she’d never even pictured me having any. She wondered suddenly if she’d been afraid to, knowing what I was. And she wondered what it would feel like to live as a Hydran …

  I wondered too. “Nothing to tell.” I shrugged, looking away. There was a time when I’d wanted to search for my mother’s people. But then I’d killed Rubiy. And after that there hadn’t seemed to be much point in it; because by killing him I’d proved that I could never be one of them.

  Elnear pressed her lips together, and didn’t let herself ask again. At last she said, “Cat, do you ever wonder, when you relive that awful loss … feel that sinking-into-a-hole darkness…” her gaze got lost somewhere, “if perhaps you feel that way not because you’re so different from the rest of us, but because you’re so human?” She glanced up at me; I felt her trying to reach out to something inside me—something she wasn’t sure even still existed.

  I felt myself clench up, in a kind of angry reflex. But then I made myself look at her again, face her reality, acknowledge all the things about her that had made her matter to me … admit that human wasn’t a four-letter word. “Siebeling said … he told me not to—to pretend I’m something I’m not.” I looked down at my hands, suddenly wishing that I had pictures to hold. “That I’m not really human, I mean. Most of the freaks I know are human, every way except one.… Even the Hydrans I’ve met are more human than they want to be.”

  “Most humans are more human than they want to be, too,” she said quietly.

  I half smiled. “Thanks.…” I got to my feet.

  “For what?” she asked.

  “For reminding me that if humans and Hydrans didn’t have something in common, I wouldn’t be here.”

  She laughed. I liked the sound of her laughter. “That’s an unusual sweater,” she said, really seeing me for the first time tonight. “Wherever did you find it?”

  “Lying in the street. Good night, ma’am.”

  “Good night,” she murmured, looking after me a little oddly.

  I smiled as I left her, figuring that at least I’d left her with something to wonder about besides the future; something to think about besides the lonely night and the rain.

  But it didn’t leave me with much else to think about, by the time I reached my room again. I pulled Deadeye’s headset out of my pocket and put it on; stretched out on the bed with my hands behind my head and filled the empty places with all the data I could swallow in one dose. There was still a lot of information left waiting when I pulled it off again. Then finally I closed my eyes, and let the static in my brain sing my aching body to sleep.

  I woke up again with a start, for no reason that I could name, hours later. My mind was quiet now, and it let the grayness come seeping back as I listened to the rain. Listening, I wondered about how the sound of rain seemed to fill my mind with the same kind of longings and sorrows that I’d seen in Elnear’s. I could count on the fingers of one hand the number of times I’d heard it rain. I hadn’t had a lifetime of listening to it to make it mean more to me than the simple sound of dripping water. I remembered the way I’d felt when I’d first set foot on Earth … a total stranger, and yet somehow coming home. Remembered what Elnear had been trying to show me this evening: that the human side of me had its own needs, its own history; and that not everything it felt was something I had to be ashamed of. And I realized that for the first time in a long time I didn’t feel angry.

  I thought about Lazuli then, wondered if she was lying awake in Charon’s bed, not alone but always lonely, listening to the rain. She wanted me to think about her.… I wondered if she meant it the way I thought she did. I wondered if she was thinking about me, missing me. I knew that even if she was, her thoughts didn’t go much further than the way my body fit into hers. I’d been a pullover, and she’d known it—

  I waited for that to make me angry. But it only made me remember the feel of my body fitting into hers.… There’d been too many others who’d really fucked me over. Why should I be angry at a bored, unhappy, beautiful woman who’d only wanted some boytoy to fuck her brains out.… Maybe it didn’t really matter why she wanted me; not when just thinking about that smooth perfume-scented skin, her hair like silk down across my chest, was enough to make my head swim. But it wasn’t going to happen again. Not tonight. Especially not like this. I told myself to forget about her, and go to sleep. I told myself I wasn’t crazy; I told myself I was. I told myself she was using me again.… I told myself if she really wanted me to think about her tonight, I could make sure she never forgot it.…

  I let go of my thoughts, reaching out into the emptiness, spreading a net of invisible threads tipped with light. I pictured the Crystal Palace in my mind, not so far away that my mind couldn’t reach it, reach inside, searching through the dark silences for a familiar star.

  I found her, side by side with Charon. Asleep, dreaming a dim, restless dream about suffocating in a windowless room. I drifted past the sullen heat of Charon’s sleeping mind without looking in, and closed focus to enter Lazuli’s. I slipped into her dream, as softly as a thief … felt her body quiver and stir, not quite waking; felt her dream change to include me. I lay down beside her inside her dream, and let my mind begin to touch her the way my hands, my body, ached to do … fired the nerve strings that fed her mind every sensation I could have given her, moving over her, against her, inside her.…

  Somewhere in the middle of it she woke. (You wanted me to,) I whispered, (you asked for me.…) Gentling her, reassuring her, so that she didn’t cry out but only let herself drift back down into her yearning … feeling the sensations of her pleasure doubled as her hands began to touch her body, the way my hands were already touching my own. Until the beam of white heat joining us mind to mind exploded like a sun, and left us alone in our separate bodies, back in our separate worlds again, only sharing the sound of the rain.

  * * *

  In the morning when I woke I knew more about artificial intelligence than I’d ever wanted to … and less than ever about what in hell I was really doing here, waking up in this bed, playing cat and mouse in it while I played ratcatcher for the taMings. I wondered what Lazuli was trying to do—to herself, to me. If she really didn’t care whether Charon found out; if she was really that stupid, or that unhappy. Or whether she just didn’t care because she thought if anything happened because of this, it wouldn’t happen to her.…

  Feeling numb and out-of-control, I got up and slapped on Dead-eye’s headset again. I fed my brain as much new data as it would take; forcing it, to keep from thinking about what I was doing—and because the sooner I knew everything he wanted me to know, the sooner I could get at the information I really wanted, and maybe get out of here. Then I stumbled downstairs to find something to feed my body, to get it through another day.

  Talitha came shyly into the dining room, stood staring at me while I heaped my plate with the usual morning leftovers. I ignored her, my brain buzzing too loud, until finally she came across the room and tugged on my sweater.

  “I want more,” she said.

  “You’ve got the right idea, kid,” I said. “You’ll make a good taMing.” I went on filling up my plate.

  “I want more grapes.” She looked up at me, waiting, her small face as perfect as a flower, and just as blank. “Grapes—” She tugged harder on me, and threw in a grudging, “Please?”

  I handed her a clump of grapes. “Thank you,” she said gravely.

  “Sure.” I nodded, feeling just a little crummy.

  “Auntie said we’re going to pick berries this morning!” she announced, around a mouthful of fat green globes.

  “Great,” I mumbled, through a haze of binary code sequences and half a piece of bread.

  “You can come too. I’ll show you how, because you don’t know how to do anything right.” She began to tug on my arm. “Come on—�
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  I shook my head, red-faced and half smiling; not sure if I could think of a worse way to spend the morning if I tried. “I got things I have to—”

  “Please join us, Cat.” Lazuli stepped into the room, into my line of sight, and changed my mind with a glance. She was dressed in a transparent tunic patterned with leaves, over an electric-blue body-cover that somehow only made what it was covering up more obvious. She didn’t say anything else; didn’t need to, when her mind was saying it all.

  I nodded slowly, choked down another bite of spiced bun that suddenly could have been plastic.

  Elnear came into the room, carrying her art console; dressed like she usually was, as if she didn’t want anybody to look at her for long. The contrast between them almost hurt my eyes. “Yes, won’t you come—?” she asked, missing my nod. I bit my tongue for wanting to say the obvious, with Lazuli’s eyes still burning a hole in my flesh, and couldn’t think of anything else.

  And so somehow I found myself in the autumn forest out on the mountainside above the taMings’ private valley, with the smell of damp earth filling my head the way buzzing data strings tilled my brain. The things Elnear called golden raspberries grew not-really-wild in a patch of jagged leaves and thorns. We picked them, and it was everything I’d expected it to be. I hated every minute of it. It reminded me of trying to pick answers out of Daric’s mind … it reminded me of digging ore in the Mines on Cinder: Picking something fragile and perfect out of a matrix that didn’t want to give it up, where any wrong move could mean pain.…

  “You don’t look like you’re enjoying this very much, Cat,” Elnear said, peering out at me from underneath her wide-brimmed hat. She looked happier and more relaxed than I’d ever seen her. I shrugged.

  “He doesn’t know how to have fun,” Talitha said; I heard Jiro laugh, too sharply, somewhere behind my back. “That’s why I’m helping him.” She was eating berries out of my hand as fast as I picked them.

  “Then let me help you, too.” Lazuli slid a berry between my lips with deft, gentle fingers. It was as soft as her skin, the juice sweet and tangy as I crushed it with my tongue. “There,” she said, “now you’re smiling.” Her body, her mind, were smiling at me—had been, helplessly, ever since she’d laid eyes on me this morning. Her awareness of me was like a warm fluid slowly melting down through the ice of overlapping data inside my mind. “You know, I had a dream about you last night,” she murmured. Her eyes laughed at the sudden panic in my own, even while they begged me to prove to her again that it hadn’t been just a dream.

  (It wasn’t a dream.) I saw her face flush as I proved it. I looked down and away again, not answering her out loud, because Elnear was watching us too closely. I wished Lazuli wouldn’t do this to me. I felt embarrassed, frustrated … on fire with the heat of the arousal I couldn’t control as she imagined me rcaching out to find her, to touch her, anywhere; like some kind of demon lover who could take her even while she lay asleep in her husband’s bed, making her forget who she was and where, making her forget anything but the pleasure of being made love to impossibly.…

  “Well,” Elnear said, making us realize that we’d been standing there staring at each other like magnetic dolls for way too long. “I believe I’m going to try some sketching on down the slope. Do be careful—”Something in her voice made me look back at her. “It can be treacherous … when the leaves are wet, you know.” One last glance, her eyes as transparent as blue glass, letting me know that she understood: everything that was happening, how it felt to be young, how it felt to be lonely … how it felt to dance on a minefield. “Do be careful,” she murmured again, glancing at Lazuli this time. “Come with me, children—” She waved to Talitha and Jiro. “I’ve brought a special treat for you.”

  Lazuli looked after her, half troubled and half self-conscious, as Elnear guided the children away, leaving us alone together intentionally, pointedly. Not giving us her blessing … but giving us room to breathe. Talitha ran ahead, squealing and scuffling through the leaves while Jiro trailed behind, looking back over his shoulder at us, his expression more like his mother’s than he knew.

  When they were gone we settled side by side on the blanket, our bodies not quite touching, while I wove a band of warm contact between us. She fed me berries between long deep kisses. Light showered down through the trees, haloing her hair; making the restless ceiling over our heads into a living window of stained glass. Looking up into all that beauty, I wondered if this was how someone had gotten the idea. And I wondered if it was really so impossible to be happy in a place like this.…

  The call function began to beep on my databand. I sat up, startled; looked down to be sure the bandphone video was off before I answered. It was already on … had been on, transmitting for God only knew how long. I hadn’t done it; I knew I hadn’t. Lazuli’s face paled as I swore, blocking the image with my hand. “Braedee—?” I said, my voice white.

  I hadn’t turned on the receiver, either, but his voice said, “Checkmate.” And that was all.

  TWENTY-FOUR

  I DID MY best to make Lazuli believe that Braedee wouldn’t talk, without telling her why. I had to believe he only meant that we were back where we’d started, because now he had something on me that could hurt me plenty—just like I had on him. That was the way he wanted it; the way he liked it. But somehow after that she couldn’t shut out reality any more, and neither could I. We went on down the hill through a golden rain of leaves, looking for Elnear; not touching, not even speaking much.

  That night she stayed with Charon in the Crystal Palace. She didn’t ask me to think about her, but part of her wanted to. I thought about her anyway, but this time I kept my thoughts to myself. Braedee didn’t make contact with me again, and I didn’t return his call. I told myself that I wanted to wait until I had the information Deadeye was going to help me get; knowing that I was really stalling just because I didn’t have the guts to face him without it.

  By the next day Elnear was itching to get back to work, and so was I. The last of Deadeye’s data was filtering down into my mind; by the time night came around I’d be ready to pay him another visit. The usual morning in the office seemed to go by in slow motion. I wasn’t sure if it was because what was filling my mind was so strange, or because it made everything else too normal.

  Finally I took a break, giving my restless thoughts some space. I didn’t get far down the hallway before somebody’s hand caught my shoulder, jerking me back and around. Daric. I hadn’t sensed him coming up behind me; probably because he hadn’t wanted me to.

  “You bastard,” he said, shoving me up against the wall like we were the only two people in the entire building. I didn’t have to look past the rage in his eyes to know the reason: Argentyne. But buried below the pain there was something more—sheer terror was wearing his fury like body armor. The only reason I wasn’t dead of an embolism or a heart attack right now was that he knew he couldn’t get past my guard. “Come with me.” He jerked me forward again. I let him lead me through the halls to the same whiteroom he’d used with Stryger. He sealed it, turned back to me. “You little shit—” he said; broke off, and had to start again. “You turned her against me. She said she never wants to see me again. She said to ask you why.… Why?”

  “Because I told her the truth about what you are,” I said.

  “What do you mean?” He held me with his eyes, fists trembling at his sides while he fought himself for control. “She knows everything about me—” The fear inside him was swelling until he was afraid it was going to choke one of us to death. “If she didn’t hate me before, why should she now?”

  “Now she knows what you do for Stryger—the truth about that girl you brought to Purgatory. You remember,” I said, hardly recognizing my own voice, “the one Stryger hurt so bad you were afraid she’d die. The freak you bought to play victim for him.”

  “Is that all—?” Daric’s whole body suddenly went slack with relief. “So what?” he said, and shrugged.
“Nobody made the bitch do it. She didn’t file any complaint.”

  After a long minute I asked softly, “How was it, watching him beat her up, Daric? How’d you like it? Was she a telepath, did she let you feel it? Is that what Stryger really likes? What you really want? Did you really wish it was you instead … or do you just get off on knowing Stryger’s like all the rest of the deadheads, never guessing your secret—?”

  He turned white. “Which secret?” he whispered.

  (You’re one of us.) I thought. (Freak. Teek. Psion.)

  His mind struck at me like a snake. My own mind blocked the thrust of thought, and broke its back before it could reach me. I tossed his sending back at him. “You can’t hurt me. You’re not good enough.” He’d never be good enough, even if he’d had training to teach him how to use it right. He didn’t have that much talent. Being a psion had driven his whole life into this dead end, and he wasn’t even a good one.

  He turned away, his eyes searching the corners of the room. “No,” he said, “no, no, no, no. This isn’t real. It’s impossible. No. No.” He licked his lips, rubbed his hand over his mouth. Trying, after a lifetime, to believe it had finally happened. He turned back to me; I felt panic claw at the walls of his mind. “Who else did you tell? Argentyne, you told her.…”

  “Yeah, I told her.” I nodded, enjoying the look on his face. He wanted to smash my own face in, more than he’d ever wanted anything in his life. Now he knew how he’d made me feel.

  “That’s why she turned against me—”

  “She doesn’t give a damn about it,” I said.

  Incredulity fought its way out through his fury. “You’re lying. You told her so she’d hate me—”

  “Yeah. That’s right, I did.” Finally admitting it, to myself more than to him. “But she really didn’t care. Not everybody’s a bigot. If she hates you now, it’s because you’re a lousy bastard. Not because you’re a psion.”