by John Kessel
“Every day here we ignore equal or worse injustices—against men as well as women—than the Cousins have. Still, everyone’s afraid of them.”
“Of course we’re afraid. That’s why the inspectors were sent.”
A doctor entered the room. She glided past Amestris to her mother. She bowed her head. “Madam Eskander, you have a fine new grandson.”
Afroza bowed her own head. “Al-hamdu Lillāh,” she said.
The doctor allowed them to enter the room. Leila had somehow managed to arrange her hair and makeup to maintain her appearance of cool beauty. Her son, who would be named Cyrus, was wrapped tightly in a blanket, eyes closed, his tiny hands up beneath his chin. He had a full head of spiky black hair and a sweet, round face. Amestris congratulated her sister and, when Dariush arrived, made ready to leave.
Afroza asked, “Will you come to dinner this evening?”
“I am afraid that I have work.”
Afroza didn’t press Amestris. She turned back to the ebullient Dariush and his beautiful family.
Back in the waiting room Amestris found people gathered before the pixwall: the doctor who had delivered Leila’s baby, several nurses. One of the nurses, brow furrowed, held his hand to his mouth. On the screen was some commotion. “What is it?” Amestris asked.
“There’s been an attack at the Society of Cousins,” the nurse said. “When the OLS investigators arrived there was an explosion.”
On the screen a crowd gathered around the entrance to the Fowler train station. People chanted slogans and held up video banners. Police were trying to clear an aisle among the protesters from the doors to a van. The station doors opened and a number of people came out, among them Erno and the other SCOCOM investigators.
Some of the crowd began chanting Erno’s name. Amestris caught a glimpse of Sirius, and then there was a sharp crack, an echoing boom. The image jerked. Many in the crowd flinched, and then began to rush toward the station doors. Some shouted, others pointed upward. The camera tilted up to show the roof of the Fowler crater—a blue sky—and a jet of black smoke uncurling against it. The video abruptly went blank.
“They’ve been showing this same clip over and over,” one of the nurses said.
Amestris tried to call Erno, but got no response—not even a shift to his Aide. She sat down.
A newscaster came on and repeated that the video they had received was from the Society of Cousins internal public affairs feed. No further video was available, and no explanation was forthcoming from the Cousins.
The newscaster speculated about the nature of the assault and who might have been behind it. A representative from the OLS gave a brief, contentless statement. Commentators came on and conjectured wildly: The dome had been blown open and thousands killed. The SCOCOM team had been kidnapped. OLS troops should be sent.
Afroza and Dariush came out and sat with her. Afroza sent some messages. Dariush said, “They would never allow the inspections to proceed unhindered.”
“I’ve contacted your father,” Afroza said. She touched Amestris’s shoulder. “He’ll be here soon.”
After a while Cyrus arrived. He embraced his wife and she and Dariush took him in to see Leila and the baby. Amestris stared at the screen and waited. Some of the hospital staff left and others drifted in to watch. Finally Cyrus came back out.
“What do you know?” Amestris asked.
“It appears to have been a hoax of some sort. There was a panic. Dr. Göttsch has been in communication with the OLS Secretary. The SCOCOM investigators are uninjured, and have been taken to their hotel.”
“Erno is unhurt?”
“As far as I know, he’s fine.”
“Is there some way to contact him?”
“Regular channels should be back in order soon.”
Amestris thanked Cyrus, congratulated both him and her mother, and left. Down in the lobby she told her Aide to keep trying to reach Erno.
She was at home when his call came. She threw it onto the wall.
Erno’s hair was mussed, but otherwise he looked fine. A bit more drawn, perhaps, than he had a month ago. Behind him on the wall was a framed, ancient black-and-white photograph of some hard-faced woman, in profile.
“I’m sorry I couldn’t reach you until now,” he said. “You must have worried.”
“Father told me you were all right,” she said. “Are you?”
“I’m fine.”
“I thought Cousins were not prone to violence.”
“What are they reporting?”
“The video is everywhere. Within the last hour they’ve started to say that it wasn’t a real explosion.”
“It wasn’t. We’re in the hotel and tomorrow we’re going to move into the offices they’ve set up for us. There was some panic but nothing serious. Did you see the crowds at the station?”
“Yes,” said Amestris. There was an excitement to his voice that intrigued Amestris. What was he feeling, to be back there after so long?
“A lot of them waved copies of that book Stories for Men at me as if I were some prophet and it was the Qu’ran. I need to get the tree genomes and leave.”
“Father won’t let that happen until you satisfy him.”
“He’s so easy to satisfy.”
“He’ll be in a good mood when you talk to him. Leila delivered a grandson this afternoon.”
“Leila is well?”
“Leila will be practicing new dance routines in a month. She’s named him Cyrus. It will probably take up more news time tomorrow than anything that happens to you there. You’ll have to do something spectacular to get back your media attention.”
Erno’s eyes softened. He smiled. “I’m happy to see you are as serious as ever.”
“Is there any chance you could come to harm?”
“I can’t imagine it.”
“Your imagination is faulty.”
He ducked his chin a little, the smile widened, and he was ten years younger.
“I miss you,” she said.
“Good. I was afraid you might be relieved.”
“I’m not relieved.”
“How is the business?”
“We received a report from Apollo on the selenium in their water.”
“And that new variety of spruce?”
Half of the seedlings had developed some strange canker on their bark. “Not good.”
“You’ve seen Sam?”
“As little as possible.”
He looked her in the eyes and she looked back at him.
Finally Erno spoke. “Send me the selenium query and I’ll reply as soon as I can.”
She didn’t want him to go yet. “If things there get out of hand, Erno, don’t get too involved. You can’t control the SCOCOM report. They’ve probably already written the conclusions.”
“Don’t worry, I’ll come back,” Erno said, “if only because this place makes me feel strange.”
“How very flattering,” Amestris said, and smiled.
• • • • •
Mock Shock Blocks OLS Probe!
Tonight on Here’s the Point! Sirius asks the question, “Who is Looker and what does he want?”
Our Mothers Warned Us!
. . . the repetition of Thomas Marysson‘s deadly provocation is evidence of the Reform movement’s escalating radicalism, which now threatens the lives of every Cousin, female and male . . .
Matrons’ Repression Sparks SoC Terror Threat!
. . . opposition leader Camillesdaughter claims the fake bomb is the work of agents provocateurs seeking to discredit the Reform Party.
Fake Bomb Aimed at Pamson!
. . . Kayasdaughter hints the incident may be the work of agents provocateurs seeking to discredit the Society of Cousins.
• • • • •
SCOCOM set up headquarters in offices on the forty-second floor of the Diana Tower. Real, not virtual, windows commanded a spectacular view of the crater’s interior. On some days humidity in the air condensed
into a haze that clouded the glass with moisture. Below stretched farms and a portion of Sobieski Park. Flyers would occasionally swoop past their windows.
In addition to Göttsch, Beason, Li, and Erno were a staff of five from the OLS and two assistants assigned by the Society. Beason was sure these Cousins were spies for the Matrons. Erno would have been surprised if they weren’t.
There were two prongs to SCOCOM’s investigation: first, an inquiry into the treatment of male Cousins. This involved interviews and examination of colony records on education, birth rates, social mobility, living standards, incarceration, customs, and the legal system.
The second was the degree to which the Society of Cousins was engaged in weapons research prohibited under the Organization of Lunar States’ Universal Disarmament Regime.
Though the first goal was the one that most concerned the average Cousin, the second was what SCOCOM really cared about. The interviews carried on by Beason and his staff were secondary to the probes of the science programs that Göttsch and Li were to pursue.
A week after their arrival the team interviewed the staff of Biotech, determined to get to the bottom of exactly what sort of gene hacking was being conducted by the Society.
The first interview was with Lemmy Odillesson. Erno had not pressed for this, but Cyrus had somehow arranged it. It was up to Erno to make the most of the opportunity.
Lemmy was a small, spry man of middle years, maybe sixty-five or seventy. No standard of beauty existed by which he might be judged attractive. Lemmy, nervous, kept looking at Erno as if he expected some cue to get out of this.
The outside of the wedge-shaped conference room was a curved wall of glass. Along another stretched a mural that visual augmentation identified as Shiva watching Vishnu transform himself into the enchantress Mohini. A third was a pixwall. Sirius was at the interview, his handpaws crossed on the edge of the conference table, his long, domed head resting upon them. Lemmy seemed more unnerved by the dog’s presence than by the OLS investigators.
“Do you object to our recording this interview?” Sirius muttered.
“Excuse me?”
“He said, do you object to being recorded,” Beason said.
“No. I have no objection.”
“Very well,” Göttsch said, “let’s get right to business. First, tell us your name and the nature of your work.”
“My name is Lemmy Blau Odillesson. By training I’m a genobotanist. I spent the first twenty-five years of my career studying closed microecosystems. Some time on design, but more seeking to understand and develop methods for regulating and repairing systems that fall out of balance. That led me into thinking about forest ecosystems and adapting varieties of Earth trees to lunar environments. I have spent the last twenty years modifying old species and inventing new ones as sources of food and materials.”
“Have any of your gene hacks been for other purposes?”
“ ‘Gene hack’ is a crude term for what I do.”
“What do you do?”
“Well, once you understand the programming processes within the genes, you can do any number of things. Most are impractical. For instance, I produced what I call a ‘lunchbox tree,’ which produces, as fruit, cellulose boxes containing one apple, a breadlike ‘sandwich,’ and a tuber of juice. But that was, I’m afraid, more of a stunt than a practical species.”
“Back in Persepolis we have one growing in our office lobby,” Erno said, attempting to put Lemmy at ease. “I used your 2130 paper as a guide.”
Lemmy looked surprised. “I’m flattered you would spend the time on it.”
“Do you feel, Professor Odillesson, that your work is being exploited here?” Beason asked.
Lemmy took a moment to collect himself. “Not as much as I would like. I’m not always good at practical applications: It’s my goal for everything I do to be useful, given the resources I am allowed.”
“So resources are withheld from you?” Göttsch asked.
“As Dr. Li can confirm, that’s more a matter of the Earth multinationals’ proprietary restrictions. For instance, our gene surgery vectors are not state-of-the–art; when querying biological function, we must use in silico tools to complement the in vivo. But ingenuity can go a long way to compensate for lack of resources.”
“Do you ever wish that you might be working in, say, an Earth facility? A government-industry alliance could provide you with support that would allow you to explore the limits of your creativity.”
Odillesson shook his head. “I don’t want to go to Earth.”
“You needn’t go to Earth,” Li said. “There are the OLS labs at Huygens. And at New Guangzhou we have extensive resources.”
“Yes. But I would have to leave my family. I couldn’t do that.”
“You could bring them with you,” Göttsch said.
“There are sixteen people in my family.”
“You could run your own lab, with unlimited resources.”
Odillesson’s face set. “I don’t feel any limitations.”
Göttsch sat back. Sirius had not lifted his head, and his brown gaze was unreadable.
Beason leaned forward. “Are you engaged in weapons research?”
“Of course not. I’m a genobotanist.”
“Are you aware of any research in the colony that could be applied to bioweapons?”
“No.”
“But there are lines of research that you may not be aware of.”
“We don’t do weapons research.”
“You just told us that there are limitations on your resources. I could imagine that someone here might, out of frustration with the system, take up such research.”
Erno spoke up. “I worked with Dr. Odillesson, as you know. Research is closely monitored, and no one could get very far without the lab administrators knowing.”
“Not if the lab administrators were a party to the project,” Beason said.
Odillesson looked at Erno in appeal. When Erno did not help him, he said, “Dr. Beason, let me explain. I am a Cousin. I have a good life. My skills were recognized when I was a boy. All my life I have been encouraged to pursue my interests. My wishes have been taken into consideration at every step of my career. My mother and sisters and teachers have given me every opportunity. My lover took me into her bed when I was fifteen, and I have fathered one of her daughters. Aside from my work, my greatest pleasure is spending time with her, her wife, and their children and my three grandchildren. I don’t know a lot about the other lunar colonies, but I can’t imagine that I would be better off in any of them.”
“What about your political powerlessness? You are not allowed to vote. You can’t own property. Those grandchildren are not your own. You have no say in the fundamental decisions that control your life.”
“I can’t recall ever being made to do anything that harmed myself or anyone else,” Lemmy said. “Erno knows all these things.”
“Mr. Pamelasson did not feel the way that you do. Many others don’t. Are their objections to be ignored?”
“I don’t know. I—I don’t know much about these things. I have nothing to complain about that can be solely attributed to the Society, and not to the”—he struggled for words—“the human condition.”
Sirius’s ears turned forward; his eyes remained lidded.
“Ah, the human condition,” Göttsch said. She steepled her fingers and leaned back in her chair. “Our experience is that the condition of humans is subject to change.”
Li said, “For all your privilege, few men elsewhere on the moon would accept your situation. You are a pet, given freedoms that most of your fellow Cousins never see.”
“Pardon me,” Odillesson said. “My impression is that such disparities of privilege are common in the—in the other lunar states.”
“Your point?” Li said.
“Simply that the inequalities that men live with here are certainly no worse than those men live with elsewhere. Rather less, I would think.”
&nbs
p; “Perhaps,” Göttsch said. “That is what we are here to find out.”
“Those who sacrifice freedom for security deserve neither,” Beason said. “It wouldn’t surprise me that you are willing to lie for the Matrons.”
“Lie about what?”
“About your secret weapons program.”
Lemmy opened his hands before him. “How many times will you make me say it: There is—there is no weapons program.”
“So you say.”
The interview—interrogation, it seemed to Erno, went on for another thirty minutes. Throughout it all, Lemmy, increasingly flustered, denied knowledge of any bioweapons. Erno was surprised by Odillesson’s strength in the face of the barrage. It was hard to watch. At the risk of putting himself at odds with the others, Erno occasionally posed a sympathetic question. Lemmy’s eyes—grateful—shifted to him.
Finally Erno insisted, “I think this ground has been well enough tilled. If my colleagues don’t object, I think we should let you go.”
They relented, and Lemmy was allowed to leave. As the others began to discuss his interview, Erno said, “I’m going out to him.”
Göttsch waved a hand, and Erno walked out to find Lemmy leaning against one of the chairs in the anteroom. Through a doorway, Erno saw one of the SCOCOM staff watching from his desk. Lemmy’s wounded expression was an accusation. The staff person lowered his head. Lemmy ran the back of his hand over his forehead and sighed. “That was awful.”
Erno placed a hand on his shoulder. “I’m sorry.”
“Oh, I don’t blame you.”
Erno wondered why not. “Can I walk you to the elevators?”
“All right.”
They passed through the offices to the hall, and Erno closed the door behind them. Waiting for the elevator, Erno said, “I need to ask you again if you might give me gene samples of your tree varieties. I can get by with spruce and maple, but if you could supply even some indications of how I might work on ash, it would be a life saver.”
Lemmy gave him a tight smile. “Is your life in danger?”
“Well, not literally—”
“Because ours are, if these people get control of the Society.”
“It won’t come to that. If you help me, I’ll make sure they know that the rest of the moon is under no threat from the Society.”