Hero!

by Dave Duncan

  Yather smiles grimly, but without concealing relief. Evidently Vaun’s appearance has made the conversation friendlier.

  “This war on Avalon? There was a ship in from Avalon not long ago.”

  “Carina, sir. Last year.”

  The blond boy tears a hunk from a roll and speaks with his mouth full. “Don’t recall any war talk.”

  Yather looks uneasy again. “Fourteen and a half years, sir. Actually, I think Carina took nearer fifteen. The fighting may not have started when she left. People forget, too, in that time span, and they might not expect us to care about—”

  Roker is glaring. “That’s why we have interrogations, SecOff! Have you reviewed the Carina records?”

  “Not in detail, sir. There was mention of unrest, of course. There always is. And there was mention of illicit biological experimentation, but no one knew any details, as usual. That should have been followed up, I agree, and we can track down the immigrants and work them over again…”

  The admiral grunts disapprovingly.

  “Only three of us, sir! Internal investigations are always sensitive—didn’t want word to leak back to the suspect. No case number to assign extra machine time…”

  “That will change,” Roker mutters. It is a sign of forgiveness, and Yather’s heavy frame seems to relax again. He fingers his swollen jaw as if it hurts.

  The admiral works another load into his mouth and lays down his fork. He leans back and scratches his hairy belly, studying Vaun. Mumble: “Take off your shirt.”

  Vaun obeys uneasily. Busily chewing, Roker gestures for him to drop his pants also.

  “Mm. Looks human enough. Prior has no hairs on his chest either. Wonder why not?”

  Because chest hair is an unnecessary frill, Vaun thinks, but he suspects that it would be unwise to say so in front of Roker.

  “But he does have tits!” Roker curls his lip at Vaun again. “Why have you got tits, lad?”

  “I don’t know sir. Why have you?”

  The blue eyes narrow warningly. “Because I’m a product of evolution. Evolution progresses by trial and error, not by intent, right, Yather?”

  “Right, sir. It does the best it can with what it’s got to work with. No shortcuts.”

  “But if this…boy? It? Him? I suppose we call him human? If this lad was brewed up in a bottle, then whoever designed him could have omitted unnecessary things like tits. Right?”

  “I would assume so, sir.”

  As the inspection seems to be over, Vaun begins to dress. He shivers at the clammy touch of wet cloth. There is an unpleasant odor around, but it doesn’t seem to be him. He thinks it comes from the trees.

  “’Sthat hair or dirt on your chin?” Again Rather directs his questions at Vaun. The poor folk of the delta would offer a visitor a drink and a seat, but a peasant must stand before spacers.

  “Hair, sir.”

  “Beards have no real function either, have they, Yather?”

  “Only as a secondary sexual characteristic, sir, I think.”

  “What sex life has an artificial construct got? Do they screw test tubes? Why even balls?”

  “Hard to say, sir, as their reproduction must be agamic.”

  Roker shoots a nasty glance at Yather, who flushes.

  “Sorry. Asexual, that is. IVe been reading up on this, picking up jargon. Testicles are needed to make hormones, I suspect.”

  Roker grunts. “Prior has a pretty impressive reputation.”

  “That could be stiffener, sir.”

  “Mm.” Roker continues eating for a moment, scowling at Vaun. “We can check his intake. So it’s camouflage? Nipples and beard…male chin and shoulders. Not purely functional—they’re designed so they can pass as human?”

  “We think so, sir.”

  The long, rubbery upper lip curls again in a sneer. “And what does this tell us about their intentions, mm?”

  A scrabbling of boots on dirt, and Tham comes lumbering up the trail. He is scarlet-faced and gasping. He flashes Vaun a congratulatory smile, then comes to attention and salutes the half-naked admiral. The beefy boy shows his teeth in welcome.

  “Come in, ComOff, sit down. Here, you look like you need a drink. Built for speed, is he?”

  Tham swallows eagerly, then wipes his mouth. “Built for just about everything, I think, sir.”

  “Like Prior. Remember that night we all got into an arm wrestling match? You were there?”

  “I think so, sir. The evening is blurry, but I remember my elbow the next morning.”

  “You were overall champion, sir,” Yather says quickly. “You wiped the floor with us.”

  Muscleboy nods, scowling. “But Prior let me beat him—I could see it in his eyes.” He looks Vaun over again thoughtfully, as if about to issue a challenge.

  Then he seems to change his mind. “Well, this is a fine piece of work you’ve done, Tham. Well beyond the normal call of your duties.”

  “Thank you, sir. Security Officer Yather—”

  “Of course.” Roker waves his fork at the food table. “Help yourself to whatever you fancy. So we have cuckoos in our nest. What do you suppose Prior’s planning, mm? Going to build a baby factory? What did you call it—a hive?” He stuffs a wad of meat in his mouth, and Vaun’s stomach issues a loud rumble.

  Tham rises and goes to the large table at the rear. “We tend to think not, sir. Yath?”

  The normally surly Yather boy becomes almost exuberant. “The way we look at it, sir, the technology isn’t available here. It’s completely forbidden for humans, and even the animal work is rare nowadays. The Stravakians are doing a little of it, but as far as we know, that’s all.”

  “There’s a black market in baby improvement back in Kilbra. That I do know.”

  “Oh, you find gene stitching being done everywhere, sir, and a lot of it is just kitchen charlatanism. We haven’t called on DataCen at all, yet, but so far as Hariz and I have been able to establish on our own, sir, the know-how to produce anything like this—” He waves a thumb toward Vaun. “—has never existed on Ult, or any of the founder worlds, even. Artificial animals, certainly—gnu-steeds, and yimyaks, and angorazebs—but no one ever managed to produce a workable human brain before. Moronic cripples was all.”

  Roker curls up his lip, chewing and speaking at the same time.

  “He may have brought the know-how with him.”

  Yather becomes diffident, as if contradicting the admiral is a touchy business. “Possible, sir, of course…but again doubtful. Even our best miniaturization could not reduce such a volume of data to invisibility, and those settlers were inspected closely. He did very well even to bring in the ova…and that is only one problem. He had four grown cuckoos that we know of, and maybe more still lost in the woods, but none of them are molecular biologists. Even if they were, they would have to acquire the equipment and the materials, and a safe location. It’s certainly possible, of course, but if that’s what he plans, then why become a spacer? Why spend seventeen years in the Patrol?”

  Vaun doesn’t understand, but Roker grunts thoughtfully, and nods.

  Tham wanders idly by with a glass in his hand. “We can always ask ex-Commodore Prior, of course. Ask what he has in mind.” Chuckling, he hands Vaun the glass without looking at him, and heads back to the food. Vaun drinks greedily.

  Roker snorts. “He’s long gone, surely?”

  “Don’t know that,” Yather says, grabbing the conversation back before Tham can speak again. “He’s due back at his desk tomorrow. Seemed inappropriate to com him, under the circumstances.”

  Roker’s fork clatters on his plate. “Prior is no crumbrain! I say we’ll never see him again!”

  Yather flinches and looks nervously to Tham.

  “Perhaps,” Tham says calmly from the background.

  The admiral twists in his chair. He clearly respects Tham’s opinions more than Yather’s. “Why do you doubt?”

  “Look at it from his point of view, sir. He’s had an
incredible string of bad luck.” Plate in hand, Tham has completed his inspection of the display of food, and made his selection. He spoons something white and lumpy onto his plate. “First there was the Avalon newscast, if that’s what it is. Pure chance!”

  “That’s filed in Central, of course?”

  “No, it isn’t.” Tham chuckles, and helps himself to some green stringy stuff. “Anyway, if he’s monitoring the Avalon file, I can’t find his prints. Secondly, I was credulous enough to believe my eyes and call for the ID check.” He pours orange sauce over the white stuff. “Thirdly, he didn’t know we were tailing him, or he’d never have left his torch unattended at the rendezvous, right?” Brown stuff next. “Fourthly, he got tangled up in a religious procession. None of our doing, but it delayed him getting back. Hariz almost lost him.”

  Roker’s unfriendly blue gaze comes back to regard Vaun with surprise. “He doesn’t know we’ve got this, you mean?”

  Tham adds a couple of rolls to his heaped plate. “How can he? Hariz swears Prior didn’t get back to the torch until three or four minutes after we—” He glances at Vaun with a smile. “—until after we hustled the evidence out of there. The next cuckoo arrived five minutes after that. Now, unless Yather and I left our wallets lying inside, Prior has no idea what happened to the—to Citizen Vaun.”

  “And we covered up,” Yather adds. “I gotta contact in the Cashalix department, and he made up a roadkill for us with the kid’s ID.”

  “He did look sort of run-over by the time Yath had done with him,” Tham says, heading to the table.

  Roker taps fingers on the arm of his chair. “And has the next of kin made inquiries?”

  Tham and Yather exchange winks behind his back. “No, sir. But yesterday the file was illegally accessed by parties unknown.”

  Roker grunts again. “So he must assume the kid got lost and run over?”

  “That’s right.” Tham sits down, looking cheerfully at his heaped plate. “It’s the logical assumption. I’m gambling that he’ll carry on as if nothing has happened. I suggest we do the same, just lay low and watch him. Nobody but us three and Hariz know anything at all.”

  Vaun wishes he had been included in that remark. His mouth begins running like the Putra as he watches Tham savoring his first mouthful.

  “And hope he’ll lead us to his nest?” Roker curls up his lip skeptically.

  The other two say, “Yes, sir,” in unison.

  The admiral turns his blue eyes on Vaun in a cold, disagreeable stare. “And do what with the renegade?”

  “The patriot, sir,” Tham mutters, but all three now study Vaun for what feels like a long time. Evidently Tham and Yather are going to leave this decision entirely up to their boss. It is Prior the traitor they want, and the baby cuckoo from the delta is of very little interest now he has sung his song for them.

  The cold liquid Vaun has been gulping seems be turning much colder inside him as he waits to hear his fate. He can think of all sorts of helpful suggestions he could offer. Why not just feed him to the monsters and dispose of the evidence? The medics and scientists will be interested in him, because he remembers Tham saying that Prior’s files are missing. That’s another useful idea he won’t propose—ship him off to a lab to be dissected. He is a unique specimen, and by analyzing him they can learn about their enemies, the Brotherhood. He keeps his face impassive and braces his knees together in case they start knocking. He hopes they’ll let him die on a full stomach.

  Suddenly Roker smiles. “The patriot, of course.” He heaves his bulk from the chair with ominous ease, and paces barefoot over to Vaun. He is slabbed with muscle, and a good head taller.

  He wraps a meaty hand around Vaun’s upper arm. In a friendly gesture. Like a tourniquet. He is beaming. Vaun’s eyes are about level with all that golden chest hair, and the painful grip on his arm is saying that he is not much of a specimen, really, is he? The physical nearness is menacing. The smile is horribly reminiscent of Olmin’s smiles.

  “So you are loyal to Ult and the human race, are you, lad?”

  Vaun looks up at the happy gleam in the blue eyes and distrusts it with all his soul. “Yes, sir.”

  “Not to your test-tube brothers?”

  “I…I got along well with them, sir. They seemed like good guys to me.”

  The giant lowers shaggy, golden eyebrows.

  “But I disapprove of what was done to my mother, and the other girls. And they lied to me, sir.” He remembers Raj and Dice, their affectionate smiles and unfailing good humor. He wishes Admiral Roker were just a fraction more likable. He resents the contempt behind the big public smile. The admiral has been eating onions.

  “Well, Citizen Vaun…” Roker turns on his cheerful voice again. “Well, I have a suggestion. Even if Commodore Prior is a traitor, I’ll admit he’s one of the best damned officers in the Patrol. We’ve lost him, but I wouldn’t mind having a replacement. How would you like to be a spacer?”

  “Me, sir?” Vaun says incredulously. Out of the corner of his eye, he notices Yather and Tham starting to grin at each other, and he doesn’t like the thought that they can see something about this offer that he can’t.

  “Yes, you.” Roker rotates Vaun easily to face the view, and waves a thick arm at the scenery. “Everything you can see here is mine, because the Patrol gave it to me. It’s mine until the day I die. Not all of us live this well, but we mostly do all right. Don’t we, lads?”

  “Yes, sir,” say the others on cue.

  “Fine houses, lots of respect, travel, girls…” Roker’s blue-blue eyes lock onto Vaun’s. His voice drops. “I forgot! Not interested in girls?”

  Anger burns in Vaun’s throat, and he forgets discretion. “Not in the least!”

  Roker smiles pityingly. “We can fix that soon enough. Don’t worry.”

  Worry? True, Vaun worried about it back in the village, but Dice explained it willingly enough on the boat when he asked. “No, we don’t want girls. We don’t need girls. Wants and needs are weaknesses. Not needing or wanting girls is one of our strengths, an advantage we have over the randoms.”

  Why should Vaun want a want? He has watched that want infect the boys in the village as they reach adolescence, a feverish yearning that burns up their thoughts and their lives and gives them no peace, and precious little time for anything else. Who needs that need? What use are the admiral’s absurd muscles except to impress girls?

  The big boy shrugs and releases Vaun’s arm, but only so he can grip his shoulder instead, innocently digging a thumb into the pressure point over the bone. “Well, whatever you want, the Patrol’s got it. Whatever’s in you, the Patrol will bring it out, too. It’s the best chance a lad of your age can ever have.”

  It should be a wonderful offer. Vaun should be jumping at it. Why isn’t he? “But I’m only a peasant.”

  Roker frowns, blue eyes glinting out under golden brows. “That means ‘No’?”

  Vaun looks despairingly at Tham. Tham takes pity on him, and laughs. He walks over, and his presence reduces the tension.

  “Doesn’t that remind you of Prior, sir? He’s cautious like that! Vaun, the admiral is making you a very good offer, and quite genuinely, I’m sure. There’s one advantage that he hasn’t mentioned, and that’s security. Recruits go to Training School at Doggoth, and at Doggoth you’ll be safe from your former comrades—which may be good for your health, until we can round them all up. You will be well hidden from view. There can’t be anyone there who remembers Prior, and it won’t matter if they do—you can quite truthfully say you’re his brother. Everyone up there is someone’s son, or niece, or something.”

  Vaun has seen pubcom shows where the hero or heroine goes to Doggoth. It’s reputed to be a tough place. He isn’t afraid of that. He can handle whatever other recruits have to handle, but what special things might happen to him at Doggoth? The Patrol may have its own labs there. He will be utterly at Roker’s mercy in Doggoth…Has Roker any mercy?…If he has, he hasn�
�t shown it yet.

  “So you’ll be out of sight,” Tham continues. “Besides, it’s a fantastic opportunity for someone of your background, a very generous reward for the help you have given us. I think you’d be wise to accept.”

  And no alternative has been mentioned. Vaun studies Tham’s friendly smile for a long moment, and finally looks up at Roker to say, “Thank you, sir. I accept.” But he is really speaking to Tham.

  There must be someone in the world he can trust.

  RELUCTANTLY ADMITTING TO himself that he had been a refractory idiot in running on a twisted knee—and that the aforementioned knee was now a burning ball of utter agony—Vaun left the jungle trail by an inconspicuous branch path, which led to an obscure basement entrance.

  He saw no need to visit his own quarters or the more frequented parts of the house, and he showered, dried, and dressed without once slowing below a run…except while inserting himself into his shorts, a process that science had not improved since prehistoric times. He paused briefly to scowl at his reflection and conclude that his face was even more battered-looking than it felt. In less than three minutes after entering the building, he was hobbling up the stairs to the terrace level. A new record.

  He should, of course, go and get the booster he had missed that morning, but the medic would throw in some painkiller, and he perversely thought he deserved to suffer a bit longer for his stupidity. Another hour or so without booster would do no harm.

  With his shirt hanging open, still toweling his hair, still panting hard from his exercise, he paused in the doorway to admire the view. The bay, Glory Falls, the West Face, and the icy spire of Bandor…he knew them of old. Today the major tourist attraction at Valhal was none of those.

  Head haloed with red fire in the sunlight, Feirn was leaning over the balustrade, standing on tiptoe to peer down at something below. Vaun could not see what was proving so interesting—most likely a flock of spectrum orchidoforms, which were at their best just now, strutting their display on all the lawns—but he had a fine view of long, slim legs, and thin white shorts pulled tight over a trim little ass as fine as any he had ever admired. Beside it was a male posterior clad in spacer uniform pants, although the lanky ensign had no need to stand on tiptoe to see.