***
“I’m not trying to be disrespectful,” Tedla said, glancing at Val nervously.
“I know,” Val said, though her laugh sounded uncomfortable even in her own ears. “It’s just odd to hear your own culture analyzed by someone who’s supposed to be the analyzee.”
“That’s the risk they took in educating me,” Tedla said.
“But you got through it anyway,” Val said. “Before you deny it, Joansie talked to Magister Delgado. He said you weren’t flunking out, or anything close to it. So what happened? Did you rebel?” As soon as the words were out of her mouth, she felt silly. Rebellion was completely alien to Tedla’s nature.
The neuter looked intensely uncomfortable. “I wish I didn’t have to tell you the next part.”
Val waited in silence.
“Oh well,” Tedla said. “You could have found it out yourself by now, if you had just looked up Magister Galele’s name.”
Tedla had told her a great many things, but had never looked this reluctant before. “What happened?” she said. Hesitantly, Tedla said, “I was very close to graduating, as you said. I was preparing for oral exams when I got a message from Capella Two. Magister Galele had been arrested, and was in jail.” Tedla closed its eyes, and its voice sank to a whisper. “He had been picked up in a vice raid on a house that specialized in child prostitution.”
***
I couldn’t believe it, at first. I thought it was one more plot to destroy him for what he’d done on my planet. I was outraged. I couldn’t think of anything else. I quickly made arrangements to go back to Capella Two. Before I could leave, a peace officer came to interview me. He kept probing, asking leading questions, till I realized they wanted me to supply more evidence. At last he came out and offered to pay my way back if I would just agree to say Magister Galele had molested me, too.
It was like having a tornado in my brain. I was so angry I didn’t even tell Magister Delgado where I was going. When I got to Capella Two, I tried to get in to see the magister, but instead they sat me down and showed me the evidence.
It was only then I learned why he was in so much trouble. You see, it was not his first offense. Long before I had known him, before he had even come to my planet, he had been convicted on the same charge, and had taken court-ordered treatments. Now he was a recidivist to the law, one of those rare, incurable people on whom even brain alteration fails. He had used up all his chances.
My entire world shattered around me that day. The person I had known best, the person I had loved and admired with all my heart, had completely hidden his true nature from me. I hadn’t known him at all. Everything I had trusted was a complete deception.
I was still angry, but now at him. How well I remember that shabby gray room where they laid it all out before me. I paced up and down between the window and the wall, my mind whirling with outrage and confusion. In that state, they tried again to get me to admit that I also had been his plaything. When I still denied it, they showed me pictures of the children they had picked up in their sweep, children in makeup and grotesquely suggestive costumes, sexualized before their time. There was one, a little girl with curly blond hair and dark eyes, that could have been a picture of myself at that age.
I felt horribly implicated then, dirtied by association, as if I had been an accomplice. But I still wouldn’t lie. They put me in a hotel room nearby, where they could keep up the pressure. There they visited me every day, telling me more details, trying to get my cooperation. They needed my testimony because I was an adult now, and all the other witnesses were children.
Any other crime I could have forgiven him. I wouldn’t have liked it, but I could have made excuses. This was too personal.
At last his own lawyer came to talk to me, to ask if I would testify on his behalf. He was planning to admit his guilt—he could scarcely do anything else—but hoping that my support might get him clemency.
I refused to say a word in his defense.
I never went to the trial. I stayed in my hotel room through the whole thing, and only learned afterwards what happened. No one defended him, and the judges were very harsh. They sentenced him to prison for twenty years. It might as well have been for the rest of his life.
On the night before he was to be transferred to prison, he sent me a message. When I saw it listed in my mailbox, I returned it, marked Refused. I never found out what was in it.
I had to hire someone to dispose of his belongings. I couldn’t have entered his rooms myself, even though they told me any evidence was gone. The woman who did it was discreet and thorough. The only thing she brought me was a sealed envelope addressed to me in Magister Galele’s hand. I almost threw it out, but at the last minute I put it away unopened.
I stayed on Capella Two, still living in that hotel, though I couldn’t afford it. My mind was in such turmoil I didn’t know what else to do. I spent a lot of time wandering around, just walking aimlessly for days on end, porting to other places till I didn’t even know where I was, and returning at night so exhausted I didn’t even dream.
Magister Galele only lasted two months in prison. He wasn’t made for it; the strain was too great, and his heart gave out. It was his lawyer who brought me the news. In his will, he left all his copyrights to me. They were all he had.
That night I sat alone in my room without a light on, utterly wasted with emotion. At last, very late, I turned on a light and took out the envelope he had left me. It was a short note. All I remember of it is:
***
You are the only beautiful thing in my sordid life. You are the only thing that has ever made me proud of myself. If I am dead by the time you read this, know that I died loving you.
***
I cried myself to sleep that night, holding the paper pressed against my heart.
What I’d been denying to myself, and could no longer, was that I still loved him. In spite of what he had done, in spite of all my anger, he was the most precious thing in my life. And now it was too late.
For the next few days I sat in my room, barely stirring, barely eating. I had cried so much I felt drained, but I couldn’t stop rethinking everything. It was no longer a mystery to me why I had never suspected him. It may sound sentimental, but I think it is true: For a short time, his love had actually redeemed him.
Everything looked different now. I had thought he was my guardian, but he was the one who had needed protection. How badly I had failed him. If only I had read him right, and let him have the kind of relationship he wanted, he might never have turned elsewhere. If only I hadn’t left him alone and gone to C4D, he might never have relapsed.
If only I had forgiven him, he might not have died.
They say that blands can never truly love, and the deepest feelings are denied us. I cannot believe that is true. If humans loved or grieved more deeply than I, then the world would be strewn with their empty husks. I have loved. I have known grief. I know that, if I know anything.
I left my room on the second night, and never returned. I wandered from wayport to wayport till my money ran out, then slept in alleys in the cold. I deserved it, you see. In all my life I’d only truly loved two people, and I had killed them both.
Early one morning I found myself in Shandurry’s druggery. He can diagnose a thousand varieties of despair, and he instantly recognized mine. He gave me a drug to blunt the pain and a bed to sleep in, the first true sleep I’d had in days. When he woke me hours later and said I had to get out into the cold again, I broke down and begged him to let me stay. When he told me the price, it only seemed just. After all, I had been trained for it. It seemed like my life had just come full circle.
Everything I earned went back to Shandurry for drugs. The pain was just too intense, I couldn’t have survived without them. Shandurry didn’t like it; he wants his whores quick in the wits, so they can steal and wheedle higher prices out of the clients. But he kept me on because of the big man, who was very rich and completely obsessed with me. In the
end, though, even that wasn’t enough. He started withholding the drugs. When I came to my senses and realized what a sink of degradation my life had become, I knew the only solution was to end it. I had already stolen the gun, perhaps sensing what I was going to have to do. I didn’t tell Shandurry anything. I just walked out—and you know the rest.
***
Tedla’s body was rigid with tension. Val reached out to touch her companion’s knee. It flinched away. She wondered if, all this time, she had been misinterpreting that reaction.
“Tedla, why don’t you want me to touch you?” she said.
“You shouldn’t. If you touch me, something horrible will happen to you. I’m like a carrier.”
“But you have let all sorts of people touch you.”
“It didn’t matter with them. They weren’t good people.”
Very gently, Val said, “You can’t blame yourself, Tedla. You can’t save everyone. Especially not from themselves.”
“I don’t want to save everyone,” Tedla said. “Just the people I love.”
Val thought of Alair Galele. She felt a little betrayed herself, ashamed that she had actually begun to like the man. She blamed her own acumen that she had seen nothing of the predator in his writings. Weakness, bad judgment, helpless impulsivity. Not malice.
The brain alteration treatments for pedophilia were severe and rarely failed, the conditioning was so strong. She looked at Tedla and thought of living year in and year out within touching distance of the thing you wanted most, the thing you yearned for more than life. Was it enough to break down even the strongest conditioning? She looked away, not wanting Tedla to know what she was thinking.
She suddenly felt an urgent need for a drink. She swung her legs over the edge of the bed to get up. Tedla caught her hand. “You’re not leaving, are you?”
“I’m not leaving,” Val said.
“I’m sorry,” Tedla said, its voice shaking. “You don’t know how scared I am. If they catch me, if they take me back...I would be better off if I’d killed myself.”
“They’re not going to take you back,” Val said. “I’m not going to let them.”
She got up and ordered a double Scotch from the dispenser. When she glanced back, Tedla had collapsed in exhaustion on the bed, its face pressed into the covers. Val sat down at the terminal. She had barely activated it when it buzzed with an incoming call. After a momentary hesitation, she answered.
Shandurry’s face was livid with anger. “Put your whore on,” he said.
Val scowled at him, but pushed her chair back. Tedla had sat up on the bed. Its eyes looked dark with shadows. “Shandurry?” it said.
“What have you done, you alley cat?” Shandurry demanded.
“What do you mean?”
“Don’t try to sell me that innocent crap. Why didn’t you tell me you’re on the big man’s shit list?”
Tedla looked gray with fear. “Did you talk to him? Did you tell him where I am?”
“Oh I see. You were counting on me not following through.”
“Three days! You said I could have three days!” Tedla cried out.
“Save your breath, bitch-boy.” Shandurry cut off the call.
Val turned to Tedla. “What was that about?”
“I don’t know. I haven’t done anything.”
“Who is this big man? Is he likely to cause trouble?”
“I don’t know anything about him. His real name’s Pym.”
Val froze, but her heart was laboring. “Are you kidding, Tedla? You fellated Pym?”
Tedla looked terrified. “What’s the matter? Do you know him?”
“He’s just the WAC administrator in charge of the Gammadian project!” Something struck her. “No wonder they wanted to wipe your memories! God, do you suppose Surin knew?”
“What do we do?” Tedla asked.
Val had no chance to answer. There were voices outside the door. She had barely jumped to her feet when the door burst open and Shandurry came in, followed by three men in suits. One of them went straight for her, the other two for Tedla. “How dare you—” she began, but got no further. The man grabbed her around the waist, pinning her arms at her sides. She struggled furiously, but her barefoot kicks had little effect.
The second man pinned Tedla back on the bed, while the third took out a transdermal and pressed it against the neuter’s neck. They waited a few seconds, then one of them picked up the unconscious body as if it weighed no more than the pillow. One of its arms dangled loosely.
“You fucking bastards!” Val screamed. She tried to jerk free, but the goon still held her.
The man carrying Tedla left, and the other took out a roll of tape and secured Val’s wrists behind her, with another strip over her mouth. They threw her roughly onto the bed, then turned to the door. Shandurry was still holding it open for them. “Thanks,” one of them said, the only word they had uttered.
Alone, Val struggled fruitlessly to free her hands. When she was exhausted and sweaty, she lay still a moment. She had to apply her brain to this problem. Looking around the room, her eyes fell on a steel-studded cabinet near the manacles mounted on the wall. She pushed herself upright and went over to it, turning around and groping behind her to unfasten the latch. When she kicked the doors wide, she saw what she had expected: whips, shockers, needles, and other fanciful torture equipment. And, yes, a rack of knives. She wondered if Pym had been stimulated by castration fantasies. She would gladly have given him the real thing at the moment.
Turning around again, she groped for the hilt of one of the knives. When she had maneuvered it out, she took it over to the bed, kicked up the covers, and wedged the handle under the mattress, blade out. Drawing a deep breath to steady herself, she gingerly knelt to saw apart the tape binding her hands.
The knife wasn’t very sharp, but it did the trick at last. She ripped the last bits of tape from her wrists, then freed her mouth. No more than ten minutes had passed; they had obviously wanted only to slow her down till they got away. They would be long gone by now; there was no point following. She sat down at the terminal.
“He’s not here, Val,” Kendra said. “He’s at K-Court.”
“Page him,” Val said grimly. “It’s an emergency. Life and death.”
“Val, are you okay?”
“Not my life and death, Kendra! Someone else’s.” She gave the number of her terminal and cut off.
She paced up and down in agitation, wondering if she was doing the right thing. It was a choice of evils now, and she needed a big evil to take on WAC. When the message buzzer sounded, she leaped to answer.
She had never seen Magister Gossup look as nearly angry as this. He said, “Valerie, if you expect me to—”
“Never mind!” she cried out. “WAC’s got Tedla. You’ve got to tell Nasatir. If he wants Tedla with an intact brain, he’s got to move fast. Pym’s the one to call.”
“How do you know this?” Gossup said.
“Because I was here when the WAC goons carted Tedla off not ten minutes ago. I would have called sooner, but they left me tied up.”
“Where are you?” Gossup said.
“It doesn’t matter! What matters is, they’re planning to shock Tedla’s brain to jelly so it can’t expose Pym. He was one of its customers when it sold sex for money. Or maybe you knew that all along.”
She had the satisfaction of seeing him look genuinely shocked. “Can you prove this?” he demanded.
“I know who can,” she said. “Anyway, WAC will probably turn Tedla over to Nasatir as soon as they figure it’s safe—”
“They have to. The court granted Nasatir custody. And you’re in danger of a kidnapping charge.”
“—so at this point the only question is, does Tedla go back to Gammadis with a brain or without one?”
At last Gossup seemed to grasp the whole picture. “I’ll talk to Delegate Nasatir,” he said. The screen went blank.
Val leaned back and closed her eyes, feeling simultane
ously exhausted and keyed to fight. She had no idea if she had done the right thing. She thought, with a guilty twinge of empathy, of Magister Galele. No wonder Gossup had called him evil. Gossup probably thought Galele had brought Tedla back solely to serve as his sexual slave. That was what Gossup had been trying to hide. She groaned and put her hand to her forehead. And to think she had denied that humans were complete prisoners of their sexuality.
She got up wearily to leave. When she arrived back in the dark and writhing corridor of Shandurry’s entertainment complex, the Eclectic was waiting for her with a long printout. “You racked up some charges,” he said.
“You piece of shit,” Val said. “As if WAC didn’t pay you enough already.”
He didn’t try to stop her as she walked out.
***
When she got home, Max and Deedee were out, and her mailbox was crowded with messages—requests for interviews and information, mostly. She skimmed through them with a rising sense of disappointment. They were all from small fringe newsgroups with limited circulation. The major newsnets had picked up on the Gammadian negotiations, but so far they had failed to see any general interest in Tedla’s story. It would take work and time to turn them around. Three days might have done it. But she no longer had three days.
She sat staring at her screen. Never before had she felt so completely powerless. There was nothing, absolutely nothing, she could do. It was an alien feeling, and she clenched her fists to deny its validity.
What was it Tedla had said? Something about the powerless having no recourse but through the minds of their masters. At first, her instincts rebelled at the idea. But as she sat there, unable to think of any alternative, her hand moved slowly to pick up her scarf and pack again.
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