Offspring

by Steven Harper

  Lucia smiled and tapped one cuff. The suit swirled into a leafy design. Another tap, and it shimmered into desert coloring. “The hood has a one-way mask on it, so I don’t even have to wear make-up,” she said. “I’ll leave now so I can find a good vantage point.”

  “Are you licensed for a weapon?” Kendi asked.

  Lucia patted a belt compartment. “I can carry a neuro-pistol, stun-level only. I will see you down there.”

  “Actually, we won’t see you,” Kendi said. “I hope.”

  “Yes.” Lucia touched her collarbone, the place where she usually wore a small figurine of Irfan. “Mother Irfan will bless us, Fa—Kendi.”

  And she left. Kendi and Ben waited half an hour, then followed. Outside, the carpenters had finished the staircases and were dismantling the two walkways. Susan Bayberry, the brown-haired supervisor, called out an apology.

  “We should be done in a few hours, sir,” she said from across the gap. The polymer mesh underneath held a few dropped pieces of wood and a resin gun. Visible through the mesh were leaves, branches, and lower walkways. One of the carpenters drew a small pistol from his belt and aimed it downward. An orange beam of light touched the resin gun, and it flew upward. With a practiced motion, the carpenter shut off the beam and caught the errant gun. A sticky bead of resin clung to the end like a bit of liquid amber.

  “Do you want me to show you how to use the stair bridges now?” Bayberry asked.

  “Later,” Kendi said distractedly. “We should be back soon. Leave instructions if you don’t see us.”

  Without waiting for an answer, he and Ben trotted down the stairs which wound around the talltree. Ben carried the bag over one shoulder. Dirty gray clouds dragged across the sky, pushing ahead of them an omen of cold rain. Tree lizards chittered and chirped in a cheerful counterpoint to Kendi’s mood. A brown bark lizard hissed indignantly at them, then scampered up the talltree with a flick of its tail.

  On the front balcony of the house below, an older woman built like a hickory walking stick was scooping soil from a sack into a large pot. A flat of sky-blue blossoms waited nearby. The house itself groaned with plants and flowers. Hanging baskets spilled vines over their sides. Window boxes burst with bright colors. Ivy crawled up the walls. Pots of all sizes boasted a rainbow of flowers and greenery. Kendi tried to slip past the woman without attracting her attention, but she looked up and caught sight of the two men. Kendi tried not to grimace. He liked his neighbor, but he wasn’t in the mood to talk. Still, he couldn’t bring himself to be rude.

  “Grandmother Mee,” he said, pressing fingertips to forehead.

  “Father Kendi,” she replied. Dirt smudged her cheeks. “And Mr. Rymar. Is all that hammering up there for you?”

  “We’re having some work done,” Kendi replied. “I hope they didn’t disturb you. They should be done soon.”

  She waved a brown hand. “No bother. It’s something different to wonder about. Now that I’ve been Silenced, all I have are my flowers and neighborhood gossip.”

  “We’re in something of a hurry, Grandmother,” Ben said, shifting the satchel.

  “Off with you, then,” she said to Kendi’s relief. “But stop back and tell me what’s going on in the Dream sometime, would you? I miss it.”

  “I will, Grandmother,” Kendi promised, and let Ben lead him away.

  The monorail station was a wide platform supported by the massive branches of the talltree and partly supported by thick cables drilled into the trunk itself. A pair of tracks snaked away through the leaves and branches for trains that ran in opposite directions. About a dozen people, both human and Ched-Balaar, awaited the next train. According to Kendi’s ocular implant, it would arrive in the next three minutes.

  “How are you holding up?” Kendi murmured to Ben.

  “I’m upright,” Ben said. “That’s the best I can do right now.”

  Kendi wanted to smash something. Instead he turned and looked up the track to see if the train was coming. It wasn’t, of course.

  “Excuse me, aren’t you Father Kendi?”

  Three people at the monorail station—two human and one Ched-Balaar—asked for his autograph. A fourth tried to convince him to buy into an investment program for a fried chick-lizard franchise, and Kendi had to snarl at him before he would go away.

  “Maybe we should get our own flitcar after all,” Ben said as the train finally whooshed into the station like a silent dragon.

  “Just filling out the forms will take months,” Kendi replied sourly. “Though I’m starting to think the same thing.”

  They boarded and found seats in the section for humans. Ched-Balaar sat on the floor and hooked their front claws into footholds designed for that purpose. Two of them chattered quietly to teach other, arms waving as one of them made a point. Kendi automatically sat next to the window, and Ben took the position next to the aisle. This cut down on the number of people on the train who might see and recognize the famous Kendi Weaver, and when had sitting like this become a habit?

  Ben wound a leg through one handle of the bag and set it on the floor. The train slid forward, then put on a smooth burst of speed. The trees outside smeared into a green-brown blur. They changed trains and finally arrived at the Ulikov station. As Lucia had said, this part of Treetown was more run-down. Tall, beehive apartment houses drooped among the talltree branches. The leaves here were thinner than elsewhere, letting in more gray sky, and some of the platforms creaked ominously as Kendi walked across them. The people were more shabbily dressed, and they didn’t accost Kendi or Ben except to give them furtive stares. Kendi saw no Ched-Balaar at all. This was no surprise—this part of Treetown was known to harbor groups with anti-Ched-Balaar sentiments. The Human League, a group more paranoid than the rest, claimed that the Ched-Balaar had caused the Despair in order to force humans out of the Dream. Kendi wondered if they were the ones who had uncovered the information about Ben. The Human League was probably short on cash these days, and blackmail made a good fund raiser.

  “Spare a freemark for a fellow human?” asked a gray-faced, unshaven man. Kendi shook his head in refusal, then caught sight of the satchel hanging over Ben’s shoulder. The money in that bag would feed a family of four for months, and Kendi was quibbling over a lousy freemark? He dropped a handful of coins into the man’s palm and kept walking.

  The pair crossed several walkways and went down a set of stairs to another balcony in front of an abandoned house. Graffiti sprawled across the door: Fuck Reza. Ben, face still pale, checked his data pad. “This is it.”

  “What time is it?”

  “Two minutes before two.”

  Kendi peered over the rail. The mesh below was rent and torn like a fish net that had trapped a shark—storm damage or vandalism that the neighborhood couldn’t afford to repair. Leaves and bark descended into shadow. Who was waiting down there? Ben unslung the satchel.

  “Are you two in place?” came Lucia’s whisper over Kendi’s earpiece. He tapped it.

  “We are that,” he murmured.

  “Do you see anyone?” Ben asked, also in a murmur.

  “No, but they may be hidden as I am. Make the drop in five...four...”

  “Is anyone looking?” Ben asked.

  Kendi checked. A few figures moved in the distance, but the nearby balcony and walkway leading through it were currently deserted. “Nope.”

  Ben took a deep breath and held the satchel out over the balcony. Kendi leaned over the rail to keep on eye on it. When Lucia reached zero, Ben opened his hand.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  “If I lived like a dolphin, I would probably live longer.”

  —Daniel Vik

  The satchel fell, and an orange beam of light flashed down from somewhere above Kendi’s head. The satchel hovered for a split-second, then fled up the beam and disappeared.

  Kendi was running before he was even aware of it. The bag had popped into an upper window of an abandoned two-story house one level up and ninety-degr
ees clockwise around the tree. He pounded up a staircase without looking to see if Ben were behind him and hit the house’s platform. Doors and windows on the first floor were boarded up, and Kendi saw no way in. A flicker of movement on the roof caught his eye. A figure in a bulky jumpsuit was climbing out of a high window. A hood obscured the figure’s face, and the satchel was strapped to its back. Kendi spotted a fire ladder running up the side of the house and dashed toward it. The

  figure made for the far gutter.

  “Did you drop the satchel?” came Lucia’s voice in Kendi’s earpiece. “I didn’t see it.”

  Kendi ignored her. He reached the roof just as the figure caught sight of him. It froze, then turned and ran across the shingles. Kendi followed, heart pounding, jaw tensed. A walkway for the upper level ran past the house two or three meters up and out. It had no mesh beneath it. The figure ran full tilt for the gutter and leaped. It easily snagged a support cable and pulled itself onto the swinging walkway. Kendi put on a burst of speed. He hit the edge and jumped.

  Everything slowed. Kendi saw his own hands stretched out before him. The support cable was a handbreadth away. The figure on the walkway pulled a pistol from its belt. With aching slowness, it aimed. Kendi’s hands touched the cable. The figure fired down at him. This time the beam was green, and it caught Kendi square in the chest. The air was smashed from his lungs, and the cable tore itself from his grip. Kendi flew backward and fell. Leaves and branches rushed past him and wind filled his ears. Then there was a stretching sensation, and he stopped.

  Kendi hung there, dazed and motionless. Above him, weathered wood and green leaves swayed sickeningly. Kendi felt bruised and out of breath. He tried to move his arms and legs. They didn’t respond. A tearing noise, and Kendi dropped a few centimeters. He gasped, and his surrounding snapped into focus. He had fallen into the tattered mesh below the rendezvous balcony. His arm had gone through one of the holes, and that was all that prevented him from sliding into a much bigger rent further down the mesh. Again he tried to move, but his muscles refused to work. Another tear, and the hole widened.

  “Kendi!” Ben’s face appeared in Kendi’s field of vision. He was lying on his stomach to look over the edge. “Kendi! Are you okay?”

  Kendi managed a blurry response, unable to create coherent words.

  “I’ve called a rescue squad,” Ben said. “God, can you—”

  The hole tore some more and Kendi jerked downward. Ben swore.

  “Grab my hand!” he shouted, and thrust his arm down. It was within easy reach. Kendi tried to move, but only managed a twitch. Ben slid feet-first over the edge, legs dangling, arm wrapped around a balcony strut. He reached for Kendi’s free arm, but fell a few centimeters short. Ben’s feet swung over empty air.

  “You have to bring your arm up so I can grab you,” Ben said. His voice was perfectly calm, but Kendi saw the sheen of sweat on his forehead. “You can do it, Ken. Bring your arm up.”

  Rip, drop. Another tear and Kendi would slide into green oblivion. Kendi shrugged, trying to flip his arm up toward Ben, and managed a useless flopping motion.

  “Almost, Ken,” Ben said. “Come on. Try again.”

  Kendi shrugged harder. The motion brought his arm up. Ben reached. With a rotten tearing sound, the last of the mesh gave way. Kendi’s stomach lurched and he fell. Then he jerked to a stop. Ben’s hand was white around Kendi’s forearm. Kendi felt a rush of pain. Pins and needles stabbed his entire body and an iron band crushed his arm where Ben had him in a death grip. Their feet swung gently over empty air. Ben groaned aloud.

  Kendi hung there for a moment, then gave himself a mental shake. He could feel his arms and legs again, and that meant he could move them. He brought his free arm up. Hot pain wrenched every muscle, but it moved. He got it around Ben’s neck. This brought him partially behind Ben, like a child climbing on for a piggy-back ride. The motion made Ben hiss through clenched teeth. His elbow, the one wrapped around the wooden strut, must be in agony. Kendi hung on through his own pain.

  “I’ve got a hold,” he gasped. “Now what?”

  In answer, Ben let go of Kendi and lunged with his free arm. Kendi swung wildly but kept his hold around Ben’s neck. Ben cried out in pain, but managed to grab the strut with his other arm. He was facing the balcony now.

  “Can you climb up?” he panted.

  Kendi reached for the balcony. Pain thundered through him, but his hand reached the edge. He started to climb, then lost his grip. He fell backward and only barely managed to wrap his arms around Ben’s neck again. The jolt wrung another grunt from Ben. Panting from pain and exertion, Kendi reached up to try again, but couldn’t even touch wood. He gritted his teeth.

  “I have to lunge for it,” he said. “Ready?”

  Ben jerked his head in a nod.

  “One . . two...three.” Kendi lunged for the balcony—and missed. He was sliding down Ben’s back when a hard, scarred hand grabbed his. Lucia added her other hand to the grip and pulled. Kendi made it over the edge of the balcony onto blessedly solid wood, then turned to help Ben up. The three of them lay panting on the platform, savoring the feeling of being alive and out of danger. Hardwood had never felt so good beneath his body.

  Sirens wailed in the distance. Kendi sat up. “Let’s get out of here,” he said. “I don’t feel like explaining anything.”

  They didn’t quite flee—Kendi couldn’t manage anything above a fast walk, and Ben’s right arm hung uselessly at his side—but they managed to get away before the rescue squad arrived. Kendi realized belatedly that barely two minutes had passed since he’d been shot.

  Once they were a safe distance away, they ducked into an empty stairwell. Kendi explained what had happened while Lucia rolled up Ben’s sleeve to examine his arm. The hard muscle was already darkening with bruises, and he winced under Lucia’s careful prodding. Then she had Kendi lift his shirt. A rough circle was already turning purple on his chest and stomach.

  “The blackmailer hit you with a gravity beam set to repulse,” Lucia said.

  “I figured that out,” Kendi said.

  “I think your arm is sprained, Ben. Harenn will have to look at it. And you, Fa—Kendi, will need analgesics. The human body isn’t made to be pushed around by a gravity beam. In some ways, it’s as effective as a neuro-stunner.”

  “Let’s just get home,” Ben said. “I feel like shit.”

  “What about the money, Lucia?” Kendi asked. “Are you tracking it?”

  Lucia shook her head. “The bugs shorted out almost immediately. The gravity beam must have destroyed them.”

  Lucia changed her camouflage jumpsuit to an unremarkable blue, and they emerged from the stairwell to trudge toward the train station. The monorail ride home was silent and solemn. Kendi could feel his muscles stiffening. Ben sat in the hard seat, his face unreadable, though Kendi knew him well enough to recognize how upset he was. Pain mixed with guilt. Why had Kendi been so stupid? He should have let the blackmailer get away. He had come within a hair of dying, had almost taken Ben with him. Now they were out ten thousand freemarks, and the blackmailer was probably royally pissed off. That didn’t bode well.

  Kendi thanked his ancestors when they got home and saw the carpenters had left. Except for crumbs of sawdust scattered here and there, the staircases and walkways looked exactly the same as before. Harenn was waiting for them in the house. In the living room with her was a boy with dark eyes, hair, and skin. He was a bit short, and good-looking in a way that made maiden aunts ache to pinch his cheeks. Kendi had long ago decided the boy would one day break hearts on a dozen worlds.

  “Bedj-ka,” he said weakly. “What are—”

  “School is out, and he can’t stay home alone,” Harenn said. “What happened?”

  “You look awful,” Bedj-ka said.

  “Bedj-ka, I want you to go into Father Kendi’s room,” Harenn said. “You may use the sim-games there.”

  “Uh, not those,” Kendi said quickly. “They woul
dn’t be—um...”

  “There’s another sim unit in my office,” Ben said.

  “Go, Bedj-ka,” Harenn said. “Now!”

  “I never get to hear anything good,” Bedj-ka complained, but left.

  “I’ll get the medical kit,” Lucia said, and disappeared into the bathroom. Kendi explained what happened, and Harenn’s mouth hardened. When Lucia returned, Harenn took out the kit’s little scanner and told Ben to take off his shirt. Kendi flinched at the sight. The clear line of a balcony strut was imprinted in the crook of his elbow, and Ben’s fair skin showed the mark with perfect clarity. The limb was swelling. The hard, well-defined muscles of his arm and chest twitched painfully when Harenn touched them. She checked the scanner.

  “Your arm is badly sprained,” she said, and racked an ampule into a dermospray. She pressed it against his arm with a thump. “This will clear it up, though it will take several hours. You should wear a sling for the next day or so. You will need prescription painkillers, but I do not have—”

  “I have a stash,” Kendi said.

  Harenn gave him a long look. “Do I want to know how you laid hands on them?”

  “Not if you want to keep your nurse’s license.”

  “Very well. Take what you need and no more, Ben. Lucia, help him put his shirt back on. Kendi, I need you to hold still.” Harenn examined him, poking, prodding, scanning. Kendi bore the process in uncharacteristic silence. The pain had settled into a low, steady ache.

  “Your assailant could have killed you,” Harenn said. “If that beam had been turned up higher, it would have punched your heart out through your spine. You were very lucky.”

  “I know,” Kendi said with look at Ben. Lucia was helping his sore arm into the sleeve, and Kendi was seized with an urge to push her away. That was his job.

  “As it is,” Harenn continued, “your muscles will be sore for a day or two. There is nothing for it except rest, a hot bath, and pain medication.”

  “Ben?” Bedj-ka called from the office. “Your computer is signaling. It says you have an urgent message.”