A Cosmic Christmas

by Hank Davis

  The thing was—there were burner indentations on the side of the wall towards the fields. He’d made them and climbed up them just an half an hour ago. There were none on the other side, where fifty feet below, the flyers on the zipway were coming to a stop.

  Normally descending towards the zipway and running across would have meant death. Just the friction of heated air in the space beneath the flyers was enough to kill. But as the flyers stopped there was just a chance . . . Only it had to be done before the authorities got there to check people in the flyers. He had to be across and up the other wall, and over the side, into . . . He wasn’t sure what was on the other side. Other cities and fields, he imagined. But what wasn’t there was Freiwerk. Freiwerk was on the same side of the zipway as Hoffnungshaus, which meant it would be the side of the highway that escaped mules—without burners or the agility to scale the walls of the zipway—would roam, and where their pursuers would scour.

  He bit at his lip and frowned. His gray attire would be conspicuous as he was descending the wall, and people in the stopping flyers might call the law on him. On the other hand, the night was dark, there was snow, and the light of the suddenly unreadable holographic advertisements above would cast a pattern of light and shadows on the walls anyway. Moving light and shadows. It was just possible, in the confusion, he would pass unnoticed. If he could be fast enough. Fortunately, he’d been bio-engineered to be fast. Among other things.

  Getting to the other side of the zipway would get him stranded away from Hoffnungshaus, and he would still have the trouble of being an escaped bio-engineered artifact, proscribed on his own and acceptable only under supervision of the authorities. On the other hand, it would keep him alive past the night. He could always get back to Hoffnungshaus, if he survived. He could always steal a flyer. He’d done it before.

  His body had already made the decision for him. He bent sideways, pointing the burner at a point down the zipway wall, melting an indentation deep enough for a toe hold. Then he swung down, holding on to the top of the wall, setting his foot in the indentation, and thinking fast.

  The problem was he usually did this going up—not coming down. Going up, he made toe holds and hand holds, and then toe holds again, all the way up. Coming down, he’d need to make handholds, and rely on his cold fingers to hold him up. Difficult. Not impossible.

  Working quickly, he melted an indentation for his hand, waited a few seconds for it to cool in the December air, and, holding onto it, melted an indentation further down.

  He scrambled, hand over hand down, sometimes rushing it and getting singed fingertips, feeling as if he were going incredibly slow but knowing he was faster than any normal human. The sirens still sounded down the zipway, and the flyers below him were still moving, though slower, as the central control slowed them down so it could stop them.

  By the time Jarl was near enough that the wind of normal zipway traffic would have knocked him down, the flyers were going slower and it was a mere stiff wind. He waited there, poised in the area of darkness below the light cast by the holographs and above the lights of the flyers below, hearing the sirens come ever closer, feeling the wind die down.

  He could hear his heart beat loudly. The sound of blood rushing in his head made him near-deaf. His fingers felt numb with cold, and he wished the flyers would stop before the sirens got any closer. But he couldn’t change either rate. He could only hope it would work out for him. He could only stay there, suspended halfway between the top of the wall and the zipway, and wish would all come out all right. He’d taken a gamble, and sometimes you lost gambles.

  He felt more than saw the flyers stop, and he dropped down the remaining meter and a half to the surface of the zipway. The flyers, in stopping, had come to rest on the zipway. It was something he hadn’t counted on, which was stupid. Parked flyers always rested on the ground. But he’d counted on that space of darkness beneath the flyers, to run to the other side of the zipway. Stupid Jarl. So much for bio-engineered for intelligence.

  Now he faced nine rows of flyers, side by side, with their lights on in an endless traffic jam extending way back, completely obstructing the zipway. He had to run among them, somehow, without getting all of those people on their links, calling the authorities.

  The only thing he could think of—the only thing he could do—was what he used to get out of trouble at Hoffnungshaus, or at least to keep his trouble as limited as he could. Look, he told himself, as though you have every right to be here.

  He added a minor flourish, by rounding a flyer in such way that for people of other flyers, it would look like he had come out of it. Why anyone should come out of a flyer in these circumstances was anyone’s guess. But people did things like that. At least Jarl thought they did. He’d read about them doing things like that. Truth be told, other than books and holos he knew precious little about what real people outside Hoffnungshaus did or why. But he would pretend he came out of the flyer, and walk sedately across.

  The problem with walking sedately across was the ever-closer sirens. But Jarl didn’t dare run. He felt as though he were holding himself sternly in hand, and not rushing across was the hardest thing he’d ever done.

  By the time he reached the other side, right by the wall, it had become obvious that he had already lost too. The sirens were close enough that he could hear the voice blared at intervals: “Do not let anyone into your flyer. Some mules have penetrated the zipway.” The Peace Keepers were close enough that in another five minutes their floodlights would illuminate the flyers in the zipway and the wall on each side as starkly as the full light of day, if not more.

  Even Jarl could not climb the wall that fast, bio-engineered or not. And if caught halfway up, they would know there was something wrong with him, and he would probably be shot down. But if he didn’t try it . . .

  He could as easily be taken on the ground.

  Wild thoughts of dropping to the ground and knitting himself with the base of the wall crossed his mind and were quickly dismissed, followed by thoughts of running, using his extra speed—just running between the flyers and disappearing. But you could not disappear when each flyer contained people who could come out and grab you. Or shoot you.

  Do not let anyone in your flyer. The words, coming over the announcement system of the Peace Keeper flyers seemed to echo themselves in Jarl’s head, in his own internal voice. If they were saying that, it was because people might.

  Fine. Jarl in their place would never do so, but he didn’t understand people and would freely admit that he couldn’t imagine any of them being silly enough to allow a stranger into their flyer with mules on the loose.

  Whenever there were reports on mule riots and mule outbreaks, they went out of their way to tell everyone that some mules looked just like any other humans. Their lack of soul wasn’t visible from the outside—hence, the artifact ring. This made it hard for Jarl to believe he could find refuge due to his youthful appearance, even if he faked innocence.

  On the other hand, Jarl had a burner. And many, if not most people were unarmed.

  He took a deep breath, again, feeling the cold air singe his lungs with a burning sensation. It was a risk. Perhaps too great a risk. Anyone coerced at burner point to let him into their flyer was likely to turn on him the minute the authorities arrived. That was almost certain. But not certain. Not absolutely certain. While getting shot standing out here was absolutely certain.

  He scanned the flyers around. Most of them were too small for him to climb aboard and conceal himself when the authorities arrived. But nearby was an eggplant-colored one. It seemed to be a family flyer—six seats at least—and unless there were little ones asleep on the seats, it had only a man and a woman aboard.

  Jarl walked back towards it, dipping his hand under his tunic for the burner. He must not show it before he was behind the flyer, because if he did, then the people in the flyer behind or to the side might call the authorities.

  So he kept his burner in his waistband, unt
il he got right behind the flyer, then shielding it with his body, started burning the genlock. This would set off alarms in the flyer, but it was better than going to the window and waving the burner and demanding to be let in. First, because a lot of the flyers had burner-proof dimatough windshields. Second, because—

  Second, because by the time the man clambered back over the seats, towards the rear door, the genlock had burned off, the flyer was unlocked, and Jarl could pull the door up and clamber in, burner in hand, all without being seen to be armed by anyone else but his victims.

  The man, standing in the middle of the last row of seats, facing the cargo area, was probably forty. At least, he looked like the director of Hoffnungshaus, who was forty. He had streaks of gray hair back from his temples, marring his otherwise thick mahogany-red hair. He was thickly built too—powerful shoulders, strong legs, big hands clenched on the back of the seats.

  But I have a burner, Jarl thought, and brought it up, to point square at the man, at the same time looking up into blue-grey eyes. The eyes glanced at the burner, then at Jarl, then the man said, softly, “You might want to close that back hatch, son.”

  “I have a burner,” Jarl said, his voice reedy and thin as it hadn’t been for at least four years.

  “So I see,” the man said. “If you’re not going to close that hatch, let me do it,” his voice was mild, concerned, seeming not at all worried by Jarl’s burner, or what must be the sheer panic in Jarl’s eyes. Jarl felt that panic mount. What sort of man wasn’t afraid of a burner? He’d read. He’d seen holos. He knew that people were afraid of death. Weren’t they? Jarl sure as hell was.

  He realized he’d started trembling so badly that his teeth were knocking together, and he was shaking with it, as well as with reaction to the warmth of the flyer after nearly freezing atop the wall. He realized the burner was shaking too hard for him to point at anything. He knew the man must think the same because he pushed past Jarl, closed the back hatch, and did something to it that secured it in place. “There, that will hold,” he said, then turned around. “And now, son, what are we going to do with you?”

  Jarl shocked himself with a sob, though it was probably just a reaction to the temperature difference. But there was this long breath intake, and his voice came as wavering as his trembling hand, “I can shoot. I can. I can burn you.”

  “Of course you can. But the way your hand is shaking, you’re more likely to set the inside of the flyer on fire, and I don’t think that’s what you want, is it?” the man asked. And then very gently, “Give me the burner.”

  Jarl tried not to, but the large hand reached over and took it before he could control his shaking hand. And now Jarl was unarmed and the man had a burner. And Jarl couldn’t even see what the man was doing, through the film of tears that had unaccountably filled his eyes, in probably yet another reaction to the cold. What is the use? He sank down to his knees, then sat back on his heels, as he waited for the burn he was sure would come.

  He heard a click as the burner charge was pulled, the burner safety pushed in place, then a low whistle. “A Peace Keeper burner. Where did you get this?”

  “I—It was months ago. I stole it. What does it matter?” Now Jarl’s voice sounded hysterical. He could hear the sirens drawing ever closer. A light like full daylight only brighter came through the windows, blinding them. “Shoot me and be done.”

  “Give me your left hand,” the man said, his voice still very calm. And then, “I see.” The sound of a deeply drawn breath. “This will wait. They’re here. You’ll never pass. Not dressed like that.”

  Jarl found himself hauled up by his left hand and thrown, forcibly, to lying down on a seat. Something fluffy was thrown over him. The man’s voice whispered, “Do your best to look ill and sleepy, can you?” And to the other person in the flyer, the one who’d remained quiet through all this. “Jane, make this disappear as much as you can.”

  “I can’t make it disappear. Not enough to—”

  “Enough that it will pass unless they take the flyer apart. My job is to make sure they don’t. And give me an ID gem. Male. I’d say around fifteen. Or can pass as such. Quickly, Jane.”

  And suddenly, there was a rush of fresh air, cold and smelling of snow, and Jarl realized that the man had opened the door to the flyer. “How may I help you, officer?”

  Jarl’s heart was beating so loudly that he had trouble hearing what the Peace Keeper was saying, though he caught the words “mules” “riots” and “forty dead.” And then a polite request for the family documents.

  Jarl heard gems handed over and the clink of their fitting into a reader. “Mr . . . Carl Alterman, and your wife and son?” the Peace Keeper asked.

  “Yes,” the man said. “Our son has been having high fevers. We think it is one of those new viruses. We’re headed for Friestadt, to see a specialist? Nothing else has worked.”

  “Oh,” the Peace Keeper said, and though Jarl had absolutely no idea why, he could hear the dread in the Peace Keeper’s voice, and had the feeling he wouldn’t be touched.

  The Peace Keeper said, in the official voice, again, “If you’d put your fingers in this machine? It detects the genetic markers of mules, even if the ring has somehow been lost. It’s just a formality.”

  The woman must have gone first, because Jarl heard the ping, and then she leaned back and said, “Honey, do you think you could wake enough to—” Just before a ping sounded that Jarl guessed meant the man too was not bio-engineered.

  But the Peace Keeper spoke up before Jarl could answer—even had he known how to—“No need, ma’am. If he’s contagious it could be a public health risk.”

  And then the door closed, and Jarl found himself taking big gulps of air.

  He heard the locks closing on the flyer, and the woman said, softly, “Don’t sit up. They can still see in here, but we need to talk.”

  Jarl thought it was funny how the woman’s voice sounded so very different than even in holos. He’d never heard a woman’s voice without electronic modulation, and it was higher than men’s, sure, but it also sounded . . . richer, in ways he couldn’t quite express.

  “Yes,” the man said, before Jarl could speak. “We must know what we’re up against, if they’re serious enough to test the genetic markers. Let’s start at the beginning: are you a mule?”

  “No— Yes.” Jarl took a deep breath. “Maybe.”

  He shouldn’t have been hurt by the woman’s musical giggle, but he was. And then surprised by the man’s less tense voice as he said, “Promising! Are you from Freiwerk?”

  “What? No. Hoffnungshaus. I am . . . I am bio-engineered. And all my . . . all my . . . kind are too, but we are not mules. We’re not gestated in non-human animals, and we’re not subnormal. We’re rather . . . the other way.”

  A sharp sucking in of breath from the man, and Jarl had the impression he’d said something terribly wrong, but he wasn’t sure what.

  “I see,” the man said. “So, the rumors aren’t just rumors. What is your name?”

  “Jarl Ingemar,” Jarl said. “We were named by the people who designed us, you know, the national team. I . . . was sent over from Scandinavia at three, when it was decided—”

  “Yes, yes. So, if the rumors are true you’d be what? Twenty? Twenty-one?”

  “Nineteen.”

  A breath like a sigh from the man, and a noise Jarl couldn’t interpret from the woman, followed by, “Starved.” And something that sounded like “Poor boys.”

  Then the silence went on so long that Jarl wondered what he had said that was so terrible. And then he had to know. “Please, sir,” he said. “What do you want to do with me?”

  “Uh? Do? Nothing. But—”

  “But once he’s known to be missing they’ll turn the countryside inside out looking for him,” the woman said.

  “And won’t stop till he’s captured or there’s proof he’s dead and gone. They’ll want to keep their dirty little secret hidden. . . . Making supermen, in
deed.”

  “I don’t want to die,” Jarl said, reflexively, understanding nothing but that. His teeth had stopped chattering and the blanket made him feel warm. His fingers stung lightly, where he’d burned them. And he realized he was very hungry. And he didn’t want to die.

  “No, of course not,” the man said. And then after another deep sigh, “What were you doing out there? I suspect they guard you precious few even better than the people from Freiwerk. Don’t tell me that there was a riot at your place, also?”

  “Uh? No. We . . . There aren’t enough of us to riot. And I’m one of the oldest.”

  “So, how did you get out? What are you doing here?”

  Jarl squirmed. How to explain his private obsession, his driving need? How to do it without sounding completely insane, or worse, like a vandal? These people had given him shelter. His entire survival was staked on their continued good will. If they turned him out of the flyer, if they called the Peace Keeper over, Jarl would be done for.

  “It’s the angel,” he said, and then realized he had started all wrong. “I mean, we can see the zipway from our window,” he said. “From my window. I can see the zipway and the glow of the holograms above,” he said. “Not what they say, of course. Not without calculating it. I mean, they’re designed to be seen—”

  “Yes,” the man said. Curtly. A demand that Jarl go on, without saying it.

  “Yeah, well. I used to dream about it. About the zipway. When I was really little. I dreamed about flying in it and reading the holograms.” He paused and sensed the puzzled impatience of his hosts. “Only then, when I was four or five, I saw a picture of an angel. You know, a being with wings?”

  “We know what angels are,” the woman said, very softly.