by D M Arnold
“Memo? Have you two been corresponding?”
“Yes. For the past couple of years, I've been needling Senta about the wisdom of moving the sequencing labs here to Sudal. I knew if I kept hammering away, sooner or later we'd see some results.”
“Really?” Nyk replied. “What a great idea! I'm surprised neither of us thought of it before.” Senta gave him a withering look.
“Nyk, Ryanna is head of plant breeding for potatoes. I was hoping you could take some time to discuss a problem she's been struggling with. She'd like the opinion of an exobotanist. Maybe you and she can talk while Senta and I negotiate our little project.”
“Why don't we talk in my office?” Ryanna suggested and led him down a corridor. She was a large woman in early middle age with short reddish-blond hair, a round face and intensely blue eyes. Nyk took a seat in her cluttered office. “I don't know if you've heard, but we've had another native microbe invasion. It's the third in two years. We had to destroy an entire agridome's worth of potatoes and then sterilize the dome.” Nyk winced. “Fortunately it was one of our smaller facilities.”
“Have you identified the microbe?”
“Yes, and this one's turning out to be extremely difficult. We've had good luck in the past making subtle genetic changes, but this one hasn't responded. I was hoping you could give us a hand.”
“What would you like me to do?”
“We have a fairly extensive collection of potato cultures, some going back a couple hundred years. So far, we haven't found a single variety that's resistant to this microbe. We're about to start investigating cross-species gene splicing. I thought you might give us some starting points.”
“Potatoes are members of the solonaceae or nightshade family. Many nightshade species are toxic. Perhaps we can find some likely specimens there. Also, if you can get me a list of all the related cultures you have, I'll cross-reference them with plant suppliers and see if we can get the ball rolling. I'll also speak to Seymor about getting some help on the ground on Earth.”
Nyk walked back to Dyoman's office where Senta was completing her conversation. “Thank you Senta,” Hasse said. “I'm sure this will work out.”
“Nice seeing you again, Nyk,” said Ryanna.
Nyk escorted Senta outside into the midday heat and popped open the groundcar. “I heard Ryanna say, 'Nice seeing you again,'” Senta said. “How do you know her?”
“She used to baby-sit me when I was little. I hadn't realized she married Dyoman.” Nyk brought up a list of destinations on the car's display. “Home? Or do you have somewhere else you'd like to go?”
“Home. It'll take me some time to be accustomed to Sudal as home.”
“Car, the Residence.”
“By the way, Nykkyo, you can dispense with the gloating.”
“Who's gloating? You made the right decision, even if you did it for the wrong reason.”
“What do you mean the wrong reason? It's simply become a necessity due to the logistics of working with the pilot beds, especially now we've added more crops to our sequencing schedules.”
“The fact this decision came on the heels of Andra's freedom is nothing more than a coincidence?”
“Yes, a happy coincidence for me, but a coincidence nonetheless. Now, I'm going to do you a favor and forget I heard you say that.”
The groundcar left the Sudal city limits and headed toward the coast. “How are you going to solve all the problems of relocating?” he asked.
“What problems?”
“The laundry list of reasons you give me every time I suggest moving the labs. For example, the staffing problem.”
“Dyoman says we will have no trouble finding the necessary staffing. Some of the City based staff will relocate. We'll make it attractive for them. A few have homes here and will be happy to move ... Don't you dare say it!”
“Say what?”
“Don't you dare say I told you so. Nykkyo, we are doing this for the good of the program and it'll involve sacrifice on the part of everyone, not the least myself.”
* * *
Nyk lay nude on his childhood bed. Senta entered his bedroom wearing her light, sleeveless robe. She looked around in the subdued light. “No cover?” she asked.
“There's one in the closet if you must.” Senta retrieved a lightweight blanket and spread it on the bed, folding it back above Nyk's waist. She slipped off her robe, climbed into the bed and lay beside Nyk. “You have beautiful eyes, Senta.”
“I mean it, Nykkyo -- don't you even think about it. If you lay a hand on me, I'll kick your ass straight to the edge of that bluff and down onto the rocks!”
Nyk cracked a smile. Senta smiled and they both laughed.
“Would you let me rub your back?” he asked.
“You'd rub my back?” She rolled over onto her stomach. He sat up and began stroking her back between her shoulder blades. “That feels good... You used to do this after we made love...”
“Yes, to compensate for being a rotten lover.”
“I never said you were a rotten lover.”
“You never had to say it, I knew it.”
“You've improved over the years...”
“Yes, under your tutelage. You're qualified to give master lessons in lovemaking. I'm afraid I shall forever be a novice.” He made strokes down the length of her spine with the heel of his hand. “I wanted this time with you, Senta, because we have some important things to discuss.”
“Yes, we do. Nykkyo, I'd like for us to consider reconciliation. I know you'll have responsibilities on Earth with the Agency. But you, Andra and I can make this work. There's plenty of room at this house, for the times your onworld. Andra's more than willing to be our amfin.”
“I'm sorry, korlyta. It's out of the question.”
“Why?”
“Because when I make transit to Earth, it'll be a one-way trip. I'll be Earthbound.”
“No, Nyk! You don't mean it!”
“I do mean it. I've wrapped up my onworld affairs, and I make transit tomorrow.”
“You haven't come to your senses about the Earth woman. It can't work, Nykkyo.”
“I love her and I've agreed to help her raise her child. This isn't a whim, Senta -- it's something I must do.”
“Do you mean the bastard child from the rape? She'll be an unwed mother. I can't believe you'd involve yourself in such! If it were I, I'd be mortified. I'd ... I'd ... Well, I'd never carry such a child. What of the line?”
“You're talking of my line. Earth attitudes on unwed mothers are far different. Destiny has put this into motion. Her child's on his way, and he needs a father. Remember, without that child, there'd be no Kyhanas. There'd be no me, and perhaps no you.”
“I did this, didn't I? You're doing this to punish me, aren't you?”
“No, Senta. You and I have never been right for each other. That became clear to me during my Agency assignment. We married because Veska wished to bind to the Kyhana line. It's the wrong reason. We should admit we made a mistake and get on with being friends. I respect you, Senta -- I admire the work you do and the person you are. I welcome you as a friend.”
“Maybe it is good you'll be Earthbound for a while. It'll give me time to sort out my feelings for you. Maybe we can work things out when you come back. I think you will return, once the reality of what you're doing sinks in.”
“Senta, there's something else. Andra told me you know something about my family line. It's something you discovered while sequencing Suki's hair.”
She raised up on her elbows. “Andra told you that? I swore her to secrecy! I'll have words with her in the morning.”
“It's my family. I think I have the right to know what you discovered.” She sat up and turned from him. “Senta, what did you find?” She pressed her fist to her lips. “Tell me what you found.”
“Nykkyo, please try not to be too upset. Promise me you won't be upset.”
“I can't promise anything until I know what it is.”
“You said the probability of ancestry was eighty-five to ninety percent.”
“I said that probability applied to Sukiko's ancestry to Gordo Kyhana.”
“He lived over three thousand Floran years ago. Tell me the whole story, Senta.”
“Nyk, I'm speaking as a geneticist. When you delivered Sukiko's hair to me, I realized I had a unique opportunity to study how human genes mutate and become diluted through the generations. It's not every day a scientist is handed such a laboratory. I thought I had the raw material for a very interesting publication in the Genetics Journal.
“My plan was to use Sukiko's genetic sequence as a baseline. We have no sequencing data to fill the gap between Sukiko and Gordo, or even Koichi and Gordo, but the records are complete from Gordo on. I wanted to try applying to humans the techniques I developed for tracking genetic changes in our food crops.
“I began comparing genetic markers from Gordo onward, with the intent of extrapolating the changes back to Sukiko. I was especially interested in estimating exactly when the Japanese racial traits vanished. With the extrapolated data, I could reconstruct the likely appearance of any generation of Kyhana between Sukiko and Gordo.”
“When you visited Suki in the clinic, you wanted to see for yourself her physical characteristics. It was for your research, wasn't it?”
She nodded. “Nykkyo, contact with her is a unique opportunity. It's much more rare than once in a lifetime -- it's once in a people's lifetimes.” She sniffed. “You are so lucky, I am so envious of you!”
“Senta, there's no reason you can't be friends with Suki, too.”
“No? Do you think so?”
“She'd probably welcome it. When you did the sequencing, what did you find?”
“The data all looked promising. I had nearly perfect correlation. Then the endpoint wouldn't fit. It was an obvious outlier.”
“The endpoint? Do you mean me? Am I the endpoint, the outlier?”
“Yes, Nyk. At first I thought I made a mistake. I double-checked, and obtained the same result. I started working backward from your sequence. I didn't have to look far.”
“Senta, can you explain what this means in language I can comprehend?” Her lip trembled and her eyes began to fill. “Senta, tell me what this means.”
“Nyk, you're not the biological son of Xarvo Kyhana. I'm so, so sorry.”
Nyk began to hyperventilate. He closed his eyes, clenched his fist and pressed it to his lips. “Who is my father?” Senta wiped tears from her eyes. “Senta, tell me who my father is!”
“I don't know.”
“How could you not know? You didn't do a search and find out?”
“No, Nyk, it's not that simple. There's a good reason the family lines follow the paternal side. We can index the male side easily by tracing the Y chromosome. It's the only chromosome guaranteed to pass from father to son, and it changes little from generation to generation. You're a freak of nature -- you suffer atypical female syndrome. You don't possess a Y chromosome, so I had to sequence you as if you were a woman. On the female side, it's much more a game of statistics. There are billions of possible combinations, and billions of candidates. It's not practical to perform a statistical match on them all. If we could narrow it down, it'd be much easier.”
“Why didn't you tell me?” Senta sniffed. “Senta, why didn't you tell me?”
“Because I figured what you didn't know wouldn't hurt you. I knew how much it meant to you to be a Kyhana, with the crest and Koichi's journal and all. It doesn't matter. Xarvo and Jylla Kyhana took out your birth license, so legally you are a Kyhana and nothing can take that from you. You're the same Nykkyo today as you were yesterday. It really doesn't matter who your biological father was.”
“It matters to me! How dare you assume what matters and doesn't matter when it's my family and my genes?”
“I'm sorry, Nyk,” she sobbed. “I didn't want to hurt you. I never wanted to hurt you. I do love you. You probably don't believe that, right now, but I do. Oh, Nykkyo, I don't want to lose you.” He pulled away from her as she reached toward him.
Nyk stood and walked, nude, down the spiral staircase and onto the bluff. He sat on a rock, listening to the sound of the surf wash in below him. He heard Senta from behind. “Nyk, please, please. I'm so sorry! Please come back to bed!”
He let the sound of the surf drown out her words.
* * *
Nyk felt a hand on his shoulder. He turned to see Andra, clutching her shell. “You've been here all night?” He nodded. “I heard you and Senta talking last night. Now, she's not speaking to me. Did it have to do with the hair?”
“Yes, it did. She told me I'm not my father's son.”
“Who is your father?”
“She said she doesn't know. I believe her. What she knows for sure is I am not a Kyhana.”
“This frees you for Sukiko!”
“It denies me what I thought was my heritage. I've known Destiny is cruel, and now I know just how cruel She can be. My father likely possessed the same Y-chromosome as the fetus in Suki's womb. To think that same chromosome had been passed along the generations for nearly seven thousand Floran years. For two hundred generations, all the Kyhana men have shared that same chromosome. Except me.” He picked up a rock, threw it into the surf and buried his face in his hands. “The Kyhana line starts with Suki's unborn child, and it ended, vaporized, in the shuttle crash. I'm an outsider looking in.”
He felt Andra caress his back. “We all must share some Kyhana blood. Each of us is the offspring of the original thousand settlers, and we know of the interbreeding in the early years.”
He looked up at her. “It's ironic -- there's a good chance you're more closely related to Sukiko than I am.”
“Nyk, we're all cousins.”
“In a way, I was expecting something like this. Two hundred generations leaves plenty of room for hanky-panky. I was expecting to find the Kyhana line broken, genetically. That's what I thought Senta's discovery was. To learn it was broken by my own parents.” He threw another rock.
“They never told me. That's what hurts. If they had told me from the beginning, I could've dealt with it. Instead, they led me on. Everyone led me on, because no one wanted to hurt me.” He stood and faced her. “Look at me. Am I as dim and naive and weak as everyone surrounding me must believe?”
“I think you're a fine man. I salute the strength and courage you have to do what you're about to do.”
“Courage?”
“Yes, Nyk. You're leaving your home to spend your life in an alien culture. We were taught at the academy never to question an assignment, but to do our duty and to make the best of whatever situation we encountered. Destiny has given you this assignment. If, indeed, your duty is to love Sukiko and her child to secure the Kyhana line, then you will be a hero and untold billions will owe you their lives -- including me.”
“I feel so unlike a hero.” He stood and walked, his hand laced with hers, toward the house. He stopped to regard the memorial plaque. “'They loved the sea nearly as deeply as they loved each other.' That's a bald-faced lie. We tell such lies about the dead. My parents didn't love each other.”
“How do you know?”
“You're looking at the living proof. I am the issue of an adulterous liaison. A deliberate, adulterous liaison.”
“Are you sure?”
“Beyond a doubt.”
“How? How do you know you weren't ... conceived from a sperm bank?”
“Because of my defect. No one would design a child with atypical female syndrome. A genetic counselor would've seen the trait and culled out my embryo. I am a natural child and not my father's. That's how I know it's a lie.” He approached the plaque and attempted to work his fingernails under it. “I'd like to pry it off that stone and fling it into the sea.” He picked up a small stone, threw it at the plaque and it bounced off. “Veska
had that made, and I installed it. Such lies... Veska!”
Nyk walked into the house. He saw Senta sitting at a vidisplay annotating crop sequencing reports. His gaze focused on the Kyhana wedding crest tattoo on her arm. “Can you access birth sequences from here?”
She looked up from the display. “Yes.”
“If I name a short list of candidates, can you bring up their sequences and match them to mine?”
“Of course I can.”
“Let's start with your stepdad.”
“No, Nyk, I refuse. Don't make me do that.”
“It's my family and my genes. I must know. Bring up Veska's sequence and perform the match, or show me how and I will.”
Senta turned to the vidisplay and poked its touchscreen. Nyk awaited the results of the comparison. “I can't believe it!” she said.
“By rights it's his crest you should have on your arm.”
“What made you think it was Dad?”
“Because he's the only other man I ever saw spend time with my mother.” Nyk shook his head. “I should've suspected as much. This answers many questions. It explains why I was so unlike my father -- why Veska liked coming here on his vacations and why he stopped after my parents were killed -- why they kept separate bedrooms and why I never heard them making love.”
He headed into his childhood bedroom. “What are you doing?” he heard Senta call after him.
“I'm packing my case,” he yelled. “I have a transit to make.”
18 -- Earthbound
Nykkyo stepped off the shuttle onto the transit platform and walked straight to Veska's office. He stood in the doorway. “My friend and son, you used to say. I thought you meant son-in-law. Now, I've learnt our relationship is much closer.”
“Come and sit down, Nykkyo.”
“Why, Veska? Why wasn't I told?”
“Nykkyo, there were two women in my life that I loved, and I lost them both -- Jylla and Lydda.”
“My mother and Senta's.”
“I'll start with Jylla. Xarvo and I were good friends from the time we were boys in Sudal. We were rivals for Jylla. She loved me more, I think, but chose to marry him because of the family line. You see, Nykkyo, I suffer the curse of a broken line.”