Mutant Star

by Karen Haber

  ***

  The blue curve of Earth filled two thirds of the window. Rick stared at it in fascination. With satisfaction, Rick took in the dense blackness of space. Alanna stood beside him, speechless.

  A thin, olive-skinned man with a long face entered the room.

  “I’m Jasper Saladin,” he said. “I’ll be supervising you. Ever done any welding in vacuum?”

  “No.”

  “How about low-g?”

  Rick shook his head.

  “Marvelous.” Saladin smiled sourly. “We’re starting from scratch here.”

  “Colonel Hawkins said you wanted telekinetics,” Rick said. “If you need trained ones, then train us.”

  Saladin regarded him silently. Then his mouth curved upward at one corner in a grudging smile. “All right. Let’s get started, before we waste any more time.”

  Rick and Alanna followed him along the corridor and down several levels into a wide bay.

  “There are pressure suits on the wall,” Saladin said. “Put them on and let me check the seals and oxygen supply.”

  He strapped himself into a red suit and mask and his voice over suit-to-suit intercom was strangely flattened. “Good. I want you to get used to moving in zero-g vacuum in these suits. Make certain your tethers are in place. We’ve got interlocking webbing on the soles of your suits, and matching pathways to keep you in place. If you should start to drift, these lines are the only way we can haul you back.”

  “The only way?” Rick said. “Seems dangerous.”

  Saladin flashed him an unreadable look. “It is. Now plant yourselves firmly on the path. I’m going to open the space doors and we’ll be in vacuum. Everybody secure?”

  He pressed a wall-mounted keypad. Airlock doors slid into place over the entrance to the main Pavilion as a warning klaxon sounded. At the far end of the shuttle bay a wall was sliding back to reveal the dense blackness of space beyond.

  Rick felt a thrill of terror course up his spine. Space. Vacuum. He had asked for it, hadn’t he?

  “Everybody okay?” Saladin glanced at them quickly. “Now try walking forward.”

  Rick pulled one foot free from the clinging path—it seemed to take forever. The step he took was more of a hop. He had to force his leg back down as it wobbled, weightless. Like walking through water, without the stiff resistance.

  “Not as easy as you thought?” Saladin said.

  “This is really inefficient,” Alanna said. “No wonder you’re behind schedule.”

  “Oh, really? What would you suggest?”

  “This.” She pulled one foot free, then the other. Floating above the pathway, she curled her legs under her and suddenly shot forward as though propelled. “It’s much easier to do it telekinetically.”

  Rick regretted that Saladin’s mask cut off his expression.

  “I’m sure it is,” Saladin said after a moment. “I’d suggest you make full use of your talents to assist your work.”

  “When do we try welding?”

  “I thought we’d wait until tomorrow …”

  “Let’s do it now,” Rick said. “You were the one worried about wasting time.”

  “All right. Fine. This way.” Saladin moved in graceless hops toward a work area near the far curve of the bay. “These are steel-infused girders that we routinely use in construction of the pavilions.”

  “Why don’t they just build these on Earth and ship them up?” Alanna said.

  “Too expensive to put them in orbit. And the insurance costs are prohibitive. We can’t guarantee every launch will be perfect when we’re transporting things on this scale.”

  Rick glanced at the metal supports. It would be easy to meld them, he saw. Child’s play. He waited through Saladin’s labored explanation, then began mating girders as though he had been doing it all his life. A little pressure here, concentration there. A quick flare of energy and voila.

  “Very nice,” Saladin said.

  Rick began to twist the girders into abstract patterns.

  “You’re wasting valuable material.”

  “Come off it, Saladin. This has all got to be waste for practice.” The surface of the girders was smooth and gray, flickering here and there with the glint of light off some mica chips in the ceramic epoxy mix. As Rick watched, the mica chips glittered and grew larger. The surface of the girder became rough, pockmarked, riddled with holes and bubbles. Rick realized that he was looking into the girder, at the structure of the thing. He saw strings of molecules snaking around one another. And he understood that there was something wrong with their spidery patterns, something dangerous and unstable.

  “How much of this metal has been used on the new Pavilion?” Rick asked.

  “That’s a strange question,” Saladin said. “Why should you …”

  “Just answer it!”

  “Maybe a ton.”

  “It’s all got to be replaced,” Rick said. “And right away.”

  “You must be joking.”

  “It’s riddled with flaws, Saladin. A microassay should tell you what’s wrong and where.”

  “How do you know?”

  “I can see them.”

  Alanna swung around in slow motion. “See them? Rick, what are you talking about?”

  “I don’t know how,” he said. “But I can see into the metal. See where the microbubbles are.”

  “Bubbles?” Saladin’s voice was tinged with alarm. “But we checked this equipment thoroughly.”

  “Then check it again.”

  “But how can you see them?”

  “I told you,” Rick said sharply. “I don’t know. But they’re there. And you’d better do something about them or there’ll be a bad accident.”

  Alanna leaned toward him. “Can you see that, too?”

  Rick closed his eyes. Images of deformed machinery, inert bodies on severed lifelines. Chaos. Silent death in space. “Yes. Yes, I can. Saladin, you’ve got to stop it, do you hear?”

  Saladin was already on the intercom. “Stop work. Yes, I know Hawkins won’t like it. Tell him I’ll explain. And get a microassay going on the new steel shipment.” He turned back, closed the space doors. The hiss of returning air filled their ears, and returning gravity gradually reclaimed and weighted their limbs.

  Saladin removed his mask. “We’ll have to wait for test results, to be sure. But if you’re right, Akimura, somebody has a lot to answer for.” He paused. “And God help you if you aren’t. I didn’t know mutants could see into things. Or foresee the future.”

  Rick smiled grimly and unsealed his suit. “Neither did I.”

  Alanna was staring at him, an uneasy expression on her face. When their eyes met, she peered at him intently, as though she could look right into his soul. Her expression was pensive, even worried. Then she glanced away.

  ***

  “What do you mean we have to stop construction!” Hawkins stared at Saladin as though he’d lost his mind. “I bring you two telekinetics and the next thing I hear is you’ve frozen all movement.”

  Saladin’s expression was even more sour than usual. “Akimura found flaws in the steel.”

  “What? I thought you had it checked.”

  “I did. But he was right. I don’t know how he did it. But if we’d continued to build, stress fractures would have occurred. Possibly total structural failure. I don’t even like to think about it.”

  “You’ve confirmed this?”

  “Yes.”

  “How long for repairs?”

  “A month.”

  Hawkins sighed. “Can you keep it to that?”

  “I’ll try.”

  Hawkins nodded in dismissal. But Saladin lingered, fidgeting.

  “Something else?”

  “It’s Akimura.”

  “Is he difficult?”

  “Not really. But after finding the flaws, he started to tell me about the pattern of stress fractures that would occur. He could see it as clearly as though he were looking into a crystal ball.”
r />   “Speculation.”

  “I don’t think so.”

  “His girlfriend didn’t start to tell you the future, too, did she?”

  Saladin leaned forward. “Alanna just seems to be telekinetic. But this guy is unusual.”

  “I’d say so. Especially if he can amaze a cynic like you, Jasper.”

  Saladin scowled and walked out.

  As though he were looking into a crystal ball …

  Was it possible? Hawkins liked to think of himself as a level-headed businessman. But what he had experienced at the Berkeley labs and heard about today shook his faith in the nature of reality. What if Rick Akimura could see into things? And into the future?

  He had to find him. Question him.

  “Leporello, find Rick Akimura.”

  “He’s on the gym level. In the pool.”

  “Page him. No, wait. I’ll go talk to him myself.” Hawkins was on his feet. “The only way to get answers is to ask the questions yourself.”

  .

  ******************

  10

  The pool glistened in its g-field like a huge, jellied aquamarine jewel. Rick leaned back and floated upon the warm, wet cushion of the water, savoring the sensation, staring up and out into the galaxy through the windows that ringed the gym.

  The pool vanished. The room dropped away. He was not on the Pavilion. He was far from Earth. Strange red sands shifted beneath his feet and figures in bulky pressure suits trudged along paths carved through rocky hills. The sky was dark blue, almost black. White stars twinkled through the thin atmosphere. Mars. It had to be Mars. But when? Five minutes from now? Five years?

  “Mind if I join you?”

  The red sandscape disappeared. Rick returned to real time with a splash. He opened his eyes. Ethan Hawkins was bobbing next to him in the water.

  “It’s a big pool. Plenty of room for two,” Rick said, and wondered how long he had been out, elsewhere or when.

  “Sorry to disturb your meditations.” Hawkins didn’t look very sorry.

  “Any word on my union application?” Rick said.

  “Not yet. These things take time. And they’re unwilling to admit too many telekinetics, Rick. You know they’re afraid of losing their jobs.”

  “Yeah. Well, I can see why. But I don’t like working as a scab.”

  “You’re not a scab, Rick. You’re not breaking any strike line.”

  “Sure feels like it with the cold shoulder the union guys are giving me.”

  “That’s to be expected. They know you’re under special contract.”

  “Call it what you want,” Rick said. “Those welders don’t like it that I’m nonunion. They want a closed shop. I’m forcing it open.”

  “Let me worry about that.” Hawkins stretched slowly in the water. “Thought I’d get a lap or two in. Want to join me?”

  “How about a race?” Rick said.

  “Fine,” Hawkins said. “But I should warn you that swimming was my sport in college.”

  “Extreme. I love a challenge.”

  They made their way to the shallow end, waited until the wallmech signaled them, and kicked off the edge of the gravity field.

  As Rick had expected, Hawkins was a powerful swimmer, especially with that prosthetic arm. The seal between arm and shoulder was a livid pink scar, but the arm looked nearly normal. Hawkins cut through the water like a shark, determined, remorseless, strong.

  Rick couldn’t match Hawkins’s power but he was equally determined, and managed to keep pace. For a moment he was tempted to use telekinesis to gain the lead. No. No. Do it without mutant stunts. He stroked desperately, lungs heaving, legs thrashing, and began to pull ahead.

  Should I let the boss win?

  As soon as he thought it, Rick put even more distance between himself and Hawkins. Every man and mutant for himself, he thought. His lead increased. Lengthened. By the time Hawkins touched the far edge of the pool, Rick was sitting on the deck with his legs dangling in the water, ready to hand him a towel.

  A look of frustration passed over Hawkins’s face. “Nice form,” he said, unsmiling. “I didn’t know you were such a swimmer.”

  “I’m full of surprises,” Rick said with a sharp grin.

  “No doubt.” Hawkins pulled himself up out of the pool and wrapped the towel around his midsection. “I understand you found some flaws in the metal Jasper Saladin asked you to weld.”

  “Yeah,” Rick said. “It was full of holes. You really ought to improve your quality control, Colonel.”

  Hawkins gave him a sharp look. “Surely the flaws were on a microscopic level. You’d need more than good eyes to see them.”

  Rick shrugged.

  “Saladin also said you told him precisely how the flaws would deform the new Pavilion. The pattern of stress fractures.”

  “So?”

  “I’d call that a gift for prophecy.”

  “Would you?”

  “And I’d call any man that had a reliable gift for it a wealthy, lucky individual,” Hawkins said. “What do you think, Rick?”

  Rick eyed him coolly. “What are you offering?”

  “Whatever you want.” The eagerness in the colonel’s voice was unmistakable.

  “You’d like me to become house seer for Aria Corp. and tell you where to place your bets.” Rick shook his head. “Even if I could, I wouldn’t do it.”

  “But you can see the future.”

  “Can I? That’s what you said. I only told Saladin about the potential for destruction.”

  “But you saw it.”

  “I saw something,” Rick said. “A possibility. There’s no guarantee about it.”

  “I’m not asking for guarantees.”

  “Aren’t you?”

  “Rick, why do you want to float in space welding metal when you could be lying on a beach somewhere …”

  “That vision came to me,” Rick said. “I didn’t go looking for it. I can’t just summon the future with a snap of my fingers. Even if I wanted to, I couldn’t tell you what you’ll be doing ten minutes from now. Or a year. It doesn’t seem to work that way.”

  “A pity.”

  “Yeah.”

  Hawkins’s wristscreen beeped.

  “Excuse me.” He got to his feet and began to walk toward the door.

  Rick sniffed at his esper trail and caught traces of schemes, ambition, an odd measure or two from some opera. And two images of himself.

  In the first, he was sitting at a table covered by a rich velvet cloth, wearing a strange headdress,, like a turban, and he was peering intently into a crystal ball whose interior revealed the vastness of space.

  In the second image, he was dangling on the end of a looping silver cord with the blaze of stars as a backdrop, negotiating desperately. Was that part real, or just projected paranoia? Tricky, these telepathic games. What is real, he wondered uneasily. And what will be?

  A wave of longing swept over him for his jet cycle and the simpler life of a null biker. No union worries. No future to foresee. Rick was getting in deeper and deeper here. He told himself that whatever happened, he could handle it. He had to.

  ***

  The room shook and swayed as a thunderous roar filled the air. Slabs of wall panel cracked and fell, shattering on the lab floor. Priceless equipment was smashed between tables. The windows crumpled, spewing shards of glass into the room.

  Julian sat up and took off his headset and mike. His heart was pounding a panicked solo, but he made himself get up calmly and walk into Eva’s office.

  “We’ve got to get out of the building,” he said.

  She looked at him in astonishment. “Julian, what are you doing in here? You’re supposed to be on shift.”

  “Listen to me.” He grabbed her arm. “There’s going to be an earthquake. A big one. We could be killed. I just saw it.”

  “You saw it through a flare? But that doesn’t mean anything.”

  “How can you say that?”

  “Julian, y
ou’re losing your perspective just a wee bit, don’t you think?” Eva said. “There’s no guarantee these visions are true, clear predictions. And even if they are, there’s no telling when they’ll occur.”

  “I know, Eva. Believe me, I feel it. In my bones.”

  “Take a deep breath. Count to ten.”

  “You don’t believe it, do you?” Julian glowered at her, tears of frustration and fury blurring his sight. “You’ve never believed it.”

  “Now calm down.”

  “No,” he said. “No, this is just a cynical exercise for Dr. Eva Seguy so she can obtain tenure. You don’t think these flares contain precognitive information. You never did.”

  Eva’s cheeks were bright red. “How dare you talk to me that way!”

  “It’s true, isn’t it?”

  Eva refused to meet his gaze. He looked away, toward the pink and white flowers in a celadon vase on her desk. The orchids began to nod, bobbing gracefully on long stems. For a moment he was amused. Nodding flowers? Then the seismic alarms went off, sounding a staccato warning, and the lights went out.

  The floor made a long, slow roll under their feet. Julian reached through the dim room to grab Eva. Around them, couches jiggled, leaped into the air, slammed down again. The sound of equipment falling to the floor, panels opening, screens breaking, filled the air.

  “This is a bad one!” Eva cried. “We’ve got to get out.”

  “No time.”

  Julian grabbed her and pulled her under the desk. Together they cowered in the dark.

  The ground shook and shook again.

  Julian waited for the ceiling to come down. Every lab had been retrofitted for earthquakes years ago, but there was no guarantee they would hold for a quake longer than fifteen seconds. And this one had gone on for almost half a minute. He tried to remember if his vision had shown him the extent of the damage. No. He was on his own in real time, facing real death.

  The floor shook, jolting them both against the side of the desk. Ceiling panels crashed down and flipped into the wall.

  Eva was whispering something that sounded like the Lord’s Prayer. Julian felt weak envy: if he could have prayed, he would have.

  The rumbling died away, distant thunder moving on.

  Julian lifted his head.

  Dust clogged the air. Silence settled with the dust, broken only by the occasional tick of crumbling plaster or shifting debris. Not one piece of furniture remained upright. The couches were scattered like children’s dollhouse furniture. Great, jagged cracks raced up the walls toward the ceiling. Somewhere an electrical line buzzed and sputtered.