by Watts Martin
“You’d tell me it wasn’t possible, wouldn’t you?”
“Oh, it’s possible, it’s just…not…” He rubs the back of his head. “Are you sure that’s what you heard?”
“Yeah,” she whispers. “Positive.”
He heads over and squeezes her hand, holding it for a few seconds, then heads out silently, looking troubled.
No one else pops their head into the room over the next few minutes. It’s late. She turns back to the entertainment system, settling on a comedy serial she watches occasionally. Which was the last episode of this she saw? Twenty-five? Twenty-seven? “Kis, what was the…”
She stops herself, then lets out a long, thin sigh. Stabbing the choice for episode twenty-six, she leans back on the pillow, making herself focus only on the screen. She falls asleep halfway through episode twenty-seven.
“How does that feel?”
Gail taps the tooth with her tongue, lightly. “Like a tooth. Everything still aches, though.” She studies herself in the mirror; without the bandages she looks nearly normal. Except for the hospital gown.
“Like I said, you’re going to be sore for at least a week. Don’t put weight on that foot or that shoulder.” Dr. Allen points helpfully at each body part as she speaks.
“I know. Yes.” Gail starts to push herself up into a standing position. Both shoulders twinge angrily. She gasps in pain.
“What did I just say? No weight!” The tigress glares. “Sit back down and wait for the wheelchair.” She turns to a control surface and taps on it a few times. The wheelchair in the corner beeps and navigates toward them.
“I thought I could use a crutch.”
“Tomorrow.” The wheelchair stops and waits for Gail to pull herself into it. Allen barely waits before leaving the room; the chair jerks into motion, following her and carrying its passenger along.
“Look, I feel fine.”
“You just told me you didn’t a minute ago, and even if you hadn’t, I’d know better. The reconstruction needs time to set.”
“But—”
“No saving the world for a few more weeks, and that’s final.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
They walk/wheel past her room’s door. She starts to say something, then realizes they’re heading to Sky’s room. “Mara’s Blood. Did they finish?”
“They did.”
“And you didn’t tell me?” Gail almost leaps out of the chair despite it still moving.
Allen puts a hand on her shoulder, without pressing. “You had your own healing to do.” She lets the chair roll ahead of her through the doorway.
“Yes, but…” She trails off. The room’s the same as it was two days ago. The Keces scientists are almost in the same positions. Sky’s in the same position. Everyone seems very somber.
Oh, God, it didn’t work, did it? They’ve brought her here to say goodbye.
“Ms. Simmons.” The man, still in the same lab coat, nods to her. “From what I’ve heard you had one hell of an adventure recovering the program for us.”
“Yeah. Did you…is it…”
The woman, standing by Sky’s bedside, looks between the wolf and a monitor. “Yes, and yes.”
Gail’s heart leaps. She fumbles for the manual controls to the wheelchair, guiding it over to Sky’s bedside.
“She’s going to have to stay on hemodialysis for the rest of the day, and we’re assessing the extent of the damage past her kidneys. But over the last five hours her prognosis has shifted from poor to excellent.”
“Thank you.” She takes Sky’s hand in both of hers. “How long can I stay with her here?”
Doctor Allen smiles. “As long as you want.”
The tigress leaves. One of the technicians leaves a few minutes after that, off to give a status update to Mr. Nakimura; the woman technician stays behind, still monitoring.
An hour past that, Sky’s eyes open. Gail’s own eyes widen, and she leans forward. “Sky?”
The wolf turns her head, slowly, and looks at Gail. She takes a long, shallow breath. “What happened to you?” she whispers.
Gail laughs, tears starting to run down her muzzle. “That’s kind of a long story.”
Sky smiles. “I’m not going anywhere.”
Coda
“Mmm?” She’s sure somebody just said something, and that’s rude. She’s clearly lying here sound asleep.
Confirmation comes in the form of a pillow thwack to her head. “I said wake up!”
Gail covers her face. “We don’t have to rush. The kid’s a day old. She’s not going anywhere.”
“We’re supposed to be meeting Jack and his daughter in less than two hours. Barely an hour and a half.”
“Stop counting down. It’s only a half-hour walk.”
“And we have to stop to get Josie.” The coyote pushes the pillow out of the way, leaning over and blowing on Gail’s closest ear. “Don’t make me bite you.”
Gail rolls over to look up at Dani’s mock-threatening growl. “Promise to bite later.”
Dani’s growl becomes a groan. The coyote pulls Gail up to a sitting position, then climbs out of bed, heading toward the bathroom. “Up, rat, up.”
After watching the dark grey tail disappear, Gail slips out from the sheets, heading to the closet and pulling on a bathrobe. Some of Dani’s clothes are hanging there now, too. She’s sure she’s left a couple things at Dani’s place, though. At least she hopes she has. If she’s staring at all her worldly possessions, they still fit on two shelves and ten hangers.
Naturally, Sky’s already up and starting coffee. “Good morning. I hope you finally got to sleep.”
“Hmm? Yeah, I didn’t have any problem sleeping.” She flicks her ears. “We didn’t, uh, keep you up, did we?”
“Oh, no.” Sky says that with the measured pace of someone who actually means yes.
Smiling sheepishly, Gail takes a seat. “I was doing some apartment hunting over the last week. There’s a one-bedroom place that’s opening up a block from here.”
Sky’s brows lift as she sets three coffee mugs down. “Oh?”
“Well, you’ve let me take over your den for nearly a year now.”
“Yes, and the whole time you’ve been telling me it was because you weren’t sure if you were going to stay in New Coyoacán.” Sky takes her own seat, crossing her legs.
“I wasn’t. I’m…” Still not? She got busy here much faster than she’d expected, than she’d intended. She still misses Kis, and still misses the stars, but she honestly doesn’t miss her old job. There’s much more she’d miss here. “My contract with the school is going to be extended.”
Sky sips her coffee and smiles slightly, then flips through the smartpaper she’s left on the table, scanning headlines and grunting. “The crowd we’re going to be navigating through at the hospital might be reason enough for me to leave New Coyoacán. They’ve got reporters from the inner system there.”
Gail looks into her coffee mug. “Is it too early in the morning to add rum to this?”
“Oh, come on.” Dani steps out of the back room. “You’re excellent at handling reporters.” The coyote’s gone very femme today, a calf-length dark blue batik skirt, sleeveless, modest neckline but backline plunging almost to the tail. It looks loose and casual until you try to figure out the mechanics of how it stays on, and begin to suspect the only options are nanotech or black magic. The overall effect is a little drool-inducing, but Dani can create the same effect in a tux. As far as Gail’s concerned, Dani can create the same effect in a burlap sack.
“Not by choice. Besides, out of sight, out of mind. They were all over us for a month, then left.”
“Other than the reporters with the long-form articles,” Sky corrects. “And ones regularly asking you what you think of the news of the day, or just fishing for what you’re doing with your time now.”
Gail clears her throat, but doesn’t contradict her sister. That’s another reason she’s considering moving out—Sky enjoys public attention even
less than she does.
Dani picks up the remaining coffee cup, spooning sugar into it. “And the documentary crew.”
Gail nearly drops her cup. “Documentary crew?”
The coyote grins. “Just predicting, sweetie. Give it another year.”
“Mara’s Blood.” She sighs, taking another sip of her coffee before standing up. “I’ll go get ready.”
When they get to Blue Coyote they’re a few minutes early, but Jack’s already there. Gail spoke with him two days ago when he and Laurie arrived on Panorica and he looked good. In person he looks—relaxed. She’s seen him in denim and a casual polytee before, but now he looks like he wants to be wearing that, like jeans are no longer an uncomfortable, alien place.
Laurie’s cute. She has her father’s eyes, but the straight black hair has to come from mom. Those eyes look wide even before they catch sight of Gail, Sky, Dani and Josie approaching.
Gail gives Jack a hug as he introduces them all to his daughter—the three he knows, at least. He hesitates at the rabbit girl.
“I’m Josie Dupree. One of Gail’s students.”
Laurie looks at the rat appraisingly. She’s already a few centimeters taller than Gail. “You’re a teacher?”
She shakes her head. “I’m a substitute teacher sometimes, and I help with tutoring and counseling.” That inverts the order of how she spends her time when she’s working with students, but counselor sounds…well, like something she’s not qualified to do. She and Josie connected because they understand each other.
“So you’re not going to be teaching one of my classes.” Laurie’s tone has a touch of challenge to it.
Gail laughs. “No, you’re safe.”
Jack clears his throat, flashing his daughter a warning frown. Laurie rolls her eyes.
They talk over breakfast, filling in gaps on each other’s recent pasts. Interpol “released” him back to the FBI; the FBI kept him on the payroll another four months doing nothing, then pushed him into early retirement. His separation has become a divorce with alternating custody. Claudia isn’t thrilled by her daughter spending a year halfway around the solar system, but Laurie is.
At least, she’s thrilled by Jack’s telling. Laurie stays conspicuously silent.
“Okay.” Gail waves a sopaipilla in the air, a tiny cloud of powdered sugar raining over her fingers. “But I want to hear you tell me why you decided to move here.”
Laurie answers before her dad does. “He says there’s more wilderness on the Ring than there is on Earth.”
“More accessible wilderness,” Jack corrects. “We live—”
“Lived.”
“—a thousand kilometers from any unmanaged land.”
“Dad, this is a giant artificial ring in space! It’s all managed.”
Josie perks up. “There’s a lot of this section of the Ring we leave as open space. I don’t know if that’s what you call unmanaged, but it’s real wilderness.”
“Isn’t it just…I mean, land, space, whatever you call it here, it’s got to be so expensive. Isn’t building it just to leave it undeveloped a huge waste?”
“No.” Josie shakes her head, looking earnest. “Our green space naturally does a lot of what other places on the River need to do mechanically. And mixing nature and technology is, well.” She laughs, and gestures at herself. “It’s us.”
Laurie looks puzzled. The rabbit scoots her chair closer to the other teen. “How much do you know about totemics?”
“A little.” They lower their voices, creating their own separate conversation.
Jack’s finished one of his sopaipillas, and addresses the other adults as the two girls keep speaking. “I took a break for a while, and it’s been relaxing, but I need to get back to work. Sky put me in touch with the right people to ask about consulting with the RJC.”
Gail grins. “Not that it won’t be nice to see you occasionally, but there’s got to be places a lot closer you could be consulting with.”
“I could have gone into private security work. But…” He shakes his head. “The big contractors in the United States combine everything Ansel would argue against with everything I would argue against. I’d rather work for a private judiciary out here than there. Maybe that’s where I’ll end up. But this is where I have contacts. Now, you haven’t told me just how you got into education.”
“I started working with some teachers after hours to learn more about artificial intelligence design and programming. I’d already met Josie here and she’s deeply into AI, like much smarter than I’m ever going to be, and…well, she and I had a lot to talk about beyond that.” She clears her throat. “Anyway, that led to working with other students.”
They keep talking for another few minutes until Sky announces, “We need to head to the hospital now.”
Jack looks at Laurie. “You can come with us if you want, or head back to the hotel.”
“Could I go out with Josie? She wants to show me around.”
“We might go to the history museum,” the rabbit adds. Laurie nods.
“The history museum? Sure. That sounds good. Call if you need anything, and be back at the hotel at…sixteen o’clock?”
The two head off, Josie in the lead, talking animatedly.
Jack stares after her. “She’s going to a museum. Voluntarily.”
Gail grins. “You look incredulous.”
“Museums are not the natural habitat of most teenagers.”
“Josie’s unusual.”
As they approach the hospital, it becomes clear Sky’d been right about the crowd. But it’s not just reporters—it’s protestors, too. Seriously? Here? She reads the smartpaper signs with scrolling slogans. Species is a choice. No tyranny of biology. Xenos matter.
Someone spots them and a cry goes up, mixed cheers and boos, an attempt at a chant that thankfully doesn’t get far enough for her to figure out what it would have been. It alerts the reporters, though, and they dart toward the group like a school of carnivorous fish. “Ms. Simmons!”
“Single file,” Jack advises. “Head down, move fast.”
Sky takes the lead, arms out to the side, baring her teeth a few millimeters, parting the sea through sheer force of will.
“Gail, if you have—”
“—think of this momentous—”
“—concern about this shift—”
“—could some totemic species go extinct?”
What? She turns to look at that reporter, but Dani steers her past the RJC guards at the hospital’s entrance and on inside. She knows why Nevada chose to have her birth here instead of at home—there were too many unknowns for anyone to be comfortable without a full medical staff—but getting her back out through this gauntlet is going to be a nightmare.
“Gail.” Bunten’s waiting there, of course, standing by a totemic doctor she doesn’t recognize. What is he? Feline, yes. Serval? Bunten clasps her hand in both of his for a moment. He’s checked in on her a few times over the last year. It’s the person standing next to him she didn’t expect: Jason Nakimura.
“Ms. Simmons.” He nods slightly to her. “I trust you’ve been well.”
“All things considered. It’d be nice if your settlement came through, finally.”
“That’s not under my control, I fear.”
After more greetings the group moves together down the hallway toward the obstetrics wing, the doctor in the lead. She falls into step beside Nakimura again. “So are you here for the good PR?”
“I’ve been here since before Ms. Duarte went into labor, along with Keces technicians. Her daughter is the first totemic live birth delivered outside our laboratories, and the first with the potential to naturally pass totemic genes to her children. She’s of great interest to us.”
“So that’s a yes.”
“It is.” Keces won’t be collecting license fees on Nevada’s grandchildren, but they’ll have an immense first mover advantage in providing the in utero transformation as long as it remains necess
ary. It’ll be years before anyone else gets the expertise to offer the service, and no one else will be able to claim they invented it. They didn’t fight the compulsory licensing order as hard as they’ve been fighting her settlement payout.
It takes another minute of walking to reach Nevada’s room, with another set of anti-reporter guards. It’s a big room, but already has a crowd: two nurses, Travis and his full transform cervine parents, and an older cisform woman Gail doesn’t recognize. When she looks at Gail it’s clear she recognizes her, though, her smile stiffening.
And, in the center of it all, Nevada, sitting up in bed, looking tired and disheveled and radiant. She’s looking down at her arms, at the blanket she’s cradling, at a being unlike any that had existed in the universe before yesterday. Her baby. Her daughter.
A vixen.
Gail walks slowly toward the bed. Travis touches his wife’s shoulder and she looks at him, then over to the rat, her eyes lighting up. She smiles back, gets close enough to the bed to stand by Travis. His parents almost push her closer.
She looks tiny, almost lost in the blanket, and at first like an optical illusion: is she a fox, or a human? Proportionately, human, but she has a muzzle, ears flat against her head, fuzz all over—far more orange than Nevada’s silver look. Squint and she changes. Fox. Human. Fox. Human. No antlers.
“She’s beautiful,” Gail breathes. And she is. Gail’s never wanted children, but watching this impossible little infant makes her heart flutter in an unexpected way. “What’s her name?” She knows they’d picked one out, but they’d refused to share.
“Carmen,” Nevada says softly. She touches a finger to the little vixen’s nose. “Carmen Gail Duarte.”
Gail makes a choking noise and flicks her gaze rapidly between Nevada and Travis. “Oh, you didn’t.”
“Too late.” Travis pulls her into a one-armed hug. “Come here, godmother.”
Fortunately, that’s not another surprise he’s springing on her. They’d already talked about it, although she got the distinct impression she wasn’t allowed to demur to that, either. She hugs him back, feeling tears start to well up.
