by Jean Lorrah
“That the army is mingling with the populace in case of rioting, yes. But do most people realize that the veterans of the Western Campaign are the ones on duty tonight?”
“Probably not,” she said with a smile.
“You didn’t kill today,” said Baird, trying to keep his curiosity from being too embarrassingly obvious.
“Not for seven months,” Conta replied.
“Then you’ve disjuncted!” he said.
A brief shadow passed through her field, but she nodded, and he could feel the truth in her words as she said, “I will never kill again, Baird. But I’m one of the fortunate ones. I made a friend among the Gens—well, he’s much more than a friend, now. As soon as the border opens I’ll meet him at the crossing up near Keon. We’re going to live in Laveen—”
“You’re planning to live with a Gen?” Baird asked.
“It’s harder for him than it is for me,” she replied. “He has to come in-Territory—but he’ll be safe in Laveen. Have you ever been there, Baird? The city is like an extension of Householding Keon. A good two-thirds of the Simes are nonjunct or disjunct. Families live together, Sime and Gen.”
“There are a good number of families living that way in Norlea,” Baird pointed out, “under the protection of Carre.”
“Yes—there are lots of role models here, too. The real problems in Gulf are going to come in Lanta and Nashul.”
Those were the two largest cities in the territory, and neither had a Householding. Conta was right—those cities would be very hard to bring under Tecton control. Baird was glad he lived in Norlea.
But something else Conta had said made him ask, “You and Elendra both made friends among the Gen soldiers?”
“Practically everyone did, except for a few unrelenting juncts. Shen it, Baird, those Gens were just as smart, just as determined, and just as fierce fighters as we were. But...I don’t know if you’ve gone through with your determination to disjunct....”
“I’m...in the process,” he replied. “I took transfer from a channel today.”
“Good for you!” she told him. “I...uh...heard about what happened to you....”
“My Genjacking, you mean,” he said flatly. “I don’t suppose I’ll ever live that down.”
“Oh, Baird—don’t feel that way!” Conta told him. “There will be worse than that, believe me. We’re in for a rough year in Gulf—in all the Sime Territories.” She shook her head. “Not all Simes are going to be as lucky as I am. Robert is willing to come in-Territory for me.”
Something in the way she said the strange Gen name made Baird realize, “You love him. A Gen.” He knew it was possible—there were Sime/Gen couples in the Householdings, and even among a few families living in Norlea under Carre’s protection, but it was still strange for him to think of the possibility of treating a Gen as—
—as fully human, it came to him.
But Gens were fully human. Wild Gens—
Again he examined his thinking. Not Wild Gens, like wild animals. That was his father’s voice. Everyone knew, but no one ever faced the fact that Gens had their own civilization: farms, cities, government, art. Everyone knew, if they would only admit it, that Gens were just as human as Simes.
And so, they refused to think about it.
“You and this...Robert,” said Baird, realizing as he said it that it was the Gen variant of the common name Robair. “Are you planning to...get married?”
Conta flashed him a smile as warm happiness permeated her field. “We’re already married,” she said. “The Sectuib in Keon officiated at our pledge ceremony. It shouldn’t be long before Tecton laws are adopted for everyone, and we will be able to officially register our marriage.”
Laws, perhaps, Baird thought, but customs? Acceptance? Perhaps up there in the north around Keon, where the Householding had reached into the Sime community a generation ago and enticed local Simes into their lifestyle with the carrot rather than the stick. “I hope everything works out for you,” he said, wondering how she could trust that a Gen would risk his life to come into Sime Territory.
Conta must have zlinned the doubt in his field, for she flashed him another grin, this one brimming with confidence. “You’ve never had transfer with a Gen, have you?”
“No.”
“Well, when you do, you will know why a Gen who once gives transfer can’t just stop. The sensation is as addictive for them as it is for us, Baird.”
Now there was an incredible idea—and one brimming with hope. Conta was clearly not talking about the bland, unsatisfying transfer of selyn that a Sime got from channel’s transfer. If the transfer were direct instead of through an intermediary....
“I have to get back out there, Baird,” Conta told him. “We all have to be in position before the lottery begins.” Still, she looked into his eyes and added, “If you can find someone to do for you what Robert does for me—believe me, you will never miss the Kill.”
Perhaps I already have someone, Baird thought as he returned to making his round of The Post. The desperation beneath the revelry was still there—but now he thought perhaps people were anxious over nothing. Well, not really nothing. He spotted his father, playing cards with several wealthy customers, and wondered where a Gen willing to provide transfer for Treavor Axton would come from. And all these other Simes.
Conta’s Robert was willing to come in-Territory specifically for her. There might be others who had bonded with Simes during that winter campaign in the far Western Mountains. But other Gens would not come into Gulf—they would have no incentive. The channels would buy their selyn, and bring it in for their insipid transfers. Life, perhaps, but at what cost?
Riots? Revolt? How many Sime deaths to make up for the Gen deaths that had gone before? Life at the cost of placing armed soldiers in places of entertainment, just in case....
Three other soldiers Baird zlinned amidst the crowd were high-field, but he had no way of telling whether it was from the Kill or channel’s transfer. In the gambling hall he zlinned two more who had obviously not taken a Last Kill today.
The troops had not yet been demobilized. Conta was not free to travel north to meet her Gen lover, because they might have to keep the peace in Gulf. Baird wondered if his father knew. Of course he did—Treavor Axton knew everything that happened in Norlea. Would he and his cronies actually attempt the rebellion they muttered about? Would they incite riots against the Tecton? How could he persuade his father not to get involved?
It was no use asking Conta to speak to Treavor Axton—he would just see falling in love with a Gen as perverted. Perhaps, though, if Baird shared Elendra’s private letters....
Baird loved his father, and knew his father loved him in spite of the disappointment he had turned out. Treavor Axton was a mix of idealism and pragmatism, a combination which had built The Post into the most successful entertainment establishment in Norlea. He treated his employees well—and they were loyal because they could not get better places anywhere else. He would break some laws, such as those concerning contraband, for he always knew which tentacles to grease—but he had never done anything to Baird’s knowledge that could result in anything worse than paying a fine.
Sometimes Baird wondered if his father regretted taking his son to the channels to save his life. Of course, if he had not done so, and Baird had died, he would never have known the emotional impact being nursed back to life by Gens would have on the boy. So he certainly would have regretted it had he not made that pragmatic decision.
Would his attitude change now that Baird was no longer a special case? Now that all new Simes had to start their adult lives on channel’s transfer, as Baird had wanted to do? Perhaps under these new laws, Treavor Axton might take the pragmatic stance again, and see his son as better off than most Simes because he wanted to disjunct.
He could only hope.
Treavor Axton folded his cards and got up from the table. Baird didn’t want to stay and watch the lottery, zlin the fear of the Gen
boy as he was handed over to his death. But as he started to leave the room one of the waiters stopped him. “Mr. Axton says to come and draw the winning ticket, Mr. Baird.”
Shen!
He turned to find his father approaching. “I won’t do it, Dad,” he said. “The Kill is over for me.”
“It’s not over for two more hours,” his father replied. “This has nothing to do with any differences you and I have about the Kill. This is about your responsibility as proprietor of The Post.”
“You’re the proprietor,” Baird told him. “I’m just your son.”
“And heir. This lottery is the biggest event we’ve had at The Post in months. You’ve been full of good ideas about how to keep business going after tonight. Everything changes at midnight—let people enjoy themselves until then. Come and draw the winning ticket. The winner will take the Gen away—it’s not as if there’s going to be a public Kill.”
That stung.
Trust Treavor Axton to know how to use both carrot and stick: Baird wanted desperately to be his father’s partner—and now that the Kill was ending, it was possible. If people could only forget Baird’s worst embarrassment.
He squared his shoulders and walked with his father to where the Choice Kill was caged. People crowded into the hall, brandishing lottery tickets.
A hush fell over the room, and the boy’s anxiety level rose, to the delight of the room full of juncts. Hardened gamblers deserted dice and cards to watch the show, as the pack of Simes in Need edged closer to the cage, clutching their ticket stubs.
Baird looked at and zlinned the men and women in Need, each hoping to get that one Choice Kill to remember for the rest of their lives. Almost all of them were people who could not afford to buy such a Kill, especially tonight. All but one of them would flee from here to the Pen, to claim the empty-eyed Pen Gen paid for by their taxes.
Baird found himself wanting one of these people to win—not one of the wealthy patrons who had already killed today and would simply sell the Gen to the highest bidder. And yet he didn’t want the boy to die!
The Gen was the child of Simes, like Jonmair. It was even possible that his parents were in the crowd at The Post, spending the windfall they had gotten for him. We are insane, Baird realized as those contradictory thoughts rose in his mind. But in only two hours we will have sanity imposed on us. I will survive for two more hours—but this boy won’t.
Still, as his father instructed, Baird went to the locked barrel that contained the lottery tickets. It was an honest lottery—there was never a reason to cheat, as ticket purchases always totaled more than the price of whatever they gave away. The Post had never held a lottery for a Choice Kill before, and Baird was very grateful they never could again.
Baird spun the barrel. It was heavy, clogged with tickets. Then he and his father each probed the lock with a combination of tentacles.
Baird opened the little door in the barrel, reached in, and stirred the tickets some more as his father announced, “My son will pull three tickets. The first one will be for the Choice Kill. The other two will each be for a free night for two at The Post, including a room, all food and drinks, entertainment, and a stake for the gambling tables.”
“Just get on with it!” somebody yelled.
“Yeah—who gets the Choice Kill?” responded another voice.
Baird was desperately glad that he was both replete with selyn and not truly post. He stopped zlinning, then pulled the first ticket, and handed it to his father.
“This one is the winner of the Choice Kill,” said Treavor Axton, holding it up for all to see—but no one was close enough to read the numbers. He held out his hand to his son.
Baird handed him another ticket.
“This one is for a night at The Post,” he said, and everyone groaned. Axton read off the numbers, and one of the women in Need screamed in a combination of joy at winning something and frustration that it was not the prize she wanted. Axton handed her the ticket, saying, “Go claim your Kill, and then come back and enjoy yourself.”
People applauded, and cleared a path for her as she bolted for the Pen.
Baird chose the final ticket. When his father read the number, Weln Varrier, the owner of the bank and a regular patron responded, “That one’s mine!”
There was laughter, and good-natured shouts. “You’ve already got all the money in Norlea—what will you do that you don’t do already?”
But then a hush fell as Treavor Axton held up the first ticket Baird had drawn. “And the lucky winning number is—”
As Treavor Axton read the numbers the crowd remained hushed, the Simes in Need crowded near the cage struggling to use their eyes to read their tickets. Raw disappointment rose from them as Grennij Prebolt, another of The Posts’s regular customers, searched through a handful of tickets and held one up. “The Gen is mine!” he announced.
But Prebolt was not in Need. He strode forward and said to the Simes in Need, “Don’t go yet—one of you can still have this Choice Kill, at a price even you can afford. It’s no good to anyone after midnight. So let’s have our own little Choice Auction right here!”
Baird felt sick at the expectation rising from the crowd, the satisfaction he saw on his father’s face. It couldn’t have worked out better for The Post, of course: their customers were getting far more entertainment than if one of those in Need had simply won, and dragged the Gen away to a private Killroom.
Prebolt came up front as Treavor Axton made a great show out of opening the cage and clipping the white-painted chain to the boy’s collar. When he resisted, Axton dragged him from the cage and shoved him toward Grennij Prebolt.
The boy fell to his knees at his new owner’s feet. “Please,” he begged. “You’re not in Need. Let me live. I’ll work for you—I’ll do anything you want—just don’t kill me!”
The crowd roared approval at the unfolding drama.
Grennij Prebolt jerked the boy to his feet. “You got just one thing to do tonight, Gen. Die!”
Laughter echoed through the gambling salon. Prebolt laughed, too. The only Simes not laughing were Baird and those in Need, pitted now against one another.
Prebolt strutted back and forth, mimicking an auctioneer. “Zlin that field, folks—ripe and full and aware! The best Kill you’ll ever have! What am I bid?”
The bidding began—absurdly low, but all these people could afford. It rose, and two men turned and dashed out, obviously unable to compete and now desperate for a Kill—any Kill. As the price rose, one after another dropped out and ran for the Pen—a show Baird knew their audience found supremely entertaining, while he could hardly control his gorge at the display of junctness, feeding on the suffering of others.
Finally the bidding was down to two women, glaring at one another as they upped their bids by the tiny increments that were all they could afford. One of the women had obviously had a hard life. Her hair was thin, her face deeply tanned and lined, her clothes often-mended denims. The other woman was young, probably changed over within only a year or two, dressed in a plain but new dress. She would be pretty, Baird realized, if her face were not pinched with Need. Her close-cropped black hair was thick and curly, her dark eyes enormous. She desperately counted the coins in her hand and when her opponent made one final bid, she shook her head in frustration. “No! I’ve got to have that Gen. I’ve never had a Choice Kill!”
“Unless you got more money, you ain’t gittin’ one tonight!” gloated the other woman.
“I don’t have any more money—but I’ll share my post-syndrome with you!” the young woman appealed to Grennij Prebolt.
The crowd cheered with wild delight.
“No fair, you bitch!” screamed the older woman, leaping at the younger one. “I won fair and square!”
The two women were at one another’s throats, the gathered Simes egging them on. They fought with teeth and nails, tearing one another’s hair and clothes while the audience roared its approval and the Gen cowered away from their
flailing tentacles.
Then the younger woman had the older one pinned, and began to bash her head against the floor.
Treavor Axton signaled, and several of the staff converged to pull the two women apart before either was seriously hurt. The crowd yelled “Awwww” in disappointment, but it was not a serious protest. This was, after all The Post, not one of the dives along the waterfront.
The two women were set on their feet, and the one who had won pulled out a worn leather pouch and began counting coins.
As she did so, the young loser shook herself free from the waiter holding her, saying, “Let me go! I have to get to the Pen!”
But instead of dashing for the door like all the previous losers—she turned and snatched up the Choice Kill!
Both Baird and his father were too far from her to stop it, Grennij Prebolt was busy accepting payment from the winner, and the waiter was taken completely off guard.
The Gen screamed as the woman grabbed him, but with the speed of an attacking Sime she wrapped her tentacles about his arms, jerked him forward, and when he tried to turn his face away took her fifth contact point on his cheek.
The Gen was still screaming—and looking straight at Baird—as fear turned to agony. His eyes widened, his mouth spread into the square of horror as his voice choked off—and then the life went out of him and he dropped, limp, from the woman’s tentacles.
Baird wanted to turn and run—but he could not. The same burning shame that had overwhelmed him when he had committed Genjacking threatened to freeze him—but he had been raised always to do the right thing. And the right thing at this moment was to placate the customer who had had her rightful Kill taken from her.
Quickly, he moved to scoop the coins she had counted out of Grennij Prebolt’s hand and back into hers. Then he pulled out his own purse and added to her sum more than enough to buy one of the last Choice Kills at the auction that now had less than an hour to go. “Buy the best,” he told her. “Go now!”
The crowd cheered her out, then turned to booing the young woman who had stolen her Kill. But she refused to be embarrassed. “I’m glad I did it!” she declared. “At least once in my life I had a Choice Kill!” She stepped over the body of the Gen and approached Grennij Prebolt. “My offer still holds,” she said—and the audience howled with laughter.
