by Baen Books
“Moms carried the babies in their bellies,” Pabbi said, patting Aðon’s stomach.
“Uh...” was all Jamal could say. That would be even weirder than all this. “Oh, and he wanted me to ask what the baby’s number is.”
His parents eyeballed each other again. What was all this look-passing and eyebrow raising about?
“He must be close,” said Pabbi. “I wonder how many more he has.”
“Far fewer than your dad,” said Aðon.
Annoyingly, they let the matter drop without explaining their cryptic chatter to Jamal.
Finally, the bulk of the freak show was over. Time to get the baby and head home.
“We’d like to attend the birthing,” insisted Pabbi. “We were there for Jamal’s first breath. We’d like to be there for Akane’s.”
“We’re going to watch her come out of the tube and get all cleaned up,” Jamal’s aðon said to him, overly perky. “Look, there she is.” They entered one last room, this one with normal light again. One tube occupied the space, surrounded by four technicians. This baby looked like the ones in the previous room--you know, actually like a baby. Like a real little person instead of a funky slimy thing. She had hair and eyelashes and fingernails and everything.
Two of the technicians held the tube in place while the other two unhooked it from its wires and apparatuses. Eventually they popped the top off and tipped it over. The baby came spilling out onto a thick, foam-looking pad that sucked up most of the liquid.
A man came at the baby with a hose, the tip of which looked like the plastic vacuum the dentist used. The man pushed it up the baby’s nose and in her mouth and soon she was crying. A hoarse, squeaky cry that didn’t sound anything like the crying Jamal had expected.
She looked a lot smaller now that she was out of the tube, wiggling and naked on a table under the lights. She looked vulnerable.
Jamal felt a pang of protectiveness. “Can’t they get her a blanket or something?”
“They will,” Sailuk assured him. “They have to clean her up first.”
After the baby was prepped and swaddled, Sailuk went into the room to retrieve her.
When the crying Akane was brought before her new family, Sailuk asked, “Who would like to hold her first?”
Jamal tentatively raised his hand. “Can I?”
* * *
“Not so bad as you feared, eh?” asked Diego, packing a trowel and a small shovel in his bag.
“No, guess not. She’s kind of nice. Except when she cries while I’m trying to sleep.”
“Did you get the number?” he asked casually, opening the door to his quarters and ushering Jamal out. They were going to work in Mira's communal garden.
“Oh, yeah, here.” Jamal pulled a small ‘flex-sheet out of his pocket. “She’s S8-F94-3-16008.”
“Five more until I get my notice,” Diego said.
“Huh?”
“I’ll tell you about it when we get to the garden. I’ll feel more comfortable with some dirt under my nails.”
The artificial sun sat high overhead, and the cows mooed in a bored sort of way. The weather-planners were pretending it was hot today. The thermostat must have read at least thirty one degrees Celsius. Luckily a large part of the garden sat in the shade of a big tree. A few butterflies flitted by, and Jamal thought he recognized one from his classroom.
The air smelled sweet here. But he was pretty sure the scent wasn’t emanating from the flowers or the grass--it was one more illusion. They pumped in the smell to make the space seem bigger and more open than it was.
Diego dug right in. Only a few minutes passed before his hands, forearms, and boots were caked with enriched soil. “That’s better. Get a bit of this mud on you, it’s nice and cool.” He drew a dirty line down the arch of Jamal’s nose. “Good war paint,” he said with a wink.
Getting into the spirit, Jamal put a dirty handprint on Diego’s cheek. “Looks like I whacked you one.”
“Let me return the favor.” Jamal’s face now sported two handprints that mirrored each other. The dirt might as well have been face paint, and the handprints butterfly wings. “Can’t forget to wash that off before you go home. Otherwise your madre will have my hide. With a new baby to think about she doesn’t need to be giving you extra baths as well.”
“What were you saying before?” Jamal asked, looking over a bowl of seeds they’d picked up at the entrance to the field. “About Akane’s number?”
“I should probably make you ask your parents,” said Diego. He dug a small hole and gestured for Jamal to sprinkle in a few seeds. “But that would be for their sake, not yours. Jamal, I’m going to retire soon.”
The smile slumped off the boy’s face. “What?” He stood up straight. “Why?”
No. No. No. Diego wasn’t old enough to retire. Only really old people retired. And it wasn’t something you talked about. It just happened, they disappeared one day. Said good bye and left for...somewhere.
“What does Akane’s number have to do with that?” he added.
“Sit back down so we can talk about this rationally,” Diego ordered, patting the ground.
Jamal narrowed his eyes. Anything Diego said from this moment on would be held under the highest scrutiny. Sick people retired, frail people retired, incapable people retired--Diego was none of those things.
“You’re eight. You’re big enough to understand about retirement. On Earth I learned about it a whole lot sooner than eight. And we didn’t have that nice euphemism for it. We just called it what it was.”
No one ever said, but Jamal wasn’t stupid. He knew where retirees went. He knew. He just didn’t like to think about it. If no one ever talked about the truth, if everyone always glossed over the facts, why couldn’t he? “I do understand,” he said.
“Then sit down. You know I’m going to die, but you don’t understand the how or why of it. So let me tell you.”
Jamal finally sat and said in a small voice, “Did the doctors find something?”
“No. Nothing like that. I’m as healthy as a, as one of those bovine over there. But my number is about to come up, quite literally. You see, everything on the convoy’s got to balance. All that’s ever here is all there ever will be. Even if we find an asteroid to mine, we can only carry so much. We’re a closed environment. We have to scrimp and save and control and manage. So, we have to pick and choose when it comes to some things. Where do we put our resources?”
Jamal picked at a strand of grass and it gave him a thin cut--it didn’t bleed but it smarted. What did this mumbo jumbo about management have to do with Diego dying?
“Are you listening?”
“Yes,” Jamal mumbled.
“To conserve our resources, birthing can never get out of synch with dying. We can’t have more babies born than people who die. So, everyone on board has numbers. Two numbers--a number that corresponds to their birth and one that corresponds to their death. When the 16013th baby of the third generation is born, I’ll get my notice. It’ll let me know that after another three clones are brought to term I’ll be scheduled for official retirement. They’ll set a date, and I’ll go over to Hippocrates and they’ll--”
Jamal’s hands flew to his ears. “Shut up. I don’t want to hear about it. I don’t want to know how they’ll kill you.”
“Oh, stop it now.” Diego pried Jamal’s hands from his head.
Fire and water surged inside Jamal’s brain. His face grew hot and swollen. “But why? You’re still a perfectly good person. There’s nothing wrong with you. Retirement is for people who have problems that can’t be reversed.”
“Yes, I know. And a lot of people go that way. They get some sort of terminal or chronic problem and never see their end-number. But I’m lucky, Jamal. I got to live my full life.”
“It’s all Akane’s fault,” Jamal realized. “If parents stopped asking for babies then they wouldn’t have to kill you. It’s not fair! Why grow a new person when you have to kill a perfectly go
od person to get it? It’s not right!”
“Now don’t go blaming your parents or your sister. Babies can’t be blamed for anything.”
“This is stupid.” The boy stood and pulled at his hair. “You have to fight, you can’t let them take you.”
“They’re not carrying me away kicking and screaming. This is how things work. This is how they’re supposed to be. The old die off, leaving resources for the young. We just make it a little neater and a little tidier. The exact same thing happens on Earth. It’s a natural cycle.”
“That’s bull--”
“Watch your language.”
“I won’t let this happen. They can take the baby back.”
“Now you’re just being childish. Listen to me. I’m ok with this. I knew it was coming. I’m happy to give my resources over. It makes me proud to do so. I’m helping the mission. I’m assuring the convoy remains balanced and healthy. To prolong my life after retirement age would be selfish. Wrong. Disloyal.” He pushed himself up and took Jamal by the shoulders. “I would be abandoning my responsibilities. It would be the worst thing I could do, you know that.”
Jamal threw his arms around Diego’s waist. “I don’t want you to go. I don’t want them to take you away.”
“I know, boy. But it’s for you and your generation. I die so you can live.”
* * *
Jamal put on a brave face--even if it was wet and puffy--when he went home. No amount of reassurance from Diego could convince him the old man’s retirement was a good thing, though. No one wanted to die.
Why would they want to exchange Diego--he’d just fixed that bean processer or something, hadn’t he?--for a useless baby. How did that make any sense?
This was wrong. He might only be eight, but there was no way he would sit by while they hauled off his favorite person in all of space.
That night he lay wide awake while Akane cried out in the communal space. His parents were trying to sooth her, but the she just wouldn’t shut up.
Since he couldn’t sleep he worked on a plan. Diego wasn’t going anywhere without a fight.
The next day was group-play day. Not really school, and not really a day off. Someone-- someone’s grandma, if he remembered right--called it daycare. If your mom and dad didn’t have the day off when you did, you went to group-play.
Several halls merged to form the communal play space. It wasn’t a room, and it wasn’t a passage either. It was a strange space on Mira, meant for mingling but rarely used by anyone other than children. Chairs and tables popped out from cubbies in the walls. Hidden closets held extra dishes and celebratory items. The area could be turned into a fort with a few re-appropriated bed sheets and a little squinting.
When Jamal saw that the group-play guardian’s back was turned, it was time to initiate Plan Diego. He shoved his hands in his pockets and side-stepped down the hall, away from the communal area. He found an access panel and dropped to his knees. From his pocket he produced a screwdriver taken from his parent’s emergency tool kit.
Carefully, Jamal unscrewed the fasteners that secure the panel, then crawled inside. There were all kinds of rumors about the access tunnels. Sure, sure, the wrongly-grown freaks were supposed to live in them, but that wasn’t all. Alligators, giant bugs, ghosts, and even alien egg-sacks were supposed to call the convoy ducts home.
Several times he had to stop and fight off the willies--especially when the motion-sensing work lights failed to flick on as fast as he’d hoped.
Cramped, dusty, and sweltering, the tunnels were not the stuff of play-time fantasy. It was slow going, pulling himself up flimsy ladders, shuffling through tight shafts, and squeezing around awkward corners. No one was meant to travel from one end of the ship to the other this way, but that was the idea. If someone found Jamal wandering the hallways they’d stop him, turn him around, and escort his butt right back to daycare.
Twenty minutes later he kicked his way out of another access panel. Only a moment passed before he regained his bearings and confirmed he was where he wanted to be: Outside I.C.C.’s main server room.
He pounded ferociously on the door.
“Yeah, just a sec,” came a man’s voice from inside. A moment later the door slid to the side, revealing a tall, well-built, middle-aged black man.
“I need your help,” Jamal said.
The man considered the boy for a second longer before realizing, “Hey, you’re my replacement, aren’t you?”
* * *
There were two primary clones for each job--cycle mates. Clone A would be in charge while Clone B apprenticed--all while another Clone A was educated and another Clone B was born. The staggered growth was meant to add some normalcy--so that no one was forced into the surreal situation of having to train a genetic mirror of themselves. Subsequently, no fewer than two versions of a clone were alive at any one time.
Jamal seeking out his predecessor was unusual, but not unprecedented. It was natural to be curious about your genetic twin. But cornering them at their place of work was discouraged, because it was rude. Young Jamal was acutely--though not fully--aware of this when the older Jamal invited him into the server room. The space was dark. Ghostly lights formed rows and columns down the sides of the big, black servers, which in turn had been laid out in the room on a grid.
“Something tells me you shouldn’t be here, little man,” said the older clone. He sat down at his work station near the rear of the room. He swiveled his chair to face Jamal, and did not offer the boy a seat.
Jamal realized for the first time why it was important to have the third slapped on the end of his name. “I need your help, uh, sir. It’s important. Something terrible is happening on board, and we’ve got to stop it.”
“What? And you came to me because you thought, heck, I’m you and I’ll understand your problem immediately through, what, a mind-meld? Do they not explain what a clone is to you kids?”
That wasn’t it at all. “You’re not me,” Jamal said, indignant. “I came here because you’ve got access to I.C.C. I want to change some records and you can do it best.”
Older Jamal considered this for a moment. He nodded once. “Ok. Spill.”
Jamal explained, went on and on about Diego’s multitude of virtues, then presented his solution. “I just want you to change the babies’ numbers. Make it so fifty--no, a hundred babies have to be born before Diego retires. Or, you know, just change Diego’s other number--his death number.”
“I cannot allow tampering with the convoy’s inventory system,” said I.C.C.
“What it said.” Older Jamal sniffed and wiped his nose on his eggplant-colored jumpsuit sleeve.
“Inventory?” said Jamal, “You mean like when we have to count all of our quarter’s spoons and forks and stuff to make sure it’s all there? You do that with people?”
“Of course. What did you think the numbers were for?” The computer sounded confused, though its inflections were even.
“Look, kid,” said Older Jamal. A work-cap sat on his terminal. He picked it up and twirled it between his hands. “You’ve got to face it. We’re all spoons, ok? If you want a brand new spoon, you have to get rid of the bent one. Get it?”
“But there’s nothing wrong with this spoon,” Jamal insisted. “And he’s not a spoon, he’s a person. He’s my friend.”
“Yeah, well, we all lose friends. This is just how things work. We’re all on a time table, all set up to rotate. You were born at the precise time you needed to be so that you could replace me when I start to get slow. It’ll be the same for the Jamal after you. It’s part of life. I suggest you accept it and run back to school.”
“But why is it a part of life?”
“Because some guy back on Earth looked at all the numbers and decided this way was best for the mission.”
Jamal squeezed the screwdriver in his pocket, looking for something to hold onto. Something to use as a touchstone. His whole world seemed to be sliding off its blocks. “Is it?”
&
nbsp; Older Jamal placed his cap on his head. “Is it what?”
“Best?” Jamal turned toward a blinking red light and camera lens mounted in the back of the room. “Is it, I.C.C.?”
“I do not currently have a holistic comprehension of the idea: Best. Please clarify.”
His little hands did a dance in the air as he tried to explain. “Best, you know, the, uh goodest way to do stuff. Like, brushing your teeth is better than not brushing your teeth, otherwise you’ve got to see the dentist with the drill.”
“I think the word he’s looking for,” said Older Jamal, repositioning himself in front of a monitor at his work station, “is efficient. Is our current grow-and-recycle system the most efficient use of personnel in accordance with the mission?”
“It is a system in which the failsafes create inefficiencies, but ensure the greatest chance of overall success,” responded I.C.C. in its cold, mechanical way.
Older Jamal shrugged, “There you have it.”
There you have what? “I don’t understand.”
The computer began again, “The system is reliant on--”
“Let me put it in laymen’s terms, I.C.C.” Older Jamal waved a hand in dismissal. I.C.C. thanked him, and it almost sounded relieved. Jamal knew it wasn’t used to answering to a child. “Look, little man. Sure, our system isn’t the best in the sense that we don’t squeeze every last drop of productivity out of a person before they croak. We work them ‘til death, but we don’t work them to death. Come here.”
Flicking a finger at the boy, he simultaneously stiff-armed ‘flex-sheets, a half-eaten sandwich, and a coffee cup aside on his console. With a sliver of trepidation, Jamal came forward and let the man pick him up and place him on the now-clean surface.
Jamal looked his older, biological twin in the eye. The expression he found was stern, but not unkind. There were flecks of gray in the hair nearest the man’s temples, and Jamal found himself wondering just how many years into his future he was looking.
