“Then you should see all of them,” Jackson said.
Felix frowned. I thought he was going to say no, but he surprised me.
“Jackson is right,” Felix said. “You should see all of them. Even the ones who aren't going to leave the Outpost.”
My heart did a small flip, like it did when Jackson's musicians played a particularly interesting line of music.
“I would like that,” I said. “I would like it very much.”
* * * *
They called it the Children's Ring, but Felix told me that wasn't accurate. Not all children on the Outpost lived here, only the ones without family.
It was still a dangerous sector. People died all the time, leaving their children untended. Many children died, abandoned and alone.
Even more came to the Outpost, searching for some way to survive.
Eventually, the Outpost set up an area for them, complete with teachers and caretakers. If they were old enough, the children had to agree to live by the Outpost's rules—education and care in return for years of service wherever the Outpost deemed appropriate. If the children weren't old enough to make a decision for themselves, they were offered for limited adoption. The limited adoption period lasted no more than two months. If no one took the children, they were then placed in the Children's Ring and expected to follow the same rules as all the others.
“Limited adoption?” I asked as we settled into one of the Conservatory's glide vehicles. Felix handled the controls. His position gave him all kinds of privileges within the Conservatory and parts of the Outpost. “What exactly does that mean?”
“The child doesn't have to become part of any family,” Felix said. “But the person who sponsors the adoption guarantees the child's education and livelihood. Most of the children who go to Djape do so under terms of a limited adoption.”
“So I had one,” I said.
“Most likely,” Felix said. “This plan has been in place for decades.”
I swallowed hard. My throat constricted. Still, I managed to ask, “Could I trace mine?”
“If you're still using the name you had when you arrived on the Outpost,” Felix said. “And the only way to know that is to look.”
Jackson sat in the back of the glide car. He wasn't watching either of us. Instead, he watched the door fronts pass us by. We had gone by several musical departments, all part of the Conservatory, and all of them leading into areas as large as the Old Earth Music Department.
The glide cart left the Conservatory through one of the bridges that led to the Higher Education Ring. We went through two other bridges between rings, each more crowded and cramped than the last, until we ended up in the Children's Ring.
It had straight walls and no apparent windows into the space beyond. The walls were decorated with multicolored rectangles. It took me a while to realize that those rectangles were doors.
Felix glided the cart past schools, religious buildings, and storefronts, finally stopping at a wide building with double doors marked Auditorium.
“This is the induction center,” he said. “Children spend their first week or so here, as they learn the rules, figure out where they fit, and get tested.”
My shoulders were rigid. My hands, clasped over my stomach, were pressed so tightly together that my fingers ached.
“Tested for what?” I asked.
“Their various aptitudes,” Felix said.
“To find out if they're musical,” I said.
“Musical, mathematical, or have a facility for languages.” Felix glided the cart into a pole that had locks along the edges. “As well as hundreds of other skills and talents.”
“So they all have a place,” I said, feeling more relieved than I expected.
“Of course not,” Jackson said. “Some kids are too young to have skills. Others are too traumatized to even try.”
He sounded bitter. He was clearly familiar with this place. I shifted on my seat so that I could see him.
“What happens to those children?” I asked.
“They're the ones who usually get shipped off by freighter at thirteen,” Jackson said. “If they survive that long.”
“Survive?” I asked. “Children die here?”
“It's not health,” Jackson said. “It's cooperation. You have to work within the machine. If you don't, then you get moved.”
“Moved where?” I asked.
“There is an area for troubled children,” Felix said. He let himself out of the cart onto one of the glide platforms. He hit the button, sending himself down.
I felt disoriented. Felix hadn't wanted to discuss the troubled children. Jackson wasn't looking at me either.
“They die in the area for troubled children?” I asked.
Jackson shrugged one shoulder. “They don't thrive.”
“How do you know this?” I asked.
He turned toward me. His expression was bleak. “You and I both came through this place. You received a limited adoption and lost body parts. I was trouble. I worked a freighter.”
“But you have a teaching position now,” I said. “You play music every night.”
“Where do you think I learned about the blues?”
“They play blues on freighters?” I asked.
Jackson smiled faintly, almost contemptuously, and shook his head. “Did you like living on Djape?”
My garden rose in my mind. And the music, playing softly in my study. The forbidden music. The way my back tensed before I went on stage. The feeling of relief and terror that happened as my voice cracked.
“I don't know,” I said.
“I hated the freighter,” he said. “I hated what Felix calls the Trouble Area. You didn't hate Djape.”
“Hate is a strong word,” I said.
“And I've noticed that you don't use strong words.” Jackson shrugged. “Go visit. See what you think.”
My heart was pounding.
“How do I get down?” I asked.
“Touch the pole,” Jackson said. “Your glide platform will appear next to the door.”
I had to lean forward to touch the pole. It vibrated slightly under my fingertips. Within seconds, the platform appeared beside the car, a square bit of flooring that looked unstable to me. Still, I let myself out, balancing myself with my hands on the pole and the glide car.
“Are you coming?” I asked Jackson.
His face was gray. He looked vaguely ill. “No.”
I studied him for a moment, but he no longer met my gaze. Instead, he looked at the neighborhood as if he had never seen it before.
I left him. The platform took me down slowly. It felt as rickety as it looked, as if if I moved wrong, I would fall. I held myself rigid. The platform landed, and I staggered slightly to the left.
Felix was waiting beside the double doors.
“Did Jackson try to talk you out of coming?” he asked.
“No,” I said. “But he's not going to join us.”
Felix gave me a sideways, somewhat distracted grin. “You know he grew up here.”
“He told me,” I said. “I didn't expect it.”
“You should have. I think a good 50 percent of the permanent workforce came through the Children's Ring.”
He pulled the doors opened, stepping inside. The interior was dark compared with the main thoroughfare we'd traveled along.
“Did you?” I asked as I followed him into the dimness.
“No,” he said. “I'm one of the lucky ones. I was hired for my expertise.”
“With children?” I asked.
This time he did look at me in surprise. “In Ancient Music, particularly Earth forms.”
“I'm surprised the Outpost found that a valuable skill.”
“It wasn't the Outpost,” he said. “It was the Conservatory. They needed someone with a broad range of knowledge to handle the Old Earth Department. All human music was born on Earth. Those forms are the most important.”
“All human music,” I said slowly. �
�Even what we sang on Djape?”
“Especially what you sang there,” he said. “The diatonic scale—the eight whole notes—comes from Ancient Greece. The hexachords that you also sang were developed in Europe in what was called the Middle Ages, and arpeggios, especially those sung in descending order, which were first developed in a period called the Renaissance.”
“But I was told that the Pane had unique musical tastes,” I said.
“Most humans do not listen to pure notes or broken chords and consider them entertainment. To humans, they are part of a great whole, a symphony or a song. To the Pane, they are the entire performance.”
We had gone deep into the building. It had no windows. Only doorways marked with numbers running alongside the hallway. Eventually the hallway opened up, revealing another set of double doors.
“I contacted the headmistress here,” he said. “The boys are waiting for you.”
He made it sound like I was still going to chose them. My stomach clenched.
“They don't think I'm going to adopt them or anything, do they?” I asked.
He shook his head. “They only know that you want an audition. That is what you want, isn't it?”
I wasn't sure what I wanted. “Is that what you do when someone comes from Djape?”
“Scales and arpeggios only,” he said. “Would you like to hear that?”
It was what I understood. But I didn't want to set up the wrong expectations.
“Whatever they have prepared is fine,” I said.
He made a small grunt, as if I had disappointed him, and then we stepped through the doors.
I had expected an auditorium—something with a stage and chairs. While this room was large, it was just an empty space. The floor did slope downward slightly, but that seemed to be more of a design flaw than anything else.
A woman stood to one side and when she saw us, she waved a hand. A group of boys filed in. They ranged in age from about ten to four or five. At the end of the group, four women brought in very little children. The women held their hands as the boys half-walked, half-tumbled forward. Some were so young that they hadn't mastered walking very well yet. Others had obviously been raised in zero-g and weren't used to walking in gravity.
“Only boys?” I asked.
Felix gave me a withering look. “No other aliens care about our music. And the Pane only want male sopranos.”
I almost protested again that I was not here for the Pane, but I did not. He had thought I was interested only in the children who might go to Djape—and maybe I was.
“We'll start with the little ones,” Felix said. “Let's just go one by one.”
Each little boy paraded forward. At the urging of the woman who had led him in, he would sing a diatonic scale. All the little ones had beautiful voices, but only one sang with such purity that my hair stood on end.
He was tiny, with big brown eyes and hair cut so short that it stood straight up on top. He didn't seem to understand why anyone wanted him to sing, but all the woman had to do was name the note and he sang it with clarity and such accuracy that if I tested the note mechanically, I would have found him to hit the center of the pitch—no variation, not even a fraction of a fraction off.
“He's one of the two, isn't he?” I softly asked Felix. Felix nodded.
I walked up to the boy and crouched.
“Sing after me,” I said, and proceeded to sing the C Major arpeggio that I had destroyed in Tygher City.
The boy sang with me—C-E-G-C-G-E-C—his notes so pure and fresh that shivers ran down my spine.
He didn't know what he was singing. He was just making sounds. Lovely sounds, but nothing more.
The older boys watched, rapt. The youngest boys squirmed, held fast by the women who had brought them in. Everyone was staring at me.
“Thank you,” I said to the little one who sang for me.
He gave me a wide grin, and then ran back to his handler. He hugged her thigh.
I frowned as I saw that. He had made a connection here, whether he had known it or not. He would not be able to hug a woman like that on Djape. Not without special permission.
Then I stood, and backed up.
“Let's hear the rest of you,” I said.
The woman who had called them all in clapped her hands together. They looked toward her. Then she waved her hands in a fashion that seemed to give them direction.
One quarter of them started. They sang in perfect unison, singing the entire verse. Then they started over, and when they got to the end of the first line, another quarter of the group started at the beginning. When the second group got to the end of the first line, the third quarter chimed in. And when they reached their line, the final quarter joined.
I had never heard the song sung this way—and it became instantly clear that the song had been designed to be sung like this. The harmonies were lovely, the boys’ voices strong.
And like a perfect chorus, no voice stuck out.
One of the oldest boys on the side closest to me sang with such complete joy that my eye went to him immediately. He smiled as the harmonies grew more intense and his body swayed as if he were listening to one of Jackson's performances in the blues club.
The boys finished and the chords echoed through the auditorium. Now I knew how the place had gotten its name. Its acoustics were perfect.
“Let's hear it again,” I said, “but this time, with only one person from each group.”
I didn't care who the first three were, but I wanted to hear that joyful boy. So I picked three others from the sections and him. He had been in the final group, so he would have a solo at the end, but he wouldn't start.
The boy who started wobbled his way through the opening line. He was clearly terrified, his throat closing and constricting the notes. He didn't lose pitch, but his tone was muddy.
The second child joined, then the third. The fourth—the boy I was interested in—tilted his head back and opened his mouth, blending perfectly. Again he sang with joy.
As each part dropped out, his became stronger. At the end, he sounded like the entire chorus all by himself.
And like that little boy who sang for me, this boy had a purity of tone that sent shivers down my spine.
“You're amazing,” Felix said to me. “You found the other one.”
It wasn't hard. I had grown up listening to voices like that. But I nodded.
“Thank you,” I said to the boys. “Thank you all.”
I thanked the women as well, and they nodded at me. Then the one who had directed the chorus asked Felix if they could leave. He looked at me.
I nodded, and the boys filed out.
“Satisfied?” he asked.
But I wasn't. I felt even more uncomfortable than I had expected—not because this performance raised memories. It didn't. But because of the children themselves.
I must have been as young as that first boy when I'd left the Outpost. I had no memory of a time before Djape, and I had vague memories of imitation singing, much like I had the boy do for me. It was the way the youngest children learned to sing in the Pane style.
But the older boy bothered me. He had already learned music—this culture's music —and he loved it.
“You can't send that older child to Djape,” I said to Felix. “The Pane will destroy him.”
Felix frowned at me. “You can't know that.”
“I know it better than you,” I said. “They'll teach perfection, not enjoyment. Each note is an exam, not a linked unit with any other note. He may spend years there, but he'll never be a top-level performer, and he will learn to hate his gift.”
Felix glanced toward the door the boys had left through.
“So that's why you wanted to come,” he said. “To prevent children from going to Djape. I told you how entrenched this system is, how the Pane money helps the other children—”
“Yes,” I said. “You told me, and I believe you. The youngest one is exactly what they want. He is a mimic. He ma
kes sounds, pure sounds, not music. He is a human windchime, and they will love him.”
Felix was still watching me warily. “I still hear hesitation in your voice.”
I sighed. I was guessing at this last part. “He has affection for the woman who brought him here. You shouldn't break that up.”
“Women can't contaminate the performers,” Felix said.
“You could argue that she's already had an influence, and it can't be heard in his voice. Make her a deal-breaker.”
He stared at me. “You guarantee that the Pane will like him?”
“Yes,” I said. “I spent my entire life in that system. I know what they're looking for.”
“You realize his happiness isn't an issue,” Felix said.
“It seems that happiness isn't an issue for anyone here,” I said, not telling him that I never thought of happiness either. “But if he has someone to care for him, he'll perform better, and maybe he'll survive longer than some of the others who come to Djape.”
Maybe he wouldn't have a horrible realization, as I had, that the person he thought cared about him only cared about his perfect voice.
“Why would he survive longer?” Felix asked.
“Fear,” I said. “Voices shatter from the sheer terror of making a mistake. I was raised to be perfect or I would be rejected. Maybe if he has someone who cares for him as him, he will not be afraid of such rejection. His voice won't constrict. He'll perform from strength, not from terror.”
Felix continued to stare at me, and then he shook his head. He grinned, just a little. “You want my job?”
“I know nothing about Old Earth,” I said.
“Picking voices for the Pane,” he said.
“No,” I said before I could edit my response. “I want to study every form of music possible. I want to break the habits I learned on Djape, not embrace them.”
“So you're a lot more like that older kid. You love music,” Felix said.
I thought of those stolen moments in my study, the revelations in the blues club, the odd sound to my own voice as I tried that seven-note opening.
“I was nothing like that boy,” I said. “I was a windchime, just like the little one. But I stumbled on some recordings, and they changed me.”
The recordings had frightened me too, but I wasn't going to tell Felix that. They had frightened me because they had contaminated me, and I had let it happen. I might even have let that vocal break happen, just to escape the repetition of performance, the nightly striving for perfection.
Asimov's SF, September 2009 Page 18
