The Kid Who Came From Space

by Ross Welford

  I, however, felt uncomfortable. So uncomfortable, in fact, that I got up quietly and began to make my way to the exit. As I left the group, I could hear Mr Park continue his lecture in his characteristic monotone.

  ‘Observe, if you will, this exhibit. This is Carlo, an Original. It was brought here thirty years ago. Originals are quite rare here in the Earth Zone, and will provide new cells for cloning, enabling us to make the exhibits more varied. The behaviour you are witnessing is a form of pleasure. It is known that laughter can produce these so-called “tears”—’

  I turned back and interrupted Mr Park. ‘So can unhappiness. Sadness. Grief.’

  Mr Park looked at me levelly. ‘How informed you are, Hellyann. And you are right, of course. Human beings like Carlo here are very often at the mercy of their emotions, which we, of course, are not. Is that not true, Hellyann?’

  I nodded solemnly. ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘It is one of the many things that make us superior beings.’

  From his seated position, Carlo continued his wailing noise. It cut straight through me.

  I swallowed hard. ‘But, sir, what if he—’

  ‘It, do you not mean?’

  ‘What if it really is crying from unhappiness?’

  Mr Park stood up, stroked his tail through his hand and adopted a deeper voice. ‘Hellyann. As soon as Originals are brought from Earth – and, as you know, this does not happen very often – but as soon as they are, they are made calm with the most advanced forms of drugs known to us. But, if I am to anticipate your next question, we do not shut off all of their emotions. Their emotions are what make them human.’ He paused to let this sink in. ‘Such a course of action would undoubtedly be cruel. Or, as they would say, inhuman.’

  Everyone was looking at me now, even Av. I turned and went out into the fresh air, breathing in big gulps. ‘Sobbing.’ That was the noise Carlo was making. Along with laughing, it is not something we do. Babies, small children, the very old: sometimes they do it. But it is unusual and considered very peculiar.

  I heard Mr Park’s words in my head, again and again, along with the noise of Carlo.

  Cruel. Inhuman.

  From inside I heard Av’s voice. ‘Mr Park? How does one become a Collector of Originals?’

  ‘Well, Av …’ He droned on and I did not listen further, for – although I did not realise it at the time – I was already forming a decision that would take me to Earth.

  ‘It is not just you,’ said a voice behind me, startling me.

  I turned to see that Kallan had left the dark movie room too.

  He came close enough for me to smell his breath, and I could tell he was being sincere. ‘When you were laughing then—’ he began, but I stopped him.

  ‘I was not laughing! I, erm …’

  ‘Don’t worry, Hellyann.’

  He knew I was lying – he could smell it – but whatever he was about to say next was drowned out by a hideous, loud honking noise unlike anything I had heard before, a long sound like this:

  PAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!

  I turned, and saw something that would change my whole life.

  The noise was being made by one of the ‘motorcars’ operated by a human. It was a warning sound.

  Two or three seconds is not long enough for me to notice everything at once: some of these observations have been pieced together later, based on my recollection of what happened.

  In the front of the car, looking out of the big glass window screen, was a woman, her eyes wide and her mouth pulled open in what I now guess was terror. The motorcar was travelling quite fast, and it was very close to a young human. The boy was facing away from the motorcar. I believe the first time he saw it was when we did: he turned his head to the sound that the motorcar was making.

  Kallan and I both gasped. The motorcar was surely going to hit the boy! He seemed unable to move and the car hurtled towards him.

  And then there was a blur of movement. From nowhere, it seemed to me at the time, a figure appeared: another human, who ran in front of the motorcar and pushed the boy out of the way. There was a thud as the front of the vehicle hit the person who had pushed the boy. Her body jerked upwards and on to the front of the car, hitting the big glass window hard with her skull, and then rolling off, landing at the side: a jumbled heap of clothes and limbs.

  Other humans screamed and ran towards them. The motorcar carried on and smashed into a wall. A few seconds later, the woman operating it staggered out, wailing and crying.

  It was very different from the movie we had just seen. Kallan and I watched, dumbfounded.

  A small crowd had gathered. The boy was helped to his feet: he seemed unharmed. The woman who had saved him, however, had not moved. One or two Assistant Advisors – the Anthallans who act as guards and guides – had ambled over and taken out their healing sticks, but it was difficult to see what was happening.

  And then Mr Park was next to us, waving his arms and saying, ‘Come on, move along, nothing to see.’

  Except there was something to see. The woman was still lying on the ground, and people around her had straightened up and were shaking their heads.

  ‘Is she dead?’ I asked Mr Park.

  He glanced back.

  ‘Most probably. High-speed impact of that sort is very likely fatal. Motorcars are prone to brake and sensor failure: that is, when the operator is in control of all the vehicle’s functions. Highly dangerous. Frankly, I am surprised this is not a more frequent occurrence.’ He paused, then added, ‘Thankfully it was just one of the exhibits and not one of us, eh? Now, let us leave them to it.’

  I heard a wail of sadness coming from the group of humans.

  ‘Why did she do that?’ I asked Kallan in a low voice. ‘The woman who stepped in front of the car. She saved the young one’s life – but she died herself! It’s not rational. Not logical. She … she …’

  ‘She gave her life for his?’ he said solemnly. ‘It is the same reason they laugh and cry, I think. They feel things very deeply. It is why it is wrong for us to keep them here.’

  I stared at him in shock. I had never heard anyone say such a thing. Kallan glanced around, aware that he had said something unusual.

  In the years that followed, I never forgot those few seconds. How could I? The brief, ghastly image of the crumpled woman on the ground who died to save a child. Was it her child? I did not know. But I never forgot her, or the extraordinary and irrational thing she had done.

  Nor did I forget the man sobbing in the screening room, or what Kallan, who became a friend, had said: It is wrong for us to keep them here.

  That day was what led me to the decision I eventually came to.

  That I would help Originals.

  That I would return them to Earth, where they belonged.

  I met Kallan on the grass-covered plain that surrounds our city. I would normally have got there via the huge city arena, but that is swarming with AAs and Sky Eyes – I might have been stopped by people I know who might have invited me to share some greest, and I would have had to lie to explain why I could not, and none of my species is good at that.

  So I kept my head up and walked confidently where the perfectly round trees lend a degree of cover from Sky Eyes to get to this isolated spot.

  To one side of us, the uniformly short grass, trimmed regularly by the bot-cutters, stretched to the horizon. To the other side, the city with its neat rows of pod-homes arranged in wide, clean grids.

  Nearly four years had passed since my visit to Earth Zone and I had never shaken off the memory of Carlo’s weeping in the dark movie room, or the woman who ran in front of a motorcar to save a young boy.

  Conversations such as the one we were about to have are definitely punishable by short-sleep. Possibly even long-sleep. There is almost nowhere safe to have private conversations in the city. The only problem is that there is no real reason anyone would go to the grassy plain other than to have a private conversation …

  It was there
fore potentially suspicious, but we had no choice.

  The group I was about to meet were mainly involved in attempts to persuade the Earth Zone to stop the future collection of Originals. They had had no success, although people did talk about them, usually in tones of disapproval.

  ‘They are causing a disturbance. It is quite unfair,’ I once heard someone say.

  ‘They can think what they like, but they should keep quiet about it.’

  ‘They are allowing their emotions to get the better of them.’ That last one was Av, my school companion, whom I had not seen in a long time.

  The Earth Zone had been forced to issue a statement, on private screens and public media, which was delivered by the Advisor. The statement was added to the list of directives read out so often that many people knew them by heart.

  His perfect, generated face peered out and his voice intoned:

  ‘The occasional collection of Original human beings is essential to the educational work of Earth Zone.

  ‘Originals are well cared for. They are fed and clothed. Daily doses of highly sophisticated medication ensure that their poor intellects and emotional states cannot overwhelm them while they are at Earth Zone.

  ‘It would be quite inappropriate to return the very small number of Originals to Earth. There is a significant risk that they will have accumulated knowledge of life beyond their solar system. This could hugely damage their planet’s natural development and is in direct contravention of our responsibilities under the Intra-Universal Non-Interference Protocol.

  ‘We greatly value the stability, truth and peace of our lives. If a tiny number see fit to threaten that, then severe measures will be taken.’

  Kallan looked over first one shoulder, then the other, and then he made the sign, which I returned: three fingers of the left hand placed momentarily over the heart.

  We were not being observed, or at least we could not observe that we were being observed.

  He raised his hand to cover his mouth. Then he pointed to his PG. He repeated the covering of his mouth and pointed to the PG on my wrist.

  He switched his off, and I did the same. Now, switching off one’s Personal Guide is not forbidden, but it is very unusual. Unusual enough that if someone did it a lot, or kept theirs switched off for a long time, it might be assumed by the Assistant Advisors that you had something to hide.

  Kallan spoke quickly and kept his voice to a low rasp, either from habit or from a fear of ultra-long-distance listening.

  ‘There is a new one,’ he said, and I knew who he was talking about straight away. ‘Two days ago, juvenile, female.’

  I had already seen her at Earth Zone. I knew my time had come.

  My time. I felt a surge in my stomach.

  It had taken them a long time to trust me. Now that they did, I could not let them down. I looked at Kallan closely and touched my heart.

  ‘I’m ready,’ I said.

  ‘Good,’ said Kallan. ‘Is your PG definitely off?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Show me,’ he demanded, and I did.

  Then he stepped forward, I felt a pressure on my neck and everything went blank.

  I awoke in a large dark room, lit by candles, which made the room smell of smoke.

  Candles? Who has candles? Where do you even get candles? Naked flames – any sort of fire for that matter – have been forbidden since the Big Burn. I immediately felt a warm thrill pass through me.

  ‘Sorry,’ said Kallan, helping me up from the bench where I had lain. ‘Are you all right?’ He did not wait for an answer. ‘We sort of had to do that. Security, you know.’

  I nodded. ‘You mean you do not trust me.’

  ‘We do not trust you completely. The risks of this operation are considerable, and for the time being we do not want you to know where we are. Now follow me. I need to show you something.’

  I walked behind him to a large set of iron doors. He took a candle from a holder on the wall and handed it to me while he worked the door handle.

  ‘Kallan?’ I asked. ‘Why the candles? I mean …’

  ‘Because we need light, and we have not yet found a way of stealing power from the Network. Do you not like candles?’

  The truth is: I love them. Outside it was light almost all of the time. Sunlight in the daytime, and artificial light at night. Candles were different: I loved their flickery light, I loved their smell, I loved the way that they cast deep shadows and illuminated only what was near. I also rather liked the fact that, because they were officially disapproved of, there was a secret thrill involved with them.

  I said to Kallan, ‘Candlelight reminds me of my dreams.’

  He smiled and said, ‘Did you ever dream of this?’

  We had advanced into the room and our footsteps echoed in the cavernous darkness. He held up the candle with one hand, as, with the other, he pulled a sheet off a large shape. He kept pulling and pulling until the machine was fully revealed, and I blinked with amazement.

  You would call it a ‘spaceship’, and I like that name. We do not use ships, not much, but we know what they are, and I do like the idea of a ship that goes through space, sailing through universes faster than time itself.

  This, though, looked nothing like one of your ships, with sails and ropes. Instead it was a large triangle with a big, dark dome. Legs at each corner supported it, and there was a shallow hull that would enable it to be stable in water. It was higher than I was from the top of the dome to the bottom of the hull, and was a matt, dark shade all over that did not reflect the flickering candlelight that Kallan held aloft. Its edges seemed to blend into the darkness, making it appear almost shapeless.

  I had never seen one in real life. So many questions were running through my head that I did not know in which order to ask them.

  ‘How did you get this?’ I asked. ‘Are these not forbidden, now? Where has it been? Does anybody know it is here? I mean, how …’ I looked around nervously, as if an AA might walk in at any time.

  ‘Calm down,’ said Kallan, gently. ‘We are in no danger here. In fact, we are among friends.’

  As he said the words, another six candles sparked up one by one in the shadows of the room. Each was lit from another and held by a person who had been waiting for Kallan’s signal. Slowly, they advanced and stood in formation: a perfect circle of candlelight surrounding the dark spaceship.

  Kallan reached out and took my hand in his. ‘Come,’ he whispered. ‘I would like you to meet some other Hearters.’

  As he led me round the circle, he introduced them by name.

  ‘This is Ash,’ he said.

  Ash was a very old female, her hair thinning all over her body.

  She smiled warmly, said ‘Welcome, Hellyann’, and touched three fingers to her heart.

  The rest all did the same as Kallan told me their names. All of them were old, all of them looked at me with an intensity of hope and warmth that I had never experienced in my life, until by the end of the circle of introduction, I found it hard to swallow because of my emotion.

  ‘We had almost given up hope,’ said Ash, stepping forward and looking deep into my eyes. She was probably the same height as me but held herself hunched, as though she had been fearful of discovery her whole life.

  ‘Hope of … what?’ I said, looking round the group.

  ‘Of returning an Original, of course,’ said Ash. She reached up and stroked my face with the back of her hand – a gesture so gentle and tender that it made me smile. ‘We are all too old to make the journey safely, and we thought we were the last of our kind. But then you came along.’

  I let this sink in, then I looked over at Kallan. ‘Why not him?’ I murmured to Ash.

  Kallan heard me. ‘I am already under suspicion,’ he said. ‘It could threaten us all.’ He ran his hand over the hull of the spaceship. ‘This craft dates back to the Great Exploration. You have probably heard of it?’

  Everybody has heard of the Great Exploration: the period many years a
go when our people set out to explore the universes and collect new life forms. Most were very unlike us: aggressive and intelligent bacteria, for example, or huge, feathered reptiles.

  At least two planets’ entire life was wiped out by a germ we carried that they were unable to resist.

  On another planet we caused a war. The inhabitants decided that we were gods who had come to destroy their existing gods, and disagreements among the inhabitants about who were the real gods caused a conflict which is said to be raging still.

  Eventually, the Advisor limited contact with other planets to carefully chosen Collectors, operating under strict licence.

  ‘But all unlicensed spaceships were destroyed, years ago,’ I said to Kallan.

  He looked around at the circle of people, their faces glowing with candlelight, and smiled his half-smile.

  ‘All but one,’ he said. ‘And it’s all yours.’

  From the spaceship came a voice in English: ‘Howdy, Hellyann. My name is Philip. How the very heck are you?’

  The whole side of the spaceship slid back to create a wide opening, revealing the sparse, dimly lit interior. I stood in the gloomy cavern with the other Hearters, illuminated by candlelight and the warm, soft light from the spaceship’s inside walls.

  Kallan stepped forward and murmured in my ear. ‘It is time,’ he said.

  ‘Time? Time for what?’

  ‘Philip has been pre-programmed. Your first mission is simple.’

  ‘My … my first …? You mean … now?’

  The light from within the spaceship glowed a little brighter, and Philip’s voice said, ‘You didn’t think this lot would hang about for permission, did you? Meet your passenger, recently stolen from Earth Zone. I believe you have seen her before. Tammy Tait! Show your face!’

  The human girl stepped forward from the back of the spaceship, the outline of her body darkening the glow. It was her hair I recognised first: the tangled mess of matted curls that I had seen two days ago when she peered at me from her Earth Zone enclosure. She lifted her hand and waggled the fingers on it and said something that sounded like ‘Hi’.