The original gems had been crude, brute-force labourers, but their impact on both science and society had been immense. The bioengineering conglomerates, the gemtechs, had learned more from the unconstrained experimentation of their manufacture than they ever could have from the focused fight against the Syndrome. The public were accustomed to gems being the default resource for work deemed difficult or dangerous; indeed, having grown up with the arrangement, the Syndrome orphans found it in no way strange.
The way was clear for specialist gems to be created: gems with hyper-developed senses of smell and taste for toxic waste detection, gems with the strength, lung capacity and altitude tolerance for mountaintop mining, gems who could breathe underwater, gems with paranormal speed and dexterity for the new consumer-product assembly lines, gems whose bodies synthesised drugs or grew organs and tissue for transplant. Gem females became the new surrogate mothers, often having no other purpose.
From the beginning many gems had been marked by unmistakable anatomic differences: a contrast made more sharp by the complete absence from post-Syndrome norm populations of deformity, disability or even the traditional variations in body size. While ever more extreme and outlandish experiments continued to alter the human form, the engineering of a clear visual identifier for the gems who had no other obvious physical modification quickly became a rigidly observed industry standard. These alternative gemsigns have most often been in the form of brightly coloured, phosphorescent hair. Some gemtechs have even become known for signature hues: Recombin Blue, Gempro Green, Bel’Natur Red.
The recovery turned into a boom. Gemtech fired a renaissance in industrial processes, scientific discovery and artistic expression. New players entered the market, exploiting the entire spectrum of living matter; flora, fauna and bacteria quickly outstripped human gems both in scale and economic significance. But the oldest, richest and most prestigious companies were those that still practised their art on the human double helix, turning out ever more exotic and expensive products.
It was the very uniqueness, the individuality, of those products that began to trouble the norms. A growing sense of affinity was augmented by the fact that, because their extraordinary abilities increasingly had a sensory or cognitive basis, they could not be dissociated from intellectual capacity. Even those whose special characteristics were physical rather than mental were now working in environments which required sophisticated interactions with equipment, norms and each other. Simply put, gems had to be smart to be useful.
Being smart meant they were able to assess their own circumstances, note the discrepancies between themselves and the rest of humanity, and demand redress. Being smart made it much more difficult to dismiss them as subnormals incapable of appreciating the full richness of human experience. Being smart made it easier for normals to empathise with them, and for gems to understand the importance of encouraging that empathy to develop.
Gems began to work collectively, withholding labour and forcing confrontations. The ability to learn, analyse and communicate that had made them marketable now enabled them to form alliances, identify sympathisers and smuggle their stories onto the socialstream networks. Some escaped entirely, using their specialised skills and senses to circumvent gemtech security, and found outside the sealed factories and locked dormitories a society growing increasingly uneasy with itself.
A steady stream of revelations about the true conditions to which gems were subjected horrified the public. Pressure groups sprang up. Governments demanded access and explanation. Gemtech reports on errors, accidents and deaths were reviewed and found to be finely detailed with respect to the implications for bioengineering, but otherwise cursory. In the newly resurgent universities, students compared them to eighteenth-century insurance reports of Middle Passage losses, put their heads in their hands and wept.
Supporters of the status quo, led by the gemtechs, pointed out that since gems had not evolved naturally but had been created for a specific purpose, they could have no reasonable objection to the uses to which their creators intended they should be put. The gems and their allies reacted with fury. The religions woke up, recollected their core dogma, and indignantly reminded faithful and faithless alike that whatever else they might believe, they were in error if they presumed to possess the authority of God.
Eli thumbed the tablet off and squeezed his eyes shut. Zavcka Klist’s ‘different behaviour modalities’ replayed in the darkness behind his lids. He found he was shaking.
He wondered for a moment if the vids embedded in the otherwise drily academic language of the report had been tampered with, the horrific scenes artificially generated, but knew it was a false hope. She was much too smart to make such an easily detectable mistake. Likewise she would not now have given him information that should have been turned over a year ago. He was certain he would find that what he had just witnessed had been neatly tabulated and included in some obscurely indexed datastream. Without the video of course.
He could give her a very hard time for that, report it to the courts, accuse Bel’Natur of burying a potential risk to public safety when it would have counted against them and revealing it only when they thought they could turn it to advantage. It was perfectly true and maybe he would. But the stone was back in his stomach again, and he knew that he was having these thoughts to distract himself.
Ruthless though she might be, Zavcka Klist wasn’t really the problem. What she had shown him was.
He paced the hotel room, trying to think while he ran a diagnostic on the vids. It confirmed what he already knew. He needed a way to work through the material, an explanation, some context. As if in response, his earset buzzed. Some instinct for caution made him walk over to look at the tablet instead of simply flicking his ‘set to receive. The memtab had included her personal comcode, which now flashed to identify the incoming transmission.
He stared at it in disbelief for a moment, then resumed his pacing, letting the earset buzz away into silence. So she’d built an alert into the report, intending to tackle him again as soon as he’d viewed it. While the images were fresh in his mind.
The manipulation was so blatant it gave him purchase. He’d speak to Zavcka Klist, but not now and not first.
He picked up his other tablet and called Robert Trench’s comcode. It buzzed twice before Rob’s slightly sleepy face filled the screen.
‘Rob. Sorry, I know it’s late.’
‘Not very. You look terrible.’
‘Yeah. Just finished going through the Klist stuff.’
‘And?’
‘I want to meet with Aryel Morningstar.’
DAY TWO
6
He was taken to her in the morning, driven back amongst the gleaming towers of the city’s bustling heart, winding through the newly revived cultural quarter to reach an older, unrepaired road that ran down to the river. A grey winter drizzle barely ruffled the surface of the water. The driver stopped outside a building that looked as if it might once have housed a gymnasium, or maybe an old-fashioned library.
He was on his own. Rob had been ready, eager even, to rearrange his packed schedule and accompany him, but Eli had said no.
‘This is likely to be a difficult conversation,’ he’d pointed out. ‘You already have a good relationship – I don’t want it tainted if things get unpleasant. Besides you’ve already spent enough time babysitting me.’
Rob had sighed and conceded, and now Eli was shaking his head at the driver as she made to get out of the car with him.
‘It’s fine, thanks. I’m expected,’ nodding at a man with a shock of vivid green hair who had emerged through the double doors and was walking down the steps. ‘No need for you to stay.’
The driver was explaining that Dr Trench had told her to wait, as the green-haired man arrived to greet them. His name was Horace, and he surprised Eli by endorsing Rob’s instruction.
‘Hardly ever any taxis down here,’ he explained, ‘and very few private cars. We could arrange to get
you back, of course, but it might take a while.’
Eli left the driver waiting by the kerb and followed Horace back up the steps and into a spacious entry foyer. It was bisected by a display counter across which a succession of gem-related announcements flickered. Eli noted a community meeting on the upcoming conference, a list of skills and jobs available, and a theatrical performance in that very building in a few days’ time.
The man sitting behind the counter glanced up from his tablet, then rose as Horace walked Eli over. He was tall, powerfully built and olive-skinned, with vaguely Asian features under close-cropped indigo hair. As Horace introduced them Eli stuck out his hand and the big man shook it. There was none of the momentary hesitation Horace had shown at the same gesture, a sign of a gem unused to the courtesy; but the same glint of appreciation showed in the brown eyes. The little boy flipping pages on a child-size tablet on the floor behind him looked up.
Eli was immediately curious. It was unusual to see children in a gem community; most gems had been given contraceptive implants at puberty, and few so far had had the means or the conviction to have them removed. Whether they should be aided, encouraged or even allowed to do so continued to be one of the most contentious issues in the ongoing debate about gem entitlements, and one which, despite norm discomfort around the subject, he sensed the Conference would have to grapple with.
One of the things that many norms found disturbing was that there was no guarantee there would be gemsign to identify naturally conceived offspring. The few such babies who had been carried to term and born healthy generally had a normal, nonradiant hair colour, and indeed this child’s head was covered in a completely ordinary sandybrown tangle. But the children he knew of were all infants and toddlers, much younger than this boy.
‘Dr Walker, meet Bal. He’s one of our volunteers, been here since the beginning. And that,’ following Eli’s gaze and sounding, he thought, just a touch uncertain, ‘is his boy, Gabe.’
‘Good to meet you, Bal. Hi, Gabe.’ The boy smiled at him and Eli smiled back. He glanced back at Bal and noted that the eyes had gone just a little bit hard.
Horace led him through a side door and along a corridor lined with vidpaintings. He was friendly and chatty, full of tidbits about the history of the building and the way it had been repurposed.
‘It must have taken a long time.’
‘Most of the past year to get it to this point, but there’s plenty more to do. We’ve worked so hard on all the buildings in the Squats. I hope we get to stay.’
Eli swallowed a sigh and wondered if the green-haired gem really thought it was up to him. They were going through another door, and up a flight of stairs.
‘The lobby felt like a proper neighbourhood place,’ he offered. ‘Nice that kids can hang out there as well.’ There was a long pause.
‘Yes … of course we don’t have very many. Bal and Gaela, though, she’s his partner, they’re great parents.’ He pushed open another door. ‘Here we are.’ Eli thought he said it with relief.
The room they stepped into was large, chilly, and dim. It had far fewer of the trappings of modernity than the areas they’d walked through before. Eli suspected the dark, heavy curtains which lined the walls were covering up patches of damp and peeling paint. The ceiling looked to have inset lights, original to the building and probably defunct; a couple of power panels had been set up, casting a paltry glow over the large wooden table in the centre.
The people sitting and standing around it looked up as they entered. There were three: an ordinary-looking young man who scowled at him, a rotund woman with big hips, big breasts and tousled turquoise hair, and a seated figure on the far side of the table. He clocked something familiar about the youth and a distinctly aggressive aura from the large woman as he followed Horace over, but his attention stayed fixed on their companion. There was no question who was in charge of that room.
The first thing that struck him was how small she was; the vidclip attached to her profile had given no sense of scale. In the low light he could make out little besides a delicate face and slender hands, lightly clasped where they rested on the massive table. She seemed to emerge, ghost-like, from the shadows. Dark hair smoothed back from a high, clear brow, appearing to dissolve into the indistinctness of clothing and curtains. As he grew closer he could see that she was wearing some kind of enveloping garment that blended into the charcoal greyness of the background fabric. Against it her skin shone a pale, smooth bronze. Her eyes were large and clear, a blue the colour of a summer sky.
But she looks fine now, he thought, and knew it for a ridiculous understatement. Against the decay of the room and the animosity of its occupants, she was a revelation.
She sat perfectly still and watched him approach. The man and woman stepped back, ensuring that she would be introduced first. The instinctive deference also had the effect of turning them into an honour guard, flanking and framing her as he was presented. Horace bowed ever so slightly from the waist, extending a hand towards her as they stopped at the table. Even though Eli understood the subtle psychological cues at work he still felt their effect, a sense of being exalted by her presence. It was made more powerful by his conviction that it was unconscious and unplanned.
And then she rose to greet him, and the wall moved with her.
Or so it seemed for a shocking instant as she broke away from the illusory continuum of curtains and clothing. She bore a lump on her back wider than her shoulders, a triangular swelling that appeared to start at the nape of the neck and carry on down the length of her spine. It looked to be more than half again the size of her torso. She stood straight and appeared to carry it easily enough, but he shuddered inside at the thought of the extra weight on her diminutive frame, the pain she must suffer if it really was made up of embedded hardware. She was barely five feet tall.
The true size and shape of whatever grotesquerie had been visited upon her was covered by a voluminous cloak that fastened close about her throat and fell to her feet. Her hands emerged from tight-fitting sleeves set into the garment. She was holding one of them out to him now, finely shaped lips twitching into a wry smile. She did not seem angry at his discomfiture, or pleased or satisfied. Just mildly amused.
He shook her hand. It was tiny but surprisingly strong.
‘Dr Walker, it’s good to meet you. I’m Aryel.’
‘Eli, please.’
‘Eli. Welcome to the Squats.’
‘Thank you.’ He released her hand, made a helpless gesture. ‘I’m sorry, I didn’t mean …’
He trailed off as she laughed. Her voice was low and beautifully modulated, almost musical. It sounded strange coming from so small and misshapen a body. ‘Don’t worry about it. Happens all the time. Let me introduce you.’
The turquoise woman was Wenda and the young man Donal. Wenda shook his hand with an air that said if Aryel thought it was okay she supposed she’d have to go along. When Eli turned to Donal the scowl deepened. Eli was sure he’d seen that look before. When Donal shrugged away from the handshake, instead deliberately using his right hand to tuck shaggy, mousy brown hair behind his ear, Eli had it.
‘The train!’ he said. ‘You were on the train with me yesterday. You— Oh,’ as a prodigiously overlarge, sharply pointed and funnelled ear became visible from behind the mass of hair. ‘Oh, I see.’ He looked at Aryel.
‘Yes,’ she said simply. ‘We knew you were being targeted and it seemed to me that a long, unaccompanied train journey was an opportunity unlikely to be missed. Your work is crucial to the future of our people and I needed to know what we’re up against. Donal was travelling down anyway so I asked him to keep an ear on you.’ She fixed him with a very direct look. ‘What he overheard was … distressing.’
‘I can understand that.’ Somehow, strangely, he found that he was not angry about being spied on. The lack of subterfuge, the candour with which she told him what she’d done, the provision of reasons but not excuses and the way she took responsibility
were completely disarming. They had every reason to wonder, and worry, whether he would succumb to pressure from the gemtechs. The conversation with Zavcka Klist would not have reassured them.
He looked from her to Donal, hands now shoved deep in his pockets; Wenda, arms folded and nostrils flaring; Horace, standing one foot atop the other, cringing with embarrassment; and back to Aryel. She stood calm and unhurried, waiting for him to explain himself, move them past this moment; make it acceptable to the others for her to talk to him. He understood that exactly how he did so was important. And that he could expect no help.
He kept his eyes on Donal but addressed himself to all of them. ‘What you have to understand … please … is that I have to listen to everybody. My job is to consider all of the information and come to some kind of balanced conclusion. I can’t just cut people off, but I do want to hear from everyone.’ He spread his hands. ‘It’s been less than twenty-four hours and here I am. I’ve got a lot of questions, and I’m hoping you can help me with the answers.’
He left it unspoken but obvious that they had not come to him; he had sought them out in order to achieve just that balance. They all glanced at Aryel. She looked pointedly at Donal.
‘So you’re no’ jus’ for them then?’ he finally said, with a kind of grudging disbelief. ‘Tha’s wha’ you’re sayin’?’
‘That’s why I’m here.’
The silence stretched out. Donal’s fists clenched and unclenched in his pockets. Finally he tore his eyes away from the floor, met Eli’s gaze for a moment, then looked at Aryel and nodded.
‘Soun’s like he’s tellin’ the truth.’
Eli offered his hand again and this time Donal shook it reluctantly. ‘You can tell whether someone’s lying?’ Eli asked. He told himself it was an opportunity to change the subject, but he could feel his endless fascination with gems, with the breadth and depth of the permutations the human envelope was capable of, threatening to take over. ‘That’s one I hadn’t heard of. I imagine,’ he looked Donal in the eye again, ‘it’s difficult as well as useful.’
Gemsigns Page 6
