The Mutant Season

by Robert Silverberg;Karen Haber

  “Have you eaten?” She sounded tired.

  “No.”

  “Take off your coat and I’ll make a sandwich for you.”

  The wooden chair legs scraped as his mother stood up and walked into the kitchen. With the light shining on her dark hair, her face nearly framed by the scarlet cowl-necked sweater she wore, his mother reminded Michael of a print he’d once seen, a Japanese print of a geisha in a berry-colored kimono and scarf. He hung up his coat and sat in the chair she’d vacated. He peered at the text onscreen, a horror story from some old collection.

  “You like reading this stuff?”

  “Yes. It takes me to a totally different world. And then I’m always grateful to come back to my own.”

  “Wish I felt that way,” Michael said. “Where is everybody?”

  “Your father stayed behind to talk with Halden and Zenora. Jimmy and Melanie are next door watching Tela’s big screen.”

  She brought a soya loaf sandwich and a cup of cocoa to the table and sat down opposite him, looking pensive.

  “Michael, I know you feel resentful of the demands we place on you,” she said. “But your father doesn’t mean to be harsh with you.”

  “Then why does he act that way?”

  She sighed. “He’s worried. You know how important it is to him to build for the future. And he’s very proud of you.”

  “Sure, of having a double mutant for a son. Well, if he’s so proud, why doesn’t he tell me so himself?”

  “That’s very difficult for him.”

  Michael swallowed a mouthful of sandwich.

  “I wish he wouldn’t make it so difficult for me,” he said. “And Mel.”

  “I know.”

  “Did you ever feel this way?”

  She smiled gently. “Of course. But it was different when I was growing up. There was much more enthusiasm within the clan. We felt like we were on the cusp of a new age. But that was in the seventies, when anything seemed possible.”

  “What was it like?”

  “Oh, exciting. Confusing. Especially to a child.” She paused, old memories bringing color to her cheeks. “It felt like the world was bright with opportunity and color. That all the old ways were changing. And, in a way, they were. But then came the violence. And, in many ways, things stayed the same for us.”

  Michael leaned back in his chair. “Didn’t anybody think the time of waiting might be over?”

  Sadly, his mother nodded. “I was too young to remember much of what went on in the meetings. But I do remember that one year, a motion was made to come forth, proclaim ourselves in the public arena. Some of the older members resisted, and in the end, the clan split on the issue. So finally, some of us came forth, back in the nineties. Before that, the meetings were twice as big, twice as many people there as attend now. But we had been divided before that. The sixties and seventies split us, and those looking for openness left. They moved away, some to California. Among them was the boy I thought I would marry.”

  “What happened to them? To him?”

  A shadow passed across her delicate features. “We are starting to come back together again now. Perhaps one day we will all be together, like in the old times. As for that boy, well, he disappeared.”

  Michael stopped chewing his sandwich and looked at his mother as though he’d never really seen her before. She had an entire private life she’d never shown him. He felt new respect for her.

  “Did he die?”

  “I suppose so.”

  “What was he like?”

  She reached over gently to brush a strand of his hair out of his eyes. “A bit like your cousin Skerry. Wild. That’s what made him so appealing. And would have made him impossible to live with.”

  Michael was tempted to tell her he’d seen Skerry. The words almost bubbled out, but he decided to hold back. If she told anybody, he’d be grilled about it. Right now, he enjoyed having a few secrets of his own.

  3

  the music from the hardwired’s mechband bounced off the pink tiles in the bathroom in strange, distorted echoes: waow, waow, like the cry of a distant, electronic cat. Melanie stared in the cracked glass of the mirror. Her face was flushed from the heat. It was a warm night for the middle of February.

  The Valedrine she’d found in her mother’s medicine cabinet was buzzing along nicely through her brain, leaving her just the slightest bit numb. She pulled a yellow comb through her hair and studied her reflection. A part-Chinese girl with soft brown hair stared back at her. Just a nice, normal girl out for an evening of fun.

  A nice, normal girl with golden eyes.

  She stared at her face as though she’d never seen it before, transfixed by the strangeness of those eyes, a double-edged reminder of who she was. A mutant. A null. Who would want her? Mutant or normal, who would ever want her?

  Maybe she should wear contact lenses. She closed her eyes with pleasure at the thought; covering that mutant gold with dark brown, or hazel. At least then she’d look like an ordinary Asian girl. Imagine living like a nonmutant, she thought. How strange. To walk down a street and just fade into the crowd…

  The door to the bathroom slammed open and Tiff Seldon walked in, chattering with Cilla Cole. They stopped when they saw Melanie. Tiff shouldered by her toward the stalls. She was a full head taller than Melanie, with a square, athletic figure, her head topped by a bristling yellow crew cut.

  “Excuse me,” she said with exaggerated courtesy, clipping Melanie with her hip.

  Melanie pitched forward, almost cracking her forehead against the mirror glass before she caught herself.

  “Hey!” She glared over her shoulder. That shove had been deliberate. She knew it. Cilla leaned against the wall tiles opposite the sink, skinny arms crossed in front of her, a joystick between her lips, double silver rings in each nostril. Her hair was perhaps an inch longer than Tiff’s, and bright green. She grinned at Melanie with cheerful malice.

  “Hey yourself, mutie. Why don’t you do some tricks for us?” Tiff said, her voice booming out from behind the stall.

  Melanie threw her comb into her purse, and turned to leave. But Cilla blocked her path.

  “Somebody’s talking to you, mutie. Don’t you pay attention?”

  “Get out of my way, Cilla.” Melanie’s voice was cool but her heart pounded. Tiff and Cilla were tough and reckless, part of a crowd that bashed mutants for fun.

  “No manners at all.” Cilla shook her head in mock disapproval and, moving in from the right, shoved Melanie backward against the wall. Melanie dodged to her left, but Tiff was suddenly looming over her, grinning nastily. Reaching a meaty hand under her shirt, Tiff pulled out a knife: it flashed silver in the fluorescent lights. Then she grabbed Melanie by the shoulder, waving the small vibroblade in front of her face. Its surface glistened.

  “Isn’t this nice? My brother doesn’t know I took it from his jacket.” Tiff’s breath smelled of wine or beer, and her eyes gleamed with a peculiar light.” Thought I’d try a little carving. Maybe whittle a mutie.” She snickered.

  Melanie gulped, staring at the knife. Were they really going to cut her?

  The blade danced closer, vibrating, as Tiff faked a pass at Melanie’s chin. Melanie shut her eyes. If she screamed, would anybody hear her? Her cousin Germyn was waiting for her at the bar. Wouldn’t she come looking for her? Or maybe if Melanie concentrated hard, very hard, she’d discover that she really did have the mutant gift. Then she could fling Tiff away from her with a breath, float to the ceiling and escape. She squeezed her eyes shut, trying desperately to levitate the two nonmutants. But the harder she tried, the weaker she felt. In despair, she gave up. She’d never be able to do anything. And they’d never leave her alone.

  Melanie opened her eyes, wondering when the blade would slice her flesh and how much it would hurt. Maybe she’d die, and then Tiff would go to jail for the rest of her life. Maybe that wasn’t such a bad idea. The sniper who’d shot three mutants at the World Trade Center ten years ago
had gone to jail. But Melanie didn’t really want to die.

  “Tiff, don’t do it,” she pleaded. “You’ll be sorry.”

  The bathroom door swung open. Kelly McLeod stood there, mouth open, clutching her purse.

  “McLeod, I suggest you use another bathroom,” Tiff said menacingly. “This one is occupied.” She held the knife steady under Melanie’s chin.

  Kelly walked in, hands on hips.

  “What’s going on?”

  “Just doing a little mutie carving,” Cilla said, giggling. “Want to help?”

  “Are you crazy?” Kelly gave her a disgusted look. “What’s she done to you?”

  Cilla scowled at her. “Why do you care? Are you some kind of mutie lover? Tiff, maybe you should cut her, too.”

  “Kelly, get out of here before you get hurt,” Melanie gasped.

  But Kelly ignored her. Instead, she stepped forward, grabbed Cilla’s nose rings, and pulled hard. Cilla screeched, flailing at her with both hands.

  “Get off her,” Kelly shouted. “I said, get off her!”

  “Stay out of this, McLeod.” Tiff said, turning from Melanie to point the vibroblade at Kelly.

  “Go ’wave yourself.”

  Tiff lunged for her, but Kelly released her hold on the other girl and dodged. Instead, Tiff nicked Cilla’s arm with the knife. Cilla clutched the wound and started to wail as blood seeped around her fingers.

  “Shut up, Cilla!” Tiff yelled. “There’s some plaskin in my purse. God, I barely touched you.”

  Cilla closed her mouth in midsob and began rummaging in Tiff’s purse for a bandage.

  Kelly laughed. “Do you always do whatever she tells you to do?”

  “Mutie lover!” Cilla yelled. She spun around and caught Kelly with a back-handed slap that rocked her head to the right, spraying blood on the wall in red streaks. Tiff cursed, shoved Melanie away from her and turned around, knife hand poised to strike Kelly.

  Melanie saw her chance. She leaped at Tiff, grabbed the hand holding the knife and drew it toward her mouth, sinking her teeth into the flesh above the wrist bone.

  Tiff howled with pain. Melanie clamped her jaws and hung on as the larger girl tried to shake her loose. She could taste the salt of Tiff’s blood. The knife clattered to the tiles at their feet. Melanie kicked it into the corner by the door. She saw Kelly struggling with Cilla. The room was crowded now, noisy and suddenly filled with people. Loud voices echoed around her.

  “Ow! Let go of me, you damned mutant!” Tiff yelled.

  Go to hell, Melanie thought.

  “Ladies! Break it up!”

  Jeff, the Hardwired’s bouncer, waded in among them, dark head bobbing as he ducked punches. He pried Cilla and Kelly apart, getting kicked twice in the scuffle. His bald, burly partner, Ron, grabbed Melanie and Tiff.

  “Let go of her, girlie.” He shook Melanie, not gently.

  Reluctantly, Melanie opened her mouth to release Tiff’s wrist, now bloody.

  With a look of disgust, Jeff shoved them toward the door. “The girls are always the worst,” he said to Ron, who gave a connoisseur’s nod.

  “Yeah, vicious,” he said gruffly.

  “Well, I don’t care what this is about or who started it.” Jeff’s voice was harsh. “You know the rules: no fighting in the Hardwired. Your memberships are revoked for two weeks. Out.”

  The club was silent; even the mechband had been turned off. Rows of faces watched as Tiff and Cilla hurried out the door, cursing. At the bar exit, Tiff paused.

  “Mutie, I’ll be looking for you,” she yelled.

  Melanie made an obscene gesture at her. Tiff returned it and walked out, clutching her wounded wrist.

  Jeff held the door open. “Out, ladies. That means you two, too.”

  Melanie scanned the crowd for Germyn, then gave up the effort. She knew that her cousin had probably gone home at the first sign of trouble, taking her skimmer with her. Just as well, she thought. Germyn was never the greatest company. Grabbing her orange parka from the wall hook, Melanie walked out into the parking lot. Kelly followed, quietly. Melanie watched her out of the corner of her eye. Why had she helped her? Aside from a few classes together, they barely knew each other.

  The silence grew between them. Finally, Melanie couldn’t stand it any longer.

  “Thanks,” she blurted out. “You didn’t have to do that, you know.”

  Kelly shrugged. “I couldn’t just stand there and let them cut you, could I? Besides, I can’t stand either one of those gorks. But you ought to be more careful—they’re easy to antagonize.”

  “Don’t I know it,” Melanie said bitterly. “But they caused the problem. I was just minding my own business.”

  “I guess.” Kelly kicked at a loose piece of gravel.

  Melanie stopped walking as she made a sudden connection.

  Suddenly she said, “You’re dating my brother, aren’t you?”

  “Yeah.”

  She looked closely at her rescuer. Kelly was pretty in a nonmutant way. All that dark hair and those big, blue eyes. But what did Michael see in her, really, besides that? Jena was much sexier, she thought, and she was terrific at telekinetic sports and gymnastics. But maybe Michael didn’t care.

  Kelly seemed nice, much nicer than Jena. Normal guys at school were always sniffing around her; half the football team, at least. Not that she paid any attention to them. Well, she might have a thing for mutants. It happened sometimes. Melanie remembered the freckle-faced boy who had followed her around for half a year when she was a sophomore. Mutant-groupies, she called them. Well, maybe her brother was a normal-groupie. But he was crazy to risk clan censure just to date a normal, even one as nice as Kelly McLeod. “Need a ride home?” Kelly asked.

  “Yeah. It looks like my cousin forgot about me,” Melanie said. “Hope you don’t mind.”

  “No problem. Come on.” Kelly led her to a silver-gray skimmer.

  “Nice,” Melanie said enviously. “Yours?”

  “My mother’s. Hop in.” Kelly unlocked the door.

  She pressed the starter, but the only response was a dull growl. She tried again. The engine refused to turn over.

  “Damn.” Kelly popped the hood open and got out of the skimmer. A moment later, she was back, clutching a handful of orange wires. Her face was grim.

  “What happened?” Melanie said.

  “The starter’s been cut,” Kelly said. “I’ll bet that bitch Tiff did it. Didn’t think she had the time.” She walked to the back of the skimmer and began rummaging in the trunk.

  Melanie followed her. “Now what?” she asked, feeling helpless. She’d never understood much about skimmer mechanics anyway.

  “I think I can jury-rig it with some wire from my dad’s tool kit,” Kelly said, pulling something out of the trunk and striding toward the front of the skimmer. “He always keeps an extra in this skimmer. Here, hold this.” She handed Melanie a flashlight. “Keep the light over here.”

  Leaning over the engine, she began to fiddle with what looked to Melanie like twin rows of metal plugs, looping braided green wire over and under them, occasionally tightening a wire coil with a small screwdriver.

  “Hold that light higher, will ya?”

  Hastily, Melanie complied.

  With a grunt, Kelly stood up, wiping her hands on a rag.

  “There. Let’s hope it works.”

  She leaned over the driver’s seat and pressed the starter button. For a moment, nothing happened. Then, with a grinding complaint, the skimmer came to life. The girls smiled at one another in relief. Kelly threw the tools back into the trunk.

  “Where did you learn to do that?” Melanie asked, amazed.

  “My dad’s a mechanical freak,” Kelly said. “I think it comes from being a pilot. I just hung around until he started to teach me how to fix things.” Kelly turned the skimmer out of the parking lot. “Michael thinks it’s funny that I know how to use tools.”

  “How long have you two been going out?” />
  “About two months. Ever since you got back from that meeting-vacation or whatever it was.”

  “You must really like him,” Melanie said carefully.

  “Yeah. I do.” Kelly said. She stopped the skimmer at an intersection, waiting for the light to change, and looked at Melanie. “You sound like you don’t approve.”

  Melanie hesitated. It was no secret that mutants kept to themselves, but she didn’t want to give away information to an outsider. Still, if Kelly wanted to get involved with Michael, she might as well know the truth.

  “It’s okay with me. He seems happy. But my father would have a fit if he found out.”

  “Why?”

  “Mutants aren’t supposed to date outside the clan.”

  Kelly stared at her. “You’re joking.”

  “No. Nonmutant friends are tolerated. Barely. But that’s it. You have to marry inside the clan. They’re trying to maintain and protect clan numbers in case things get ugly again, the way they were in the nineties.”

  “Circling the wagons?”

  “Sort of.”

  The traffic signal switched from red to green.

  “And if you don’t marry within the clan?”

  “You risk censure. Or worse.”

  “Censure?” Kelly laughed. “What does that mean? Do they slap your hands? Send you to bed without supper?”

  “It’s nothing to laugh about,” Melanie insisted. “It’s tough. Censured clan members are outcasts.”

  “Hard to imagine.” Kelly flipped a strand of hair out of her eyes. “It sounds like some antique cult.”

  “Maybe to you,” Melanie said coldly. “But this is the way we live. And if you want to see my brother, you’d better understand the risks he’s taking for you.”

  Kelly was silent for a moment, concentrating on the road. Skimmer lights streaked past them, red, yellow, white.