***
“Please, Magister. I am begging you. You have to do something,” Val said, her hoarse voice cracking.
Magister Gossup looked bloodless as a stone god. They were in his office, and the message light on his terminal was blinking furiously, but he was ignoring it. She had just poured out the whole rest of the story to him. His index finger moved against the top of his desk. “I don’t know what you expect from me, Valerie,” he said.
“Justice,” she said. “For Tedla, for all the blands.”
“That is not in my power,” he said.
Instead of arguing, Val let the silence grow. At last she said, “You know, Tedla kept saying how much easier it was to be powerless. No responsibility. That’s what made it attractive to be a bland.”
Gossup stirred, frowning at her analogy. “Even if it were in my power, it would be a violation of professional ethics,” he said. “We are xenologists, Valerie. Our responsibility is not to change Gammadis, but to observe it as it is.”
“Even if we have to collaborate in tyranny?” Val said.
“It’s not our role to make value judgments,” he said. “If we did, we would be no better than Alair Galele.”
Softly, Val said, “Galele was the only one who did the right thing on Gammadis. With all his flaws, at least he acted with a conscience.”
Gossup gave her a sharp look. “I don’t condone the system on Gammadis. But we cannot impose change on them. Coercion never works—history has proved that again and again. True change has to come from within. The ultimate solution to injustice is always an influx of information. Our best alternative is to open communication so the Gammadians will gradually grow out of their ways.”
“That won’t do Tedla any good.”
“But if Tedla doesn’t return, it will never happen.”
Bitterly, she said, “So we sacrifice one bland for the good of the rest?”
“You have an inflammatory way of putting things, Valerie. I thought I’d taught you cultural relativism.”
There was a sharp ache in her head. She was too tired to argue with him any more. He had all the standard answers ready, all the answers she had believed herself when they were safely theoretical, before she had had to test them in experience.
In a dull voice she said, “Where is Tedla now?”
“In Nasatir’s hands,” Gossup said. “We will send it home tomorrow.”
“Can I talk to it?”
“Do you really think they are likely to consent to that?”
Val looked down. She felt completely beaten.
Gossup drew in a breath as if to speak, but said nothing. At last, hesitantly, he said, “I might be able to get you into the lightbeam waystation tomorrow. You couldn’t say anything, you understand. But you could see it.”
She could not tell whether he thought he was being kind, or teaching her a lesson. But it seemed like the only concession she was likely to get. “I guess I’ll have to settle for that,” she said.
He looked at her thoughtfully. “You need to learn more detachment if you are going to thrive in this profession, Valerie.”
Which profession? she wondered. Xenology, or betrayal?
***
Val had no strategy in mind when she decided to bring Deedee along to the lightbeam waystation the next day. The child’s presence attracted no attention, since the facility was regularly open to family members and friends of people departing to other worlds. When she showed Gossup’s passcard, the ticket agent directed her to a private viewroom. There were three others waiting when she arrived, none of whom she recognized—witnesses from WAC and Epco, she supposed, there to make sure no mishap occurred.
Beyond a thick glass window lay the translation chamber, silent technicians at work. When a door opened on the other side, Val lifted Deedee up on a chair seat to see. Nasatir entered, followed by Tedla. The neuter wore a loose-fitting gray knit suit, and its eyes were on the ground. If Val had not known otherwise, she would have concluded that WAC had tampered with its brain, its face was so utterly blank of thought or emotion. Val wondered if it was drugged.
“Wave good-bye to Tedla, Deedee,” Val said.
She tapped on the window; Tedla glanced up and saw them. No, it wasn’t drugged. It was horribly, desperately aware. For a bare second they exchanged a look, and Val tried to pour all of her tangled emotions into her eyes. Deedee leaned forward and pressed a hand against the glass; Tedla reached out as if to press its hand to hers, but Nasatir spoke to it sharply.
Val’s eyes met Nasatir’s then, and they grappled. We see you, Val thought at him. Even our children see you.
Deliberately ignoring her, Nasatir drew Tedla over to the translation cylinder. Mechanically, the neuter climbed up on the slab and lay back, staring at the ceiling. The technicians made some last adjustments, then the slab retracted into the disassembler. There was a flash of bright light, and when the slab extruded again, Tedla was gone.
Val laid her forehead against the cold glass. There was nothing more she could do.
“Where has Tedla gone, Mama?” Deedee asked.
“Home,” Val answered. “It went home.”
“When will it come back?”
“I don’t know, Deedee.”
She lifted the child to the floor and knelt to hug her tight. This at least, Val thought, was something that she could do right. Here, within the circle of her arms, was a tiny part of the world where an individual had the power to make a difference.
With that thought, her tears began to come.
***
“You need to get away, Valerie,” Magister Gossup said to her a week later.
She saw double meaning in everything now, and this was no exception. He had reasons to want her gone.
She had thought it would get easier as time went on, but her memories were like a dull, chronic ache, as if some poison inside her were digesting in acid, chemically transforming into cynicism.
“I have a contract I could give you,” Gossup went on. “It would get you away from Capella Two for a short time.”
Now that it was too late, the newsnets had finally discovered Tedla’s story, and requests for interviews were flooding in. She was turning down most of them, unable to bring herself to profit from the story. The only satisfaction she got was watching the discomfort in Nasatir’s face when he tried to defend his planet on screen. Nasatir doubtless wanted the issue to go away, and getting rid of her would prevent her from stirring the embers.
“How much does it pay?” she asked dully.
“Five thousand.”
Hush money, but she could use it. She was going to need help defending her degree before the Magisterium. They had called her credentials up for review. “Where?” she asked.
“C4D. It’s a co-project with the university there.”
She sighed. “I’ll have to talk to Max.”
“We could send him, too. And your daughter. The travel funds are inexplicably generous.”
They had clearly pegged Max as a troublemaker, as well. She thought of letting Gossup know she saw through this, but it didn’t seem to matter any more. “I’ll ask him,” she said.
And so, three days later, she was back at the lightbeam waystation, on the other side of the glass this time. She half expected to see someone from WAC witnessing their departure, but no one was there.
Max went first, then Deedee, who acted remarkably good and grown up. When Val’s turn came, she lay back on the slab, and her eyes blurred with tears. They were still wet when she got off the receiving couch on C4D.
To Val’s surprise, Magister Delgado himself was there to meet them. He proved to be a rotund and voluble assemblage of snow-white, flyaway hair and wispy beard. She instantly saw why Gossup had never gotten along with him, and why Galele had. When Val appeared, the Magister was already teasing Deedee with a grandfatherly air, and she was drinking in the attention. “Welcome, my dear,” Delgado said to Val. “I’m delighted to meet someone who’s able to fluste
r that old prig Gossup.”
The image of Gossup flustered was so inconceivable it made Val wonder if Delgado had ever met him face to face.
At the baggage desk the Magister got into a loud and polysyllabic argument with a customs agent that seemed likely to result in their luggage being impounded. But just as Val was about to intervene, the Magister and the agent embraced each other warmly, and Val’s family was waved through without so much as an inspection.
As they left the waystation, Delgado said, “Gossup tells me you are probably the leading expert on Gammadis now.”
“Is that why I’m here?” Val said.
With a piercing look, Delgado answered, “You can’t seriously think it has nothing to do with it.”
No, Val thought ruefully. Gammadis had everything to do with her predicament.
Deedee was excited to be on another planet, and kept pointing at people and asking questions, till Val had to caution her to keep her voice low.
“She’s a born xenologist,” Delgado said dotingly.
“I wish we could inoculate her against it,” Val said.
The hotel had a swimming pool, which sent Deedee into raptures of excitement. All the way up to their room, she begged Val to take her swimming. “As soon as we get settled in,” Val said. Max and Delgado were dealing with the luggage, so Val took the key-card. When the door swung open, she saw there was some mix-up; the room was already occupied. A tall figure dressed in black was standing by the window.
“Excuse me, they gave us the wrong room,” Val said, and tried to pull the door closed. But Deedee wriggled past her, and dashed across the room toward the stranger.
“Deedee!” Val said sharply, barging into the room to drag Deedee back. “Come back here! I’m sorry, she—”
The stranger had swept Deedee up in a bear hug, and now turned to Val, smiling. Every word left Val’s mind, except one. “Tedla!” she shrieked, and then she was across the room. She threw her arms around Tedla and Deedee in a three-way embrace.
“Oh my god, my god, it’s really you!” she said, laughing and crying at the same time. Tedla was warm and solid against her. She didn’t want to let go, as if Tedla might dissolve into a lost chance if she did.
Tedla set Deedee on the bed, and the child began babbling out news, completely unamazed to find Tedla here.
“How did you get here?” Val said. “What’s going on?”
Tedla glanced cautiously at the open door. Max was standing there, staring in amazement; Delgado pushed him on in and closed the door.
“Is this your doing?” Val said.
Delgado raised his hands as if to fend off any credit. “I am only an accomplice,” he said.
Conspiracies. They were everywhere. Val felt bewildered. “Who is responsible, then?”
“Truth to tell, it was you.”
“What?”
“I can’t think of any other reason for Kpatksiro Gossup to lay his career on the line for a point of conscience,” Delgado said. Then, seeing Val’s explosive expression, he explained, “It was simple, really. He arranged with the technicians to divert the lightbeam a little, so instead of going to Gammadis, Tedla ended up here.”
“That Vind son of a bitch!” Val said hotly. “He must have been cooking this up while he was lecturing me on objectivity.” She turned to Tedla. “Did you know?”
Tedla shook its head. “Not till I got here.”
It was ironic: Her moment of greatest helplessness had been the one that had made the difference. Victory didn’t feel like she had expected. She had wanted whole planets to stand up and declare that she was right, not this furtive compromise. She looked at Tedla, who was watching her with a cautious expression. And suddenly it didn’t matter how small the circle of her success was, as long as Tedla was in it. Even if she had changed only one mind, it was enough.
A thought struck her. “How is Gossup going to explain this to the Gammadians?” she said.
“It’s a fifty-one-year bluff,” Delgado said. “They won’t be expecting Tedla for half a century, and who knows what will have happened by then? They’ll have diplomatic relations restored soon, and PPC communications will start. In fifty-one years, there could be a different attitude.” He shook his head in wonderment. “Who would have suspected Gossup had the guile? I must remember never to challenge him to poker.”
Deedee pulled at Tedla’s arm. “Tedla, will you take me swimming?”
Tedla said, “No, Deedee. I’m a secret. No one is supposed to know I’m here. Can you keep a secret?”
Gravely, Deedee nodded.
“That goes for all of you,” Delgado said seriously.
***
After Delgado left they ordered in a meal, and Val took Deedee down for a swim to tire her out. When they had eaten, drunk toasts to Vind duplicity, and gotten Deedee to bed, Val, Max, and Tedla sat in the hotel room before the open window, looking out on the skyline, where C4D University rose in a jumble of geometric shapes against the deep blue sky.
Val couldn’t take her eyes off Tedla. It looked svelte and stylish in the new clothes, but something in its eyes seemed older.
“What are you going to do, Tedla?” Val asked. “Will you finish your degree?”
“I suppose I will,” Tedla said. A pang crossed its face—a little bit guilt, a little bit longing. “You know, I’m ashamed to say so, but there was a part of me that wanted to go back, even at the end. When I woke up and found I was on C4D, all I could think was, now I’m my own guardian—responsible for making my life work out, and no one to blame if it doesn’t. Powerlessness is such a lure, such a poisonous lure.”
“Think of the other blands,” Val said. “Every day you’re free, you give them hope.”
Tedla frowned, but didn’t deny it. “We’ll have to give them more than just hope before the end.” Its eyes rose seriously to meet Val’s. “I’m going to go back some day. When I can do it on my own terms.”
“When you do, I’ll be right behind you,” Val promised. “But now is not the time.”
“I suppose not. Not yet. There are still things in the outside worlds I’ve never seen, and stories I don’t know the end of. Maybe there are even people out here I haven’t met, people I may someday love, and who may love me. So it makes sense to finish my degree. It’s what Magister Galele would have wanted.”
There was an awkward silence.
“Well, you always have a home with us,” Val said.
“Thank you,” Tedla said. It looked out at the deep sky, the limitless well of free space beyond the planet. “It’s so strange. I feel like I don’t have any notion of who I am, or even what I am. I half think I might meet myself on the street corner some day, and not even recognize me.”
“Welcome to humanity,” Val said.
Halfway Human Page 47
