Fift blinked. Ze had just taken zir frozen soup from the dispenser.
The beating of Shria’s heart, felt through zir bones amid the noise and tumult. The electric hum of vir skin.
“Now,” Smistria said.
Fift handed the soup to zirself at the table, and followed them towards the door.
“Kill—”
“This is nonsensical,” Father Squell said angrily, jumping up from vir seating harness. “The feed is down! People are . . . up to who knows what! Unwatched, unchallenged, no one to hold them accountable . . . someone sabotaging the feed . . . strange groups, gathering in anonybodies . . . and you’re going out?”
“—the Midwives!”
“And they will give you a bat why, exactly? This is not the time for playing capture-the-kernel!”
Fift hurried up the stairs after Frill and Smistria and the door closed behind them. In the breakfast room, Squell’s words hung in the air.
Father Nupolo stood, slowly, and put vir hand on Squell’s shoulder.
“Kill the Midwives!”
“Shut UP!” someone in the crowd yelled, sounding panicked.
“Is that what you’re saying? KILL?” someone else shouted.
“What do you want from us?”
Fift embraced Shria. Ve folded vir arms around zir, shoving vir forehead into the crook of zir neck. Around them, the anonybodies shoved and roared. Fift was elbowed in the spine, kicked in the calf. Ze almost fell, but Shria pulled zir up.
Ze’d been struck. Zir spine, zir calf—it surely hadn’t been on purpose. But maybe that was worse. They didn’t even notice that they’d hit a Staid.
Shria started to cry. “Oh Kumru,” ve choked, “what’s happening?”
Fift looked up, fearful. Panaximandra held up a hand. “Is that word so terrible? ‘Kill’?” Ve shook vir head and angry tears filled vir eyes and spilled over silently. Ve licked at them as ve spoke. “Oh, how long lives make cowards! People of the world, lust for your now eight hundred expected years has tamed you—this plenitude has made you craven! Give me a million barbarians with eighty-year lifespans, armed with clubs, and I could take this world and set it on fire. I could burn this prison and plant a garden. Oh, my world! My world!”
Fift, at the breakfast table, stared at zir cold soup. Ze covered zir face with zir fists.
“We will be your million!” someone shouted.
“You’re a slackwit,” someone else shouted back.
Squell put vir elbows on the table and leaned in, vir forehead next to Fift’s. “Fift,” ve said gently, forcing confidence into vir voice. “You have to concentrate. Use your words. Fift, nothing is so bad that it can’t be addressed. But you have to explain what’s going on.”
“They’re jumping around and shouting and talking about . . . some kind of war, I guess? It’s like something out of . . .” Fift flushed. It was like the Anger of the Thirty Thousand Scorned Data-Hatchers in the narrative eighth subsection of Melihor’s fourth metacommentary, but of course ze couldn’t say that. “. . . out of history.”
“But we need the Midwives,” someone shouted. “You said yourself! Ungendered babies—”
“Oh, Midwives are precious!” Panaximandra said. “But these Midwives of ours have overreached themselves. They call themselves the parents of society . . . but that is a lie. They cannot guide us. They cannot make us strong. A Midwife is like a placenta: holy, vital, at first you cannot do without it. But to grow strong, you cannot depend on it too long. You must cut it away.”
“War?” Nupolo leaned forward. “What are you talking about, Fift? Is this another performance? More Clowns . . . ?”
“It’s not the Clowns,” Squell said, leaning back, vir voice tight.
Amid the deserted courtyards of Slow-as-Molasses, Fift hurried to keep up with Father Frill and Father Smistria.
“Quit shoving!” someone shouted in the crowd behind Fift; then ze was knocked into Shria. They fell, and Fift snatched at something that looked like a rope. Zir hand closed on rubbery flesh—it was an umbilical cord connecting two of the rent-a-bodies, belly to uterus. The bodies—both red—screamed and fell on top of Fift and Shria.
In the breakfast room, Fift took a shuddering breath, pulled zir fists from zir face, and stirred zir soup with a trembling spoon.
Zir Fathers’ eyes were on zir. Ze imagined what they would say if only they could see where ze was; they would lose it. Ze tried to force a smile. “I wonder what Thavé thinks of this? If this is one of the dying-of-boredom cultures, I’d hate to see the exciting ones.”
“What are you talking about?” Father Nupolo said. Ve sat back down, stiff, scowling, at the table’s end. “Cultures? Thavé? Kumru’s eyes, Fift—I hope you’re not making void-blessed Long Conversation allusions in front of us!”
“No, no,” Fift said. The smile eluded zir. “I mean, from today. Didn’t you hear what Thavé said?”
“What who said?” Father Squell asked.
“The alien?” Grobbard said, raising an eyebrow.
One of the red anonybodies was lying next to Fift, knees to its forehead, holding its belly and weeping. The other body, on its knees, grabbed Fift by the shift and punched zir, once, hard, in the side of the head. Fift cried out in all zir bodies. Shria tackled the red nobody, knocking it to the ground.
“What was that?” Father Frill said. Ve stopped in a corridor, knives jingling from vir sash. Seeing Fift’s expression, ve took zir hand.
Father Smistria glared back at them. “Can we keep moving?”
“Somebody punched me,” Fift told Frill.
In the breakfast room, Squell leaned forward again. “Fift, what happened?”
“Weren’t you listening?” Fift said, holding the side of zir head. “I mean, weren’t you watching me in the pavilion with Shria? When we were talking to Thavé?”
“Fift, we don’t spend the whole void-spurned day following you on the feed,” Father Nupolo said.
“Fift, what happened?” Squell said. “Why are you holding your head?”
“We had a million viewers!” Fift said, and had to look away from Father Squell. Ze slurped zir frozen soup. Ze knew ze was being ridiculous. Ze’d lost Shria; ve was behind a wall of bodies. But after the constant pressure of worrying about what ze said or sent—what zir parents would hear or guess—to have it turn out they hadn’t even been watching, they’d just been ignoring—
Ze struggled through the legs of the anonybodies, trying to reach Shria. More of them were tripping and stumbling now, and a body fell in front of Fift. Ze tensed, and then wriggled over it, as quickly as ze could. Someone kicked zir in the leg. Above, from the puff-pillar, Panaximandra was roaring “Freedom! Valor! Conquest! Babies!” and the anonybodies began, awkwardly, to fall into the chant. Shria had a red body pinned, its wrists in vir hands. “Shria!” Fift shouted. Ze tried to send vem a note, but the send failed. The note cycled, waiting for a connection.
“Punched you?” Frill cried. “Literally? This isn’t a metaphor? Someone punched you?” Vir eyes widened, hands balled into fists. Smistria took Frill’s sleeve to pull vem down the corridor, but Frill shoved vem back, a straight-arm to vir chest. “Who punched you? Who?”
“Frill!” Smistria snapped, grabbing vir arm again. “Come on, let’s move, let’s get to zir.” Slowly, Frill allowed vemself to be dragged.
In the breakfast room, Father Grobbard, eyes closed, said, “Here it is, the record of your talk with the alien. Yes, you did have quite a spike, didn’t you?”
“Fift, please,” Squell said, vir voice trembling. Ve laid vir hand softly on Fift’s shoulder. “Please tell me what’s going on.”
“It’s all right,” Fift said. “I . . . stumbled into something.”
Squell’s face fell. Ve didn’t believe zir. “Oh, Kumru!” ve said. “You’re terrifying me. If only we could see—I can’t even see Frill and Smi—I see nothing! And where is Pip, why isn’t ze answering me?”
“Freedom! Valor! Conques
t! Babies!”
“Most of zir was at that banquet in Tearless,” Grobbard said, zir eyes still closed. “It’ll take zir forever to get back from there. Ze’s also on zir way back singlebodied, on foot, from the above and before. Ze answered my first note, nothing since then. But the send is affected as well.”
Shria let go of the red body and leapt to vir feet, shoving forward towards Fift. Ve was knocked down again by a blue anonybody and Fift lost sight of vem for a moment.
Ze was here, alone, in the midst of a riot. It was a riot, and the Peaceables were nowhere to be found . . . but then, of course, they couldn’t see the riot, could they? An invisible riot. Ze posted an Urgent Request for Assistance; but even if it was noticed among a hundred million others, how could the Peaceables gather without the feed? No one could see zir, no one could help zir.
Fift had spent much of the year ze turned nine in a course of Martial Staidity, which was considered just the thing for somatic integration. Ze asked zir agents to recall it.
{You’ll have to—excuse us.} zir context advisory agent sent. {There is a difficulty.}
{Some norms are apparently in need of reevaluation.} zir social nuance agent sent. {Obstacles present themselves. One is currently not local to oneself. Please attend.}
Kumru.
“Freedom! Valor! Conquest! Babies!”
Martial Staidity. How did it go? Get your feet under you. Center of balance low. Everything proceeds from the thighs and the buttocks. Always move slowly.
In turtle stance, ze pressed zir body gently against the moving, shifting bodies. Ze held zirself against them, giving when they shoved, moving into the space that opened up when they rocked back.
Father Frill and Father Smistria hustled Fift along. Frill was shaking with rage, vir nostrils flaring, vir teeth chattering. “Who hit you, Fift?” ve asked again. “Who?”
“I don’t know!” Fift said, zir voice cracking a little. “How should I know? There’s no lookup! There’s no lookup!”
“All right, all right,” Smistria growled. “One foot in front of another.”
Fift took an elbow in the face, hard—ze couldn’t get zir neck loose in time (stupid, stupid, holding zir neck tight like a stone), but ze remembered to let zir knees fold, to fall with the blow, crumple down, flow down, chest to zir knees, rolling back up, back onto zir feet. Zir ears rang.
Under Frill’s hand, ze shuddered.
“I almost got a connection to Darnadi for a moment,” Frill said through gritted teeth. “Perhaps you could just call, Smi?”
“Call?” Smistria snapped. “Are you feeling wealthy enough to compel a logistics administrator to do your bidding over a call? You really should let me know about these secret sources of confidence of yours, Frill. It must be sexual conquests, because your cooking certainly hasn’t improved . . .”
One foot at a time, slowly, slowly, no fast movements, flowing like water. Another knee came at zir, and this time ze shifted zir weight to move with it.
The world was gone. Only three little pockets were visible: the breakfast room, the corridor, the riot. The rest had vanished, as if swallowed by the void.
A shudder of rage ran through Father Frill’s body. “There is no reason to be mean, Smi,” ve said tightly. “Let us control ourselves for the sake of the child, and once this crisis is over, any time you’d like to visit the mats with me, I’d be delighted to oblige you.”
Smistria’s eyebrows rose. “Oh, I see,” ve said. “Yes? Yes, perhaps we should do that, Frill. Perhaps it’s time.”
Stupid Fathers! Now they were stiffening like peacocks, slowing to glare at each other. Fift pulled out of their grasp. “Stop it. Stop it!” ze said, and pushed ahead of them, hurrying down the corridor.
The note—Shria wait for me—cycled, cycled, waiting for a connection.
“Very interesting,” Grobbard said, zir eyes closed. Ze must be watching the conversation with Thavé.
“What’s interesting?” Fift asked.
“Doesn’t the timing seem a little . . . dramatic?” Grobbard asked. Ze rubbed the fine golden fuzz of zir scalp. “Thavé explains how our culture is brittle, or stagnant, or whatever is supposedly wrong with it, then ze gestures to the surrounding habitations, and just then the lights happen to go out and the Clowns come onstage with their piece about a revolution . . . ?”
“Oh,” Fift said. It hadn’t seemed staged. But . . .
Shria came crashing back between two anonybodies, vir nose bloody. Two of the bodies pushed through behind vem, catching vem by the arms. Ve kicked one in the shins.
Squell hugged vemself. “How could they just go off like that? Now we can’t see anyone! They should have listened to me! I’m the only one here who’s had experience with this kind of thing—you know, in the asteroids, we have to deal with seconds of bodylag all the time. And when connectivity is bad, when there’s a solar flare, or something . . . well, the first rule is, you don’t just separate!”
Fift glanced behind zir. Frill and Smistria were following, pointedly not looking at each other. Ze climbed into the aqueous ball of the ball-drop without them, and tipped it off the ledge. “I can’t believe I’m actually using Martial Staidity,” ze said to zirself aloud. “That is too fucking sad.” No one could hear zir; with no feed, zir words vanished into the air, gone forever.
Some faltering moment of feed-connection must have flickered to life, because the note vanished: on its way, perhaps, to Shria.
“What do you mean?” Fift asked Grobbard. “You mean it was part of the show? That Thavé’s in on it, with the Cirque? That ze was waiting for someone to give zir a cue so ze could deliver zir lines . . . ?”
“Perhaps,” Grobbard said. “Or perhaps ze was simply forewarned? Knew it was happening? And found a way to insert zir own message before the show?” Ze shrugged.
Fift reached Shria and curled an arm around vir waist. One of the Vails, holding one of Shria’s arms, yanked back an anonymized blue leg to kick vem. Fift’s heart was pounding, but ze flowed zir own leg out and lightly, gently placed zir foot against the foot of the Vail. The Vail paused. Shria roared.
Panaximandra was saying something else, but Fift couldn’t hear over the crowd bellowing, “FREEDOM!”
The ball bounced at the bottom of the chute, carrying Fift up with it. Ze braced zirself for the buffering second touchdown, and sank into the goop.
“I can’t believe the two of you are sitting here calmly talking about that,” Squell said. “In the middle of this! Fift, you tell that Shria vailchild to bring you back here this heartbeat!”
“VALOR!”
The other Vail struck Shria in the head and ve stumbled back, dragging Fift with vem. Ze lost zir calming hold on the first Vail’s foot, but ze kept hanging onto Shria. Ze kept zir head down.
Ze ducked out of the ball’s mouth and watched it slurp up, drawn back up into the drop chute. Ze started shaking. “Martial Staidity,” ze said. “Kumru.”
“Are you listening to me?” Squell said. “Are you away from that crowd?”
“CONQUEST!”
Shria lost vir footing and fell. Vir body was shaking with sobs. Fift crawled over vem, covering vir head, vir chest, trying to be water. They wouldn’t kick a Staid, would they? Not on purpose? Shria yanked vir head away. “Shh, Shria,” ze said. “Shh. Come on: curl up, play dead.” Something snapped against the side of zir head and zir ears rang again. A body fell on them, and Fift sank down with the weight.
Shria yanked vemself out of zir grasp. Fift tried to flow out from under, and caught vir arm. “Shria,” ze said. “We—”
“LET GO OF ME!” Shria screamed.
“Fift,” Father Grobbard said. “Please answer your Father Squell.”
Fift leaned zir head against the ridiculous active-display wall above the running floor. If the feed were on and ze could have seen zirself, it would have looked like ze was leaning zir head on air, a bodylength from a spiky, twisted garnagh tree. Behind zir, ze heard the ball rebo
und. “Shria,” ze whispered, “please.”
“Shria!” Ze screamed, losing zir flow-like-water relaxation. “Please!”
Shria was up on vir feet again, and ve was roaring, striking the anonybodies with elbows and knees.
“BABIES!”
Father Grobbard raised zir eyebrows. “Fift?”
“I’m a little fucking distracted now, you old toad,” Fift said—and felt an immediate stab of guilt, even though ze’d only said it in the body that was waiting by the ball-drop, and the absent feed would (hopefully) not preserve the comment. Ze turned zir head to watch the ball carrying Smistria and Frill bounce, buffer, and settle into the goop.
Blue and black and red feet, their toes webbed together, and one black boot (but not Shria’s) filled the space in front of Fift’s eyes. Ze checked lookup. Still down. Ze checked the feed for a view. There was one view of where ze was now: slow, jittery, flecked, taken from an elevator some distance away. The byway was mobbed with colors, with bodies, jerky, rushing. From that vantage point, over the feed, it looked like they were dancing. Shria was somewhere in that mess. Ve wouldn’t answer zir.
Ze rested zir forehead against the ground. In the lab at Stiffwaddle Somatic Fashions, ze had wondered where zir tears were, if they were gone forever. Now, very faintly, ze felt their incipient trace, an uneasy quavering that, if ze failed to hold it down, could become panic, sobs, shaking.
Father Smistria and Father Frill were holding hands when they came out of the ball-drop. “Come on, Fift,” Frill said, and they rushed on ahead of zir. They seemed weirdly abuzz, the martial tension of their fight having shifted into something that drew them closer. Smistria’s thumb traced a line across Frill’s wrist. Fathers! Ridiculous. Fift puffed after them.
In the jittery, grainy view of the byway, there was no sign of Shria.
“This is our time!” Somehow Panaximandra’s voice carried better over the feed, sounded clearer, if tinny and scratchy and jittery from lag. “These are our signs! Remember this feeling, the texture of luxury, the feeling of freedom! Remember who you are! And when you return to your little nooks in the hive, be unsatisfied, be thirsty! We must cut ourselves free before we can begin to live!”
The Unraveling Page 11
