Variant: A Sci-Fi Romance (Variant Trilogy Book 1)

by J. Q. Baldwin

  He stalled. His cheeks hard as he eyed me from a side on glare that quickly melted into an impudent grin.

  “Okay, it’s still my turn, though.”

  I nodded my agreement.

  When the air swooshed just before his skin reached mine I pulled away and Carne ended up swatting the air.

  “I did it!” I exclaimed, proud. “My turn.”

  I learnt quickly to bluff by twitching my fingers or twisting my wrists slightly but even then it took more than five minutes before I managed to catch Carne’s hands in a slap.

  “You’re getting good at this,” he told me. “The other girls are so slow. You have plenty of time to move and they say I hit too hard even when I’m being soft,” he regaled a story of a previous game with Claudia.

  “Don’t worry bout her, Deli. I think she’s just jealous. Or scared. Her mind is sweet and fluffy but it was kinda darker today, like a rain cloud.” Carne picked up on my uneasiness at lunch. I had been replaying Claudia’s comment about our lessons.

  “You know, we won’t be doing all our lessons with them. Only the ‘basics’ Mum says, like history and English. We will do math, biology, combat strategy, and genetic sciences – so we learn about our bodies and what we can do in the afternoon. The other girls don’t do those. But once Claudia gets to know you, she will like you, Deli. Dani is real sweet too. They’re both different from us but they’re still nice and Lyndie and Sal are real nice too.”

  I believed him. Why wouldn’t I? He believed it; I could see it in his mind. There was no deception, not even a white lie to make me feel better. He seemed to worry about how I felt a lot.

  The rest of the early evening we explored the manor. It was clean and white and colourful all at the same time. All of the furniture was antique or worn and Carne explained that the whole world was in a deep ‘depression’. We were lucky that Australia wasn’t as bad as some places, where there were no homes because there was no one to rebuild them and no jobs after all the bombs and the electricity – which used to run all the time before the wars – was hardly ever working, so getting jobs for normal people was hard.

  My new home had been Ven’s parent’s home before it was ours. During the last war they held off looters, scavengers and soldiers alike. They visited sometimes but were living in the South of France at the moment. They left the house and the security business to Ven, Troy and Ava before they left for a quieter life.

  “Want to know something, Deli?” Carne propped himself onto an elbow next to me on my bed, in our own private world between the mosquito netting.

  “What?” I enquired, curious.

  “We live heaps longer than other people.”

  “How much longer?” I asked, thinking about Ana-bird’s short life.

  “Ana-bird was sick, you knew that didn’t you, Deli?” he questioned me softly.

  “Yes, I know that, Carne,” I replied sadly. “So, how much longer do we live?”

  “Bout four hundred years. We manure, no, mature,” he corrected quickly, quirking his lip at his mistake, “slower than the others and our bodies are made to last longer. Dad told me so. It’s sposed to be a secret, though,” Carne held his fingers to his lips in a hush sign.

  In one day I’d learnt more about myself than I’d ever thought I would. It made me curious about other things. About my own parents.

  I heard Mum talking before you came, Deli. She said she thought your mum must have been isolated. There isn’t that many of us so if your mum couldn’t keep you then she would have tried to send you to be with others like us if she could.

  She said that Romania was bombed heaps, so maybe your mum and dad died.

  I’m sorry, Deli. I hope they’re alive though. One day I’ll help you find them okay?

  One day I will look for them. Not just yet ‘cause I only just got here but when we’re older I will want to.

  We will. He vowed.

  My first night at Lonsdale was unsettling. I’d stood warily in the clean spray – water in Australia was sparse so showers were now a fine mist called Clean Spray. It was efficient and water-free, or so I was told. The orphanage would not have been able to afford them.

  Ava had then come in and read us both a story in my room. A story about The Three Hundred who, like another three hundred millenniums ago, had held off against a vast army. Struggling for freedom and a place of their own to keep. The story didn’t get finished but we were promised more the next night. She’d kissed my forehead, which confused me slightly. I wasn’t quite sure what the affection represented. It wasn’t unpleasant though and Ava, in her fluffy gown and cotton pyjamas had a pleasing scent wafting from her freshly washed, still wet, straight hair. It lapped at the small of her back, the layers so long. Her expression was honest and her touch whisper gentle as she said good night and ushered Carne out and into his room after his, “Night, Deli.”

  I tried sleeping, really, I did. But no matter how hard I tried it eluded me. I gave up after a while and crept to the door separating mine and Carne’s bedrooms. I pressed my ear against the door and could just pick up Carne’s even breathing.

  Slowly, I opened the door. It creaked about half way open and I stopped, not wanting to wake Carne.

  Come on Deli, jump in this side, his sleepy voice in my head said. I figured he was still too asleep to talk out loud or didn’t want to wake anyone else.

  I tiptoed to the side his mind showed and slid under the covers. His heavy arm quickly whipped over me and held me in place with him at my back.

  Then I slept.

  I didn’t wake until Carne stirred and dawn encroached upon the carpeted floor through the window, throwing dust bunnies into light. We both headed down for breakfast before our morning session. Carne confirmed that we were right on schedule. Schedules were important, he said.

  From the stairs we could hear a conversation at the table involving our names. Carne pulled me to a stop and motioned me to hush.

  Chapter Ten

  “I see nothing wrong with her going into Carne’s room,” Troy protested calmly.

  “They’ve been talking since practically birthed, they’re so close. Let’s not hide the fact that we all know who they are to one another. Hell, it’s a miracle Carne even recognised it for what it was and reported it, otherwise poor little Gypsy would’ve had a miserable life not knowing, maybe thinking she was crazy for hearing voices. We all know she was punished for believing Carne was real. Just let the kids be, I say.”

  “I suppose you’re right, Troy. In any case they won’t mature for a good many years yet.” Ava relented.

  “It’s good that Delilah trusts someone right now. She needs a friend and Carne is determined to be that person,” Ven suggested.

  “You’re right. I just worry for the both of them, that’s all,” Ava agreed.

  I took it all in, storing it. Not that the conversation worried me but it was perplexing.

  Carne motioned me forward once more and we reached the table for breakfast.

  Ven taught our afternoon class. He wanted to get the basics out of the way before he left for St Petersburg. It was a permeating dread in the home. A hushed secret, just out of reach. And even as the afternoon wore on the bright happy home became tight, closed and stifling.

  Our three desks were in a small circle. The holo-screens weren’t turned on and we didn’t use them that day.

  That day I learnt where I came from. Why I was different.

  “Alright kids,” Ven straddled his chair so that the back of the chair faced us. “Since Carne knows these things already I’ll fly over most things and re-enforce some other things.” Carne and I both nodded our understanding.

  “Right. Delilah, our genealogy is written on our bodies. I gather your ‘tattoos’,” he rabbited his fingers, “are clearly visible?”

  “I don’t understand, Sir.”

  “The coding, on your torso, leading down from where your arm lies against you, just under your shoulder blade,” he twisted, pulled up his
shirt and pointed to the long ribbon tattooed down his side that reached the back of his hip and under his pants.

  “Yes. I have that.” I agreed, consoled at more evidence of these people being the same as me.

  “Well, that tattoo is encoded into your genetic makeup. It represents a special script designed to inform of your family tree, of a sort. Each person like us,” he pointed to all three of us in turn, “has a specific notation in their own gene sequencing that is passed to their descendants.”

  “So, my parent’s names are written in this mark?” I pulled my own shirt up at the side to look at it.

  “Yes, kind of. But I’m sorry Gypsy Girl, I didn’t know your parents so their identification I can read but their names I wouldn’t know.”

  “Oh,” I said, a little disappointment leaking out my voice.

  “We’ll look into it for you though okay?” Ven promised.

  “Okay.”

  “The reason for our marks, apart from identification is that your grandparents, my parents, were created. Not born naturally. Understand so far?” he asked.

  I didn’t quite, but I was not totally misinterpreting it.

  Ven continued with little actual movement. He didn’t use any energy that would be wasted. He was dark and still like a shadow. Those burnt earthy eyes bored into me every time his attention switched to my direction. I had to force myself not to twitch under the scrutiny. His jovial nature felt plastic and frayed. It was nothing I saw. I felt it. Pressing on me, making me jittery.

  “A little over one hundred years ago military scientists found a way to incorporate abnormal genes from evolutionary advanced human beings. Oh, evolution means that living things adapting or growing to suit a changing environment. With me here?”

  “Yes,” we both answered.

  “Just speak up if I’m losing you, Gypsy.” I was beginning to like the pet name. When he said the name his weight slid away off me for short moments.

  “So these scientists used particular genes that carried things like telekinesis – that’s moving things without touching them, telepathy – like how you talk to Carne in your mind, pyrokinetics, precognition, photographic memory and a lot more things.

  “They used this in a bit of a cocktail, a mix, with things they’d learnt to create themselves like higher muscle and bone density plus performance, speed, physical strength and ability. From this cocktail they used a process called gene sequencing and mutation of the chromosome pairs in the DNA to delete all junk DNA – useless bits of information that normal people carry. They deleted certain genes that specified a higher probability for different diseases like HIV, STD’S and cancer – all types, heart disease, genetic defects and lots of other nasties. They also injected into the mix nano-byte technology for fast healing and the regeneration of organs and tissue. We good so far?”

  “I’m not sure. I think so Sir. They were trying to make us better?”

  “That exactly it, Gypsy,” Ven commended.

  “Now, after all this was done and they created three hundred super soldiers WWVII broke out. A lot of those soldiers were deployed into combat with less than one percent fatalities – soldiers that died - but when the other countries found out what the United Nations of what used to be the United States of America had created, the rest of the world got angry. So they began to bomb and infiltrate the barracks where the soldiers were housed. In the end, after so many losses from raids, the last facility was locked and burnt down. Of the three hundred who had fought one hundred and fifty escaped and scattered. It was a very sad and joyous day for our people, since only half survived.

  “Now, the scientists who created us had no idea we’d live so long. So after eighty or so years of trying to capture us, they gave us up for dead. Now we have our own scientists, who are like us, working on our individual work ups. We’ve found that our life spans are far greater than humans and also have encountered an anomaly that stems from different sequences they used in different embryos – babies. Most of us will at some point encounter our mated pair. That’s what Troy, Ava and I am – a mated pair, according to our genetic coding. That is what we suspect you two are and how Carne could sustain a link with you, Gypsy, from across the globe. So it seems you were destined to be best friends hey?”

  Carne had that ‘I already knew that’ look.

  I processed slowly. The unsaid was layered and bordered on fear. My gut ached and I had the sense I was late, extremely late. I had to initiate lock down -

  “We must keep our secret. That is our most basic rule, Gypsy Girl. We do not willingly let other normal people - except in certain situations - know of our differences. We have come too far to be noticed once more by the countries that birthed us. Okay?”

  “Yes, Sir,” I vowed solemnly, trying to ease some of his worry.

  Troy, can you come take over here? Ten minutes until base lock is logged for lock down.

  Be there in two, came the reply.

  Troy, when he arrived was distracted but not as pressing.

  The remainder of our lesson was broken up into two parts; how our bodies functioned including our metabolic rate and how much energy input was needed to sustain us, and facial recognition.

  We talked about food groups and what certain foods provided for us. It was no wonder I was always hungry at the orphanage.

  The second part of the lesson was to focus. Focus on the footage, the faces, the intent of those pictured.

  “Will you practice with me, Deli? I want to be the best.”

  I promised Carne that we would until both of us were. We spent three hours, uninterrupted, watching security drone footage of urban areas and the crowded faces within them, all the while Troy and Ven communicated the shutdown systems that would be in place until Ven’s return.

  Onyxeal fell dull and heavy. Carne was the only brightness. He shined no matter the world around us.

  Chapter Eleven

  Delilah

  Morning promised to seep into my bedroom; the window leaked condensation and was still fogged from the chilly night air. I hadn’t slept. A combination of reasons: The first being that my bed stank. Stars, who would have thought I’d be bemoaning the loss of that soft, Indian princess catastrophe of a bed? But my couch stank also so I’d been left with the only other alternative – grab my doona and lay it over the stained carpet. A hard sleeping spot had never bothered me but a soiled one was where I drew the line.

  But no, I hadn’t slept. I’d lain on my back staring at the ceiling, my mind still planning as I anticipated my initial search for my twin. The search had a minimum of two destinations, each of which had extremely good chances of further findings. Spartan was usually much stingier with intel. It put me on edge. What did he conceal that the promise of easy information was required as bait?

  It would seriously undermine my intelligence if I cuckolded my paranoia, but also to not respect the high calibre nature of my target for which I followed, and the extremes he exerted to keep my sister against her will.

  I got up off my makeshift bed and stretched out some of the tightness. I looked over at my bed, disgusted, and figured I really better find a new one today. Problem was, with such an economic recession quality products were commodities. I’d have to head for one of the higher end Burrows of the city. But there were no guarantees I could get them to deliver since my apartment was smack bang in the hub of the new middle class – poor but not yet destitute.

  Yes, I could have leased an apartment in the high end but I’d rather have the anonymity of living in a high-density population. These people all had their own problems; they cared little of other’s or knew well enough not to. I could safely hide among the sea of faces as they tramped in their own direction. I could blend amongst the waitresses, prostitutes, gangs, fruit stall owners, drug-dealers, and construction labourers. Of course a few people had their objections to my rationale.

  Ava worried. This was my first foray into the real world for an extended period. A world where a woman my size did
not eat three main courses plus desert. A world where even sitting still would seem unnatural or my lack of empathy towards others would be noticed. I was not completely comfortable myself, but I’d made the decision and although Ava had valid concerns she agreed that I needed to live some of my life on my own. I was determined to do just that. For much longer than she anticipated. I’d argued before I left, I would not accept any more assignments. I wanted my salary terminated.

  I should have known Spartan would find something to drag me closer. At least he wasn’t trying to completely bulldoze me like he would any other obstacle. No he’d dug in for the long-haul like a mite upon a honey bee - years of infiltration to kill a hive.

  Before I left the apartment I flicked my wrist and called Jobe. His face appeared across my wrist after the second ring. Nothing if not efficient.

  “Delilah,” Jobe had checked the ID before answering.

  “Posty,” I greeted his image.

  Jobe scowled. “I really wished that nickname wouldn’t stick.”

  “I wish we’d never had reason to meet,” I said honestly.

  “Oh,” he wrapped an arm over his chest and struggled for a reply. “At least you’re honest.” He appeared baffled and very young. His tawny hair was even blonder under whatever light he stood. His easy oblong face was symmetrical, traditionally handsome and only lined during his current frown.

  “Can I have you do re-con on my MV?”

  “That’s what I’m paid for,” he joked. If I’d met Jobe elsewhere, under different circumstances I’d admire his affable camaraderie and effortless joy.

  I hadn’t.

  And that was a sad fact, but to allow him the belief that we could be anything more than transient colleagues was callous. Statistically, I’d end up destroying this boy’s life somehow.

  “I’ll call you when I have everything. Anything else?” he hardened when I hadn’t answered his offer of friendship and it sparked a mote of pride for him.

  “Yeah, know of any good furniture stores that deliver?”