Mutant Star (9 page)

“My mistress’s eyes are nothing like the sun …” An old line from his English screen-reader danced through his head. “Nothing like the sun,” he repeated. But weren’t they? Golden, glowing, filled with warmth …

“A nice haul this time, by God! You’ve got the gift, bright eyes, I must say that!”

A snaggle-toothed crone grinned at him over a pile of glittering baubles: golden neckbobs set with blue and red faceted stones, silver rings, a diamond and emerald bracelet. The contents of Mrs. Jonathan Reddington’s jewel box, left unguarded at the wrong moment. With a little help.

Old Lucy would give him a good price for it, he knew. Best in Back Bay. And he deserved no less. How many would be so bold as to wait by the window until the right moment, then, using the Gift, spill some crockery down the hall? And didn’t milady leap up and scurry away to see what the problem was? And didn’t that leave the jewel box all unattended, and the window latch an easy mark for one with the Gift? Snip-snap. Up and over the sash, a quick blink, and Mrs. Reddington’s jewel box was glittering in his grasp. Thankee, ma’am. A tip of the hat, and into the leather pouch, into the pocket. Up and over the cold, painted window sash—not forgetting to close and lock the window behind him—we wouldn’t want to leave a draft, and milady to catch the grippe, now, would we?—and back out into the safety of the night, straightaway to Old Lucy’s. He was the best of the light fingers in Back Bay, and maybe all of old Boston. Let anybody try and put the lie to that statement.

“Huh?”

Rick blinked. A twelve-wheeled tanker roared past, rocking the cycle—and him—in its wake. The road was in front of him, wheels whining beneath him. Old Lucy? Boston? What the hell was that? Falling asleep on the road would get him killed fast. He shook his head to clear it. His arms tingled and he felt strange: dizzy, almost hungover. Stop for coffee or a stim hypo soon. He was up too late last night. Maybe he was getting old. Or crazy.

***

Julian was floating, turning end over end in a timeless space as coruscating rainbows danced in his vision field. Red purple green. Blue yellow orange. Wait—he saw form. Movement. Depth and dimension. A figure in antiquated dress peered through a many-paned window at a woman sitting by a dressing table. It was just like some old-fashioned play: the man wore a long coat, a hat and scarf. The woman wore sumptuous green velvet, low-cut, and her hair was pulled back, caught at the neck by a shining green ribbon that sat above fat black curls.

Crash!

Julian heard the sound of crockery meeting stone.

The woman started at the noise, jumped up, and hurried out of the room.

The door swung shut behind her.

As Julian watched, amazed, the window latch moved, and then the window slid open. The man clambered up and over the window ledge. His face was illuminated for a moment in the lamplight. Julian gasped.

The thief’s eyes were bright gold. And his face was familiar—too familiar. He looked just like Julian’s brother, Rick.

“Omigod.”

“Julian, what is it?” Eva Seguy’s voice was loud over the lab headphones.

The image vanished.

“My God,” Julian said. He sat up. Shook his head to clear it. “Maybe you should take me off this project. I’m starting to hallucinate.”

“Get in here now.”

Eva was waiting for him by the door to her office. She handed him a hypo. “Use it.”

Julian eyed the red hypo with reluctance. “What is this?”

“A serotonin booster.”

“I don’t want it.”

“The mutant healers gave it to me. Every flare rider needs it occasionally.” She put her hands on her hips. “Come on, now. Don’t be ornery.”

Julian pressed the hypo against his arm. It hissed and he sighed with relief as the strange aching in his head eased.

“Now sit and tell me everything.”

“Eva, you may have to disqualify me from the program.”

“Oh, really? Let me be the judge of that.” She sat down next to him on the worn blue wallcushions. “Start at the beginning.”

“I saw a man—some kind of thief.”

“Where?”

“Looked like, I don’t know, England or maybe Boston hundreds of years ago. Hard to tell. Anyway, the guy was using telekinesis to rob a rich woman of her jewels.”

“How could you tell?”

“I watched him decoy her, then sneak into the house. And he had golden eyes, Eva.”

“Interesting.” She tapped her foot thoughtfully. “But I don’t see why you want to resign from the program.”

“No, you don’t understand.” Julian shut his eyes. “The man. He looked just like Rick.”

“Your twin?”

He nodded. “I think I’m losing my objectivity.”

Julian felt the cool touch of her hand on his head. He opened his eyes. Eva gave him a skeptical look.

“Coincidence,” she said. “You’re making too much out of this.”

“Eva, I know what I saw.”

“How could it have been your brother? You said this appeared to be a scene out of the past—maybe two hundred years ago. Use simple logic, Julian.”

“I know. I know.”

She stood up and began pacing. “You’ve been one of our most reliable flare riders,” she said. “I need you for this program, Julian. Don’t get spooked by something you saw that you don’t understand.”

“But—”

“Of course, if you want time off, you can have it.” She took her seat behind the desk. “There’s not much I can do to stop you. And maybe you really do want to quit the program.”

“Don’t be ridiculous!” He stared at her, aghast. “You know how I feel about this research.” But not how I feel about you, he thought. Yet.

A sly smile lit her face. “Good. Just testing. Julian, we’re bound to discover all sorts of disquieting things through this work. I don’t want you to cave in at the first sign of peculiar data.”

“I understand.”

“I may have been a little tough on you, but I’m under some pressure myself.” The fluorescent lights cast blue shadows on her elfin face. She looked tired. “I’ve been getting queries from all over about our experiments. Now I’m getting heat from Dr. Dalheim. He wants results. He should know better. We’ve only been at this six months. The program’s funded for another three. I haven’t heard a peep back on any of our grant applications. But the hint’s been dropped: this space is needed.”

“What does that mean?”

“That if we don’t come up with something impressive soon, we may be looking for a new home.” She leaned back in her chair. “I don’t want this program exposed to publicity before it’s ready—it could turn into a circus.”

“Not with you in charge.”

She looked away. “I might not be in charge.”

“Could that happen?”

“With the right kind of influence, anything can happen,” she said. “I’ve seen university programs taken over by department chairmen. Or privatized in the blink of an eye. Suddenly, ‘industry’ experts are pulled in. Funding is changed. Next thing you know, a lab in Seoul is the best place for the tests. The original investigators are out in the cold.” Her face, normally so animated, was bleak.

Julian leaned over and patted her hand. He allowed his touch to linger for a moment. “Don’t worry about that. Don’t worry about anything. We’ve been getting great results. I feel better already from that shot.”

Eva brightened. “Wonderful. Want to tap back in?”

“Let’s go.”

Together, they walked back to the lab.

He allowed her to apply the sensors to his forehead and behind his ears, and to reattach the microphone. Her touch was deft and light, and it sent a tingle up his backbone.

“Ready?”

He gave her the thumbs-up sign and settled back into the linkage. The familiar rainbow danced before his eyes. A thousand colors to contemplate. And, perhaps, a thousand years.

***

Rick pulled into the red-lined no-parking area behind Green Boot Brain Shop, under the green sign: “When your chips are down, we’ll replace ’em.”

Shog, the shop boss, greeted him with a scowl. “Nice of you to drop in before lunch, Akimura. There’s three brains waiting on your bench. If you don’t want me to add yours to the bunch, get ’em fixed pronto.”

“You really are a pleasure in the morning, Shoggie.” Rick blew him a kiss, grabbed his grimy fiberplas apron, and got busy. The delicacy of the work amused and absorbed him. The colorful screenbrain housings, studded with red and silver grids, reminded him of shuttle trips he’d taken as a child with his parents: landing at night, watching the twinkling grids of Metro L.A. looming up and around the landing strip, the streets boxed and reboxed in light.

He picked up a glittering minichip with his tweezer. He could only see them when he used his mag lenses. The needle-nose tweezer with sublaser capacity welded the chips in place. Steady hands needed here. Funny, but even after a late night of partying, Rick could always concentrate on this work. Golden flakes here. Shining like the sun. Like mutant eyes. Like a fine necklace in a jewel box …

A hand grasped his shoulder.

A huge, blurry, big-eyed creature peered down at him. God, no. Not another damned vision. Rick nearly dropped his gear in alarm. Then he remembered his lenses and pushed the stretch band that held them up and over his forehead. Whew. Only Shoggie. A familiar monster.

“What the hell’s wrong with you, Akimura? Look pale, like you’d seen a ghost.” Shog cackled his trademark cackle. “I only wanted to tell you we’ve got two rush jobs coming in. Can you handle ’em this afternoon? It’ll mean overtime.”

“Sure. Sure.” Ghosts. Was he seeing ghosts? Phantom earthquakes. Flashbacks from old transvids. Got to clean up my act, he thought. No more breen. No more skree wine. Take a B-12 hypo when I get home. Take two to be safe.

Rick let the benchmech put the finished brains back in their screen housings and vacuum-seal them. Time for lunch. Off with the apron, onto the bike, goodbye Green Boot and hello open road. Home in ten minutes, brain nicely cleansed by the wind.

His roommate Henley looked up from the table where he was bagging breen for his afternoon deliveries. The pale blue, grainy powder sat in its plastic sack. “Aki, your lady’s in town, shopping. Want a breen buzz for the après-midi?”

“Thanks, no.”

Henley raised his eyebrows in surprise.

“All play and no work makes Rick a paranoid boy,” Rick sang as he opened the freeze box and rummaged in the drawers. “This morning I thought Shog was a bug-eyed monster.”

Henley snickered. “Not far wrong, there.”

Rick scooped a Wave and Go pizza out of the box and into the microwave drawer. Five minutes to anchovies and cheese. Blast-off.

He went upstairs. The portascreen was sitting on his bed, blinking fitfully. The picture wasn’t working, but Alanna had managed to type a message: Borrowed Henley’s cycle and went to town. Back at four.

Rick shook his head. Henley hardly ever lent his cycle to anybody. Perhaps Alanna’s appearance at breakfast in Rick’s shirt—and almost nothing else—had tapped the wellsprings of his latent generosity. Actually, she could have floated into town without the cycle, couldn’t she? But just as well she hadn’t. Alanna’s telekinesis was startling enough without elaborate demonstrations of her ability.

As he came down the stairs, he saw the front door bang open, powered by a stiff breeze. That damned latch needed fixing.

“Shit!” Henley hopped to his feet. He grabbed frantically at the mouth of the breen bag. The wind was billowing it open and a pale blue snow floated up and over, coating the faded wallpaper, covering the old chairs and linoleum, dusting everything and everybody in the room.

Rick gasped and felt the powder begin to choke him. Breen overdose from inhalation meant blindness. Screaming fits. Gapped synapses.

The ground fell away beneath him. Henley cried out from a great distance. But he was moving strangely now—an effect of the breen? Rick watched with interest as Henley turned away from him, white hair floating on the strange wind. He settled back down into his chair slowly, so slowly, and the blue powder blizzard was swirling, tunneling, pulling back into itself, into its bag. The front door closed. The air was clear. Rick looked at Henley. Henley looked back at him.

The microwave oven beeped. Pizza ready.

“What happened, man?” Henley’s pale blue eyes were drilling holes into Rick. “Where’d all that powder go?”

“Back in the bag, as far as I can tell.” Rick walked over and casually tested the front door. Locked. He scooped a slice of pizza onto a plate and tested it—hot, too hot to eat yet. “But then, who let the breen out of the bag to begin with?”

“Quit clowning, Akimura. You didn’t just happen to pull some mutant stunt, did you?”

“’Tweren’t me, old buddy.” Rick took a bite of pizza, burned the roof of his mouth, swallowed quickly. “Remember?” He tapped the side of his head. “Golden eyes, but nobody home? I’ve got that old-time null religion, remember?”

“Well—” Henley’s tone was strangely mistrustful. “Okay. But if you didn’t save us, then what did?”

Rick shrugged. “Act of God? Distorted perception? Wrong doors opened and all that: Ask Aldous Huxley.”