Authors: Paul Melko

Singularity's Ring (30 page)

BOOK: Singularity's Ring

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We agree, the matter settled. The first time had been in Bolivopolis, the second with the bears, the third with the pilot who had found us, the fourth with Mother Redd when we had dredged her memory for her knowledge of OG military attacks on us, and now this fifth, the pilot of the Scryfejet.

It is Strom who rejects our matter-of-fact recital.

This should not be possible,
he sends.
What have we become?

Quant, oblivious to Strom’s and the pod’s emerging horror, sends,
Perhaps Strom was first with the bears. Then the pilot is six. But he was alone
—
Oh.

She catches the thought coming the other way.

“I don’t know,” she says aloud. Moira squeezes Quant’s arm, and we think, withdrawing from the pilot in guilt. Mother Redd is sitting as far from us as she can in the passenger compartment of the jet.

Meda unstraps from her seat and takes another in front of her.

“We won’t do it again, unless we both agree.”

Mother Redd nods. “We need to keep this to ourselves, child,” she says. “This wasn’t … expected.”

“No,” we say. “Were we in those wombs?”

One of Mother Redd sighs. “Yes. Some of you. Strom, yes. Some of Elliott O’ Toole. Meda and Moira came later. Manuel … and his sister later still. But Dr. Khalid had the funding and approval to grow as many as he wanted after the attack.”

“Who was it? And why?”

“We don’t know. The military duo wasn’t caught, but the hardliners were quietly asked to step down. The Eugenics
Department was curtailed in many ways. It marked a liberalizing of the OG following the Exodus and the Gene War.”

“What did Scarlet see?” we ask.

Mother Redd starts. She holds hands, thinking among herself. The memory is as real to us as if it had happened to us the day before: Scarlet signing through the glass, “It was—”

“We’d forgotten that,” Mother Redd says. “We’d almost forgotten what Scarlet did to us.”

Anger and fear pheromones cascade through the jet.

“I didn’t mean to dredge that up,” we say. “I’m sorry.”

“No, no, child,” Mother Redd says. “The memory was already there.”

“What was she saying to you?”

“I’ve always thought she was saying, ‘It was the right thing to do.’ She was telling the rest of me that the sacrifice was necessary.”

“Was it?”

Mother Redd laughs. She stands and pulls Meda from her seat, hugging her. The rest of us come too, and we are holding her tightly. We have been gone a long time from Mother Redd.

“Child, you’ve given me such a worry,” she says into Meda’s hair. “I’ve been looking and looking for you. But I knew you’d be all right.”

“We are all right.”

We’re more than all right,
Manuel sends.
We’re beyond.

“Has any of the other quintets shown these abilities?” Meda asks.

“No, of course not,” Mother Redd says. “Just you.”

“What else was in our gene sequence? Dr. Baker was scared of what we are.”

“He was paranoid when he was a part of society. A dozen years by himself—”

“Except for the bears.”

“—except for the bears, didn’t solve that problem.”

“He was a brilliant man,” we say. “The bears … They were a friend.”

“Bears,” Mother Redd says, shaking a head. “The beaver pod IQ was never more than ninety.”

“The bears had stories. They had … community.”

Tell her,
Strom sent.
Tell her what we have.

“We have Baker’s notes. We have the bear genome.”

“What? You have it? That means …” Mother Redd looks at us, and we know what she’s thinking, not because we steal her thoughts, but because we have just been her, Apollo-Redd.

“You never trusted Khalid’s DNA because it was from the Ring. Can you trust Baker’s? He spent decades trying to unravel it.”

“If what he says is true, then even my DNA, going as far back as the trios, all pod DNA was modified by the Ring. I should trust no one including myself.”

Meda smiles for us. “And you thought Dr. Baker was paranoid.”

“I’d like to study it. Will you let me?”

“For a clean bed and a shower.”

“Done.”

It has been months since we’ve slept in our own bed. No wonder Mother Redd was trying to stay away from us. We smelled like bears.

SEVEN

Apollo

We have been gone from the farmhouse on Worthington Road since we went off on our senior trip to Columbus Station; it seems much longer than it actually is. It is warmer than the mountains have been, yet the fields of soyfalfa are ready to harvest and Mac, the trio of oxalope, is busy with the thresher. He disconnects his harness and comes over to us, licking our hands.

“Hello, Mac,” we say.

He sniffs at us.

Smell bears,
he sends. Even the thoughts of the oxalope are open to us. He gives us a look and a snort and returns to his work.

“Come on,” Mother Redd calls. “Your room is exactly as you left it.”

“Would you have rented it out?”

“If there’d been any takers.”

The Scryfejet whines away into the sky, whipping away thought and emotion.

The upstairs room is the same. We take turns in the shower, two at a time, Strom last taking double the time.

Because I’m bigger. More surface area.

Quant plots the surface area of each of us. Strom does have more, but not twice as much.

Manuel logs onto the network, and we heave a sigh of relief. Worse than no showers has been no network access. From our account, we see our work units. This is how much our skill has contributed to pod society. We have been using singleton scrip for so long, we have forgotten our work unit total.

That’s not right,
Quant sends.

As students, our work unit rate is just a few percentage points above basic living allowance. The work we did each summer for Mother Redd boosted that a few percent more. The value of our work unit account now is ten times what we’d made the year before.

Meda calls down to Mother Redd. “There’s a whole lotta cash in our account. Why?”

“Your resignation was not accepted,” she replies, calling up from the kitchen. Something with tomatoes is simmering.

Oh.

Quant does a quick calculation. We marvel at our daily rate.

I feel bribed,
Manuel says.

That’s a lot of pay for running around the jungle all that time.

We should donate it,
Moira says, but we know she is kidding.

We should convert it to singleton scrip,
Strom says, the voice of practicality.
Maybe gold. Just in case.

Manuel is already on the network, downloading news.

Checking on the
Consensus.

No. I don’t want to know,
Quant sends.

Check.

A brief consensus is reached, and Manuel searches the network for news of the
Consensus
. Elliott’s captaincy is reported, but then nothing until a few weeks ago, when there’s a news article on budget cuts for the space program. The launch is delayed while the cost of the antimatter for the drive is debated.

Strom wonders,
An attack from the anti-Community contingent?

It was impossible to say. Every news story we read—resolutions on singleton grievances, repopulation of California—we place in light of the forces we know now are at work in the world. We are coming awake after sleeping for our whole lives.

We go down to dinner.

On the steps, Quant stops to correct the slant of a picture. It is us and our ducks at the summer science fair many years ago. The ducks all seem to be trying to stand on Strom’s feet. The stairs creak as we descend, the seventh step, the third one. We look into the great room from there. A jigsaw puzzle we had been working on sits on the corner table.

We are overcome by nostalgia.

We hurt her,
Strom sends.

Yes.

We have no mother. No pod does. We are born in artificial wombs or real ones and raised in creches so that we bond with each other, not a parent. Mother Redd is no more than a mentor, an educator, yet our running away must have broken her heart.

Manuel dissents softly.
She took the job. It was a job.

She changed her name to reflect her job,
Meda challenges.

Would she have taken us if one of her hadn’t died?
Manuel asks.

No,
says Moira.
She would have continued her research.

It’s more than a job for her now,
Meda says.

She loves us,
Strom says, and Manuel nods. He cannot resist so strong a consensus as that.

We walk into the kitchen, which smells of tomato sauce mixed with onions, garlic, basil, and thyme. All of these thing are from the garden or the greenhouse. All of these things are probably Mother Redd’s own genetic design.

“Can we help?” Meda asks.

“You can help eat it,” Mother Redd replies.

Two pots of homemade pasta boil on the stove.

One is for Strom,
Moira sends.

One and a half,
he replies.

We eat with Mother Redd, just as we used to. We chat of the farm, of her work. We skirt the issues. Neither of us raises the question of Malcolm Leto or Dr. Baker. We let those things pass for the moment.

In the morning, we sleep in, dozing in and out. When one of us sleeps, the rest of us can run in the dreams, a surreal landscape that we shape. We hear the aircar, and Manuel climbs out the window to get a look from the roof. A wave of paranoia rises within us.

“It’s Dr. Khalid,” Manuel says from above. He drops his hand into the room, while watching, joining consensus.

At the sound of his name, we remember what we have retrieved from Mother Redd’s memory. For as long as we can remember, Khalid has been our doctor.
Not for all of us,
Manuel interrupts. Always, even when we were teenagers, he had rock candy for us in his pocket.

But now the image we share of him is warped and cracked. Through Mother Redd’s eyes we see someone less bright than we remember, someone petty.

He’s hasn’t changed. Just our perception,
Moira sends,
but the lack of force behind her statement stiffens our opinion.

He’s coming to see us,
Manuel sends from above. He is touching Strom’s left hand, while Strom touches Meda’s and Moira’s with his right. Manuel is a handle, not in the circle, and when thoughts pass over the triple junction, they jumble and turn.

Come inside, Manuel,
Strom sends.

Thoughts are clearest when we stand in a circle and let thoughts pass in both directions. We have a set pattern for consensus—Moira, Strom, Meda, Manuel, Quant—that serves us well. Sometimes we reach different conclusions when we switch our order, or leave someone out completely. But thought is harder then.

Manuel comes inside, finds his place, and we think.

Khalid has been our doctor from our very first mental, as well as physical, conception. Yet, he was Mother Redd’s nemesis, and his actions led to Mother Redd’s loss.

It wasn’t his actions!
Manuel says.

His going against Eugenic Department order led up to it,
Moira replies.

He had no way of knowing.

He broke the rules and part of someone died,
Strom says. The consensus is more heated than it usually gets.

Negligent accidental death,
Manuel replies.
It wasn’t even pluricide. Mother Redd is still alive.

“Don’t say that!” Quant says, speaking out of turn. “We
saw
Scarlet die!”

Which created Mother Redd!
Manuel replies.
She didn’t exist before that.

And Mother Redd nurtured us,
Meda adds.

Don’t try to justify the means by the ends!
Moira sends.

I’m not!
Manuel replies.
But Khalid did what he did for science.

We found the bears for science,
Strom sends softly.

And Dr. Baker died!
Quant sends.
We are as guilty as Khalid of manslaughter.
Moira cringes as the thought passes through her.

“Child!” Mother Redd calls up the stairs. “Khalid is here!”

We stop, Manuel pulling his hands free first. He stands at our door and listens. We hear the murmured conversation below, a laugh, a shared joke. Good friends visiting.

See?
he sends.

Anger smell from Strom fills the air, but he says nothing.

Manuel takes the stairs, and the rest of us follow. We can’t stay in our room debating our new relationship with Khalid.

He greets us with a smile, all four of him turning to look at us. Three fourths of him is identical triplets, dark-haired, slightly stooped. The fourth is taller, dark-skinned with deep black eyes. He seems older than when we last saw him.

“Home at last, I see,” he says. “After a long journey.”

He’s condescending,
Quant says.

Of course not,
Manuel replies.

“Yes. It’s good to be home,” we reply.

“I’ve come to give you a physical. I’d like to see how my star quintet is doing.”

No!
Quant shouts. All of us feel her skin crawl. Even Manuel shivers, and Dr. Khalid notices.

“Not today, Doctor.”

“Apollo!” Mother Redd says. “He’s come a long way to see you.”

He should have called first,
Quant snipes.

Meda says, “We don’t feel up to it.”

“Really, you’ve been in the jungle, then in the mountains for months. You look thin.”

We are thin. We compare our body sizes from a year
ago. All of us are leaner, sleeker, and stronger. Even Strom has put on muscle in his legs and shoulders. But our metabolisms are fine. We check it every day. We haven’t been sick, except for Moira’s infection.

Meda is about to reply, when he cuts in. “Let me just reassure myself that you’re okay. For me, more than for you.”

Manipulative,
Quant says,

But we say, “All right.”

We step into one of the adjoining lab rooms, big enough for both of us, and with enough chairs for all of us, if not Khalid, to sit.

“You seem a bit skittish, Apollo,” Dr. Khalid says, glancing at Quant.

“It’s nothing. We’ve had a long trip,” Meda replies. Superimposed on this elderly, gentle man is his younger self screaming at Mother Redd.

“Why don’t we do an exam? Just the basics.”

No!
Quant again, but Strom places a hand on her shoulder.

“Mother Redd told us how her fourth died,” Meda says. “It’s just upsetting for us. She told us where our DNA came from.”

All four of Dr. Khalid show surprise.

“She … told you?”

“Yes. She told us the Ring AI designed it. Dr. Baker confirmed it.”

Dr. Khalid steps back from us, consensing.

A swirl of thought erupts from Quant and she lunges forward, taking Dr. Khalid’s hand. We know she is trying to join his thoughts.

No!
Moira sends, mixed with veto smell.

Strom catches Quant’s arm and pulls her back to us. Dr. Khalid is staring, shocked.

Does he know?

No.

Quant’s thoughts are a violent cloud around her.

Strom takes her into his arms, and we hear Quant send weakly,
He was there when Scarlet died.

We step back as one, all of our eyes on Dr. Khalid.

“What was that outburst? Are you well?” he asks.

We should not have done that,
Moira says.
Quant shouldn’t have done that.
Her thoughts are almost shrill.

But I did, and we know,
Quant says.

We can’t ignore it,
Meda says.

We had no right!
Moira says.
We can’t use what we have no right to. It’s as if we performed an illegal search and seizure. The OG is forbidden from touching private data. His thoughts are the same thing.

He killed her,
Manuel sends.

We don’t know that,
Strom replies.

He did, I saw it.
Quant is sobbing now.

We saw Mother Redd’s memory. He didn’t do it.

BOOK: Singularity's Ring

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