Alien Child (13 page)

“Your mother was called Juanita Gutiérrez,” the voice replied. “Your father’s name was Robert Kufakunesu. If you would like to know—”

“Why did they come here?”

“For the reasons many came—they had hopes for a child but were not yet ready to raise one. At the time they arrived, the Institute was just beginning its work. They were willing to take this chance of having a child they could remove and raise later, when one or both of them might no longer be able to have a child in any other way. They were to contact the Institute when it was time to begin gestation, then return for their child at the time of its birth.”

“Why didn’t they return, though?” she said. “Was it a war? Did they die before they could come back?”

“Do not ask this,” she heard Llipel say.

“I know nothing about any war preventing their return,” the voice said. “My records show that the Institute sent them messages when they were living in your father’s African land. It seems that they had second thoughts and chose not to raise a child. There were others who never returned. Occasionally, those they left here were later adopted by others, but many were not. The Institute expanded enough as the years passed to store more embryos. There was hope all might be claimed in time, and by then some people saw reasons for keeping these specimens of humanity preserved, and envisioned a time when they might be needed.”

“Because of the last war,” Nita whispered. “Because there might not be anyone else left.”

“It seems so. There was much talk of a war during the last days people were here, but even before then, many had left this place. Perhaps people no longer needed this Institute. Fewer came, more rooms were closed and left empty, and resources were directed elsewhere, perhaps to their weapons. The Institute’s administrators could find few willing to accept the potential children stored here. Many of the parents were like yours and decided against coming here for their children. In the end, there was only silence for me, until the two called Llare and Llipel came to this place. That is all I can tell you, unless you would like to know more about your parents. I can call up records of them.”

“No,” she said softly. Her parents had forgotten her; the world had found no place for her. By the time of the last war, she had already been cast away by the two who should have cared most for her. None of her people had wanted her. Only a cybernetic intelligence, following ancient commands, had preserved her. She was alive only because of Llipel, who might finally turn from her, too.

Llipel’s arms were suddenly around her. “I did not want you to hear such words,” her guardian said. “I know what it is to seem cast away by one’s kind. I am sorry, Nita. I would close off this time for you and carry you to another, but I cannot. I thought you would be told that the two called parents had died before you were claimed, but this is as painful to hear.”

Nita twisted away. Llipel pawed at her helmet with her gloved hands in her sign of distress.

“You should have let them die,” Nita cried. “I’m glad their parents are dead. No one cared about them then, there’s no one left to care about them now. I don’t know why you bothered to raise me.” She panted for breath. “There’s no reason to bother with them now. They can just wait here until the mind begins to fail, or the circuits aren’t replaced, or until everything in this place has vanished or rotted away. They’re already forgotten—they might as well be dead.”

“Nita—”

She ran from the room, pausing only long enough to pick up her weapon before she rushed into the hall. As she tore the helmet from her head and was about to hurl it away, she remembered that Sven was probably watching her.

She moved toward the nearest screen and tried to compose herself. “Sven, everything’s all right. You don’t have to worry. I’ll come there later.” She turned away from the screen before she could see his image, stumbled toward the exit, and went outside.

11

Nita circled Llipel’s ship. She had never been this close to it before, but had only watched from the doorway whenever her guardian went out to the vessel. The door had always closed behind Llipel so that Nita could not follow.

The silver globe was not that large; she doubted that the inside could be much bigger than the room in which she and Llipel slept. How far could the two have traveled in such a small ship? She had learned enough from the Institute’s records about the solar system to know that her guardian’s people had to be from somewhere much farther away. The planets around Earth’s sun were not places where they could have survived easily, if at all. Perhaps they had a base on one of the satellites of Mars, or on Earth’s moon. Maybe Llare and Llipel had a way of communicating with such a base, and had kept that a secret, too.

She stopped next to one of the globe’s three legs. A ladder led up to the ship, but she could see no opening. For a moment, she was tempted to climb the ladder, but doubted that the ship would open to her. Llipel and Llare were not likely to leave the vessel unprotected now that Nita and Sven could go outside.

She turned away from the ship and walked across the grass, keeping near the Institute as she glanced toward the forest. The more she learned, the crueler her world became. She could almost understand why her people had sought death; maybe the pain and neglect they had inflicted on one another were finally too much for them to bear.

Rubble crunched under her boots; she had reached the expanse in front of the Institute. She strode across the flat surface and sat down on the steps leading into the tower.

“Nita.”

She looked up; Sven was coming down the steps. “You said nothing was wrong,” he continued, “but you didn’t look as though that was true. I was worried.”

“Nothing happened to the cold room. They’re all there and safe enough, if that makes any difference.”

“You don’t look very relieved.”

“I found out a few things,” she said. “I heard about my parents.”

“You’d better come inside. We can talk there now. I spoke to Llare after you came out of the cryonic facility. I told him it was our time for togetherness now and that we didn’t want to be observed. He asked me if it was our time for what our kind calls love, and I let him believe that—he knows our people liked to be alone then.”

She was silent.

“Please come inside,” he said. “Llare’s asked the mind to close its sensors in the tower so we can have privacy. It won’t open them again without our authorization. You don’t have to worry.”

She stood up and let him lead her inside. He guided her toward one side of the lobby; they sat down on the long, cushioned platform. “What happened, Nita?”

“I found out why my parents never came here for me. It wasn’t because of the war. Apparently they came here long before that. They decided they didn’t want me, they changed their minds, and no one else ever wanted me, either.”

Sven cleared his throat. “Maybe that’s not so bad. Isn’t it better than finding out that the war killed them, or that they died fighting in it?”

“I don’t know what to think!” she cried. “I don’t know how I’m supposed to feel about anything, I don’t even know what I am! I can’t be like Llipel, and I don’t want to be like our kind! Is that what I’ll turn into—someone who can’t care about anything, who acts like them?”

“I know, Nita. I’m not sure of what I am, either.” He paused. “I don’t think I want to know about my own parents. Look at it this way—we’re alive because they didn’t come for us.”

She stood up, took off her boots, then removed the protective suit, folding it up before putting it on the floor. “I suppose that’s better than dying the way our people did,” she said.

“And maybe our parents didn’t think of us as real. In a way, we weren’t yet—they wouldn’t even have been able to see us without looking through a microscope. They didn’t really know us.”

“But if they took the trouble to come here, shouldn’t they have cared about what happened to us later?” She rubbed at her eyes. “Llipel was trying to console me when I heard the truth. I was so afraid of her, and now—” She looked down at the weapon and belt that lay next to her silver suit. “I feel horrible about distrusting her.”

“I know,” Sven said. “Llare still seems so kind and understanding. I wish we could trust them, but until we’re sure, we should be careful.”

He stood up and walked toward the booth. She followed him inside and watched as he rummaged in the desk drawers, searching every one until a pile of chains and medallions was heaped on one desk.

“That’s all of them,” he murmured. “We’ll find a place to hide them up in the residential quarters. They won’t be able to get at the weapons.”

“They may have weapons of their own.”

“At least they won’t get ours.”

They shared their evening meal in the large cafeteria on the fifteenth floor. There were foods here Nita had never seen in the east wing—chunks of a fishy substance in a light sauce, tiny vegetables prepared in unfamiliar ways, small cakes, and a pinkish liquid that made her feel light-headed after only one glass.

Tempting as the food was, Sven seemed to be eating very little. He had been more cheerful when they were practicing with their wands in the garden and had talked of how they might begin to explore the forest. Then he had aimed at a bird in one of the trees, expecting only to stun it, but the bird had been dead when he picked it up.

They had learned that their wands could kill smaller creatures, and that was probably useful to know, so that they would not be reckless. She was grateful that they hadn’t aimed at the cats. But the incident had dismayed him.

Sven was picking at his food with his fingers. He had already given up trying to eat with the metal implements their kind had used to dine on certain foods. He had nodded at her attempts at conversation, but said little himself.

She was beginning to notice small differences in their reactions. However unhappy she got, her sorrowful moods passed before too long; Sven’s moods seemed to have a deeper hold on him. She wondered what this meant. How different had individuals of their kind been from one another? Releasing one’s anger could hurt someone else; holding it in might only make it worse for oneself. There seemed no purpose in having such feelings.

She suddenly yawned. Sven looked up. “You’re tired.”

“I guess I am.” She set down her knife and fork. “Maybe I should go to sleep.”

“The mind’ll let us know if anyone enters the tower,” he said, “but I don’t think anyone will. They know we want to be alone. The cats should be all right in the garden.”

“Are you going to sleep, too?”

He poured more of the pink liquid into his glass. “I think I’ll stay up for a while.”

“Do you want me to stay with you, then?”

“You don’t have to. I’m used to being alone.”

“Good night, Sven.” He turned away as she got up and walked toward the lift.

She had left the silver suit in one of the rooms on the fourteenth floor, next to the room Sven had decided to use. Her closet held no clothing, but a door near it led to a small lavatory, where she discovered a stall in which she could bathe under a stream of water.

She left the lavatory, deciding she would wash in the morning, and settled on the room’s pillowed platform. Tired as she was, she wondered if she would be able to sleep. Was it only that morning when Llare had spoken to her? Was it only thirty days ago that she had believed herself to be alone in the Institute with her guardian and Llare? It seemed much longer ago, part of a time when, whatever her sorrows, she had felt protected and safe.

Sven claimed that they had to act as though their fears were fact. She wasn’t sure she believed that. How would they ever regain the goodwill of Llipel and Llare if the two realized they had been doubted and feared? Distrust and suspicion might widen the breach; trust would be difficult to regain. She and Sven might only bring about what they most feared and lead their guardians to conclude that Earth’s people were indeed dangerous.

She was about to unbutton her shirt and prepare for sleep when she leaned toward the small screen near the platform. “I’d like to speak to Llipel,” she said quickly, before she could have second thoughts.

Her guardian’s golden-furred face suddenly appeared. “I have been concerned for you,” Llipel said. “I was sorry I could not ease you.”

“I know.”

“You are with the boy now. Llare tells me that you wish to be by yourselves during your time of togetherness. Perhaps that will ease you.”

“I’m all right now,” Nita said. “I wanted you to know.”

Llipel was silent for a bit, then said, “I will tell you this. Another time is coming, not just for you and the boy, but for us. Another change is near, and I do not know what it will bring, but no harm will come to you. You have nothing to fear from me—of that I am certain, though I do not know how I know this.”

Nita tensed. She and Sven hadn’t fooled Llipel at all. She lowered her eyes, tormented by her inability to trust her guardian even now. “It may be,” Llipel went on, “that a time of silence will come when I no longer speak to you, but I will not forget you. I feel—but I cannot put it into your words.”

Llipel sounded almost as if she was trying to say farewell. Nita was about to speak when the door opened; Sven entered the room.