Of a Note in a Cosmic Song; Part One Read online

  The new technology made it possible to make that journey in three and a half years. Would Maike be able to handle four gran of users for that amount of time? What about later, on Kun DJar?

  “That many users? How many volunteers?”

  “Another thirty two sets.”

  She scoffed. “A mas of people on one kabin and half of them users? That’ll go wrong, Aryan. There’s no way!”

  “Shush. Keep your voice down. Just think it over for now, will you?”

  She promised to do so and to contact him on the base next moon. Aryan finished his wine and walked back into the government building where he had to have his ID checked again although he’d been there less than an hour ago.

  The suits in the elevator looked him over. The rule of politeness ingrained in them was the only thing that kept their mouths from saying what their eyes did. Aryan scratched at his beard and winked at them.

  In the office he found Kalgar in a good mood after having managed to convince the government to leave himself and Frantag to worry about the hierarchy on the kabin since it wouldn’t affect the people on DJar. He would inform Frantag about that later. His mood changed when Aryan mentioned the resources needed to install the new photon tubing.

  Aryan also couldn’t help bringing up the issue of not taking children — another one of the government’s requirements. “What if Branag’s son wants to come? The kid is seventeen. What did you have in mind, a one-generation colony?”

  Branag was the designer for the kabin’s life support systems and unlike the main engineer, he was planning to leave DJar with his design.

  “You’re a troublemaker, Aryan,” Kalgar said.

  “Just like to shake the system a bit.”

  “So I’ve noticed, but you’ve got more important things to worry about. As for fighting for the rights of children, I already have somebody driving me insane about that, so save yourself the effort.”

  Aryan left the office a little later, happy with his achievement, and walked straight into the nearest transport depot. Downstairs he had to wait for the guards to come as the lady in front of him was rejected by the security booth. Aryan stepped in next, rolled up his jacket sleeve for another ID check and pulsed the code for his destination, the Gevelercity wingport, into the touch-display in front of him. A moment later his new points-account statement appeared on the screen, the fare already deducted.

  He walked out on the other side, satisfied that his promotion had made him a gran richer than he’d ever been. Not that it made much difference anymore. Points were currency to spend on DJar. If he left the planet for good there was no need to save for a year of retirement and right now he was too busy to indulge in luxuries.

  In the underground hallways Aryan was reminded of his dislike for the public transport; too many bodies in a small space. To his relief he found the airfloat to the wingport already there. He chose a seat in the back corner. The float was narrow inside with a dome-shaped roof, and even Aryan couldn’t stand up away from the aisle. The inside was painted a dirty yellow — or maybe it had faded to that over time. It didn’t help his feeling of being caged in; no windows, there was no use.

  The doors closed a minute later and with a light humming sound the float started to move; slowly at first, but as the pitch intensified so the speed increased. These floats could reach near-birdwing velocity on their long stretches but were a lot quieter, because an airfloat didn’t have the big motors needed to keep a metal bird in the sky. It just raised itself off the ground, allowing the air to fill the tunnel around it, propelled forward by the movement of that same air sucked in at the front and pushed out the other end. The float wouldn’t leave its narrow travelway until its destination was reached and the air escaped into the platform. Just below the surface and as fast as it could, the trip to the wingport took less than an hour.

  On arrival Aryan took the next birdwing to Minagua and from there a van to the base to concentrate on the design of his spacekabin.

  Greguia

  9/4/1/6184

  The amount of vines covering the stone walls of the building were testament to its age. On the Plantation it was known as “Closed House”. Like many of the older wards it had been originally built to house the rich citizens of Greguia, but the majority of them had long since moved to the city or to the islands. Eventually the whole estate had been fenced in and become an institution for the mentally disturbed.

  In the dark corridor Jema hung up her coat before unlocking the door into the living room. A musty night smell greeted her; somebody had forgotten to open the windows. A chair lay overturned beside the table which still held dirty cups from last night. A cushion had fallen off the couch and been left there. She picked it up and straightened the chair. To the right both bedroom doors were open. Some of the children were up, but the breakfast table hadn’t been set yet. They must have been busy.

  She walked into the office at the back where Gad, the night nurse, had the coffee ready.

  “What on DJar did you do?” he asked.

  “You mean my hair? I tried to paint it yesterday.”

  “It didn’t work.”

  He was right. Instead of a deep red it had come out in stripes, the brown still showing in between. She poured herself a coffee and pulled up a stool to listen to the hand-over after her daytime colleague, Max, also arrived. Gad had little news to report except that Kamaron had been restrained overnight for belting Nori again. He was the reason for the chaos in the living room. The other children had slept well. “Oh, and Klara’s mom called. She’s coming today and Nori needs a new dress. Somebody put her other one in the wash and the laundry people have thrown it out again,” he told Jema on his way out.

  Jema finished her coffee before getting up to set the table and to urge the other children out of bed. “Come on, Kamaron, time to get up. Breakfast is ready.”

  Kamaron didn’t want to get up, but food was a good enough reason to do it anyway. “They’re putting snakes in my butt,” he announced the moment he sat down at the table.

  While Max tried to get two of the other boys to eat, Kameron stuck his fingers down his throat and started gagging.

  Jema pulled his hand away. “Just eat.”

  “I have lizard eggs in my stomach,” Kameron said, and took a bite.

  After breakfast Jema followed Nori into the girls’ bedroom to give Klara her food and a wash. She closed the door in case the doctor came on his rounds early. Nori flopped into the chair and cackled at the ceiling. Jema lowered the rack on the side of Klara’s bed.

  “Hello beautiful,” she said, stroking the girl’s face. Only when the sweet porridge touched her lips did Klara respond. Food made her happy. She might be the only happy child there and she was the only one who got visitors. She was in the wrong place but for her it made no difference. After an accident in which she’d almost drowned she had lost her eyesight and her hearing along with all her mental abilities. Now twenty-three, her brain functioned at the level of a baby no older than four stations.

  After the porridge, Jema rolled the heavy body onto a stretcher and wheeled it to the corner of the room where the chemwash sat attached to the wall. Today it had to be the rose smell because that was the scent her mother preferred. Klara liked the warmth of the blower on her body and relaxed her muscles.

  Jema talked as she went. The words weren’t so much for Klara, who couldn’t hear, as for Nori, who couldn’t respond.

  After changing the bedwear she searched the closet for the new dress Klara’s mother had brought for her last moon. The closet was overstuffed since clothing was the only thing this mother could give her daughter.

  Jema left the big baby on the stretcher without clothes and turned her attention to Nori. Nori didn’t need to be asked. Jema let her climb onto her knees. For sixteen short minutes each day she gave Nori the cuddles the child so desperately needed. It wasn’t allowed, neither the physical closeness to Nori nor letting the baby masturbate now that the diaper was removed, but it w
as all they had. Klara would be dressed again long before her mother came.

  Nori enjoyed being rocked as if she was the baby. She was eleven years old. Born in a small town somewhere on Northland, Nori had grown up with a sister who was the picture-perfect example of what children should be like and which she was not: She played the wrong games, pondered a lot and withdrew into her own imagination, which got her into trouble. The more trouble, the more she withdrew, until she hadn’t responded at all anymore. The mother couldn’t cope, the teachers couldn’t cope; a doctor was contacted and Nori had ended up here, in Closed House. Same old story.

  Jema had thought about taking her home to give her a real family but her comate, Kityag, wouldn’t hear of it, so she stayed at work a bit longer whenever she could. “Don’t get emotionally attached,” she was told. “These children can’t handle that.” But Nori responded. She even said a few words here and there.

  A little later Jema had to abandon both Nori and Klara when Max called for her help. She found him trying to stop Kamaron from breaking his skull open against the wall. It took two adults to lift the strong eight-year old onto his bed. The only thing that calmed him down was the oversized toy animal Klara’s mother had brought him once and which he bit and rubbed up against until he was exhausted.

  When she returned to the bedroom Jema found Nori wearing one of Klara’s old dresses and the baby covered in excrement, so she had to start washing her all over again, this time with water.

  “We’ll go shopping later, Nori. We’ll get you a Nori dress,” she promised.

  Klara’s mother walked into the office just before lunch and handed Jema a box of chocolates. “Happy Birthday.”

  “Oh… you shouldn’t have—”

  “Of course I should. You’ve been taking care of my child nearly every day since her accident. You’re the most important being in her life and the least I can do is give you a present when everybody else keeps taking you for granted.”

  Jerma blushed from the warmth these words stirred inside her. “But I’m a worker,” she answered. “I’m suppposed to be taken for granted.”

  “You don’t really believe that and I have a good mind to talk to somebody about your place here,” Klara’s mother said and accepted the key to the kitchen so she could prepare Klara’s afternoon porridge. When she brought back the key, she also handed Jema the lighter the doctor used for his pipe. “He left it in the kitchen again.”

  Jema promised to return it to him later.

  After lunch an assistant staff member arrived so Jema could take Nori to the shop. It was a fair walk through the grey streets of the town that had been Jema’s home for eight years now. She liked Greguia better than the big city. It had everything but wasn’t as crowded. There were always a few familiar faces around. Everything she needed was within walking distance: the library, the mealmax shop and the transport depot. Only The Plantation was at the edge of town, but the walk was refreshing. Today the chilly wind pulled at her hair and skirt. Nori walked beside her in silent conversation with her own world, occcasionally laughing out loud.

  As they were crossing a street Nori suddenly turned back, causing a van to screech to a halt and its driver, a middle-aged woman, to start yelling at Jema. “If you can’t control your child, you shouldn’t have had her!”

  Jema stuck her finger up, though the woman had reacted out of shock, then took Nori’s hand and pulled the laughing girl to safety. The passengers in the van stared after them. Nori’s appearance had that effect on most people. Her spindly legs stuck out from under the tent-sized dress. Her blond hair was a jumbled mess on top of her head; nobody was allowed to comb it. At times Nori cut it herself with the only scissors available, which were totally blunt.

  Back home Nori immediately took the same scissors and went to work on the new dress until her scarred arms were visible through the sleeves. Then she was satisfied. Jema put the dirty dress into her own bag to wash at home. It was soon time to hand over; there was nothing new to report.

  The problem came with the evening shift itself. Only one of the staff members showed up. It wasn’t the first time that a new nurse had stayed away without calling. “I was afraid he’d do that. Kameron bit him yesterday,” his shiftmate said.

  There was nobody to replace him. Jema felt the looks before she saw them. They all knew she preferred to be at work. “I’ll have to call Kaspi,” she answered.

  Kaspi’s face on the screen was visibly disappointed. Jema promised to spend all day with her tomorrow since she’d be on nights. Nori wasn’t disappointed. She enjoyed the extra cuddles.

  It was nearly midnight before Jema arrived at her own house, where Kityag had invited some people over as a surprise for her birthday; his friends, not hers, and their neighbours, a couple their age who couldn’t wait to tell her they were expecting a baby. She glared at Kityag.

  “She’s finally decided to join us,” he said, and from his voice it was clear the party had started early.

  The last thing Jema wanted was to sit and be polite to all these people, so she walked to the mealsroom to get some wine.

  He followed her there. “Couldn’t you at least have turned up for your own birthday? I don’t see why you always have to visit Kaspi first. She was your mother’s friend, not yours. She’s older than your mother.”

  Jema pulled her shoulder away from his hand, irritated with herself for having forgotten to call him about her extra shift, but she walked into the living room without explaining. For a while she observed and listened. The only interesting thing to watch was one of his female colleagues trying to be subtle as she vied for Kityag’s attention. Having been born with all the physical attributes to make him desirable for women, Kityag was blatantly unaware of them, which was one of his positive traits. Jema figured she should just tell the girl to ask him openly. She might do them all a favour.

  When they finally left she was exhausted but Kityag was in the mood. He followed her to bed without tidying up first. “I’m tired,” she warned him.

  “Oh come on. It’s your birthday and we haven’t had any time together yet.”

  As if that was her fault. “I’ve got to work tomorrow.”

  “So you’ll be a bit tired. Those kids don’t notice anyhow.”

  She turned her back to him. How would he know?

  Kityag carried on talking as his hands lurked nearby. “Did you have a nice day? Did you like my gift? Four kor is a very special birthday.”

  Yeah right! Thirty-two: halfway to the end, and the gift had been a necklace made of the precious stones he so admired but which she would never wear. How much more blunt could he get?

  But as he went on, a sparkle of hope ignited inside her. Maybe he was making her an offer. Maybe that was why he’d invited those from next door. So she put up with his hands and his questions and tried not to wince at his kisses. Only when he reached for her breasts did she roll on top of them. Those had never been meant for men.

  Unaware, he carried on. “Do you like this? I want this to be good for you.”

  She didn’t answer. Words could be in the way at the best of times.

  He moved in for his final goal. Maybe it was the wine that made him move quicker. At least he wouldn’t waste an hour trying to be gentle and work up the mood. Maybe he was finally getting the message.

  But when he was almost there he stopped to search in his drawer. Then she had enough. How stupid to have hoped. How many more times before she realized this was always going to be a one-way deal? Even the stupid rubber sheath was in on the conspiracy and refused to give him a hard time tonight. She moved away. No more. Never!

  “What have I done now? What’s suddenly up with you?”

  As if he didn’t know.

  “We were having such a good time. You can’t just stop now,” he said.

  “We?” She jerked away when he tried again.

  He gave up then, angry no doubt. Slave to his body that he was.

  “He complains every time he doesn�
�t get his physical needs met,” Jema complained to Kaspi the next day. “He says we don’t get on well but he never asks why. Do you know what he said? He said it was his evolutionary drive, a need he can’t ignore. Can you believe that?”

  Jema sat on the floor in front of Kaspi’s chair playing with the bits of fluff that had come off the rug while letting Kaspi tie her hair, which was too long and too wavy, and loose as it was now it kept falling in front of her face.

  “Once he told me he liked me for being different. Can’t he see ‘different’ is a package, not just the shell? Sometimes I wish I could just join the kids in Closed House, live in a world where nobody can come in. Not to have to play this stupid social role play anymore. But I can’t. I know what lies ahead for those kids.”

  “Yes, the same thing that lies ahead of me. Now stop talking about it all the time and leave him,” Kaspi answered, her hands more than her voice giving away irritation with Jema’s angry words.

  “I will one day. Leave, I mean. One day when he’s in need. When things go wrong for him for a change. When he gets old or hurt or something. Then I will.”

  Kaspi’s hands stopped moving, their silence louder than the unspoken words. Jema had promised many times before, but it wasn’t so easy to just walk away. She’d been with Kityag for the last seven years. There was no time left to start again; life was for the young. Kaspi knew that, of course, since all Jema had done since she arrived was talk about it; just like she had the year before and the year before that, not to mention every other celebration that was suitable.

  “I’m sorry. I always talk about myself. You have so much more to worry about than I have,” she told Kaspi.

  “I worry about you. Leave him, like I said. Don’t ruin your life. It’s too short. What’s the use of waiting year after year for a birthday present that is not going to come? He’ll keep giving you things to unwrap. He probably doesn’t even know what goes through your head all the time.”