FREE STORIES 2012(97)

“It can if the rumors are true and the idiots are now creating super-slaves . . . super-bureaucrats.”

Jarl sniffed. “It’s not that difficult," he said. "I was altering the one for Eden resort. I can see the back of the holograms from the window, and I can calculate how it would be seen at speed and I can figure out how to change it. It’s not hard.”

Another long silence. He felt the question “but, why?” unspoken, hanging over all of them. “I don’t know,” he said. “I don’t know why I do it. Escaping is hard, and they usually catch me returning and whip me for getting out, and sometimes my roommates too, but . . .”

“But?”

“But if I don’t do it, all I can think of is being an angel and flying away.” He breathed deeply, feeling suddenly ashamed. Not of escaping. Not of stealing from advertisers a few hundred minutes of their advertising budget, before the repair crews set it right. No, he felt ashamed of letting Bartolomeu and Xander be whipped for his fault. Not that they ever complained, but . . . They were so little. And they deserved better from him. While he deserved nothing, and certainly not the kindness of these chance-met strangers. “Look,” he said. “I’ll go. I’ll turn myself in. I’m a danger to—”

“No. Protection is freely given,” the woman said. “We do not pass by on the other side. And we— Never mind. You’re not who we came to save, but you are as in need.”

The man said something about throwing the food of the children to the dogs, but Jane came back, “He’s as hapless as any of them, Carl. Don’t.”

“So what do you propose to do?”

“What we’d planned, what else? Only a little modified. Can you give him the serum now? It should have acted by the time we get in, when they unblock the way, if they check.”

The man was quiet a long while. “They’ll turn the area inside out . . .”

“Yes, which is why it’s important that he be genetically our son by then. Or test as such. Come, we’re not planning to be here long. They’ll comb the fields and streams first, and assume he injured himself or drowned. Particularly if he’s in the habit of getting out at night, and he clearly is. No one will want the news of the existence of bioed supermen getting out to the civilian population, so they’ll hesitate to search there. By the time they do, we will be well away and near Haven.” She paused for a moment. “Please?”

“Yes. Of course. You’re right. Of course. The alternative is turning him out, and I don’t think . . . Well.” He fumbled in something then said, “Jarl, give me your arm.”

Jarl extended it, protruding from the end of his sleeve. He needed to get a new tunic. Supposing he ever got back safely to Hoffnungshaus. Supposing they gave it to him. They might not, after this exploit. Even if he got back safely.

He felt the pinprick of the injector, but he didn’t feel any different afterwards. He thought it would be a genetic spoofing, designed to show that he was their son, should he be tested. At least that’s what he understood from what they said, and he had read about such substances in the sites Xander had hacked into on Hoffnungshaus’s links. They weren’t very good and they didn’t last very long, but as faulty as they were, people worried they would be just the beginning of a slippery slope that would allow mules—eventually—to pass as normal humans. He didn’t understand what was so scary about mules integrating with the population since, as Jarl himself, from what he understood, they’d been modified so that they could not reproduce. But it seemed to scare people a lot.

Jane was handing him a bundle of cloth, under the blanket. “Here,” she said. “Put these on, under the blanket. They won’t see clearly enough in here to see what you’re doing. Besides, if you had a fever, you’d thrash about. Then hand me your suit.”

Jarl obeyed. He couldn’t see the new suit, though it seemed to be larger than the one he’d worn: stretch pants and shirt, it felt like. He handed his suit back to her.

“I wish I could give you a haircut,” she said. “But not while the light is shining on us.”

It seemed absolutely nonsensical, because he’d had his hair cut just three months ago, and wasn’t due for the next for another month, when they’d shave all their heads to prevent lice. But he didn’t say anything, and just lay there, feeling oddly comfortable, oddly warm.

He didn’t remember falling asleep, and was shocked at waking up. Shocked, because he was in a huge bed, and because he couldn’t hear his friends. Instead, he heard birdsong and some distant noise of cutlery approaching closer.