That broke the ice. The rest of them crowded closer, some patting me on the back, some gently punching me on my shoulders, others hugging me, and all of them speaking softly, almost reverently…
"Siggy, Siggy, Siggy."
What was going on?
Looked around for B.B. but couldn't find him in the press.
Then the crowd parted to let someone through. An adult. A woman. Slim, with straight, light brown hair flowing over her shoulders. Nice figure.
When she smiled, I knew her. The platinum hair was gone, and so was all the make-up. But by the Core I knew her.
"Jean!"
"Hello, Mr. Dreyer," she said, calm and as matter-of-fact as if we had just had lunch together yesterday.
She put a hand on my shoulder and kissed me on the cheek.
All around us, the urches giggled and whispered.
"They like you," she said.
With the toddler urches clinging to my arms and legs, I could only gape at her.
"B.B. has spoken so much of you, about how you almost died catching the ones who were snatching our toddlers. You're a hero here, Mr. Dreyer. All the urchingangs have heard of you."
Finally found my voice.
"It's been two years, Jean. Thought you were Out Where All The Good Folks Go."
"I was. I went to Neeka and settled there for a while. I thought it would be all right. I thought I could fit in. But it didn't work out."
"You didn't tell them you were a clone, did you?"
"No. That wasn't the problem. I had plenty of men interested in me."
"I'll bet."
No shortage of food on the Outworlds, but they were always short on women.
"But I quickly found out that I would never be considered a suitable mate for anyone there."
"Why not?"
She shrugged forlornly. "I'm sterile."
"Oh. Right."
Had forgot about that. All clones, male and female, are routinely sterilized at birth — at deincubation, rather. Injected with something that keeps the gonads from producing gametes without interferring with their hormone output.
As far as Outworlders are concerned, a woman who can't breed is not a real woman.
"So, I came back home," she said with forced brightness. "
She put one hand on the shoulder of a nearby urch and tousled the hair of another. "And found some people who really need me."
"Yeah, but you were free to come and go as you pleased out there. Earthside you're — "
"A mother — something I can't be anywhere else."
The realization hit me then. I'm a little slow, but eventually I get there.
"You're Wendy!"
She curtsied. "At your service."
"Hear you're a real mother to them."
"I try."
"Wendy bes mom ev!" It was B.B. He had squeezed in beside her and was grinning up at both of us. "An Sig bes fren. Protectee."
Circuits were beginning to come to life, correlations were forming in my pitiful brain.
"You hired that actor to hire me to…to…"
She nodded, smiling. "Of course! Me and my Joey Jose holosuit."
It all fit. Someone had been snatching her children and returning them damaged. She had wanted it stopped and so she came to me — or rather, sent someone to me.
"Why me?"
"Because you don't quit."
Shrugged that off. Probably just trying to get on my good side.
"Why didn't you come yourself?"
"I wasn't sure you'd take the job from me. I know how you feel about clones. Besides, Spinner was always hovering about. I couldn't risk him spotting me."
"Doubt he'd recognize you."
"This is the real me," she said, twirling a strand of brown hair around her finger.
"You look nice," I said before realizing it.
"Why, thank you, Sig." She was staring at me, her eyes soft and wondering. "You've changed, haven't you?"
Shook my head. "Not a bit. Why should I?"
"I don't know. And I can't say exactly what it is, but you're different."
"My hair — combing it different."
Which was true. Now that I just had a little scar where my button used to be, I could keep my hair shorter and not have to worry about that little metal nubin showing.
"No, I mean different inside. And by the way, I've been wanting to ask you for two standard years now — "
That was a giveaway that she'd spent some time on the Outworlds — only Outworlders talked about "standard" years.
"— about that greencard you returned to me at the shuttleport."
Felt myself tighten up inside. Didn't want her figuring out that I'd done something stupid like changing the worthless phony card Barkham had given her to a genuine counterfeit Realpeople card. She'd probably get all sorts of wrong ideas then.
"What about it?"
"It felt…different.""
"It worked, didn't it? So don't complain." Then I thought of something: "Wait a bit. How'd you get back Earthside without Spinner finding out?"
"Simple," she said with a mischievous smile. "I declared citizenship on Neeka, changed my legal name, and came back on a visitor's pass."
"But that only gives you a limited stay."
"As far as Central Data is concerned, Jean Double came to Earth as a visitor and disappeared."
"'Jean Double,' huh? You've gotten pretty glossy since you left."
"I'm not as naive as I was two standards ago, if that's what you mean."
Laughed. "Nobody is!"
She laughed, too, and I liked the sound.
"But is this it?" I said, looking around at the Lost Boys' tunnel village. "This is it for the rest of your life?"
"It's not so bad." She hooked her arm around mine and I felt a strange tingle run up to my shoulder. "Come on. I'll give you the tour."
The kids fell back, then followed us in a herd as she led me toward the greenery. Watched her out of the corner of my eye. She thought I'd changed? She'd changed! This was not the dumb woman-child clone of two years ago walking at my side. She was a grown-up — content, assured, self-confident. More than her hair had changed. Seemed to me she'd made major changes under that hair.
"The daybars were here before I came, but the children never took advantage of the artificial sunlight. I had them collect some soil from the upper tunnels, steal seedlings from a few choice window boxes, and here we are: fresh vegetables."
"Filamentous," I said, and meant it.
She led me through the old station, showed me the various models of hut. Did my best to appear interested, but couldn't get a certain question out of my mind. Finally, when she stopped and showed me her own hut, I asked it: "How come you're wasting your life down here?"
She turned on me like a tiger. "Waste? I don't call this wasting my life!"
"Bloaty. What do you call it then?"
"Doing some good! Making a difference! And I don't need your dregging Realpeople seal of approval to make it matter to me, either!"
"Making a difference?" She was getting me riled. "What difference? They're still going to grow up and move upside with no legal existence and try to scratch out a living in the shadow strata."
She turned away. "I know. But maybe they'll be just a little bit better people because of what I've done for them down here. And maybe…just maybe…"
"Maybe what?"
"Maybe they won't all have to move into the shadow strata. Maybe some of them can go somewhere else."
"Like where?"
"The Outworlds.""
Too stunned to speak as she turned around and faced me with all this hope beaming from her eyes. Jean Harlow the clone had a Big Idea. A Dream.
That can be dangerous.
"Did they make you travel back and forth from the Outworlds in an unshielded cabin or something?" I said when I'd regained my voice. "Being out there must have affected your mind."