“Probably. We have to talk, Kim.”
She immediately got serious. Alex took her by the hand, led her into the room, and made her sit down in a chair. He sat down in front of her, then got out his cigarettes and lit up.
“Give me a cigarette.”
Alex lit another cigarette and handed it to her.
“We have to talk” is a magic phrase. One of the few that instantly puts a person into a serious mode. No one ever says it in order to talk about the weather or to discuss weekend plans.
It is very instructive to watch the reaction of a person expecting a serious conversation. Some people get nervous, some withdraw into themselves, some prepare for a confrontation.
Kim simply braced herself.
“What is your name? Your full name?”
“Kim O’Hara.”
“How old are you?”
“Fourteen. As of one month ago.”
“Are you from Quicksilver Pit?”
“No.” Kim shook her head.
“Then where are you from?”
“I won’t answer that.”
Alex sighed. He never expected this conversation to be easy, but the girl’s tone of voice was really beginning to trouble him.
“Kim, I must know.”
“Why?”
The girl switched to a counterattack.
“Kim, do you have friends or relatives on Quicksilver Pit?”
Silence.
“How long have you been on this planet?”
“What is it to you?”
Great. Why did it have to be this way? You try to help, and all you get is ingratitude!
“All right.” Alex interrupted the silence that had stretched between them. “Let’s figure out why I need to know this. Yesterday, I pulled you through an off-track metamorphosis. Right?”
Kim took a deep breath and exhaled audibly. Whispered:
“I am thankful, friend-spesh…”
“You don’t have to thank me. I could not act otherwise, so I can take no credit for that. But for the same reason that I had to help you…”
Kim looked at him in surprise.
“For that very reason, I can’t just walk away and leave you to your fate. Do you need help?”
The girl lowered her eyes.
“Do you or don’t you?” asked Alex harshly. “I got hired onto a ship. Okay? In a couple of days, I’m leaving Quicksilver Pit, and I may be gone for a very long time. Do you need help?”
“Yes. I do.”
“That’s better.”
Well, no, it wasn’t really better. But at least it was out in the open.
Kim got up, went over to the window, and stood still, gazing into the dim evening sky. She stuck her hands in her pockets and again stood still, having suddenly lost all her happy enthusiasm.
Alex bit his lip. Was this real, or was she just pretending? Either way, it was useless. Apparently the girl did not really understand the reason why he cared about her.
“Where are you from, Kim?”
“Edem.”
“How in the world did you end up here?” Alex was feverishly trying to visualize the route. Damn… the opposite side of the human sector of space! No less than seven hyper-channel trips or a direct jump in a courier ship. But there were no direct flights from Edem to Quicksilver Pit. There was no demand for them at all. “You’re very far away from home.”
“I don’t have a home anymore. I ran away from my family.”
“Why? No, never mind. That’s not important. How did you get over to Quicksilver Pit?”
“I’m gifted.”
“I believe you, Kim. But before the metamorphosis, you were legally still a minor. To traverse two hundred light years without any documents, or any money…”
“Who said I had no money?”
Alex nodded. She was right.
“All right. But why Quicksilver Pit?”
“I had my reasons to head nowhere but here.”
“Kim… if you won’t trust me, like you trusted me yesterday, it won’t work between us.”
“And what is supposed to work?”
It seemed she was crying, after all. Quietly, inaudibly. To walk over to her now, to hug her, to console her, would be the most natural thing to do. And absolutely the wrong thing to do.
“Are you a fighter-spesh?”
“I guess so.”
“What do you mean, you guess so? Kim, every child-spesh knows what he or she is going to be. If a geisha-girl and a boy-doctor play doctor together, they play differently. The girl will be interested in the erotic part of the game. She’ll study the rudimentary sexual reactions. The boy will try to listen to her chest, get her pulse, feel her bone structure, and examine her tonsils. If an architect-child builds a sand castle, that castle will last for a week. How did you play as a kid? Did you like to fight?”
“Yes.”
“Did you win?”
“Of course.”
“What about playing with dolls?”
“I wouldn’t mind a doll even now.” Kim giggled suddenly. “When I ran away from home, I took Lucita with me. She’s my favorite doll. But she was lost with my bag… on a ship.”
Alex rubbed his forehead. He had had occasion to see girl-speshes who were honed to become fighters. Did they play with dolls? Maybe, but for some reason, he thought that the future fighters were more likely to use their dolls for practice, as punch dummies…
“I played doctor, too,” said Kim suddenly. “But I don’t know what was more interesting to me—the pulse rate, or the sexual reactions.”
“Kim, my ship needs a fighter-spesh.”
The girl turned to him.
“Really?”
“Yes. But you have no ID. And no fighter certificate, either. How about we go to the nearest clinic tomorrow, run a genetic analysis, and have your new documents issued?”
“No!”
“Why not?”
“They’ll come looking for me, don’t you see that?”
“You’ve had your metamorphosis. You’re of age now. Even if, according to your specialization agreement, you owe your parents the reimbursement of its cost, that can’t infringe on your individual rights…”
“No!”
Her voice had risen to a shout. To keep insisting would be pointless.
“But you have nothing against employment on a ship?”
“Nothing.”
“I’ll think of something, Kim. If you are really a fighter-spesh, then everything’s all right.”
The girl looked at him, frowning. Alex patiently waited.
“Why do you even bother helping me?”
He answered with a question. “How much do you know about pilot-speshes?”
“Nothing. Well, you told me you guys have strong bones and a good eye…”
“And we also have a heightened sense of responsibility. A pilot never forsakes his crew or his passengers.”
“But… I’m not your crew…” The girl came closer to him, sat down on the floor beside his chair, looked deep into his eyes.
“Yesterday, I had no crew, Kim. I helped you out on the monorail, fed you… and things just kept going from there. So there’s no point thanking me for my selfless kindness. That’s just the way I’m made. See?”
“How strange…” All her recent tears had vanished without a trace. Kim stretched out her hand, touched Alex’s face. “So you’re… not free?”
“What makes you say that?”
Her hand was caressing his face, slowly, as though she were a blind girl, exploring his features.
“You are forced to be kind and caring…”
“Kim, we are all forced to do different things. A soldier has a duty to give his life for humanity, a doctor to save the life of a patient, a pilot to protect his crew. Even the naturals aren’t any more free than we are. We speshes change at the moment of metamorphosis, when the nucleic bombs go off. The naturals are also coerced all their lives as well, by their parents, school, society…”