Children of Steel Page 9

  "You wouldn't be able to enlighten me on what happened now, could you?" he continued.

  "I'm not sure I know what you're talking about officer," answered Gabe from the other couch.

  "If a Wolf walks out of that bathroom before I get an answer, I'm afraid I'll have to drag you all down to the station. You see, we found a gun there, and those boys were all too young to be possessing one."

  "Self defense," I said sitting up on the couch. Kathy had slid off me while the officer had been talking.

  "Oh, do you mind explaining please?"

  "Well, they attacked us and I beat them up."

  "Just you?" he asked looking skeptical

  I stood up turned around and picked up the couch, Kathy and all.

  "Do I look like I need any help?" I asked setting the couch, and a surprised Kathy, back down.

  "I guess not, but what about the gun?"

  "If I had needed it would I have left it behind? Anyway if he hadn't pulled it, I wouldn't have broken his arm."

  "Well as we only found his prints on it and no traces of Leopard, Wolf, or Fox. I'm inclined to believe you." He smiled, "Plus he was wearing a holster, that was a big hole in his story. But there is this matter of the broken arm."

  "Officer," put in Karen, "It was self defense, and he did draw a weapon. The law does give Raj here the right to defend himself. Furthermore as there were three humans in the party, a rather convincing argument could be made that he was protecting us from the gunman."

  He gave her a sidelong glance, "What are you a lawyer?"

  "Third year law student," she said smiling.

  "Hmmph, it figures. But we still don't like to have these kinds of things happening around here. I'm still going to have to get your names, and ID's. I suggest you keep out of trouble."

  "What's the big deal?" I asked as I handed him my company ID tag, "So I broke his arm, that can be fixed in a day or two. I didn't kill him."

  "He just might get a lawyer and sue you," said the officer.

  “He could try and make the argument that breaking his arm was an excessive use of force against him.”

  "But I thought we were allowed to defend ourselves here?" I was definitely confused.

  "Oh, you are. But he can still try to sue you for assault, excessive use of force or whatever. And there ain't a thing you can do about it. If say he was dead and you can prove self-defense, then you're pretty much safe."

  "I don’t think I want to kill some kid for just being stupid, even if there was a gun involved.” To me that just sounded really excessive. “So what do you suggest I do next time?"

  "Try not to break any arms, at least not if they can identify you," he said with a wink. "But I wouldn't worry about it too much. After all, you'll be off planet in a week or two and we sure aren't going to supply him with your names. He's also got a bad reputation and the judge will probably throw out anything he tries to file."

  "But if he's dead can't his family sue?" I was still a bit bewildered.

  "Nope, nobody can sue for another here. Also while a human can sue an animan, you can't sue him back," put in Kathy.

  "Not exactly fair I guess," I sighed.

  "No," said the officer, "But we're working on it." He had finished taking Gabe's and my information. We told him Dave's and he said goodbye and left.

  "What was that all about?" Asked Dave sticking his head out of the bathroom once the officer was gone.

  "Oh, just about our little run in last night," answered Gabe.

  "Do we have to go until the heat dies down? Or do we get to enjoy our leave?"

  "We stay. See Dave I keep telling you this place is alright."

  "Wait a second," I was still confused. "That was alright? What's bad then?"

  "Bad is where we have to beat feet for the ship in orbit, and usually out of the local police's jurisdiction." Said Dave.

  "Real bad is where they stick you in jail or worse," added Gabe making like he had a noose around his head.

  "You guys have been in trouble like this before?" asked Karen.

  "Not me I'm new to the game," I said.

  "I've seen it some before," said Gabe. "Dave here's the one with the most experience. Right Dave?"

  "Well," he said toweling off in the doorway, "I've been around a few more places than these two and in a lot of places we'd have had to have left town last night. Or we wouldn't be leaving at all."

  "I can't believe that," said Karen.

  "I can." Kathy said quietly.

  We all turned and looked at her. She looked around the room at us.

  "My father hates animen, won't even allow them on the farm he owns." She looked at me and smiled softly, "if he knew that I spent last night with one he'd disown me at the very least. And he'd kill you."

  "You didn’t sleep with me just to get back at your dad I hope!" I said.

  "That was why I went to the bar, you won on own your own merits last night though," she admitted. "But he was against my going to college at all. Wouldn't even help me pay for it, said it was a waste to send a woman to college. I think I know now why my Mom left him. Too bad the court awarded him custody."

  "Sorry to hear that," I said putting my arms around her and pulling her closer.

  "How do your folks feel about animen?" I asked Karen.

  Both her and Gabe started to laugh at that. I even heard Terry and Dave giggling in the bathroom.

  "Yes? What gives?" I asked when the noise died down.

  "Well, you see ..." Karen started and hesitated.

  "Her dad's a Wolf," Dave called out from the bathroom.

  "Actually he's just my Stepdad," she continued. "You see, he was the manager of my parent’s farm and his family lived on the property. His wife was a soil specialist and one day her and my Dad were flying out to one of the fields to check on some new crop he had decided to try. Unfortunately the copter crashed killing them both.

  "Anyway, our families had always been close and over the next couple of years we got closer and closer. One morning my Mom comes into the kitchen and tells us that they're getting married. So at the age of twelve I gained two brothers and a sister, the later of whom I shared a room with for quite a few years."

  "I remember when my father heard about that, he was fit to be tied!" Grinned Kathy. "Especially as your Mom has a lot more land and money than he does. The thought of an animan being richer than him was just too much."

  "Well that's both ends of the spectrum, what about Terry?" I asked.

  "Oh, my parents would be scandalized to find out I was sleeping with a man 'Out of Wedlock'. I don't think the who of it would make that much of a difference," she answered from the bathroom. "You have to remember that a lot of the people who colonized this part of the planet were escaping a society that believed in persecution, and most of us haven't forgotten that."

  I found all of this very interesting and food for thought. I really didn't know that much about the greater society I was now a member of, even if I wasn't a full member. They had taught us back at the crèche that we would face some resentment, but that it would mostly be from fringe groups. They also said that people would distrust us because we were engineered and that it was just the old 'Master Race' syndrome.

  But here I am on what is a fairly accepting planet and yet when accosted in the street, I almost get into trouble for defending myself. Of course on the other hand I had just spent the night sleeping with a human, while my friends had done the same. I looked at Kathy and smiled while I thought of last night. Obviously they hadn't told us the whole story at school, I wondered if that was intentional, or just due to the many varying laws and customs of the different planets? It was going to take time to figure this all out.

  "What are you thinking about?" asked Kathy smiling back at me.

  "Last night," and gave her a kiss.

  Dave and Terry walked into the room then.

  "Let's go folks, we're ready," announced Dave.

  We headed down to the corner cafe and got brea
kfast. It was a nice place and quite a few of the customers were animen, so we didn't stand out. The sight of the six of us didn't even seem to turn any heads.

  "This is the border between the college and the ani quarter of town," Kathy said quietly in my ear when she noticed my looking around. "So mixed couples like us are pretty common. There are parts of town where we would draw looks."

  "Let's avoid those; I don't think I need anymore trouble."

  "You know what's really funny?" She asked with an amused expression on her face.

  "What?"

  "If our sexes were reversed, most of those same people who would object to us wouldn't even think twice about it."

  "You're kidding, aren't you?"

  "Nope, my Dad thought nothing of the fox my older brother was screwing when he went to school. He couldn't bring her around the house of course, but it didn't bother him at all. But let him see a human girl with an animan, he'd blow up for sure."

  "I thought women were supposed to be equal in human society?"

  "Not everybody thinks so it seems. But at least the law says so, and he can't change that!"

  This was a really strange thought, I didn't know that humans could be so divided amongst themselves, at the schools and the corporation they’d always seemed to put on a united front. I could understand about countries, and different corporations. There people were competing for resources and the rewards that control of those things could bring. But why say somebody couldn't do something because of their sex? I was beginning to wonder just what had been left out of my education.

  "If I told Herza that she couldn't do something just because she was a female, she'd mop the ship with me." I told Kathy as we sat down.

  "Who's Herza?" She asked me.

  "One of the Leopards in my clan on ship," I replied.

  "And one of his girlfriends!" Gabe chipped in.

  "Oh?" replied Kathy her eyes sparkling, "Just one?"

  "No, four actually!" Gabe said with a laugh, "Raj is very popular with the ladies'."

  Did you ever try to blush with a furry face? I did.

  "Really Raj? Four girlfriends!" Kathy asked.

  I looked up from my feet and at her face, realizing she wasn't mad, just teasing.

  "Uh, it's something like that," I admitted. True I’d never slept with Herza or Terease, but I wasn’t going to tell Gabe that.

  "You know, you never did answer that question last night, how old are you anyway?"

  "Weeell," I looked around the table, Gabe and Dave knew but I could she the girls were all interested. "Fifteen actually," I sort of mumbled.

  "Kathy, you cradle robber you!" Laughed Karen.

  "Don't talk," I said pointing at Gabe, "He's only sixteen."

  "What?" that stopped her, and Kathy started laughing then.

  "Hey, thanks Raj!" Gabe glared at me.

  "Payback's a bitch Gabe," I smiled.

  "You earned that one Gabe," Karen said smiling. "Anyway I like 'em young."

  "And how old are you?" Terry asked Dave.

  "Oh, I'm an old man of twenty five; they just send me out to keep an eye on all these kids."

  "Fifteen Raj?" asked Kathy, "What about all that schooling you had to go through?"

  "If I hadn't opted for the shuttle training I would have been sent out at fourteen, like the rest of my group. As for school they started me at two and we don't get that much. I thought you knew that."

  "I guess I did, I just never really gave it any thought. You sure don't act like fifteen."

  "It's like you said last night, we mature faster. Designed that way I guess so the corporations can get us in to work sooner. I'm almost at my full growth now," I explained.

  "You mean you're going to get bigger?" Said Karen. "You're already the largest leopard I've ever seen, and I've seen a few," she smiled at that last part.

  "I've just got a few more pounds to fill out here and there; I don't think I'll get much taller."

  At this point the waitress came by and we made our orders, I surprised everybody by ordering two breakfasts, which I blamed on Kathy and last night. Kathy promptly blushed. After the waitress had left Gabe picked up where we had left off.

  "Really though Raj, was everybody in your group so big?"

  "Actually no, I was the only one." I really wasn't too happy about the direction the conversation was taking.

  "So why are you so big anyway? Do you know why?" He continued.

  "Umm, I would really rather not talk about that right now," I said quietly, "maybe later."

  It got quiet for a second then he changed the subject.

  "So where can we rent a copter for our trip?" he asked Karen.

  "There's a heliport just down the road from here. We can grab a taxi after we eat."

  The talk changed then to where to go and what to see. I kept pretty quiet, as Gabe's question had brought back some unpleasant memories. Kathy snuggled up closer and put her hand on my leg, and we ate breakfast like that.

  I felt better by the time I had started on the second plate and everybody was amazed I could shovel away so much. I just smiled and ate, it was the first non-ship meal I'd had in months. It tasted delicious.

  We finished then paid the bill and left, stopping back at the apartment to grab a few things. It didn't take too long to get a taxi and a short while latter we were at the heliport.

  Gabe and I went inside to show our licenses and take care of the paperwork. We got a small dual control six passenger job, and gave it a good once over before letting everybody board. When Karen asked about that Gabe answered, "This wasn't maintained by anybody we know, so I'm not getting into it without a good look first."

  We both passed on it and everybody climbed in. The copter is a pretty simple device in theory; it's a little trickier in practice. It's not a true helicopter, as the rotors are mounted on wings which rotate ninety degrees for forward flight like a plane. It can land damn near anywhere though, and is pretty fast at cruise. It not only combined the best parts of the helicopter with a plane, but some of the worst as well. They only got to be a headache if you lost an engine.

  Gabe let me have the pilot's seat for the outbound trip, and after Karen said where we should go, Kathy grabbed a map and played navigator. We cruised around the city twice with the girls pointing out some of the local landmarks, before traffic control asked us politely not to go for a third circuit. Then we headed out to the mountains they had talked about.

  On the way out we first passed over the factories that ringed the city, this quickly gave way to a green belt of parks, and then farms. When we had gotten up to ten thousand feet, Karen got our attention and pointed out to the northwest.

  "See those fields out on the horizon there?" everybody looked where she was pointing, "That's the beginning of my family's farm, it goes on for another two hundred and fifty miles. It's one of the biggest farms in the area."

  I was pretty impressed by that. What I also found interesting was that there weren't any highways like I always saw on earth when I had been flying. But then the next nearest city was a thousand miles away. Hobson's planet still had a lot of growing to do.

  We traveled on for another hour heading towards the mountain range that cut across the continent. I followed Kathy's directions to a place that Karen had marked on the map. We ended up over a lake that was pretty secluded, but not too high up. I asked Karen where I should land, and she pointed to a clearing by the lake's edge and I landed there.

  By the time I had everything shut down and secured, everybody had already piled out, so I followed them. It was a nice warm day outside with a pleasant breeze.

  "I've been coming to this spot on and off for years. There's a lean to, with a fire pit and some other things just over that rise and in the trees. Come on I'll show you," Karen said as she led the way down along the shore of the lake.

  Sure enough, just inside the trees so it couldn't be seen from the air, was a lean to, a fire pit, and even a wood pile.

  "There's an outh
ouse down that trail," She pointed off to the left at a small footpath, "so nobody has to rough it too much. Now let’s go swimming!" She said with a mischievous smile and started stripping off her clothes.

  The others did the same and I followed suit. Everybody ran down and dove in and we all swam around, just goofing off and having a good time. By the time we had gotten out and dried off, the sun was starting to go down behind the mountains.

  "Anybody got anything against spending the night here?" asked Karen. "No? I thought so. Who wants to go get the packs out of the copter?"

  Gabe volunteered so Dave and I got started on putting together a fire in the fire pit while Karen went and gave Gabe a hand.

  By the time Gabe got back to the campsite, we had pretty well cleaned up the area. Karen and Terry took the food we’d brought along from their apartment and put together a fairly enjoyable meal cooking over the fire. While we ate Karen told us about some of the parties her and her brother’s used to have up here with their friends. Afterwards we sat around the campfire for a while and talked about the differences between our life styles. I could tell that Karen and Terry had both been through this before, but Kathy and I were both pretty curious about some things. Mostly because neither of us had had the chance to mingle with the other’s specie before, at least not socially. Kathy had a definite edge though, as animen were common here. For the most part my exposure to humans had been carefully regulated as I had grown up.

  We had put down a few beers, when Gabe asked quietly.

  "So fell like talking about it now Raj?"

  "Uh, talking about what?" I asked, but had a pretty good idea.

  "Your size, everybody's dying to know. If you don't mind talking about it that is." He looked at me, curiosity burning in his eyes.

  "Gabe, you must be the most prying person I ever met. Anyway, I don't think anybody is really that interested." I said, grinning to disarm my words.

  "Well, actually," said Kathy, "I wouldn't mind hearing it. That is if you don't mind telling us."

  I looked around the fire, and everyone else agreed. I was surprised that anybody would be that interested in me. I thought back to the whole incident, staring into the fire while I did so. I was unsure as to just how much of it to tell them, did I really want people to know the whole story? I looked at my two crewmates. They were the only ones who could really spread it around, but several people had already commented on my size, so something would have to be said. I made a decision.