The Wind From a Burning Woman: Six Stories of Science Fiction (29 page)

Old literature was not nearly as graphic as fibs, but it was different enough to involve her for a time. She tried to create imitations of what she read, but erased them. Nonfib stories were harder than she suspected. She read about punishment, duty; she read about places called heaven and hell, from a writer who had died tens of thousands of years before. With ed supplement guidance, she was able to comprehend most of what she read. Plugging the store into her implant, she was able to absorb hundreds of volumes in an hour.

Some of the stores were losing definition. They hadnt been used in decades, perhaps centuries.

Halfway through, she grew impatient. She left the research area. Operating on another hunch, she didnt go to the blister as directed, but straight to memory central, two decks inboard the research area. She saw Clevo there, plugged into a data pillar, deep in some aspect of ship history. He noticed her approach, unplugged, and swiveled on his chair. Congratulations, he said, smiling at her.

Hardfought, she acknowledged, smiling.

Better than that, perhaps, he said.

She looked at him quizzically. What do you mean, better?

Ive been doing some illicit tapping on over channels.

So?

He is dangerous!

Youve been recommended.

For what?

Not for hero status, not yet. Youll have a good many more fights before that. And you probably wont enjoy it when you get there. You wont be a fighter then.

Prufrax stood silently before him.

You may have a valuable genetic assortment. Overs think you behaved remarkably well under impossible conditions.

Did I?

He nodded. Your type may be preserved.

Which means?

Theres a program being planned. They want to take the best fighters and reproduce themclone themto make uniform topgrade squadrons. It was rumored in my timeyou havent heard?

She shook her head.

Its not new. Its been done, off and on, for tens of thousands of years. This time they believe they can make it work.

You were a fighter, once, she said. Did they preserve your type?

Clevo nodded. I had something that interested them, but not, I think, as a fighter.

Prufrax looked down at her stubby-fingered hands. It was grim, she said. You know what we found?

An extermination plant.

You want me to understand them better. Well, I cant. I refuse. How could they do such things? She looked disgusted and answered her own question. Because theyre Senexi.

Humans, Clevo said, have done much the same, sometimes worse.

No!

No!

Yes, he said firmly. He sighed. Weve wiped Senexi worlds, and weve even wiped worlds with intelligent species like our own. Nobody is innocent. Not in this universe.

We were never taught that.

It wouldnt have made you a better hawk. But it might make a better human of you, to know. Greater depth of character. Do you want to be more aware?

You mean, study more?

He nodded.

What makes you think you can teach me?

Because you thought about what I asked you. About how Senexi thought. And you survived where some other hawk might not have. The overs think its in your genes. It might be. But its also in your head.

Why not tell the overs?

I have, he said. He shrugged. Im too valuable to them, otherwise Id have been busted again, a long time ago.

They wouldnt want me to learn from you?

I dont know, Clevo said. I suppose theyre aware youre talking to me. They could stop it if they wanted. They may be smarter than I give them credit for. He shrugged again. Of course theyre smart. We just disagree at times.

And if I learn from you?

Not from me, actually. From the past. From history, what other people have thought. Im really not any more capable than you... but I know history, small portions of it. I wont teach you so much, as guide.

I did use your questions, Prufrax said. But will I ever need to use themthink that wayagain?

Clevo nodded. Of course.

Youre quiet.

Shes giving in to him.

She gave in a long time ago.

She should be afraid.

Were youweever really afraid of a challenge?

No.

Not Senexi, not forbidden knowledge.

Someone listens with us. Feel

Clevo first led her through the history of past wars, judging that was appropriate considering her occupation. She was attentive enough, though her mind wandered; sometimes he was didactic, but she found that didnt bother her much. At no time did his attitude change as they pushed through the tangle of the past. Rather her perception of his attitude changed. Her perception of herself changed.

She saw that in all wars, the first stage was to dehumanize the enemy, reduce the enemy to a lower level so that he might be killed without compunction. When the enemy was not human to begin with, the task was easier. As wars progressed, this tactic frequently led to an underestimation of the enemy, with disastrous consequences. We arent exactly underestimating the Senexi, Clevo said. The overs are too smart for that. But we refuse to understand them, and that could make the war last indefinitely.

Then why dont the overs see that?

Because were being locked into a pattern. Weve been fighting for so long, weve begun to lose ourselves. And its getting worse. He assumed his didactic tone, and she knew he was reciting something hed formulated years before and repeated to himself a thousand times. There is no war so important that to win it, we must destroy our minds.

She didnt agree with that; losing the war with the Senexi would mean extinction, as she understood things.

Most often they met in the single unused weapons blister that had not been damaged. They met when the ship was basking in the real between sponge-space jaunts. He brought memory stores with him in portable modules, and they read, listened, experienced together. She never placed a great deal of importance in the things she learned; her interest was focused on Clevo. Still, she learned.

The rest of her time she spent training. She was aware of a growing isolation from the hawks, which she attributed to her uncertain rank status. Was her genotype going to be preserved or not? The decision hadnt been made. The more she learned, the less she wanted to be singled out for honor. Attracting that sort of attention might be dangerous, she thought. Dangerous to whom, or what, she could not say.

Clevo showed her how hero images had been used to indoctrinate birds and hawks in a standard of behavior that was ideal, not realistic. The results were not always good; some tragic blunders had been made by fighters trying to be more than anyone possibly could or refusing to be flexible.

The war was certainly not a fib. Yet more and more the overs seemed to be treating it as one. Unable to bring about strategic victories against the Senexi, the overs had settled in for a long war of attrition and were apparently bent on adapting all human societies to the effort.

There are overs we never hear of, who make decisions that shape our entire lives. Soon theyll determine whether or not were even born, if they dont already.

That sounds paranoid, she said, trying out a new word and concept she had only recently learned.

Maybe so.

Besides, its been like that for agesnot knowing all our overs.

But its getting worse, Clevo said. He showed her the projections he had made. In time, if trends continued unchanged, fighters and all other combatants would be treated more and more mechanically, until they became the machines the overs wished them to be.

No.

Quiet. How does he feel toward her?

It was inevitable that as she learned under his tutelage, he began to feel responsible for her changes. She was an excellent fighter. He could never be sure that what he was doing might reduce her effectiveness. And yet he had fought welldespite similar changesuntil his billet switch. It had been the overs who had decided he would be more effective, less disruptive, elsewhere.

Bitterness over that decision was part of his motive. The overs had done a foolish thing, putting a fighter into research. Fighters were tenacious. If the truth was to be hidden, then fighters were the ones likely to ferret it out. And pass it on. There was a code among fighters, seldom revealed to their immediate overs, much less to the supreme overs parsecs distant in their strategospheres. What one fighter learned that could be of help to another had to be passed on, even under penalty. Clevo was simply following that unwritten rule.

Passing on the fact that, at one time, things had been different. That war changed people, governments, societies, and that societies could effect an enormous change on their constituents, especially nowchange in their lives, their thinking. Things could become even more structured. Freedom of fight was a drug, an illusion

No!

used to perpetuate a state of hatred.

Then why do they keep all the data in stores? she asked. I mean, you study the data, everything becomes obvious.

There are still important people who think we may want to find our way-back someday. Theyre afraid well lose our roots, but

His face suddenly became peaceful. She reached out to touch him, and he jerked slightly, turning toward her in the blister. What is it? she asked.

Its not organized. Were going to lose the information. Ship overs are going to restrict access more and more. Eventually itll decay, like some already has in these stores. Ive been planning for some time to put it all in a single unit

He built the mandate!

and have the overs place one on every ship, with researchers to tend it. Formalize the loose scheme still in effect, but dying. Right now Im working on the fringes. At least Im allowed to work. But soon Ill have enough evidence that they wont be able to argue. Evidence of what happens to societies that try to obscure their histories. They go quite mad. The overs are still rational enough to listen; maybe Ill push it through. He looked out the transparent blister. The stars were smudging to one side as the cruiser began probing for entrances to sponge space. Wed better get back.

Where are you going to be when we return? Well all be transferred.

Thats some time removed. Why do you want to know?

Id like to learn more.

He smiled. Thats not your only reason.

I dont need someone to tell me what my reasons are, she said testily.

Were so reluctant, he said. She looked at him sharply, irritated and puzzled. I mean, he continued, were hawks. Comrades. Hawks couple like that. He snapped his fingers. But you and I sneak around it all the time.

Prufrax kept her face blank.

Arent you receptive toward me? he asked, his tone almost teasing.

Youre so damned superior. Stuffy, she snapped.

Arent you?

Its just thats not all, she said, her tone softening.

Indeed, he said in a barely audible whisper.

In the distance they heard the alarms.

It was never any different.

What?

Things were never any different before me.

Dont be silly. Its all here.

If Clevo made the mandate, then he put it here. It isnt true.

Why are you upset?

I dont like hearing that everything I believe is a... fib.

Ive never known the difference, I suppose. Eyes-open was never all that real to me. This isnt real, you arent... this is eyes-shut. So why be upset? You and I... we arent even whole people. I feel you. You wish the Zap, you fight, not much else. Im just a shadow, even compared to you. But she is whole. She loves him. Shes less a victim than either of us. So something has to have changed.

Youre saying things have gotten worse.

If the mandate is a lie, thats all I am. You refuse to accept. I have to accept, or Im even less than a shadow.

I dont refuse to accept. Its just hard.

You started it. You thought about love.

You did!

Do you know what love is?

Reception.

They first made love in the weapons blister. It came as no surprise; if anything, they approached it so cautiously they were clumsy. She had become more and more receptive, and he had dropped his guard. It had been quick, almost frantic, far from the orchestrated and drawn-out ballet the hawks prided themselves for. There was no pretense. No need to play the roles of artists interacting. They were depending on each other. The pleasure they exchanged was nothing compared to the emotions involved.

Were not very good with each other, Prufrax said.

Clevo shrugged. Thats because were shy.

Shy?

He explained. In the pastat various times in the past, because such differences had come and gone many times making love had been more than a physical exchange or even an expression of comradeship. It had been the acknowledgment of a bond between people.

She listened, half-believing. Like everything else she had heard, that kind of love seemed strange, distasteful. What if one hawk was lost, and the other continued to love? It interfered with the hardfought, certainly. But she was also fascinated. Shynessthe fear of ones presentation to another. The hesitation to present truth, or the inward confusion of truth at the awareness that another might be important, more important than one thought possible. That such emotions might have existed at one time, and seem so alien now, only emphasized the distance of the past, as Clevo had tried to tell her. And that she felt those emotions only confirmed she was not as far from that past as, for dignitys sake, she might have wished.

Complex emotion was not encouraged either at the Grounds or among hawks on station. Complex emotion degraded complex performance. The simple and direct was desirable.

But all we seem to do is talkuntil now, Prufrax said, holding his hand and examining his fingers one by one. They were very little different from her own, though extended a bit from hawk fingers to give greater versatility with key instruction.

Talking is the most human thing we can do.

She laughed. I know what you are, she said, moving up until her eyes were even with his chest. Youre stuffy. You arent me party type.