Starfish

At first she thinks she's gone blind; the cubby seems so dark to her uncapped eyes, walls and furniture receding into mere suggestions of shadow. She remembers turning the lights down in increments in the days since Ballard's departure, darkening this room, darkening every other corner of Beebe Station. Lubin's been doing it too, although they never talk about it.

For the first time she wonders at their actions. It doesn't make sense; eyecaps compensate automatically for changes in ambient light, always serve up the same optimum intensity to the retina. Why choose to live in a darkness you don't even perceive?

She nudges the lights up a bit; the cubby brightens. Bright colors jar the eye against a background of gray on gray. The hydrox tank reflects fluorescent orange; readouts wink red and blue and green; the handle on the bulkhead locker is a small exclamation of yellow. She can't remember the last time she noticed color; eyecaps draw the faintest images from darkness, but most of the spectrum gets lost in the process. Only now, when the lights are up, can color reassert itself.

She doesn't like it. It seems raw and out of place down here. Clarke puts her eyecaps back in, dims the lights to their usual minimal glow. The bulkhead fades to a comforting wash of blue pastels.

Just as well. Shouldn't get too careless anyway.

In a couple of days Beebe will be crawling with a full staff. She doesn't want to get used to exposing herself.

Rome

Neotenous

It didn't look human at first. It didn't even look alive. It looked like a pile of dirty rags someone had thrown against the base of the Cambie pylon. Gerry Fischer wouldn't have looked twice if the skytrain hadn't hissed overhead at exactly the right moment, strobing the ground with segmented strips of light.

He stared. Eyes, flashing in and out of shadow, stared back.

He didn't move until the train had slid away along its overhead track. The world fell back into muddy low contrast. The sidewalk. The strip of kudzu₄ below the track, gray and suffocating under countless drizzlings of concrete dust. Feeble cloudbank reflections of neon and laser from Commercial.

And this thing with the eyes, this rag-pile against the pylon. A boy.

A young boy.

This is what you do when you really love someone, Shadow always said. After all, the kid could die out here.

"Are you okay?" he said at last.

The pile of rags shifted a little, and whimpered.

"It's okay. I won't hurt you."

"I'm lost," it said, in a very strange voice.

Fischer took a step forward. “You a ref?” The nearest refugee strip was over a hundred kilometers away, and well guarded, but sometimes someone would get out.

The eyes swung from side to side: no.

But then, Fischer thought, what else would he say? Maybe he’s afraid I’ll turn him in.

"Where do you live?" he asked, and listened closely to the answer:

"Orlando."

No hint of Asian or Hindian in that voice. Back when Fischer was a kid his mom would always tell him that disasters were color-blind, but he knew better now. The kid sounded N’Am; not a ref, then. Which meant there would probably be people looking for him.

Which, in a way, was too —

Stop it.

"Orlando,” he repeated aloud. “You are lost. Where's your mom and dad?"

"Hotel." The rag pile detached itself from the pylon and shuffled closer. "Vanceattle." The words came out half-whistled, as though the kid was speaking through his sinuses. Maybe he had one of those, those — Fischer groped for the words — cleft palates, or something.

"Vanceattle? Which one?"

Shrug.

"Don't you have a watch?"

"Lost it."

You've got to help him, Shadow said.

"Well, um, look." Fischer rubbed at his temples. "I live close by. We can call from there."

There weren't that many Vanceattles in the lower mainland. The police wouldn't have to find out. And even if they did, they wouldn't charge him. Not for this. What was he supposed to do, leave the kid for body parts?

"I'm Gerry," Fischer said.

"Kevin."

Kevin looked about nine or ten. Old enough that he should know how to use a public terminal, anyway. But there was something wrong with him. He was too tall and skinny, and his limbs tangled up in themselves when he walked. Maybe he was brain damaged. Maybe one of those nanotech babies that went bad. Or maybe his mother just spent too much time outdoors when she was pregnant.

Fischer led Kevin up to his two-room timeshare. Kevin dropped onto the couch without asking. Fischer checked the fridge: root beer. The boy took it with a nervous smile. Fischer sat down beside him and put a reassuring hand on Kevin's lap.

The expression drained from Kevin's face as though someone had pulled a plug.

Go on, Shadow said. He's not complaining, is he?