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“Really? Who was paying your wages? Earth was. The people that hate us.”
“They don’t hate us,” Bobbie said, her voice tired. “They’re afraid of us.”
“Then why do they act like they hate us?” David’s father said with something like triumph.
“Because that’s what fear looks like when it needs someplace to go.”
David’s mother seemed to appear behind the three of them like some sort of magic trick. She wasn’t there, and then she was, her restraining hand on her husband’s shoulder. Her smile was humorless and undeniable.
“We’re here for David tonight,” she said.
“Yes,” Pop-Pop said, rubbing his palm against the back of Aunt Bobbie’s hand, soothing her. “For David.”
His father’s face set into an annoyed mask, but Aunt Bobbie nodded.
“You’re right,” she said. “I’m sorry, David. Dad, I’m sorry. I’ve just had a really rough day and probably too much to drink.”
“It’s all right, angel,” Pop-Pop said. Tears brightened his eyes.
“I just thought that by now I’d have some idea of…of who I was. Of what I was going to do next, and…”
“I know, angel. We all know what you’re going through.”
She laughed at that, wiping her eyes with the back of her hand. “All us of but me, then.”
The rest of the evening went just the way those things were supposed to go. People laughed and argued and drank. His father tried to call for silence and make a little speech about how proud he was, but one of the kid cousins was whispering and tapping on his hand terminal all the way through it. A few people gave David small, discreet presents of money to help him set up his dorm in Salton. Uncle Istvan’s new wife gave him an unpleasant, boozy kiss before gathering herself up and walking out with Istvan on her arm. They took a rental cart back home, his parents and Aunt Bobbie and him. He couldn’t shake the image of her weeping at the table. You step outside, though, and then what?
The cart’s wheels sounded sticky against the corridor floors. The lights had dimmed all through Breach Candy, simulating a twilight he’d never actually seen. Somewhere, the sun would slip below a horizon, a blue sky darken. He’d seen it in pictures, on video. In his life, though, it was just that the LEDs changed color and intensity. David leaned his head against one of the cart’s support poles, letting the vibration of the engines and the wheels translate directly into his skull. It felt comfortable. His mother, sitting beside him, pressed her hand against his shoulder, and he had the powerful physical memory of coming back from a party when he’d been very young. Six, maybe seven years old. He remembered putting his head in her lap, fading into sleep with the texture of her slacks against his cheek. That was never going to happen again. The woman beside him hardly even seemed to be the same person, and in a few months, he wouldn’t see her anymore. Not like he did now. And what would she have done if she knew about Hutch? About Leelee? His mother smiled at him, and it looked like love, but it was love for some other boy. The one she thought he was. He smiled back because he was supposed to.
When they got home, he went straight back to his room. He’d been around people enough. The cheesy generic wall was still up, and he shifted it back to Una Meing. Massive dark eyes with mascara on the lashes looked out at him. He dropped to the bed. Outside, Aunt Bobbie and his father were talking. He listened for a buzz of anger in their voices, but it wasn’t there. They were just talking. The water pipes started to whine. His mother taking her evening bath. Everything small and domestic and safe, and out there somewhere, Leelee was working off her debt. She’d asked for his help, and he’d failed. And Hutch. Maybe he’d always been scared of Hutch. Maybe that was what had made cooking for him seem like the right thing. The wise thing, even. Hutch was the kind of dangerous that could make people into property. Could take them and make them disappear. Being part of that world was fun. Exciting. It was a way to step outside all the good student, good son, good prospects crap that was his life. So what that it scared him now? So what that Leelee was probably being rented out to whoever had the money and David wouldn’t see her again? He’d made his choice, and this was the consequence.
Una Meing stared out at him, soulful and erotic. David turned out the lights, grabbed a pillow, and pulled it over his head. As his mind began to fragment down into sleep, Leelee kept coming back to him. Her face. Her voice. The soft, almost gentle way Hutch had said, I own Leelee and You don’t have enough to clear her debts. He wished that he did. He walked into a bleak, prison-like room that was half dream and half imagination. Leelee shied back from the sudden light and then saw who it was, and her face lit up. David, she said, how did you do it? How did you save me?
And with an almost electrical shock, he knew the answer.
He sat up, turned on the light. Una Meing’s sly-sad smile seemed more knowing than it had before. Took you long enough. He checked the time: well past midnight. It didn’t matter. It wouldn’t wait. He listened at his door for a few seconds. No voices except the professional enunciation of the newsfeed announcer. David took his hand terminal out of his satchel, sat on the edge of his bed, and put in the connection request. He didn’t expect an answer, but Steppan’s face appeared on the screen almost instantly.
“Big Dave! Hey,” Steppan said. “Heard about your placement. Good going, cousin.”
“Thanks,” David said, keeping his voice low. “But look, I need a favor.”
“Sure,” Steppan said.
“You have lab time?”
“More time than sleep,” Steppan said ruefully. “But you’ve got placement. You don’t need to scrounge for lab hours anymore.”
“Kind of do. And I could use an extra hand.”
“How long are we talking about?”
“Ten hours,” David said. “Maybe a little more. But some of that’s waiting, so you can do your own stuff too. And I’ll help with your work if you help with mine.”
Steppan shrugged.
“All right. I’ve got hours tomorrow starting at eight. You know where my space is?”
“Do,” David said.
“See you there,” Steppan said and dropped the connection. So that was the first part. David’s mind was already leaping ahead to the rest. He had enough tryptamine to build from, and the catalysts were always easy. What he didn’t have was sodium borohydride or amoproxan in anything like the volume he’d need. Closing his eyes, he went through the inventory of his secret locker, thinking about each reagent and what he could gracefully change it into. Carbon double bonds cleaved, ketones formed, inactive isomers were forced into different configurations. Slowly, certainly, a clear biochemical path formed. He opened his eyes, jotted down a quick flowchart of the reactions, and built a wish list. When he was done, he switched his hand terminal over to the main distributor’s site and ordered the reagents he’d need with immediate delivery to Steppan’s lab. The total bill was enough to clean out his secret account, but that was fine with him. He’d never cared about the money.
