Child of Earth (23 page)

Mom-Woo got it first. This was a surprise inspection, and there was a lot at stake for everyone; not just us, but the whole dome, perhaps even the entire project. Mom-Woo stepped forward and made a ritual bow, with outstretched hands. “Of course, we welcome you. We welcome all of you as our guests. The long journey across the plains must have exhausted you. Please bring yourselves into our home. I shall make soup-tea.” She poked Rinky. “Go stir up the fire, get a kettle, and gather fresh snow—”

“Thank you for your kindness, mother; but we have no need of soup. We have many other things to see today. Please? May we proceed?” Birdie looked to the rest of us and repeated, “Remember, you don't speak English, only Linnean.”

English? Why would I want to speak English? I'd stopped thinking in English a long time ago.

Mom-Woo nodded acquiescence and stepped aside. Birdie nodded to the other scout and he spoke into the headset he wore. “All right, we're good to go. Bring them out.”

The strangers wore bright colored clothing—red and blue and gold. Narrow pants and vivid jackets. They glittered and shone. A kack would have spotted them easily against the snow. An effortless meal, all of them. Two men, three women. Something about their manner—the way they walked, the way they looked at us, the way they sniffed the air—not just something,
everything
about them unnerved me.

They approached us warily, as if they feared us—as if they thought us savages. They didn't bow. They didn't offer handshakes either. They just stared. They didn't realize that they looked just as odd to us in their thin clothes, with their short hair and beardless, unleathered faces. Without braids or face-paint they looked naked. Their skin was too soft, they looked weak and fragile. Birdie made introductions too fast for any of it to register. “
Representative
Rich,
Senator
Snowden,
Secretary
Muller,
Chairman
Vocineck,
Advisor
Barx.” She introduced all of us as well; she remembered all of our names.

Birdie spoke in English to them. I could understand what she said, but it sounded strange, not familiar. “This is Da-Lorrin, head of the family. Mom-Woo, the number one wife; yes, their family arrangements are similar to our own contract-family structure, but the work-roles are much more disciplined. They have a greater degree of gender assignment. No, the Linneans don't have mutable genders; they have no biological sciences, no science at all as far as we know; we're not sure why. It's almost as if they foreswore it. The tall one is Rinky; Big Jes and Little Klin are partners within the family. Gamma and Gampa—Gampa has a patriarchal role, he's the family advisor, and Gamma is the historian, maintaining the oral history of the family and teaching it to the children. Yes, that's Kaer—the one from the videos. Morra and her family are allied; Morra and Mom-Trey are sisters from a previous contract—” When she finished, the strangers just nodded to her, as if we weren't here. As if we were exhibits in a zoo.

The woman in the bright red jacket asked, “Do they just live out here in the snow?” She pointed at what was left of our great-wagon, a looming ramshackle shape. “Do they all sleep in
that?”

Mom-Woo stepped forward then. She spoke directly to the woman; but she spoke in Linnean. “We should all get out of the wind and the cold. Would you like to come below where we have a warm fire?”

Red Jacket blinked; she looked to Birdie.

Birdie said, “She's invited you to see her home. They live underground.”

The woman made a face. As if she couldn't imagine it. “In a hole in the dirt? Like animals? Why don't they have real houses?”

Birdie's response was quiet and dispassionate. “They don't have a lot of wood. But they do have a lot of dirt. You use what you have. I think you'll find it quite interesting. This way, please.” I offered a hand to help one of the women steady herself as she picked her way down the stairs, but she didn't want me to touch her. She pulled her hand away as if I was dirty.

Down in the burrow, they didn't behave any better. Mom-Lu had stoked the fire with precious fuel we couldn't spare. She had water boiling in the pot and was already stirring in grass for soup. The three women made faces. “It stinks down here.” I looked at Mom-Woo, she looked to Mom-Lu, and she looked to Mom-Trey. The real stink down here was Red Jacket's overbearing perfume. Mom-Trey coughed into her scarf, then turned away. She went into one of the other rooms and watched, peeking around the door.

Both of the men kept their expressions stiff, but all the visitors looked uneasy, as if they'd rather be anywhere else but here. I wondered if Birdie was embarrassed; if she was, she didn't show it. She kept up a steady stream of chatter, explaining all the details of Linnean life, like a travelogue on TV. “If you'll notice, the walls are made of rammed-earth bricks. The Linneans also use sandbag construction as well; that's often faster and easier.”

The men ran their hands over the walls like masons inspecting an old building; but the walls were weeping with condensation and possibly slow leaks—Big Jes and Little Klin had been arguing about that since the first day it started. The men wiped their hands distastefully and mumbled something to the women. None of the women touched the walls. They looked around as if they were visiting a prison cell. They peeked into the other rooms of the burrow, but made no move to explore them.

Birdie tried to show them the boffili robes, how carefully we'd sewn the separate strips of fur into warm comfortable garments; they weren't interested. She showed them the painted clay jars packed with rice and beans and noodles, the pickled meats and vegetables, the root cellar, the dried and smoked provisions—all the good things we'd put away for the long winter. They tried to look polite, but the man in the black jacket poked the others. The senator, I think. “You'd have to be really desperate to eat this stuff. Or really hungry. A good steak in the evening, that's all I want.”

“Why do people live like this?” Red Jacket asked Birdie. “Don't they know any better? They don't even have a bathroom.”

Before Birdie could answer, the man in the blue jacket replied. “Don't be so harsh, Tasha. This is a step up for these people. Maybe the first time they've had a real roof over their heads. Look at them, they're proud that they can put food on the table every evening. Probably for the first time in their lives. For them, this is luxury.”

The woman next to him, the one in the gold jacket, added her own
shovelful. “You have to understand how the program actually works. The Gate Authority deliberately seeks out the poor. These people had no chance in the real world. They can't survive in a technology-based society. The Authority teaches them basic survival skills and then sends them through the world-gate. It's economic empowerment for both sides. They get a simpler world to live in, and we get rid of that class of people who can't or won't work in ours.”

“You're being too polite, Tasha. We're deporting them for their failure, for not keeping up with the world.”

“Whatever. It's good for them; it's even better for the rest of us.” Behind them, Rinky had a hand over her mouth, trying not to laugh out loud; she covered it with a coughing fit. Mom-Trey turned her back to the rest of us and pounded Rinky's back. Aunt Morra looked angry, but Irm had had a strong hand on her shoulder, squeezing hard and holding her back. Da was looking at the ceiling, as if studying a bug. Big Jes was rummaging in a corner for something; I couldn't see his face.

To her credit, Birdie kept a straight face. She looked to us and spoke quickly in Linnean. “Yes, they are boffili droppings. Please regard them as
strange animals
in a
place for strange animals
.” That triggered another coughing fit from Rinky, and even Da had to smile.

“So where do they all sleep?” Red Jacket asked bluntly.

Birdie indicated the firebed. “Usually, they all sleep together on top of the brick stove. It conserves fuel. In larger burrows, they might have two or three beds, but this is fairly normal.”

“They all sleep
together?”
Both of the men and all three of the women exchanged glances—as if Birdie had just suggested we regularly practiced incest, cannibalism and theocracy.

“It's the Linnean custom,” Birdie said. “You cannot judge any of this by the standards of Earth; Linnean culture has evolved for the conditions found on Linnea.” She started to explain that Linnea had a much more limited ecology than Earth because only a subset of Earth plants and animals had been imported—

And then, suddenly, I got it. I looked across at Da and said excitedly, “Da! These people think they're really on Linnea. I bet they insisted on a trip through the gate, but the administors couldn't allow that, so they brought them into the dome and told them they're on Linnea. They think we're colonists. I bet I'm right.”

Da's reaction of surprise and recognition ricocheted around the room. The angry expressions of the rest of the family softened immediately. The joke was on
them
, not us. Rinky even giggled aloud.

Birdie interrupted herself, stopped in the middle of a discussion of the versatility of the genetically enhanced grass, to look to me specifically. “Very smart, Kaer. Not quite accurate, but close enough. Thank you for understanding.” She winked, then turned back to the guests and dryly resumed a dissertation on what a marvelous evolution lab Linnea had become. The rapid spread of known species into new niches had startled even the most radical of theorists, and therefore the people emigrating to the new world were pioneers in the truest and bravest sense.

The visitors stood around uncomfortably and listened to Birdie's lecture with ill-concealed impatience. At last, one of the women raised her hand, “Yes, yes, we know all that. What I don't understand how can they live in this
squalor?
Don't they know any better?” I thought Mom-Lu was going to spill soup on her, but instead, she turned away and handed the bowl to Birdie.

Birdie—bless her soul—took the bowl held it high and gestured north, east, south and west, each time thanking the Old Woman in the Grass; then, appropriately, she took a sip and passed the bowl to the guests. “You must each take a sip. It's an enormous insult if you don't accept their offer of hospitality.” The visitors took the bowl and sniffed, but despite Birdie's instructions, only the men sipped at the soup. The women made more faces. “Do you think it's safe?” “It doesn't look safe.” “God knows what's in it.” I wondered if they'd been born women, or if they'd chosen to be such witches.

I looked around at the rest of the family. Big Jes was sanding the edge of his axe, as if it were some chore he'd been meaning to attend and only now had gotten around to, except the rest of us knew better; whenever he was annoyed, he sharpened his axe. Little Klin leaned against a wall, arms folded, eyes narrow. Bhetto had gathered both the little-uns into her arms and had turned away from the guests to rock them. Mikey hid behind her skirt and stared. Cindy and Parra glowered from the top of the steps. Gampa and Gamma simply left the room. Irm and Morra looked furious, but I wasn't sure at who. All in all, we must have looked seriously ferocious to these poor stupid tourists. Only Da and the moms wore their company faces, but I could see it was a strain even for them. Despite the joke. Despite their ignorance. Despite Birdie's fervent words. These people were abusing our hospitality. They were bad guests—because they weren't letting us be good hosts.

The senator pulled out his pocket-machine and looked at it. “We're running late. We've fallen way behind schedule. We'd better be moving on. Come along, people.” He started ushering them toward the ladder
steps. Birdie wisely fell silent and followed them up. I followed Da and Big Jes and Mom-Woo. I wanted to hear what they would say to Birdie. Or what Birdie might say to us. Nobody stopped me, so I went right up after.

Most of the visitors were already picking their way along the ramp toward the chopper. Blue Jacket and the senator were talking quietly to Birdie, adamantly shaking their heads. “I'm not sure these people made all that good an impression on the committee. Perhaps you should have chosen a more appropriate family?”

“You said you wanted to see a real Linnean home, Senator. We showed you a real Linnean home.”

“Well, perhaps—but this isn't as inspiring as we'd been led to believe. These poor people—couldn't you have done better for them? This is shameful.”

“This is Linnea.”

“Well.” The senator glanced around, looked up at the yellow sky, the endless plain of pink-glowing snow. He wiped his hands together as if rubbing the last of Linnea off his shining gloves. “If this is your way of saying you need more money, you've made your point. I'm not happy about this.” Next to him, Blue Jacket pulled off one of his gloves and reached inside his coat, reached deep, pulled out a thick wallet and extracted a fat wad of bills. He crunched a few steps over to Big Jes and pushed the money into his huge gloved hands. “Here. Maybe this will help. You deserve better.”

Big Jes stared at the money, the green and peach bills, then he held the cash aloft, laughing. “Look everyone—toilet paper! We have toilet paper!” Even Mom-Woo laughed out loud. Da guffawed. Rinky and I slapped each other's shoulders, laughing. Little Klin shouted, leapt backward into a snowbank and kicked his feet up in the air.

“See?” Blue Jacket said to Birdie. “They understand what's important.”

That set off a new round of laughter. Joyous, raucous, uninhibited, silly laughter.

The senator agreed. “Well ... they may be simple people, but they're happy. I can't argue with that. Maybe they know something the rest of us don't.”