Eland and Jeanne (Tales of the Shareem) (13 page)

More than Bor Nargan men as well. Bor Nargan women, on the other hand, no matter what their social status, could hold office, make policy, and most importantly, have a voice in decisions made by the ruling council.

The ruling council might not listen when a dockworker spoke to them, but all Bor Nargan women had the right to stand up before the council and say what they believed in.

However, to present something before them was tricky. The council had to be made interested, or they shunted the project to subcommittees, who could care less whether the issue ever got resolved.

Jeanne started working out her attack that night. She contacted journalists, particularly a few from off-world allowed to report here, and told them about the Shareem.

The journalists already knew a few things—mostly what the ruling council had fed to them. Jeanne filled in the interested reporters what she’d learned about DNAmo, how Shareem had been created, about meeting a few, and what they were like. She eliminated the scorching sex she’d had with Eland, and how he made her feel—she talked about what Shareem were like as men, as people with feelings and the right to stay alive.

At the end of her discussion, Jeanne told the reporters how some Shareem had already been rounded up and held, and would probably be executed.

The off-world journalists had at first shown some reluctance to do a story on Shareem, fearing to lose their privilege of working on Bor Narga. But when Jeanne mentioned termination, based only on the fact that Shareem had been engineered from batches of anonymous DNA, the attitudes changed.

Here was something worth risking a career for. The journalists saw promotions and awards in their futures with a story like this. The shame of Bor Narga, a world that claimed to be adamantly antislavery, their hypocrisy hung out for all to see.

Did Jeanne know where the Shareem were being held? they asked excitedly. Could she get the journalists in to see them?

When Jeanne answered in the negative to both, the journalists turned to their own contacts, and their stories started to catch fire.

Within a few days, the ruling council had indicated that they’d debate the question of Shareem in the open council three days hence. The captured Shareem were revealed to be in a cell block on the north edge of the city. They hadn’t been sequestered in top secret, but access was restricted. Under patroller scrutiny, though, the ruling council let a few journalists in to talk to the Shareem.

Jeanne saw the first report on the monitors in the break room at work. The vid showed the Shareem in an open, bare interview room with nothing but chairs and a table. Guards stood around them with kill guns in a ready position.

The Shareem wore dirty linen tunics that covered them to their knees, their faces unshaven. Deliberate choice on the part of the ruling council, Jeanne didn’t doubt, showing them to be scruffy ruffians.

Every woman in the break room at the dock stopped to watch the report. Shareem were mesmerizing even through a vid console with a crackling feed.

Jeanne’s gaze was only for Eland. Though he bore a week’s beard growth, he exuded strength and power that came right through the screen. Jeanne wanted to reach out to him, to clasp his hand and feel his touch, to hear his voice as he said her name.

One of the journalists began speaking, but Jeanne didn’t notice. She was busy rejoicing that Eland was alive, and whole.

Braden seemed to have been chosen to be their front man. He answered the questions, his relaxed position and easy smiles making the journalists lean toward him without fear. Rio lounged next to him, also talking quietly.

Ky sat in the background—the most dangerous-looking of the four. Eland was the largest man there, but he kept his big hands folded calmly on the table in front of him.

Jeanne tried to focus on what the reporter was saying.

Interviews with our special correspondent reveal that Shareem, while thought to be out of control and animalistic, can converse in fluent Bor Nargan on a number of topics. They form friendships with each other and have preferences for food and drink, have favorite vids and music.

Those who argue that they are programmed clones will have to admit that, if clones, they have distinct personalities, likes, and dislikes. The question before the ruling council now is—should these men be imprisoned and killed simply because they had multiple parents whose DNA was harvested by a corporation? Or can they be integrated as productive members of society?

Jeanne noticed that Rio and Braden were keeping their snarky senses of humor under control. Eland and Ky stayed silent, trying to look harmless—not that they were successful.

Only once did Eland look at the camera. He turned his head and gazed up at it, his startlingly blue eyes the only color on the screen.

He interrupted Braden’s flowing speech on how much Shareem enjoyed watching off-world sports and even made bets with each other on it.

“I just want to say to those out there worried about us,” Eland said, “That we’re all right.
I’m
all right.”

Jeanne’s strength went out of her. She fell into a chair but kept her eyes on the screen, watching Eland as long as she could.

When the camera moved from him, Jeanne pressed her hands to her chest and bowed her head, trying to hide her sudden tears.

***

When Jeanne hurried to Judith’s bar that night after work, she found Judith closing down early.

“We’re going up to the hill,” Judith said, when Jeanne asked why. “We’re attending the debates tomorrow, which start bright and early. Better that we spend the night up there.”

“You were able to get us in to speak?” Jeanne asked, surprised. The ruling council had indicated, even after all the reports today, that the Shareem question had low priority for them, and they might not allow outside arguments.

“No,” Judith said. “I got gallery passes. We can at least be there in case there’s a chance for us to state our case.”

Jeanne agreed, though she fumed. She supposed they were lucky the ruling council would debate the matter at all. Getting the journalists interested at least had done that.

The top of the only hill in Pas City held the royal palace and the seat of government. Unlike the Serestine Quarter around it, where the highborn dwelt, the government section provided inexpensive accommodation so the ordinary person and reporters could attend sessions of the council.

Judith had found them a small room in a boarding house that catered to people from the lower reaches of the metropolis. The two ate a late supper in the cafeteria, which was half full. Jeanne knew she needed food to keep up her energy, but she picked at it.

“They call this ale?” Judith said, making a face after one sip. “I call it piss.”

A woman at another table, overhearing, laughed and made a face, agreeing.

“I should hand out my card,” Judith said in a low voice to Jeanne. “I could drum up a lot of business.”

“I think that’s against the rules up here,” Jeanne said without much interest.

“Hey.” Judith slid her hand across the table and rested it on Jeanne’s. “We’re going to get them out. One way or another.”

Jeanne wasn’t so sure, but she gave Judith a nod. “I can’t stop thinking about that vid. Eland looked right at me. He knows he’s probably going to die—I saw that in his eyes—but he was trying to comfort
me
. What am I going to do?”

Judith gave her hand a warm squeeze. “Keep hoping. Keep trying. That’s what you’re going to do. You love him, don’t you?”

Jeanne gave her a wan smile. “It’s obvious, isn’t it?”

“I think it’s wonderful. Bor Nargan women are supposed to be above need and love and all that bullshit. But we can’t be. Love is what keeps us
us
, you know?”

Jeanne nodded again, then she wiped her eyes. “I’ll be all right, don’t worry. Just sometimes I need to break down like an idiot.”

She withdrew from Judith’s clasp and looked at her own hand resting on the table. Jeanne had a worker’s hands—callused, hard, abraded in places.

When Eland touched her fingers or pressed kisses to her palms, he acted as though Jeanne had the most beautiful hands in the universe.

Jeanne was resilient. Her work had made her body tough, and Eland had made her heart strong. She would not give up until he was free.

Chapter Thirteen

“Next on the agenda … the question of Shareem.”

Jeanne sat up straight. Finally, after hours and hours of talk about drainage problems on the Vistara and reducing import tariffs on parts for refrigeration units, the ruling council moved on to what Jeanne and Judith—and a ton of reporters—had come for.

The ruling council of Bor Narga consisted of two dozen women, led by the head of the ruling family. Most of the councilwomen were highborn, except for four elected from the middle class of the Vistara, and two from the working class of the lowest slopes of Pas City.

All wore similar robes, though the colors of those on the highborn women were iridescent, the fabric costly. The patterns and symbols woven into the robes told a story—Jeanne could see which women were married, which were widows, which had taken vows of celibacy in the Ways, who was a lawyer, a doctor, a banker, a small shop owner.

None looked particularly sympathetic toward the Shareem.

The history of Shareem was laid out—how the thinkers behind DNAmo, who’d genetically engineered workers for employ of the highborn, had decided to create men bred to be experts in sexual pleasure.

The Shareem had been created and kept in secret at DNAmo. They’d been made to be strong, agile, and extremely healthy, some face-sculpted to be extraordinarily handsome. The Shareem had been programmed with metabolisms that slowed aging but kept them on edge and in need of sexual release.

The councilwoman reading the report had to stop at this point and cough into a handkerchief, her cheeks burning red. The poor thing was a celibate in the Way of the Sky—what cruel person had chosen her to read out loud the details on Shareem?

When she’d regained some composure, the woman went on.

The reasoning behind the decision to create Shareem, so the DNAmo researchers who’d been caught and interrogated said, was to cater to women who would pay fortunes to experience the pleasures Shareem could give.

About twenty had been sold off-world, in defiance of Bor Narga’s antislavery laws, DNAmo pocketing the money. The rest of the Shareem had remained sequestered at DNAmo.

When the project had been discovered and the researchers arrested, they’d argued that Shareem were completely safe. They’d been kept sterile—unable to father children—and had also been bred to be free of disease.

The council had countered by saying that a very dangerous, experimental Shareem had escaped into the city, hadn’t he? The researchers, who were uncertain what the Shareem called R294E8S would do, had started searching for him, but never found him.

Once news of his escape had leaked outside DNAmo, the ruling council had ordered DNAmo looked into. Based on that report, DNAmo had been raided, the research halted and commandeered, and the company ordered to shut down.

The Shareem were to have been rounded up and held until destroyed. However, when the patrollers had gone in to shut the place down, the Shareem were gone. They’d already fled, no one knew where.

A decree had been made declaring Shareem a high risk to Bor Nargans’ safety. Shareem were to be arrested on sight and held for termination.

Recently, off-world reporters had interviewed the Shareem, raising questions across the galaxy as to their status and sentience. The council today would debate on the question of whether Shareem were indeed sentient beings, rather than programmed clones, and so should be allowed to live.

Jeanne found herself clutching the metal rail that separated the gallery from the main floor as the report wound to its close.

“The question before us is,” the councilwoman who’d read the report said, “should the Shareem be subject to the same laws as humans? Or to the laws on animals? Or robotics? The Shareem were created, not born. Though we have seen by video footage that they walk and talk, think and react, can they ever be considered to have fully functional brains?”

Jeanne’s hand tightened. She wanted to spring up, to burst out that of course Shareem had functional brains and were fully alive—it was the women on this council who were barely living. But she knew she’d be booted out of the council chamber if she did, her chance to speak lost.

The council
could
rule in the Shareem’s favor. Everything might be all right.

Pigs might just flap past the windows on little wings too.

The debate began. Most of the councilwomen, as Jeanne feared, claimed that Shareem were not human, could not think and feel like a human, and so would be dangerous out among Bor Nargans. Only two women pointed out the evidence of the video, where the Shareem answered questions like reasonable human beings, and even made jokes.

Next to Jeanne, Judith was stiff and worried as well as the debate went on. Jeanne’s anger simmered and grew with every passing statement, rage rising in her like a red wave.