Fledge (9 page)

"Feeling better now?"

"Yeah." I nod. "Wow, you're pretty intoxicating. That could come in handy."

"Yeah, if you spend your life babysitting, it's great."

"No, I mean with anyone. You're like a little drug factory. Controlling people is quite impressive."

"Yes, well, it only works on the Aves, Junco. No one else is affected. Besides, self-healing like you've got is a lot more practical."

"I can't self-heal. I can't do anything." I let out a little sigh and look at the bottom of my drink. "How the hell can I get another one? And a cigar?" I look up at her and wait for an answer.

"Here," she says, taking my finger and moving it towards the pad at the edge of the table. "Press there."

I do and a display pops up. I flip through it and choose a beer and a cigar. It beeps and shuts down. "Did it work?" The words are barely out of my mouth when the servos arrive to deliver my goodies. "Damn, that was quick." I gulp the beer and shake the cigar out and strike it up. I puff slowly and look back at Esta. "Like I was saying, I don't have any powers."

She smiles and I know what the children must feel when she's about to gently correct them. "All warriors can heal, Junco. And you're dressed as one, so I'm assuming you are one."

"No shit? What else can I do?"

She shrugs. "I'm not sure. Typically you get the powers associated with your Cluster, then whatever special talents you have."

I nod and puff on the cigar.

"Anyway, as I was saying to Ashur back at the conference room…"

My mind drifts again, I'd forgotten all about Lucan.

She snaps her fingers in front of my eyes. "Junco! Over here, dear. I'm talking to you, please pay attention."

I laugh.

"I'm so glad to finally have another Sibling here, it's been awful. I only want to read the history, Junco. And Lucan refuses–" She crinkles her forehead and half a dozen furrows appear.

"Wait, what? You're unhappy?"

She lets out a large breath of air as Ashur walks up. "Feeling better, Juncs?"

I nod. "Yeah. Esta is unhappy."

He pulls back as he looks at her and she covers her face and turns away.

"We gotta get going, Junco." He puts his hand on Esta's shoulder. "She has to fight tomorrow, Esta. She needs to get acclimated. You can walk with us if you want, let me just get a couple stims to go." And then he smiles at me and goes back to the bar.

I can tell she's struggling to hold it together, so I grab her hand and pull her up and lead her back over to Ashur.

She holds my hand all the way to the dorm and when we finally get there, she's even talking again. The stims help keep her chemicals at bay. How fucking horrible to have this effect on people. I mean, it would be cool if she could control it, but just leaching that shit out all over probably breaks a lot of deals in the Aves Cluster.

The dorm is a huge building far out in the middle of nowhere. I'm still not sure how the habitat is laid out because I've never seen a map, but we had to take two trains to get here. And there is literally nothing, I mean nothing, around the building except the train stop and a few benches in front of it.

Ash leaves to check me in and do whatever it is people do when they report for Fledge while I sit with Esta. "So, what was your Fledge like, Esta? Did you do this one?"

She gives me half a smile and shakes her head. "No, the mothers have their own special Fledge. Everyone does, actually. The General Fledge is like a last-ditch attempt to save your life. It's all pretty fucked up."

"So what did you have to do? Take care of kids or something?"

She looks away but the words come out with practiced clarity. "We had to cull them."

"Cull them? You mean kill them?"

She nods. "Yes, the Aves Cluster has specific requirements that must be met by age five. If they don't meet them they must be culled. The Fledging mothers do the culling for a year."

"Holy shit, that's awful. I'd rather kill grown-ups at least." In fact, I find it revolting and my stomach protests with a surge of acid.

"Yeah, me too. I can't do it anymore, Junco." She turns in a sudden jerking movement. "Life like this isn't worth living. I want to do something else, anything."

"I'm not too familiar with the rules here, Esta, do they let you do that?"

She shakes her head. "Not really. Lucan must agree to it."

I huff. "Well, fucking forget it then, I don't see him giving a shit about anyone but himself."

She looks into my eyes, pleading. "That's not true, Junco. He listens to you guys – you warriors. He'd listen to you, for instance."

I laugh. "Esta, he hates my guts. He literally told me he was going to break me in half back there in the conference room."

She searches my eyes, desperate.

"Plus he hates Tier, and he thinks I love Tier, so–" I look for Ash to avoid her gaze and when I find him he waves me over. "Hey, he's calling me over now so…" I get up and she follows. "OK, you can come too."

He's standing at a long desk, like you might see in a hotel back on Earth. Behind him, in another room farther off, I can see other avians who must be Fledge participants as well. They are looking out at us with interest. "So, Ashur – am I the last one here?"

He smiles down at me. "Yeah, Fledge actually started last week. You don't get to train before the first fight, but you'll be fine, Junco. I'm signing up as your sponsor so I'll come back the day after and we'll train for the second fight, OK?"

I shrug. "Whatever."

"I'm a sponsor too," Esta pipes up to the avian guy manning the desk.

He's about middle-age and a little overweight in the middle. His wings droop low down his back, like they're broken or something and the stubble on his cheeks might look good on any of my teammates, but on him it looks unkempt. "Who the hell are you?" he asks Esta.

"I'm an Aves Mother, and I'd like to sponsor one of these participants. Are there any left?"

Ash takes a deep breath but says nothing. Not our fight, his eyes tell me.

"Lady, I can count on one hand the number who have sponsors, which one do you want?"

She strains to see behind the man, her eyes darting back and forth and then her hand extends and her finger points. "Him. I want to sponsor him." The kid is easily the youngest one in view. He looks to be about ten years old. Half my age. If they're all this young I might have to grow a conscience. I'm no child killer. I look over at Esta as the words form in my brain and I have to hold down a shudder.

The fat guy yells, "Hey, kid, get over here. You want to accept this lady's offer of sponsorship?"

His eyes don't even register Esta. He looks at me and then at Ash. "Sure, why not."

Esta almost claps and I look up at Ash, but he shakes his head at me.

"Day after tomorrow, Ashur?"

He nods to her.

"Great, we'll come together."

Ash leans over and gives me a hug. "Junco, the first fight is a slaughterhouse, just kill anyone who comes near you and don't try and make it to the top. It doesn't count in the first fight. Your scorecard is the only thing that matters."

Esta looks over at her charge. "Just do whatever she does, kid. She's a trained killer, she can't lose."

Ashur grabs her by the shoulder and turns her away as I laugh. I look down at the kid. "Well, shit, you gonna show me where to go or what?"

"I'm not your slave," he says, jutting his chin up at me.

"No, but I'll keep you alive tomorrow if you're nice. So shut the fuck up and take me somewhere."

I'd make an excellent Aves Mother.

Chapter Eight

From my vantage point on the claimed bed I can see the entire dorm. The bunks are stacked seven high and they line both sides of what is a relatively small and narrow room when you consider that the better part of a thousand people are sharing quarters.

Lined up like soldiers in formation, the tables down the middle play host to several dozen smaller groups of participants. Apparently I missed the application deadline for joining one. But I'm not much of a joiner anyway.

The kid sits on the top bunk directly at the head of my own. He said he had a bunk before he went up to the front and was roped into Esta's mid-life crisis plan, but if he did, it's been claimed now. He didn't look broken up about it.

He's eating some ration pack and I feel the need to eat something as well. I kick the metal bunk frame to get his attention. "Hey, where can I get some food?"

He looks down at his ration, frowns, then offers it to me.

"No, where can
I
get some food? I don't want that shit. What else do they have here?"

"They got a machine." He nods his head down towards the front of the room. "If you got money."

"I think I do. Come on, let's go check it out."

"What if we lose our bunks?"

"Who gives a shit? They'll be plenty of them empty tomorrow, right?"

He shows a smile for the first time and I give him one back.

The climb down goes without incident, but he waits until I am on the ground before flying down to join me. As soon as we leave the periphery and enter the throngs of people the trouble begins. A girl snarls and makes a gesture that I can only assume is something obscene. I smile and promise internally to set her straight tomorrow. Farther down a boy, older like me, gets brave and reaches out to touch my hair and hiss at me as we pass. I bat his arm away and he calls me a few choice names.

The kid hangs back for a second, his bravado failing him at the exact moment it needs to rise to the top, and I have to stop and wait for him to make up his mind to proceed. I watch his face play out the conflict and remain patient as he moves past a group of girls that taunt him.

By the time we reach the little galley that houses the machines he's a nervous wreck. "Hey," I call to him as he looks at the long walk back to the bunks. "Forget about them. We'll sleep in here if you want."

He just looks at me like I'm crazy. "There's nowhere to sleep in here!"

I pan my hands out over the floor and then gesture to the tables. "There's plenty of places. Don't sweat it, like I said, the crowd won't be so brave tomorrow. And I guarantee that you and I," I wait for him to find my eyes, "will still be alive."

He smiles again.

I pan my thumb across the panel on a food machine and then let the kid pick something good. I get two and we wait as the autocook prepares it. I have no idea what it is, but when it comes out, my stomach grumbles and we both scarf it down like wild animals.

Afterward I find a cigar machine and grab half a dozen of those, then get a drink for both of us. "Wanna go outside so I can smoke this in peace?"

He screws up his face. "Are we allowed outside?"

I shrug. "Why wouldn't we be? Are we prisoners or something?"

He thinks about that longer than I feel is necessary, but finally decides we are not. The fat guy at the desk tries to stop us when I head for the door, but I shake my head and he backs off.

The day is almost gone when we sit down on the grass and I light my stogie.

"You're not from here, are you?"

I puff for a few seconds. "No, I'm from Earth. Just woke up three days ago. I have no idea what's going on to be completely honest."

He shakes his head at me, but my face convinces him without words. "What are you doing in this Fledge? If you're Aves?"

"That, kid," I pause to exhale, "is very fucking complicated."

I look away, but when I look back he's still waiting for an answer. "Lucan made me, or else I had to go back to Earth with someone I don't care for. I'm only half Aves." I shrug. "So I don't get automatic placement, I guess."

I lie back on the grass and look up. The Fledge building is massive, about half as tall as the height of the habitat, which from this vantage point looks to be a couple miles high. The structure slopes against the side as it climbs and I can only imagine what that does to the gravity in those areas, assuming this is a torus-shaped habitat. That might not be right, but it feels right from the way the horizon curves up on itself.

There are seven distinct segments to the building. "What's the deal with this?" I ask, pointing my cigar at the partitions along the side of the building.

He looks up and sighs. "The fight levels. Fight one is on the first deck, two on the second. It goes on like that. So, how did you manage to meet Lucan?"

I puff on the cigar and think back three days to when I woke up. It feels like years ago. My mind wanders back to the night I hit the deer and it feels like lifetimes ago. "He was there when they pulled me out of morph. Nasty bastard, isn't he?"

I smile over at him but he's got a weird look on his face. "Is he? I never thought so."

Oops, got a believer here. "Isn't he?" I ask, looking away now. The kid shrugs and shuts up so I take that as a no. "So, you got a name?"