don't.'
'Something's in the air. The DBA is crawling all over downtown, and the gangs in Moreytown are acting up. Most of the bodies I'm looking at the past few weeks are young, second-generation street kids.'
'I can handle myself.'
'So I worry. You were once one of those second-generation street kids.'
'I can handle myself,' Nohar said a little more forcefully.
Manny backed off. 'Anyway, we do have to stop meeting like this. When are you going to come back and let me cook you some dinner?'
You 've been trying to get me back there for fifteen years, Nohar thought. 'I'll make it over one of these days.'
'The door's always open.'
'I know.'
Manny turned and started back to Zero's, where a gaggle of pink EMTs were trying to manhandle the ursine's corpse out the door.
Nohar sighed.
'I know,' he whispered to himself.
Nohar uselessly turned the collar up on the irritating pink-designed jacket and headed for his car. There wasn't anything left for him to do here.
CHAPTER 2
Nohar's apartment had holes in the wall, a leaky roof, a sagging floor in the kitchen, and wiring that hadn't been up to code when it was put in forty years ago. However, the place had one redeeming feature. Someone had installed a huge stainless-steel shower that Nohar could fit into. Four in the morning was a godawful time to take a shower, but Nohar wanted to get the city off of him—as well as pieces of bear and Nu-goya.
Nohar stood under a blast of warm water, feeling the grit melt off his fur. Through the open door of the bathroom, he listened to the news coming off his comm and tried to forget the fiasco he had left downtown.
'... major demonstrations through the Economic Community. However, despite public pressure and threats of violence, the European parliament followed through on its vote to eliminate most internal restrictions on nonhu-man movement. The French and German states are braced for a massive influx of unemployed nonhumans from the rest of the economically troubled European nation.'
*'The French and German interior ministers issued a joint statement condemning the parliament's decision to outlaw screening across internal borders.'
Nohar sighed. The pinks in Paris and Berlin were worried about a few thousand moreaus—relatively benign moreaus for the most part. The EEC had a few combat designs in reaction to the war, but it never produced many moreaus. Most of their nonhumans
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were designed for police and hazardous industrial work.
The European parliament probably would still have considered their moreaus as no better than slaves or machines if the Vatican hadn't screwed everything up with the pope's decision that moreys had souls. The EEC was still dealing with the repercussions of that, even fifteen years after the production lines stopped.
'In a related story, a car bomb exploded in Bern, Switzerland, today outside of the Bensheim Genetic Repository Building. No injuries were reported, and no
one has claimed responsibility. Damage to the Bensheim building was estimated at a quarter of a million dollars. The Bensheim Foundation issued a statement to reassure their clients that no damage was done to their inventory of genetic material which is kept in an undisclosed location. The building that was bombed housed only administrative offices. The Foundation says that this will in no way affect its worldwide collection and distribution of semen.
'Dr. Bensheim himself issued a statement from Stockholm deploring the attack, and saying, 'The right to reproduce is fundamental and should not be denied on the basis of species.' 'In local news . . .'
Nohar turned off the water and leaned his back against the cool metal wall of the shower. He couldn't get that two and a half grand out of his mind. How the hell was he going to pay the rent—how the hell was he going to eat? He knew too many moreaus who lived out on the street, and he had already done time there himself.
Nohar slid the shower door aside and Cat looked up quizzically. The yellow tomcat was curled up on top of the John and was looking annoyingly serene. Sometimes Nohar thought there was something to the idea that you shouldn't have pets too close to your own species. Nohar turned on the dryer and Cat made a satisfying FORESTS OF THE WIGHT
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leap out the bathroom door. Served the little fuzzball right for not having the sense to worry about where his next meal was coming from. After a few minutes, Cat peeked around the doorjamb and gave Nohar a peeved expression. Nohar allowed himself the luxury of standing in front of the dryer until his entire body had aired out. Who gave a shit what this month's utility bill cost. Moot if he couldn't pay it. He needed the time to relax. He was too tense to think rationally.
'... buried tomorrow. Graveside services to be held at Lakeview Cemetery. The police have no suspects as of yet, and the Binder campaign has yet to issue an official statement other than appointing Congressman Binder's legal counsel, Edwin Harris on, as acting campaign manager.
'Former Cleveland mayor, Russell Gardner, expressed sympathy for his opponent and said that he did not to intend to make rumors of alleged financial irregularities in Binder's fund-raising a campaign issue.
'Binder finance chairman, Philip Young, could not be reached for comment.' Nohar turned off the dryer and walked out of the bathroom. He collapsed on the nearly-dead couch in the living room. There was the sound of protesting wood and permanently compressed springs. He shifted on his back, and Cat ran up and pounced on his chest. Nohar winced as four cold little feet kneaded his fur. Cat curled up to take a nap.
Nohar lifted his hand to push him off, but a loud purring made him stop and simply pet the creature.
'... more violence on the East Side today. There was an apparent clash between nonhuman gang members on Murray Hill—'
Only newscasters and politicians still called it Murray Hill. It was Morey Hill now, had been for nearly a decade. Nohar sighed. The guy on the news couldn't even bring himself to say the word morey—or even
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moreau. Nohar looked at the guy on the comm. Pink— what else—slick black hair, a nothing Midwestern accent, dead gray eyes, all the animation of a cheap computer graphic. The bodies on the screen behind him were more lively. '—fifteen dead, all of various species, making this the most bloody incidence of cross-species violence since the 'Dark August' riots of 2042. Local community leaders have expressed concern over the latest escalation of violence in the nonhuman community ... '
To prove the point, the newscast started to show clips of interviews with said 'community leaders.' Nohar snorted, with the token morey exception-Father Sean Murphy, a Brit fox who defected to the Irish Catholics, one of two ordained
morey priests in the United States—the 'community leaders' were all human.
The newscast then went into the obligatory human fear/responsibility versus moreau poverty/empowerment segment. Same shit, different day. Nohar closed his eyes and listened for something interesting to come on.
Nohar woke to the sound of the comm buzzing for his attention. Grayish daylight streamed through the windows. The comm's display was still on the news channel. More gang violence, even worse this time. It barely registered on Nohar that it had gone down only three blocks from his apartment. Flashing text informed him he had slept through two other calls and nearly eight hours. The incoming call was from Robert Dittrich. Nohar called out to the comm. 'Got it.'
