Chapter 29
She told me her name as we hurried along to her place. It was Shanna. I asked a few harmless questions, trying to keep her mind off the pain-and the blood-as best I could.
Turns out, Shanna had been on her own since she was ten, living with various destitute groups of humans until Betas, disease, or hunger forced her to move on. Shanna didn’t know where she’d been born, who her parents were, or even who her baby’s father was. She said that she was a “Southerner” and a “Baptist” and a “Bible- thumper,” none of which meant anything to me.
“How old are you, Shanna?” I finally had to ask.
“Fourteen,” she told me. “I’m fourteen. Old enough.”
As we went farther into the human neighborhood, the air became rank with the sickly sweet stink of rot. All manner of insects buzzed, fluttered, and scurried around Shanna and me. I was coming to realize that I’d taken several comforts of Elite life completely for granted. Also, that I’d given almost no thought to the terrible living conditions of humans. This place was unendurable.
“Here,” Shanna said. She weakly raised a hand to point down an alley that had patches of high weeds thrusting up through its cracked concrete.
As we entered the alley, the voice of a lookout shouted, “
I heard fast shuffling, like a pack of huge animals scurrying closer to us.
I bent to set Shanna down so I could fight them off.
“It’s OK,” she managed to call out. “He helped me. He’s a good man!”
The shuffling sounds stopped. Then, pale faces came slowly into sight, peering out of a dark building at the alley’s far end. There could have been a dozen of them, or twice that many. They were hard to tell apart-all so thin and furtive. Even the very young ones radiated extreme fear and suffering of the sort I had never encountered before.
“It’s a trick! Why would a Beta help ya?” a tall woman demanded, stepping forward defiantly. She was older, but far from infirm, and gave off a sense of intelligence and self-possession that I was surprised to see in this slum.
“Oh, I’m not a Beta-I just borrowed some clothes… after I fought a few of them,” I said. “Look here, Shanna’s in a bad way. She’s bleeding a lot. Where do you want me to take her?”
“He’s telling the truth. I think the baby’s coming, Corliss,” Shanna said in a trembling voice. Then, very softly, the girl started to cry like, well, a little girl.
Concern spread across the older woman’s face. “This way,” she said, and led us quickly into a small room in a run-down warehouse. There was a mattress of rags on the floor and a table covered with rancid food scraps. Human photographs were pinned on the walls.
I’d studied the biological phenomenon of human birth, even seen footage of it on the Cybernet, but I’d never witnessed it in person. Chloe and April-as with all Elite babies-were born in synthetic wombs in government- regulated natal centers.
The difference was one of the most fundamental between humans and Elites.
Or so I believed at the time.
Chapter 30
How strange it was-being among these humans, pretending to be one of them.
After I settled Shanna on the mattress, she began to tell her friends what had happened with the Betas, speaking haltingly in a human street dialect I could barely follow.
Their looks toward me became cautiously admiring. “How can we repay you?” Corliss finally asked.
“I just need to rest awhile. That’s thanks enough,” I said. “I’ll be on my way soon.”
“Stay here as long as you wish,” said Corliss. “You’re a friend now. And I can see you’ve been injured yourself.”
“I’ll be fine. Honestly.”
I walked farther back into the building-an abandoned warehouse with the doors and windows long since gone. There was no electricity, no running water, but at least it was shelter from the rain and wind that had started outside-not to mention any Elite satellites and drones that might be scanning the city for signs of me.
I stepped into a large room nearby and found ragged children huddled there-playing with, of all things, Jessica and Jacob dolls. It seemed ironic that these street urchins had been able to steal the most sought-after toys of the season-but that wasn’t what bothered me. When I really thought about it, there was something just
“Those things aren’t good for you,” I told the kids. “They’ll rot your brains.”
“If you’re so smart, what are you doing
The others giggled and muttered in their coarse slang, insulting me. It was disturbing to see people so hard- edged at such a young age. No doubt some of them would go on to become Betas-if they survived that long.
But I was actually heartened by the kids’ smart-aleck reaction. There was surprising verve, an underlying vitality, in this human ghetto. The skunks were a little more clever, and more rational, than I’d formerly believed. I was also detecting kindness alongside the cruelty, passion within the desperation.
Strains of music drifted through the air-and I caught, in the shadows, the whispering, giggling sounds of lovemaking.
I finally found a quiet corner to settle in. I needed to rest and regenerate. A few minutes later, Corliss brought me a basket of food-a half loaf of fresh bread, along with scraps of cheese and vegetables. My stomach growled like an animal’s. I couldn’t remember ever being so hungry, and though part of me shuddered at the thought of eating nutritionally unbalanced, germy, possibly toxin-laden human food, my mouth watered at the sight and smell of it.
I took a couple of tentative chews and then began tearing into what was my breakfast, lunch, and dinner of the day.
But simply eating their food didn’t make me one of them. Every time the words
And that’s when I heard Shanna’s bloodcurdling screams.
Chapter 31
Why did I feel responsible for this girl? Why should I?
Still, I rushed down the hallway, hoping it wasn’t Betas attacking or, worse, the city police looking for me.
But it was just Shanna-in labor. The baby was coming already, probably prematurely.
The others had dragged her rag mattress next to an old iron storage rack. Her small bare feet were braced against the uprights.
Corliss, looking nervous and worried, was kneeling between Shanna’s thighs.
