Tank birth don't look like much fun. It was all bright neon tights. His face pulling faces as he gave up the Oxyjuice and got used to the air. When the tank was empty he was leaning on the glass; he looked like a dead man choking. When they opened the door, he fell out on the floor. The techs jumped on him and hauled him upside down to drain out the Oxyjuice. Me an' the cat, we just watched. She was licking her paws, but she didn't fool me. She didn't like this guy any more than I did. I could smell that.
He began coughing and heaving as the Oxyjuice poured out of his jaws like he was being sick. But I knew at once, whatever changes they made they were good ones, 'cause those guys had a real struggle holding him, he was strong as an ox. Then they dropped him and we all stood around staring at him as he heaved about on the floor trying to get his breath.
He looked like they all look when they come out – puffy skin, all white, bloated up from months in liquid. But he was good looking under it – good muscles, tall – fine young man. Yeah. We helped him up and led him outside into the sunshine. Cherry, she didn't say a thing, just whisked off with her tail up high out ahead of us. Me, I was curious too. I wanted to watch him as he saw the world for the first time, the grass and the air and the sun. Oh, yeah, you can't help but like it, the old world, even with all the shit. I wondered if it was gonna be as amazing to him as it was to me, but I guess he had enough to do without being amazed.
He came out of it slowly, his breaths became clean. He got up all shaky, kneeling for a while on the ground to recover. He was growing more beautiful all the time. Cherry, she sat up on her tail and sniffed the air. I was watchin' her, too, and I tell you, all the hairs on her back came up in a long stripe. Me, I just wanted to bark and bark but I kept my mouth shut. I came forward to help him to his feet, but as soon as I got close I was growling right in my throat. I couldn't help it. I put my snout to him and gave him a good nosing. And you know what? His smell? He don't have one!
Shit! They all smell of something. Engine Oil, ever hear of him? Transgenic horse, thick as a sheep, strong as a wagon. Bit of an experiment, us with so few motors. Someone had the bright idea -make an animal one, a machine of flesh and blood. They called him Engine Oil because that's what he smelt of, horse sweat and engine oil. Weird! Trouble was, he was soooo thick. No gearbox, no dashboard, no steering wheel, just legs and a brain that couldn't drive a weevil, let alone five tons of muscle and alloy. He got killed at Slough and, yeah, his blood was twenty-five per cent engine oil. They drained it outta him, used it to keep the lorries going. Boy, it sure worked good! Ah! Yeah yeah! Living oil, see – kept the engine in good nick, attacked the rust, rebuilt the wear and tear. Living oil! Engine Oil was more use dead than alive.
'Where's my father?' the clone said. His first words. Soon as he spoke, the little cat thing was gone – ran off into the bushes. She'd seen what she came for and she wasn't hanging round. But I put on a show anyhow, just in case.
'Oh, you'll see him soon enough, you betcha,' I said. I put my arm around him and led him off, give him some food and drink, y'know? But I wasn't fooling no one. I had to hold back, stop myself from snapping at him, ah, yow- yow-yow! Trying to keep my tail up but it kept creeping back down. He just didn't smell of nothing! Every hair on me was standing on end.
Transgenics- you can keep 'em! Nah nah nah! Give people a hand in creation, they make an even worse mess than the gods did. See, it's not just, we give you a tail, go wag it. They gotta tell you why you go wag it, when you go wag it. They give you feelings. They give you
So what little gifts had Signy for her son?
Listen, don't get me wrong, I gotta lotta time for instincts. They're some of my favourite things. You eat, you have sex, you shit, you sniff. I love 'em all! What else? You suckle. Maybe you talk, maybe you know how to fall in love, maybe you gotta make friends. OK, fine. Good! Lotsa nice gifts!
But what kinda little gifts does Signy give her boy?
Hatred, that's what. That's what he was here for, right? Hatred for Conor, everything he stood for, had done, could do. Nah! And then the other things, the take-aways. You don't just add what you want, you take away what you don't want Styr, he was
Dangerous mix, yeah! I thought, maybe, this one we could do without.
First thing, before he goes to Siggy – Mummy's orders -he gotta get some training. He's a soldier, this boy. Not a general, she don't make him for that. He just wanna fight.
So I sent him out on a few jobs – dirty jobs, as a common soldier. You should have read the reports! He had some trouble fitting in. Him, behaving like royalty. He was a Volson, son of kings! Yeah, well, my dogs and bitches ain't too keen on that sort of attitude. You gotta fight for your respect. So he got in a few fights, a few hard fights. It's the way with us. You gotta hold your own or you get pissed on.
Oh yeah! Gotta say it, he was excellent. Signy sure knew how to put together a soldier. He got in the fights, he won the fights. Let's face it, he tore those boys to bits. Followed his orders, mind, even when he thought he knew better, but he fought like a bitch for her pups. Oh, yeah, he was the best, the very best. And every single one of my dogs who spent time with him came away wishing they hadn't.
'So what's up with him?' I asked.
'He don't smell right,' they'd say. Yeah, yeah, well, he had a smell by now. You don't live in this world and get no smell. But like they said, his smell weren't right. See, he smelt of what he'd just been doing and never of himself. Know what I mean? No, you dumb-nosed human, how could you? You don't know nothin' with your nose. Nah! See? Yeah! You stoopid monkey!
21
There's a secret bunker. Call it a strongroom, perhaps. It's a place for treasures to be kept safe. In this strongroom were two women, one younger than the other, an elderly man and an upright glass tank which opened at the front. The younger woman, still almost a girl, really, was crippled. She leaned forward in her wheelchair with a lipstick in her hand, and scrawled in deliberately childish writing on the glass, 'I love Mother.'
She smiled up at her friend. The elderly man kept his feelings away from his face.
Signy's real mother died in childbirth, bearing her and Siggy.
Cherry chewed her lip anxiously. She bent down with a question. 'I know what you're adding, but are you taking anything away as well?' she wanted to know.
Signy raised her eyebrows. She can't resist the temptation to tease. 'Pity? Mercy? Grief? What about that old handicap love?' But Cherry looked so put out that she laughed. 'Don't believe me – how could I stop loving my puss?' Cherry laughed and embraced her, believing it all. 'And I wouldn't take grief away, either. What would I be without that?'
The old man kept his thoughts to himself.
'Undress me,' said Signy.
Cherry glanced at the man. 'What about him?'
'He'll have to see me, who cares?'
Cherry helped her mistress with the buttons. 'Conor'll care.'
'Conor's at the front. The war's more important than I am.'
'That's not true!'
'Well, but he's away. Anyway, I want to be born naked.'
Seeing the powerful is always a curious business; seeing them naked is even more so. The old man was as curious as anyone, but he tried to keep his eyes away from the Queen. She was the second most powerful person in the country, after Conor, and as far as he was concerned, every little bit as scary.
Signy felt herself blushing at this exposing of herself, but she was certain she wanted to go naked into the tank. Her body was ridiculous – flabby and soft above, and those diddy little, weak little, useless legs. But now she was about to take back everything, and more.
When her clothes were off, Cherry and the man helped her up and into the open door of the tank. She kissed
