“Is it Endeavour?”
“Nothing like that.” Li gestured at the door. “Inside.”
At Rikki’s entrance, several of the children froze. More shied away. Chubby-cheeked Carla (with the mass of black curls that so reminded Rikki of her sister Janna at that age) began to whimper.
“It’s okay, sweetie,” Rikki said, reaching to brush a tear from Carla’s cheek.
Carla lurched, screaming, to cower behind a crib.
“Why do they hate me?” Rikki whispered. And why do they adore you?
“Let’s go next door,” Li said.
Next door meant the newborn unit. Li gestured Rikki ahead through this door, too. Empty cribs waited, row upon row, facing the one-way glass wall. In a few weeks, all the cribs would be occupied.
Li said, “You’re a beautiful woman.”
Well, I did wash my face and change into clothes without puke spatters. “Is that your big problem with me? That Blake finds me attractive?”
“Just an observation. You are more than welcome to Blake.” Li changed tone. “Marvin, play kid-vid zero.”
On the display integral with the low end panel of every crib, pastels morphed into the image of an old oak tree. From crib speakers came a soothing rustle of leaves. Let the vid play long enough, and it would cycle through clear skies, both sunny and starry, toddlers gleefully splashing in a wading pool, a time-lapse view of roses flowering, and other delights.
“I hadn’t realized the vid had a name,” Rikki said. “It’s just what we play.”
“It’s what you and your friends play. There are others, vids that Marvin hasn’t been at liberty to divulge.”
“I don’t understand,” Rikki said.
“Perhaps a demonstration. Marvin, kid-vid one, please.” The oak tree vanished, replaced by a close-up of Li’s smiling face. The aural accompaniment was a deep rhythmic throb: the same heartbeat recording that pulsed in the artificial wombs. “Marvin is only permitted to play that at my direction, or when no adult is present.”
Unctuous, smiling Li faces everywhere, and Rikki wanted to smash them—the flesh-and-blood face most of all. “You programmed the children to love you?”
Li smirked. “The proper term is imprinting. And yes, I did.”
“No, the proper term is child abuse.”
“You’re such a drama queen. Marvin, show our guest kid-vid two.”
The crib-panel displays went dark. The low, steady heartbeat became…something else. Primitive. Dissonant. On the crib-panel displays, lightning flashed. Beneath the music, thunder rumbled.
Rikki shivered. “What the hell is—”
“Watch,” Li commanded. “Listen. Learn.”
From the lightning-torn night sky slowly emerged…a face. Rikki’s face. The music swelled, grew more urgent and…scarier.
“The Rite of Spring,” Li said. “The children will never appreciate Stravinsky, I’m sad to say, but that’s a sacrifice worth making.”
And Rikki’s face morphed into—
A hooded…thing. Coiled. Scaly. Black with, as it reared its head, a fish-white underbelly. Hissing, swaying. It studied her dispassionately through little beady eyes. A forked tongue flickered in and out, in and out between its jaws.
Rikki’s skin crawled. She felt her eyes go round. On the back of her neck, hairs prickled. Before she could find her voice, the thing lunged. In full 3-D.
She yelped.
“The effect is even more impressive with the room night-dim,” Li said. After a brief return to a stormy night sky, Blake’s face began to emerge. “Stop vid.”
This was…hateful. Psychological torture. Madness. Whether from shock or her lingering illness, Rikki’s knees threatened to buckle. Groping behind her, she edged backward to lean against a wall.
“The vid goes on to Dana and Antonio, too, if you wondered.”
“Why?” Rikki managed to get out.
“You can figure out why,” Li said cheerily. “I doubt you can figure out how. Had you ever seen a king cobra?
“N-no.”
“Nor have I. I’ve seen snakes, of course. On Earth. I don’t recall ever seeing a snake on Mars. A good choice on someone’s part, not to import any.” Li laughed. “Or maybe Saint Patrick was involved.
“But I digress. King cobras are nasty things. Very poisonous. And without ever having seen one, at some level you knew to fear it. As the children do, instinctively.
“Dread and loathing of reptiles lives deep in our hindbrains. No one knows how early in mammalian evolution that wiring emerged. It could date to the twilight of the dinosaurs, when the reflex to flee reptiles would have served our earliest progenitors well. I merely associated your faces with that reflex. All in the children’s first months, before they even began to speak. They can’t conceptualize the fear, much less articulate it. They just have it. And when a child is loud or disobedient, a flashed image of a king cobra—or of you—sobers him up quickly.”
Rikki shuddered. “You’re a monster.”
“Name-calling, really? That’s the best you’ve got?” Li smiled. “Take comfort in knowing the children won’t miss you.”
“I don’t understand,” Rikki said.
“Perhaps this will make it clearer.” Li reached behind her back, pulling something from her waistband. Something Rikki had not seen since helping to unload cargo from Endeavour soon after Landing Day.
A handgun.
35
“Something’s wrong,” Blake decided.
“Something often is,” Dana agreed, eyes fixed on her nav console. “Might I trouble you to be more specific?”
“In a sec.” The latest asteroid to be overtaken was almost within laser range. “Firing…now. Another dud. How many is that?”
“I leave the big numbers to Antonio. So tell me, what’s wrong?”
“The latest one-line note from Rikki. They all say she’s fine, but if she were she’d have more to say. Or she’d answer a question or two of mine. Or she’d record a vid, or at least a voice message.”
“Or she’s fine and very busy. As we are.” Dana coaxed Endeavour onto a new course. “Call it fifteen minutes till the next rock comes into range.”
“I’m not too busy to contact her.”
“Well good for you. You’re not the one dealing with more sick kids every day. I don’t know what to tell you other than do your job. We need vanadium. We’ll stay out here ’til we find it or Li says we’re needed more back home. And
