Wind Spindle Chapter 17

 Del slumped out of the transpod door and mounted the underground steps three at a time to the exit, emerging into the blowing dust above ground.  He trudged the three kilometers to the lava tube city of New Kandovan, past familiar half-buried wrecks of old vehicles and equipment, without seeing any of it go by.  His stomach was churning the whole way.

The cave entrance was ringed with carved stone and adobe pueblo-style dwellings; the surrounding, sprawling livestock pens were roofed with hydroshielding tarps held down crookedly with polymer chains.  The crooked angles hadn't changed. Even the dwarf Bactrian camels, goats and chickens looked like the same ones.  Nothing ever changed here.

His mother’s Tibetan mastffs took long leaps from the doorway, their billowing black manes and snarling jaws bearing down on him. The dogs ran around him, kicking up clouds of vermillion dust.  After circling they began whining and leaping to lick his hands.  He ruffled their manes, looking up as his mother stepped out, hands on her hips.  She jerked her chin at him, pointing her lips back to the doorway framed by flapping curtains of translucent polymer, smeared with rusty clay.  He followed.

"Hey yeah!" Sani, his mother's third husband, looked up from chopping the head off a chicken.  "Time to celebrate, huh?"  He slammed the ax into the block, stood and wrapped his arms around Del as the headless bird stopped running and died, shuddering and spurting on the ground.  Del nodded and hugged back, thinking about Bowl's plant cuisine and their blue corn frybread, which contained every nutrient and had such depth of flavor it seemed to shimmer in the mouth.  He would never taste it again.

"You moving back?" his mother said, wiping her hands on her clay-smeared leather apron. She slammed the door to her potting pod three times before it sealed.

"That door track needs to be cleaned out again," said Del, "Maybe one of your lazy husbands could get a move on."

"One more jab and you're sleeping with the goats." she said.  "I'm not having.  Get me?"  Her hematite eyes were only half joking. Del was flooded with that familiar sinking feeling, and lowered his gaze.  

"I get you." he grumbled.  He wanted a drink.

Bahlul, lanky and somehow always dancing, smiled at Del as he set the tray of bread and mutton kabobs on the long stone table.  Sani, compact and calm, reached past him to put the earthen pitcher of milk vodka and cups on the table, just in time to pin the other man in place.  They both laughed and exchanged a kiss, walking behind Del's mother; Bahlul stroked her neck and Sani kissed the top of her head.  The two men sat on either side of Del and patted his shoulders, smiling warmly at him, passing him a full cup and heaping plate.  It was a happy house and his mother's husbands always tried to make Del feel included and cared for.  But they couldn't change his mother.  He sometimes wondered what they saw in her.

"So you're back," said his mother, "And whupped." 

Del bit down on the answer he wanted to give, his face growing hot.  Bahlul and Sani exchanged a look of concern, but they both stayed quiet.  

"You selling a lot of weavings?" Del asked Sani, studying the hangings that ringed smooth adobe walls of the round room.  He pointed to a vivid piece that had to be a mix of silk and wool, by the texture.  "That's a new style for you, yeah?"

Sani smiled and took a breath to reply, but Del's mother interrupted.  

"Can't imagine it," she said, "Everything was gonna be perfect, wasn't it?  You were gonna be on top of this world. Above all of it."

"It was never that."

"No? I thought you were gonna-"

"Yes, mother.  It all fell apart."

She poured him another shot of milk vodka, sliding the earthen cup across the table.  His mother's pottery was some of the plainest in Arturos, designed for the hand, not the eye.  It was pleasing to hold and use but stubbornly plain. Fancy-dancy decoration wasn't for the table.

"He used you.  He uses everyone.  Him and that freak.  All of them anyway, they just use us up,"  She said.  “Part of their big plan to wipe us out so they can take over the whole gene pool.” Bahlul reached out and put a hand over hers, as if to calm her.

"Yeah?" Del snapped, for one moment the memory of his loyalty to Mano kicked in, then the sting of Kallo's slap, and the flame died quickly .  He laughed; his mother had no end of crazy ideas about people in the Bowl and how they were out to take over Mars as a whole, erasing the First Nations genes forever.  "Well, the freak may be done with.  I won't say more."  Even as he said the words, there was a cold drop in his gut.

Suddenly his mother's sparkling dark eyes were fixed on his.  They looked at each other for a long moment.  For an instant his love for his mother flared.  He saw the fierce beauty of her, was washed in the memory of love from her. Then the sentiment slipped away. To make her proud, he had to be hard.  Especially now. He had failed. He had failed completely.

"Well, then," she said, tossing back the vodka as if it was water.

Both her husbands laughed, hopefully.  Their eager smiles told Del they were going to try to create a warm family supper tonight.  He silently wished them luck.

Del rolled the elegantly shaped, plain his cup in his fingers.  His brain buzzed warmly with milk vodka even as his heart sat apart, chilled. 

"Somebody's gotta take the goats on to market," his mother announced, the next morning. "You want to earn your meat or what?"

"Can't." Said Del. He was fastening his flight suit, "I'm off."

"Somebody want you somewhere?"

"Yeah. Yeah, somebody does want me."

"Imagine that."

Del turned away.  His mother grabbed him by the elbow; he had forgotten how strong she was. "Just come back to real life, won't ya?"

Del spun on his heel to face her. "I made a life. I earned a life. Not gonna let it be stolen out from under me.  I worked my guts out. Get me?"

She threw her hands up. "Not my problem then."

Del looked at her for a long moment. "Never was, was it?"

His mother laughed. "No, I guess not."  Then she laughed.  “Have a nice flight in this storm blowing in.”

Del started walking toward the tube station; he knew better than to take the bait.  His mother called out after him.

"Don't be fooled by them again. And don't be fooled by your own self either. You belong back here. Don't act so sore all the time." Her voice got louder, rougher, gaining a querelous edge, "What got into you anyway? How come we weren't good enough?" 

He called back over his shoulder, without turning to look at her, without slowing his pace.

"Because you wouldn't let me be good enough."

 

Kallo was still stuffing down blue corn frybread and gulping butter tea as Mano's organic voice came through the bedside panel.

"Kallo, they're going to tell you something.  And I know you don't always trust people you don't know.  But you will need to listen to them."

"OK, Daddy," she heard the wheedle in her own voice but couldn't stop.

There was a long silence.

"Daddy, what-"

"Kallo, I'm sorry.  It wasn't your mother's fault.  She was a brilliant geneticist, you know that."

"Yeah.  I know..."  Kallo was puzzled.

"And I did the best I could.  Even Del, for his part, did the best he could, at the time.  He did what I told him."

"He punched me off the cliff."

"I told you to stay away from him. Don't go near him again."

"Daddy," Kallo was becoming impatient, "What-"

"Just listen to them.  They're going to tell you what’s going on. Remember who you are, Puffin.  You are head of the grid now. You are the Mars grid. I love you.  Never forget who you are."

Then he was gone.  The line was dead.

He had never dropped out on her before. 

Kallo stood and paced the room, limping, her heart pounding.  Something was wrong.  Aiko watched her from the bed.

"He never does that," said Kallo.

"I called the doctor."  

"Thank you Aiko."  Kallo limped to the bed.  The bot looked up at her and reached a paw to touch her wrist.  The doctor glided into the room, followed by two others, also in white.

"Kalleano, this is Dr. Nsonowa and Dr. Abeni.  They're specialists in bone diseases.  And they will help me explain what I need to tell you."

"I need my flight suit."

"In a few minutes we will get it for you.  But this is important information."

Kallo held out her hands to the bot, instinctively.  It crawled into her lap.

"You are very unique, as you know."

"Just get to it."

Dr. Abeni, who had beautiful dark skin like the lady Kallo had seen yesterday, spoke now. "You have a degenerative bone disease, one we've never seen before although these kinds of degenerative responses aren't unusual in independent edits.  It's dissolving the tissues in your ankles and it will progress quickly soon unless we change certain gene signatures."

"How long will that...change take?"

"The procedure itself will take less than an hour.  First you need to know, even after we change those signatures, the damage has been done.  We can do ankle replacements of course.  But the disease is incurable, unless..."

"Get to it."

Dr. Nsonowa spoke now.  "Unless we alter the metabolic centers in your brain, and you grow up the way you were meant to grow up, this disease will progress at an accelerated rate."

"I've been fine for twelve years!"

"You've had significant ankle damage for some time.” 

"Wait.  Grow up?  You mean-"

"You will, if we are successful, complete adulthood in several weeks.  We should warn you, this will be painful.  And emotionally difficult,"  said Dr. Abeni.

"But I won't be a perfect flyer anymore if I grow."

They stared at her in silence. 

Kallo groaned.  "Just tell me!"

Dr. Haseya leaned forward, voice soft.  "If we don't act now, the progression will eventually affect your internal organs, and it could kill you."  

Kallo swallowed.

"Even if we manage to make the correct alterations and you complete growth to adulthood, you will need ankle replacements.  Possibly several, over a lifetime.  And we don't know if the disease will progress even further after that.  We need to do this procedure immediately to stop the progression."

Kallo stared at them.  The silence was long, flat, grey.

"Get out."

Aiko repositioned her paws softly on Kallo's knee.

"Sorry,"  said Kallo, "I mean-" but the tears exploded and she couldn't say more.  Each doctor put a gentle hand on Kallo’s shoulders.

 

The dust storm churned over Mars.   Stacks of roiling sand stirred up static electricity; lightning crackled as clouds of particles plowed through each other. Sand particles fell away from lighter clouds of dust that rose, lofting from the electrical field that activated even more dust.  

Insects crawled under several layers of sand and went into a form of hibernation.  Other fauna, from snakes to moles, did the same, or found shelter under rocks. Crows and other birds, having DNA merged with that of desert grouse, had soaked their belly feathers in the edges of nearby quicksand lagoons when they first sensed the oncoming storm, then wedged themselves deep into the crevasses of cacti, snapping up the occasional wandering termite or ant, nibbling on cactus flesh, and sipping on small stores of water in their own feathers to keep themselves alive.

The people of Mars, 90% of whom were adapted by the merging of human and tardigrade DNA, felt their metabolisms slowing.  They sluffed less often and slept more.  Industry on Mars slowed in turn.  Salt tower sensors kicked off energy-saving settings, driving down interior temperatures.  Filtering systems prevented sand and dust from billowing into the air shafts, but also slowed the air flow.  Water was in higher use, cleaning filtering systems much more frequently than usual and being consumed in greater amounts.  The greenhouses and cisterns were sanctuaries, providing the luxury of humidity. 

For several weeks no one went above ground.  Yurt and hogan communities nestled under basalt polymer dust covers.  Kinlani and New Khan residents had moved into emergency quarters in the cliff citie,, their sheep carried by carts into the biome levels to munch on crops grown underground.  

Fourteen kilometers deep in the Bowl, closer to geothermal temperatures and beneath layers of sand protection, life continued at a more normal pace. 

Kallo had been in many training installations, from the simple felt mats in Kinlani gyms as a small child for gymnastics competitions to the gymnastic academy in Arturos.  She had performed in the Bowl, but never trained here.  She was unprepared for the size of the Sto’ Lat Hospital therapy floor.  Dozens of exercise machines and platforms stacked with white towels gleamed in the clear light from the hospital windows.  Padded ropes of various lengths hung from the walls, dangling over fabric bolts and stacks of blankets.  A faint scent of aromatic herbs drifted through from the aqua therapy rooms. 

She had trained with instructors before, but only one at a time.  Here, every day she was accompanied by three therapists in white, all kind and soft-spoken, who eased her into exercises. most of which hurt terribly.  They all spoke to her about breathing and focus.  At first Kallo sassed them.  She knew how to breathe, thank you.  But as the exercises became more difficult she found their advice important, and she felt ashamed of how she’d acted.  They clearly were just trying to help her.  She apologized and was rewarded with warm smiles and hugs, which at first felt strange.  Her daddy hadn’t even been able to hug her for a long time, and aside from her mother he was the only one who had ever touched her.  She soon found that she liked the hugs, very much. 

 As her bones grew, so did her hunger.  She was used to simple hearty mutton stew and good bread. But in the Bowl they grew an enormous variety of foods.  She was brought drinks made from fruits and vegetables with herbs and honey and sheep’s milk yogurt, little plates of nuts and seasoned dishes with delicacies like fresh  tank shrimp, fish and eggs, and even water tubers and leaves, all rich in nutrition.   Kallo grew.  

Tassy paced.  Her mouth was dry. What would she say to him? What could she say, now?

"Hey," there he stood. Tall, broad-shouldered, his fine hematite eyes shadowed with trouble. He shuffled with uncertainty, and her heart made a little jump.

"Have a sit," she said.  She moved aside on the couch. He hesitated, then sat.

"Oh, um, tea."  Tassy said.  "Sorry, I forgot tea." She jumped up, but Del took her wrist and gently pulled her back down onto the couch.  

"It's all right," he said.  "I just needed to…be somewhere. Or something. I don't know."

"It's not my business, what happened."

"So, you don't want to know?"

For the first time her eyes met his. She nearly whispered it. "I don't want to know. Del, I do not want to know."

"You are divided, I understand."

Now she looked at the floor. "Yes."

"But you know what they are."

Tassie moaned.  "Oh Del, don't start."

"You know they just use us, all of us. And I don't blame Mano and I don't blame Kallo. After her mother died, those two just cold-welded together, like metal in space. And no one can ever get between them anyway or anyhow. But then they don't see the rest of us. We mean nothing to them."

Tassie sighed.  "Del, what is it you want?"

"I want what I worked for. I want my grid. I should be running that grid."

"I can't help you do that."

"All right then.  What can you help me with?"

Tassie stood up again. "Tea," she said.

Del said, "so that's really all?"

"The grid is Mano's.  He’s going to give it to Kallo.  What you need is real business, real trade. That's what he should give you. He could have given you that. Some kind of science, some kind of trade, something real."

"Something real? You mean like what you do?"

"Well, yeah. Not like just being a flyer and an announcer. There's nothing to that anyway."

"Nothing to that?" Del felt numb suddenly.  "It seemed to mean something to you when I was doing it."

"Well I mean of course. It's exciting to see airshows. And when you were on the inter-world grid, that was exciting to see. But I mean, anybody can do that. What Mano should have given you was a real trade."  Tassy padded out of the lab. Del sat on the couch, very still, his heart pounding.

Nothing. So everything he had done was nothing.

What Del missed, in his heart, in his guts, was the audience. With no audience he felt hollow and groundless. A part of him knew, and had always known, how to connect with many minds at once. It wasn't scientific, it was viscerally intuitive.  Without that reach into the collective mind he felt almost claustrophobic and yet empty, chased by a creeping blank spot, a slippery vacancy, a loneliness that snuggled up to him in odd moments like a patch of cold.

And Tassy, even Tassy. The one person he thought held the torch for him all this time, even she thought that he was nothing.

When Tassie returned with the tea tray, Dell scooped a bowl of tea off the tray, drank it in one gulp, and left.