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The Man, Lord Penn, entered the bedroom. Where before
he walked free and innocent of clothing, now he was dressed. The business suit
was brown silk, the tie a dark gold. On the big feet were the finest shoes made
by Spanish craftsmen and their owners. A single gold ring shown on one finger.
A soft smile was on the face. “Your pardon, Ms
Hannah. I need to change from these rags to something more comfortable.”
The razor lay under Sue’s hand. She watched from
lowered eyes as he entered the bathroom. The sounds of running water came to
her, then another voice. The Man was having a conversation with several people.
When he returned, he was wearing a bathrobe and
scrubbing the long curls on his head with a towel. The towel went around his
neck, and he sat near her on the bed.
Sue tumbled off and came to her feet curing Sim for
the pain in her stomach.
“Now, child, what gives?”
“I want gone, man,” she told him. The razor was in
her hand but still hidden. “My people will never be slaved again.”
The gentle brown eyes widened, and then his mouth
opened in a flash of white teeth and laughter.
“You are a tough one. Sue, you aren’t a slave
–“
“Then why the locks?" Eyes flashing, she
snapped, “Why are you hunting me? I don’t want nada to do with you or
yours.”
A small pain entered his eyes, then was gone, the
softness returning.
“Why? Mother thinks the world of you, tho’, truth
be known, you’ve a wee bit too much white. You aren’t any more a slave than
I.”
A whisper of sound came from a speaker. Annoyed, he
sighed.
“What?”
“Me lord, Danvers of Reno wishes to speak with
you.”
“Tell ‘im I be busy.”
“My lord, he says it’s most urgent.”
“Bloody fool,” he muttered. “Another business
meetin’. God, I should never o’ left the farms.” He moved up, away from
Sue, and to the closet.
“Open.”
As the doors slid away, he said, “Me duds. Middle
class, not too rich. Leisure time.”
A pole extended with plastic hangers of clothes. He
chose a set and the valet came in, helping him dress. A mirror shifted. They
moved by it. He gave Sue a small frown, then was gone.
She leaped at the mirror but it closed on Penn’s
heels.
“Son-of-a-bee,” she rasped, sinking to the floor
to huddle there.
Benny squatted on his heels next to her.
“I wish you could hear me. I wish I knew what to do,
then I could help.”
Slowly, her head raised, and Sue stared at him.
“Are you a ghost?”
Benny prowled through the house scaring cats and a
couple of dogs that might have been gene-spliced with grizzly bears. One old man
scowled, then turned away with a shrug. Philly had plenty of restless ghosts.
One more was nothing to worry over.
Benny gave the old man the finger and something
smacked him on the back of the head. He stumbled to the floor, started to sink
through, but managed to jump up snarling at his attacker. And saw nothing.
“What the freek was that?” he shouted. “Come out
and fight.”
Grampa sighed. What
do ya want? You got no call, boy, to be dissing your betters.
“You hit me.”
Nope. I figger a
man makes his own way to hell. Now, shut up before you get something with teeth
on your butt.
“Ah, just take a –“
A whisper of a growl and a slight shaking of the
floors made Benny still.
Grampa snapped, Run,
you fool.
Benny leaped from the floor only to find himself
laying a hospital bed with fire eating at his soul. He screamed and struggled,
but the men in black held him down while a doctor cursed the boy for coming out
of a blackout.
“Damn it, Allie,” the harvester shouted. “Take
the friggin vein. Live people donate all the time –“
“Fuck this, Monte. Bring him back when he’s legal,
not before.”
“He is legal,” Monte snapped. “He was declared
–“
“Not by me, and I rank higher than you.”
With one savage motion, the doctor ordered a nurse to
bind the opening.
“Take him up for that ass, Stern to worry about.”
Benny slumped back into unconsciousness while Monte
stared with hate.
He yawned and open his eyes. Two eyes. For a moment he
wondered about that. It didn’t feel right to have two, but he laughed it off.
Benny jumped to his feet laughing and chasing after a
butterfly. His mother called to him. Anna sang a prayer for him as he toddled on
the chubby legs of a four-year-old trying to catch the ‘pretty flower.’
An older man opened to sing with her. Grampa! Grinning
with delight, Benny forced his legs to churn through the ferns and wild flowers.
“Grampa! Hi, Grampa!,” he bellowed.
A rattlesnake hissed. It lay coiled, but the boy never
saw it. He raced by, and the snake stirred to strike. An eagle screamed. The
snake shuddered, sliding deeper under the brush.
Listening through a shotgun mike and watching what
little she could see via the Janissary Project’s satellite, old lay Hylnn
cursed the trees. She sat in a small car with a woman that was years younger, and
together they followed the antics of the future stallion of the Project.
Anna called again. More people were singing. Uncle
Charlie and Aunt Mara. Benny frowned. Funny, but Toddy wasn’t with them. Toddy
and he were the same age, almost. Toddy was his bro. For Toddy, Benny returned
to the Project . . . but as a teenager.
The child stumbled and halted, staring down at the
shorts he wore, then, puzzled, at the sight of the forest giants around him. A
skunk gave him a suspicious stare, and the child took a step towards it, but
Benny warned him back.
The animal sniffed like it smelled something bad and
stalked away.
“Flower kitty?”
The child grinned but Anna was calling, calling,
whispering, her voice weary and strained. The family was singing a healing song,
and Benny glanced again at the small body he wore and the trees of home. A tear
ran down his face for might have been, but mostly for the pain the child would
have to endure.
©2003 StoriesByEmail.com
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