Part 3 (1/2)
Sa.s.s opened her mouth to deny it, only to realise that she couldn't. He'd seen her with the others, and he, more than anyone, knew every nuance of her body.
”Take the implant. Do what you want afterwards.”
”You're not telling me to be careful,” she said, almost petulantly.
”Stars, girl, I only adopted you. I'm not really your father, and even if I were I wouldn't tell you to be careful. Not you, of all people.”
”My ... my real father . .”
”Was a dirtball colonist. I'm Fleet. You're Fleet now. You don't believe all that stuff you were taught. You're the last woman to stay virginal all your life, Sa.s.s, and that's the truth of it. Learn what you need, and see that you get it.”
Sa.s.s s.h.i.+vered. ”Sounds very mechanical, that way.”
”Not really.” Abe smiled at her, wistful and tender. ”Sa.s.s, it's a great pleasure, and a great relaxation. For some people, long-term pairing is part of it. Your parents may have been that way. But you aren't that sort. I've watched you now for what? Eight years, is it, or ten? You're an adventurer by nature; you always were, and what happened to you brought it out even stronger. You're pa.s.sionate, but you don't want to be bothered with long-term relations.h.i.+ps.”
The five-year implant she requested at Medical raised no eyebrows. When the doctor discovered it was her first, she insisted that Sa.s.s read a folder about it ”... So you'll know nothing's wrong when that patch on your arm changes color. Just come in for another one. It'll be in your records, of course, but sometimes your records aren't with you.”
Once she had the implant, she couldn't seem to stop thinking about it. Who would it be? Who would be first, she scolded herself, accepting with no more argument Abe's estimate of her character. She watched the other cadets covertly. Bronze-haired Liami, who bounced in and out of beds with the same verve as she gobbled dessert treats on holidays. Cal and Deri, who could have starred in any of the romantic serial tragedies, always in one crisis of emotion or another. How they pa.s.sed their courses was a constant topic of low-voiced wonder. Suave Abrek, who a.s.sumed that any woman he fancied would promptly swoon into his arms - despite frequent rebuffs and snide remarks from all the women cadets.
She wasn't even sure what she wanted. She and Caris, in the old days, watching Carin Coldae re-runs, had planned extravagant s.e.xual adventures: all the handsome men in the galaxy, in all the exotic places, in the midst of saving planets or colonies or catching slavers. Was handsome really better? Liami seemed to have just as much fun with the plain as the handsome. And Abrek, undeniably handsome, but all too aware of it, was no fun at all. What kind of attraction was that kind, and not just the ordinary sort that made some people a natural choice for an evening of study or workouts in the gym? Or was the ordinary sort enough?
In the midst of this confusion of mind, she noticed that she was choosing to spend quite a bit of time with Marik Delgaesson, a senior cadet from somewhere on the far side of known s.p.a.ce. She hadn't realised that human colonies spread that far, but he looked a lot more human than the heavyworlders. Brown eyes, wavy dark hair, a slightly crooked face that gave his grin a certain off-center appeal. Not really handsome, but good enough. And a superior gymnast, in both freeform and team compet.i.tions.
Sa.s.s thought about it. He might do. When their festival rotations came up at the same s.h.i.+ft, and he asked her to partner him to the open theater production, she decided to ask him. It was hard to get started on the question, so they were halfway back to the Academy, threading their way between brightly-decorated food-stalls, when she brought it up. He gave her a startled look and led her into a dark alley behind one of the government buildings.
”Now. What did you say?” In the near dark, she could hardly see his expression.
Her mouth was dry. ”I ... I wondered if you'd . . . you'd like to spend the night with me.”
He shook his head. ”Sa.s.s, you don't want that with me.”
”I don't?” Reading and conversation had not prepared her for this reaction to a proposal. She wasn't sure whether she felt insulted or hurt.
”I'm not. . . what I seem.” He drew his heavy brows down, then lifted them in a gesture that puzzled Sa.s.s. People did both, but rarely like that.
”Can you explain that?”
”Well ... I hate to disillusion you, but - ” And suddenly he wasn't there: the tall, almost-handsome, definitely charming cadet senior she'd known for the past two years. Nothing was there - or rather, a peculiar arrangement of visual oddities that had her wondering what he'd spiked her mug with. Stringy bits of this and that, nothing making any sense, until he rea.s.sembled suddenly as a very alien shape on the wall. Clinging to the wall.
Sa.s.s fought her diaphragm and got her voice back. ”You're - you're a Weft!” She felt cold all over: she had wanted to embrace that?
Another visual tangle, this time with some parts recognisable as they s.h.i.+fted toward human, and he stood before her, his face already wistful. ”Yes. We ... we usually stay in human form around humans. They prefer it. Though most don't prefer the forms we choose quite as distinctly as you did.”
Her training brought her breathing back under full control. ”It wasn't your form, exactly.”
”No?” He smiled, the crooked smile she'd dreamed about the past nights. ”You don't like my other one.”
”I liked you,” Sa.s.s said, almost angrily. ”Your - your personality - ”
”You liked what you thought I was - my human act.” Now he sounded angry, too, and for some reason that amused her.
”Well, your human act is better than some who were born that way. Don't blame me because you did a good job.”
”You aren't scared of me?”
Sa.s.s considered, and he waited in silence. ”Not scared, exactly. I was startled, yes: your human act is d.a.m.n good. I don't think you could do that if you didn't have some of the same characteristics in your own form. I'm not - I don't - ”
”You don't want to be kinky and sleep with an alien?”
”No. But I don't want to insult an alien either, not without cause. Which I don't have.”
”Mmm. Perceptive and courteous, as usual. If I were a human, Sa.s.s, I'd want you.”
”If you were human, you'd probably get what you wanted.”
”Luckily, my human shape has no human emotions attached; I can enjoy you as a person, Sa.s.s, but not wish to couple with you. We mate very differently, and in an act far more . . . mmm . . . biological . . . than human mating has become.”
Sa.s.s s.h.i.+vered; this was entirely too clinical.
”But we do - though rarely - make friends, in the human sense, with humans. I'd like that.”
All those books gave her the next line. ”I thought I was supposed to say that - no thanks, but can't we just be friends?”
He laughed, seemingly a real laugh. ”You only get to say that if you don't make the proposal in the first place.”
”Fine.” Sa.s.s put out her hands. ”I have to touch you, Marik; I'm sorry if that upsets you, but I have to. Otherwise I'll never get over being afraid.”
”Thank you.” They clasped hands for a long moment: his warm, dry hands felt entirely human. She felt the pulse throbbing in his wrist. She saw it in his throat. He shook his head at her. ”Don't try to figure it out, Sa.s.s. Our own investigators - they're not really much like human scientists - don't understand it either.”
”A Weft. I had to fall in love with a d.a.m.ned Weft!” Sa.s.s gave him a wicked grin. ”And I can't even brag about it!”
”You're not in love with me. You're a young human female with a nearly new five-year implant and a large dose of curiosity.” , ”Dammit, Marik! How old are you, anyway? You talk like an older brother!”
”Our years are different.” And with that she had to be content, for the moment. Later he was willing to say more, a little more, and introduce her to the other Wefts at the Academy. By then she'd spotted two of them, sensitive to some signal she couldn't define. Like Marik, they were all superb gymnasts and very good at unarmed combat. This last, she found, they accomplished by minute s.h.i.+fts of form.
”Say you grab my shoulder,” said Marik, and Sa.s.s obligingly grabbed his shoulder. Suddenly it wasn't there, in her grasp, and yet he'd not s.h.i.+fted to his natural form. He was still right in front of her, only his hand gripped her forearm.
”What did you do?”
”The beginning of the s.h.i.+ft changes the surface location and density - and that's what the enemy has hold of, right? We're not where we're supposed to be, and we're not all there, so to speak. In combat, serious combat, we'd have no reason to hold too tightly to the human form anyway.”
”Does it ... uh ... hurt, to stay in human form? Are you more comfortable in your own?”
Marik shrugged. ”It's like a tight uniform: not painful, but we like to get out of it now and then,” He s.h.i.+fted then and there, and Sa.s.s stared, fascinated as always.
”It doesn't bother you?” asked Silui, one of the other Wefts.