Interzone Science Fiction and Fantasy Magazine #226 (10 page)

"Can I help you, sir?” A Martian neighbor poked his long neck out into the corridor at the sound of the commotion.

"I'm looking for the man and woman who live here."

"Who are you?"

"Miranda's husband."

"Her husb— Oh. I see.” The man tilted his head and scrunched his nose in an expression I couldn't quite read.

"Do you know where they are?” I said.

"They left last week to attend basic training for the Langalanan expedition. They're due back any day."

On my adrenaline-high, I had to resist the urge to break down the door anyway. Joriander thanked him for the information and gently pressed his hand against the middle of my back, moving me away. Hexa mentioned that the ships to Langalana departed from the Cipango Planum Plateau in the western hemisphere of Triton, which is where training would take place. Our Joint Venture Agreement with the Wergens required humans to work side-by-side with them on Triton or Europa or one of the other spaceports for at least six months to qualify for these colonization missions. The Wergens provided their tech to humanity: wormhole-generating seedships for intergalactic travel, force field devices, low-level AI bots that performed the physical labor. In return, we gave them our art, our ingenuity, and—what they desired most of all—our companionship.

A trip to distant Cipango Planum risked delaying my reunion with Miranda for weeks if she were already on her way back and I missed her, so, despite my frustration, we were left with no alternative but to settle into the closest available cavern to wait. The Wergens shared the single sleeping room while I camped out on the stone green bench in the living area, staring out a window overlooking the pathway approaching the complex. The cavern smelled musky with a trace of burnt rubber—a sure sign of recently lasered rock. Stoked on stims, which I sniffed at a steady pace, I spent two days observing every approaching individual, hoping to see Miranda's sweet face, a familiar streak of red hair, her pale, soft skin. Water geysers exploded sporadically on the horizon.

The Wergens prepared meals for me and supplied the stims. When they weren't engaging me in annoying small talk, they would sit in two chairs and study me silently, a half-smile on their flat faces.

"You're very diligent,” Hexa said. “Very devoted to your mission. That's an admirable trait, Maxwell."

I twitched from the stims.

"Why did Miranda leave you?” Joriander asked.

I had already explained this to them back on Earth when I negotiated their price for using the seedship—eight months of my companionship—but they still couldn't grasp the situation. I had left out many details, of course. I told them nothing about how Rossi and I had served on the Wergen Study Group—or the ‘Love Panel’ as it came to be known in the academic circles we traveled. We were selected to work with a committee of fellow scientists to delve into the nature of the Wergens’ obsessive infatuation with humanity. Rossi and I were specifically tasked with examining the aliens’ brain chemistry, a near-impossible assignment given the aliens’ taboo against revealing anything to us about their physiology. But military operatives had surreptitiously obtained Wergen skin cells and bodyscans, which proved invaluable to our research.

We discovered that the introduction of a strand of the aliens’ single-helixed DNA into the cells of the medial temporal lobe of a human test-clone caused a new neurotransmitter to be generated in the amygdala, one that stimulated the firing of very specific postsynaptic neurons—the ones responsible for feelings of love. After synthesizing the neuromone, we were in the process of presenting our findings. That's when Rossi disappeared with the sample. And with Miranda. It never crossed my mind that he would think to
use
the neuromone, and on my wife no less. When I thought of the three years I'd worked side by side with him, the weekend swivelball games, the times I'd tried to cheer him up over watered-down beers at Helen's Pub during his rancorous divorce... How many times had Miranda and I had him over for dinner?

"She's been drugged, brainwashed,” I said to them, fingering the airpulser I now carried in the inside pocket of my jacket.

Joriander and Hexa seemed perplexed. “She doesn't understand what she's doing?” Hexa said.

"Her feelings have been...warped.” When they remained bewildered, I added: “I miss her. I miss her smile in the morning, the warmth of her body in our bed. I need to be with her."

This they understood. They bobbed their heads in empathy.

"She's my
wife
."

Joriander and Hexa looked confused again. During our uncomfortable trek from Earth I had tried my best to explain the concept of marriage to them, with no success. The Wergens had trouble understanding how mere vows could connect two people. I had finally thrown my hands up and escaped to the REM-pod where I hibernated for several months only to awaken to the sight of their flat smiling faces. How long had they stood there casting their adoring eyes in my direction over those longs months? My skin crawled.

"It's difficult for us to understand ‘leaving’ after you've been joined together in what you term marriage,” Hexa said.

"It's complicated,” I said.

When I stopped talking, Hexa changed subjects and asked: “What are these black fibers sprouting on your face?” She reached out to touch my cheek.

I flinched. “I haven't had a chance to shave."

They continued to gawk at me.

"Do you have to stare all the time?” I asked.

"You're just so...” Joriander struggled for the words. “Luminous. Incandescent. It's difficult not to admire your beauty."

Joriander's response didn't make me any more comfortable. The Wergens’ unconditional love for us transcended gender or species. As always, I did my best to ignore them and focused my attention on Triton's horizon.

My chest ached as I sucked air.

After several hundred meters, the trail before me opened into a wide, bowl-shaped arroyo. The peaks of the glacier circled high above. Ahead, the ground broke into layered ridges that sloped downwards. I twirled around looking in all directions for any sign of Rossi.

Then I glimpsed movement. Like a charmed snake, an arm rose from below an ice steppe and Rossi fired the airpulser. It struck a glacier wall, scattering icy splinters that rained down on me.

On the third night, I spotted her. She walked hand in hand with Rossi before he stopped to kiss her. A Wergen followed close behind them. Miranda waved goodbye to Rossi and he proceeded onward past the gates with the Wergen while she entered the residential catacombs alone.

"You're looking stressed, Maxwell,” Hexa said.

"Are you well?” Joriander said.

I shoved past the Wergens and bolted out the front door, down the curving corridor.

When I arrived at the entranceway I found her by the elevators, her back to me.

"Miranda!” I grabbed her arm and spun her around. Her face blanched, her eyes widened. A long strand of red-orange hair draped across her left eye. She looked exactly as if she'd seen the ghost of the husband she'd cheated on.

"Max! How did you...?"

I kissed her cheeks, her lips, her forehead, over and over. “It's okay, I'm here, I'm here."

She pushed me away. “What are you doing here?"

"I came to bring you home."

She stepped backward.

"You've been drugged! It's a chemical, a neuromone we discovered.” The words came in a flood. I explained it all to her, how the single vial of the substance had disappeared the night before she left, how Rossi must have slipped the neuromone into some food or beverage she'd consumed.

"Oh, Max,” she said. “I told you to stay away."

"None of this is your fault, Miranda. There would've been no way for you to resist. You would've fallen instantly in love with the first person you saw."

"Max, I need for you to listen to me.” She put her hands on my forearms as if to both steady me and keep me at a distance. “I
know
I'm drugged.” She paused for a beat as if to let the message sink in. “Rossi confessed everything to me."

"What?” I felt as if the floor shifted under me. “I'll work on a treatment, Miranda—“

"No, you don't understand—“

"I'll find a way to counter the effects—“

"I want to stay here with Rossi."

Her words stunned me.

"I know I
should
be furious, I
should
feel victimized. But that's not how I feel! I'm an adult, I'm lucid, rational and...I'm in love with Rossi. Deeply, totally, unconditionally in love. I'm the happiest I've ever been in my life."

"You're not thinking straight."

She shook her head vigorously. “Look, the chemical simulates the processes in the brain when a person is in love, correct? In other words, if you compared my brain chemistry with that of a normal, happy newlywed there'd be no difference between the two, isn't that right?"

"Well, yes. But in your case it's been triggered by a foreign substance, a drug!"

"So what?"

"Miranda...!"

"
So what
? What difference does it make what the
origin
of these feelings are? The point is that they're real to me. I'm in love with Rossi."

I couldn't believe what I was hearing. “And what about me? What about what we had?"

A long pause followed. “I've behaved unforgivably. You have every reason to despise me for what I've done—“

"You're not at fault. Rossi is."

"No, I should've settled things with you before leaving, Max,” she said. “But I was too much of a coward. Maybe someday you'll find it in your heart to forgive me for what I've done, but right now you need to forget about me and get on with your life."

"I can't do that.” Not while she remained under the neuromone's spell.

"Please, don't make me hurt you any more than I already have.” She turned to leave. “Rossi will be here soon. You should go."

I hoped it wouldn't come to this, but I had no choice. I lunged and grabbed her from behind. Peeling off the synth-skin covering my thumb, I pressed the dermaplast-soaked digit against the back of her ear. She struggled for just an instant before letting out a sigh and falling back into my arms.

I cradled her as Joriander and Hexa approached.

"Maxwell! What did you do?” Joriander said.

Hexa grabbed Miranda's wrist. “Is she dead?"

"She's fine. Help me take her back to the ship. We're putting her into spacesleep for the trip back to Earth."

Joriander crossed his arms and wiggled his stubby fingers, a gesture I'd never seen before, but which I later came to associate with Wergen anxiety. Hexa mimicked him.

We walked half a block to the monorail line, passersby gaping at Miranda's limp body in my arms, and boarded a private railcar back to the Lassel Airstrip.

Joriander stood watch over Miranda's body in the ship's medroom while Hexa prepared the ship for departure. I stared out of the plexi and saw the terminal's metal door whir open, two silhouettes emerging from the bright interior, one human, the other Wergen. Their appearance was inevitable, I supposed, given our implanted trackers.

I walked down the ramp onto the tarmac.

"What do you think you're doing, Max?” Rossi flashed an angry smile when he spoke. He looked thinner than I remembered, younger. Somehow he'd managed to find the time to maintain his tan on Triton. As he approached, he pulled an airpulser from his bomber jacket and pointed it at me.

"Don't do this!” the Wergen accompanying him pleaded. The alien looked at me with lovesick eyes as if marveling at a delicate flower about to be plucked.

"Don't worry, Olbodoh,” Rossi said to the Wergen. “I won't hurt him...unless he forces me to.” He moved closer, his Wergen companion shuffling right behind him. “Olbodoh,” Rossi said, “board that ship and retrieve Miranda."

"But are you sure you'll be—“

"Do it!"

The Wergen crossed his arms and wiggled his fingers while striding up the ramp, disappearing into the vessel.

"I trusted you, you son of a bitch,” I said.

I thought I saw regret flash in his eyes for a microsecond. “Don't play the victim here, Max. It doesn't suit you. Miranda's happy now. You didn't deserve her,” he said.

"You kidnapped my wife. Well, guess what? You're getting on this ship with us back to Earth. When you wake up in a few months it'll be to face charges. You'll be digging pits on Mars the rest of your miserable life."

"I don't think so, Max,” he said. “
You're
the kidnapper."

I moved closer to him and he jerked the gun upward, pointing it at my head.

"Rossi, do you think I'm so stupid I wouldn't have a contingency plan in case you had a gun?"

"Keep your distance,” he said. He pointed the airpulser at my feet and attempted a warning shot. Nothing happened.

I laughed. “My Wergen companions set up a dampening field—"

He lunged forward and knocked me hard across the mouth with the barrel of the pulser, dropping me to my knees. The force of the blow made my bodyfield blink off and on, then disappear.

The subzero temperatures assaulted me. I reached for the gun in my own jacket, the one immune to the dampening field, and fired. The shot went wide.

At that moment the ground rumbled and a geyser exploded in the distance.

I stumbled and dropped the gun.

It slid forward and Rossi dove for it ahead of me. I realized I had no chance of wresting the gun from him before he could fire it.

I scrambled backwards, then raced along the tarmac away from the ship, in the direction of Triton's towering glaciers.

I rolled to my left and hugged the frozen soil above his line of sight, trying to control my ragged breathing.

The ground shook again and an explosion boomed. Above us, a plume of ice-slush shot into the air.

When I caught sight of him again, Rossi's distant form darted into another crevice in the far ice wall.

I leapt down the steppes, my spikes crunching in the snow. I could barely feel my feet. Mucus had frozen above my lip.