A Rare And Fragile Flower

Speculative Crime Fiction by Floyd Largent

Sometimes, Kenbe Bilundgren thought he understood humans beings; other times, he was certain he did not. In the ten months since he had been manumitted by Master’s death, he had made a continuing attempt to comprehend the greater society of which he was now a part. One thing he found especially puzzling: despite the fact that the Federal government had been sufficiently enlightened to require a synthetic’s manumission upon the death of its owner, most humans regarded him and his fellow synths with unease, if not downright disgust. Most of those who did not disdain him wanted to use him for sex, as Master had, and he had already vowed that he would have that aspect of himself downgraded as soon as he could afford it. Everyone else just seemed not to care that he was artificial.

It had been this conundrum that had driven him to enroll in the nearby state university as an undergraduate. Not for the formalized education; he was extremely well-educated already, and anything he did not know he could look up—he did not need it spoon-fed to him. It was the social education he needed. A handful of years in the company of humans his own age should aid in his comprehension of them.

 He still felt it was a good idea, though it did not help that he looked like he was about thirteen years old. No one really took him seriously. Certainly not his roommate. Jamie Lukas was among the more tolerant of his classmates, but he found Kenbe’s predicament more than a little amusing, and was not above using Kenbe’s physical beauty to attract “hot babes” for himself. And he liked to call Kenbe Pinocchio.

No synth liked to be called Pinocchio. Ever. Or Data. Or Marvin. Or C3PO. Or, by all that was holy, Sprockets.

Lately, this behavior had not been occurring and, though he did not miss it, its lack bothered him. Jamie rarely addressed him at all, and there were no more parties where healthy young coeds begged him to please, just once, show them his special add-on features. He was learning a great deal about what it meant to be human; more than he wanted to, in fact. He understood much more clearly now the nature of bad judgment, and the cruelty of having to suffer the results of that judgment, and of making your loved ones suffer with you.

Jamie’s sister was dying, and Kenbe knew why, and he could not tell anyone.

Kenbe found this extremely painful, for he liked Roxanne Lukas a great deal. Indeed, she had been the first after his manumission to learn about his special add-on features, and it had been through her that he had met and befriended Jamie. Almost as painful as Roxie’s condition, however, was the fact that Jamie had somehow discovered his override codes, and had actually used them on him to enforce his silence.

That was another harsh lesson learned about human nature.

Considering Roxie’s condition, and the lengths to which it was driving Jamie, Kenbe was not surprised when the vice cop showed up at his door.

“How can I help you?” he asked the dark-skinned man who appeared in his doorway. He was one of the uneasy kind; when he looked at Kenbe, he saw a beautiful, barely-pubescent Adonis, apparently twelve or thirteen years old, with a slimly-muscled body and wavy, shoulder-length chestnut hair. The only features that immediately distinguished him as non-human were his intensely violet eyes.

“Uh, yeah. Mr. Bilundgren, right? My name’s Branford McFerrin; I’m with NAA Internal Security. I’m here to talk to your roommate.” The officer was careful to keep his tone neutral; he had no doubt already experienced his initial disgust at Kenbe’s origin much earlier, when he had researched Jamie’s background. He would have been well informed about Jamie Lukas’ unusual roommate, who was one of those rare K-4 Bilundgrens constructed specifically to act as a wealthy pedophile’s boytoy. He would know that Kenbe had served for nearly two decades in that capacity, before Master’s incautious lifestyle had gotten him killed in San Antonio’s undertown. McFerrin would be skilled at keeping his real feelings hidden, much as Kenbe was.

“May I see your credentials?” Kenbe asked him in a businesslike tone. McFerrin, no doubt prepared for such a response, was reaching into his jacket before Kenbe had finished the sentence. Kenbe scanned the proffered papers, not just in visible light but in UV and IR as well. They seemed to be genuine. Well, and well again. The North American Alliance Bureau of Internal Security, the honorable descendant of the less-honorable FBI. If it had gone that far, then Jamie was in very deep sewage without a manipulatory device. He looked at the officer. “You appear to be who you say you are.”

“Glad you approve,” McFerrin said under his breath as he put away the credentials. Kenbe politely ignored him. McFerrin looked a tiny bit flustered—no doubt he had just remembered that most synths had hearing far better than the human norm—and went straight to the point of his visit. “Where can I find Mr. Lukas?”

 Kenbe blinked slowly, mentally damning his roommate, and replied as he had been programmed to: “He is off campus at the moment.”

“Where?”

His mind was racing, and he wanted to scream, but all Kenbe could say was, “I do not know.”

“When will he be back?”

“Again, I do not know.” Kenbe’s head felt as if it were about to split in two. Do it! he thought. You are a duly appointed officer of the law—do it now!

McFerrin peered at him skeptically, almost as if he could sense the storm raging behind Kenbe’s impassive features. “Are you truly ignorant of Jamie Lukas’ whereabouts, or have you been injuncted to lie?”

There! That was it! It was with some relief that Kenbe admitted, “I have been injuncted to lie.” He sighed, and collapsed onto the ratty couch Jamie had rescued from his parents’ basement.

 The detective sat down in the swivel chair opposite. He seemed a bit angry; no doubt he was adding that misdemeanor to Jamie’s list of crimes. He also seemed a bit uncertain, and Kenbe knew what was coming next. McFerrin looked hard into Kenbe’s eyes and said, “Emergency override, Alpha Gamma Wonderolf 44537.”

Kenbe’s eyes pulsed indigo as he mapped McFerrin’s retinal patterns, uplinked to the NAA Stats and Records mainframe in Dallas, entered the provided access code, and verified that Branford Marsalis McFerrin was, in fact, an NAA-BIS agent, and had been since January 2102.

Five seconds later, McFerrin continued. “I am a duly appointed agent of the North American Alliance Bureau of Internal Security. You are required by federal, state, and local law to answer my questions, under penalty of contempt of court and subsequent temporary deactivation. Do you understand this?”

Kenbe nodded. As if he had a choice. Still, he was more relieved than annoyed.

“Where is Jamie Lukas?”

“He went to visit his twin sister, Roxanne.”

“Where?”

“Hermann Mediplex, Houston.”

McFarrin’s brow furrowed. “She’s at the Mediplex? Why?”

 Kenbe’s head was beginning to ache. “Roxie’s somatic tissues are saturated with a drug called Mutagen-A. She is not expected to live.”

Bran McFerrin looked shocked, and well he should. Obviously, he had monitored Jamie’s latest purchase, and was wondering why Jamie would even touch the stuff when he knew what it had done to his sister. McFerrin couldn’t know that it was not for him; Jamie bought it for Roxie, who was in constant pain that even endorphiates could not touch. Muta was the only thing that helped.

 Kenbe had done a great deal of research on Mutagen-A, which went by the street name “muta,” and he understood it more thoroughly than all but a handful of people on Earth. Muta was the first of a new class of somatogenic drugs recently approved by the NAA Food and Drug Administration. Developed in the Canadian El-Four labs, it had thus far been approved only for use in cosmetic surgery protocols, though other uses were being investigated. Biosculptors viewed it as a godsend: properly wielded, it caused everyday somatic cells to dedifferentiate in such a way that, with the right tools, the resulting protoplasmic mass could be molded into a new form. Once the reshaped flesh had been stabilized, via the appropriate plastic matrices, lasers, needles, and bioelectic stimuli, case-specific chemical cues jelled the protoplasm into whatever variety of tissue was needed or desired. Theoretically, bone could be transformed into lung tissue, or fat into muscle. In practice, muta was generally used to lengthen phalluses, plump up breasts, and make tired old losers look like Killa Kabrón or Jean Harlowe.

It hadn’t taken long for the narcoscenti to find another use for muta. It was discovered, quite by accident, that tiny amounts of the drug could stimulate a high comparable to high-grade crunk or sangrita. If properly administered, no significant cell dedifferentiation occurred. Proper administration usually involved injection through the nasal membranes, quite a painful prospect indeed, but fortunately for the druggies it could also be ingested orally if one didn’t mind a lesser high. So muta hit the streets, and soon became the drug of choice of the Alliance member countries. The high was sweet enough, and a lower high wasn’t nearly as bad as lifelong flashbacks or the screaming heebie-jeebies.

There was just one little side-effect, and it was discovered too late to help most of the new addicts.

 Muta wasn’t easily metabolized; this was well known from the clinical trials. It tended to make itself at home in a user’s tissues, staying for months before the body flushed it away. This wasn’t a problem for the wealthy patients who paid for the occasional reshaping, but it was a big problem for the addicts who used it on a daily basis. A few lucky stoners could eat buckets full and never get anything more than a nice buzz, slightly better than a marijuana high, but not as good as meth or X. The rest, like Roxie, weren’t as fortunate. Muta was a well-designed drug, and it did precisely what it was designed to do. Little bits of muta were good for nothing more than a high, but large doses, even those built up over months of use, activated its primary effects—with horrifying results. The slightest pressure caused saturated tissues to flow like hot wax, eventually to congeal into something completely unfamiliar. Even a stiff breeze could reshape muta-saturated flesh.

 Muta-flow didn’t hurt, but the results were strange and unpredictable. The worst of the addicts soon came to resemble refugees from some ancient leper colony or, worse, the ridiculous mutants so common to old flatscreen sci-fi flicks. Even if the affected users quit cold turkey, it was too late: there was no protocol yet for quickly remediating saturated tissues, and it took months for the last of the muta to leach out of a user’s system. When a gentle air current or your lover’s hand could trigger muta-flow, there was nothing to stop the degeneration. Eventually, the muta-flow affected vital organs or blocked circulation, and the user died. By that time, most muta-saturates were insane.

Nursing homes and hospital wards throughout the southern half of the NAA were filled with helpless muta cases. The media were rapid to report on the new drug epidemic, but even with these horrible examples available, the street trade remained brisk, with no sign of flagging. Users had heard all kinds of hyperbole about drug use since the “War on Drugs” began decades ago, and few of them were going to believe anything they didn’t encounter first hand.

McFerrin stood, and Kenbe stood with him. The cop nodded at Kenbe and said, “Thank you, Mr. Bilundgren. You’ve been very helpful. I’m sorry I had to violate your civil rights that way.”

Kenbe wasn’t happy, but he’d been treated worse. “No offense taken, Agent McFerrin. I understand completely.”

“I still don’t like having to do that kind of thing.” The cop stared down at his shoes for a moment, then looked back at Kenbe. “It’s important, Mr. Bilundgren. We have to catch the guys who are doing this to people like Roxie Lukas. We have to stop them.”

 Kenbe nodded, and McFerrin left.

The android stared after him for a long moment. McFerrin and his colleagues had their work cut out for them. As Kenbe understood it, the NAA-BIS had the Downside distribution of muta well in hand. The supply was constantly monitored, and licensing was tightly regulated. The Bureau knew exactly which bioshapers were authorized to use the drug, and they made certain that the reported amounts had actually been used. When a bodydoc was suspected to be dealing, he or she was watched very closely. Once the doc had been convicted, he or she was offered two choices: give up the names of every person involved in the trade and immigrate to the NAA colony at Utopia Planitia, or experience muta addiction first-hand. After extensive investigation, the people they informed on got the same two options: leave Earth, or die.

And the cops meant it. In most ways, the NAA legal system was more draconian than the U.S., Canadian, Mexican, and Caribbean systems that had preceded it. Without exception, the miscreants decided that it would be in their best interests to become happy, productive citizens of NAA-Mars.

 The NAA “Rat On a Colleague” program was so effective that it hadn’t been necessary to offer anyone that choice in more than five years.

The Bureau of Internal Security’s control was less complete in orbit. For various reasons, mostly historical, NAA External Security—i.e., the military—controlled Upside. They were somewhat less competent at keeping the criminal element under control, mostly because the general public didn’t want the military running roughshod over their civil rights (even if doing just that had resulted in the NAA’s formation 40 years before), and so their civil authority was limited. Upside had its own civilian police force, but it seemed unable or unwilling to cooperate efficiently with either the Downside cops or the military. As a result, muta got smuggled out of the Elfour stations and made its way down to the NAA, via venues both public and private. The newsboards were rampant with speculation that someone highly placed in Elfour was in charge of the smuggling operation, and that Upside police were firmly in his or her pocket. Most called this hypothetical leader “Sinquanon.”

 Perhaps Kenbe had just made some minor contribution to the apprehension of Sinquanon. The thought was small comfort, but it would have to do. He returned to his studies.

The next day, after long and careful thought, Kenbe changed his major to Criminology and immediately applied for graduate studies, to commence the moment he had his BS in hand. He also applied for an intern position with the NAA Bureau of Internal Security. Someday, he hoped to meet McFerrin again.

***

 One week after Agent McFerrin’s visit, Kenbe Bilundgren K-4 went to visit Roxie Lukas for the last time.    By then, renal failure was inevitable; she was skating the razor edge between coma and death, and didn’t even realize he was there. But he knew. He wanted to see her once last time, even if the misshapen thing lying in the jellybed looked nothing like the woman he’d made love to eight months ago.

Afterward, he walked out onto the hospital room’s balcony and stared at the sky as Jamie chain-smoked beside him. Jamie was lanky and tall, as his sister had been, and he was nearly as shocking a sight as Roxie now was. His face was haggard, his eyes underscored by dark crescents from lack of sleep, his tawny hair dark with grease. As Roxie faded, it seemed she was taking part of him with her.

He spoke suddenly. “Did you know that muta-saturated tissues can sometimes take fingerprints?”

“I was unaware of that,” Kenbe said softly.

“Well, they can.” Jamie sucked on his latest cigarette and gazed out at the Houston skyline. “Roxie was covered with them. Some were mine, some belonged to the hospital staff, and some they couldn’t ID right away. The cops figured they must have come from the last person she was… intimate with.” He glanced at Kenbe, his eyes haunted. “Did you know she was fuckin’ her dealer?”

Kenbe said nothing. What could he say?

 “Yeah, he’d give her free hits if she’d let him do her. She told me that, when she could still talk. I never made the connection, but that McFerrin guy, he did. Right away.” Jamie looked down at the hand holding the cigarette. “They found a whole handful of prints on her right shoulder that they figured must be from the dealer. Turns out they belonged to some Quality Assurance drone who shuttled back and forth from one of the Elfour labs. I hear he and half a dozen other fucks rammed an asteroid on the way to Mars.”

Jamie cracked a smile, the first Kenbe had seen from him in months. It was grim and completely lacking in humor, but it was a smile nonetheless. He flicked the remnants of his cigarette over the railing and watched it fall the full eight stories before he spoke again. “It was kinda chaotic up there, McFerrin said. They didn’t get that Sinquanon guy. He just plain disappeared. And somehow, in all the excitement, the Deputy Governor of that Elfour went for a walk outside without a pressure suit. Tragic loss, they say.” This time the smile was wide, satisfied, and genuine.

“Tragic indeed,” Kenbe replied, as an unaccustomed smile spread slowly across his own face.

Roxie Lukas died three days later, a rare and fragile flower that could not survive the hand that plucked her innocence.

---

Bio: Floyd Largent is a former archaeologist who never woke a sleeping god or unearthed an ancient evil (alas). Currently, he is a full-time writer and editor, and he has recently published (or had accepted for publication) 15 short stories and three poems in venues including Altered Reality, Androids and Dragons, Black Petals, Bullet Points, Beyond the Open Door anthology, Freedom Fiction Journal, Harvey Duckman Present, and more.

Cover photo by: pexels/cottonbro studio

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