what had obviously been a victim of murder.
It had been one of those infrequent nights when Miter had offered to switch places with LeBlanc, taking floors two and three. Had it not been so, LeBlanc himself would have discovered the body, though he had viewed it after receiving Miter’s near hysterical call over their wrist comps. After the rigorous interrogation the forcers had subjected Miter to, LeBlanc was grateful he hadn’t been the one to discover the corpse, knowing that as a clone, a former soldier, and a fairly new employee, he would have less credibility. As it was, Miter had a hard time explaining how he had missed discovering the corpse earlier, when it lay there in the middle of the floor in the large antechamber to the third level’s Hall of Antiquities, which Miter claimed he had passed through several times previously during his shift.
LeBlanc recalled the victim now, as he strolled toward the same antechamber. The memory did not frighten him – he had seen far more violated bodies during his three intense years of military service – but it did make him vigilant. The victim had been another homeless person, a young male junkie, though they didn’t know where he might have been hiding. The theory was that a homeless companion had killed him in a quarrel, and fled. But fled where? Cameras were trained on every entrance to the museum, and while they and all the other cameras in the building (any one of which could be accessed on security’s wrist comps at any time) only viewed and did not record, the entrance/exit cameras were programmed to sound an alert at the sight of any unfamiliar body that appeared in their range out of visiting hours – aside from the guards, whom the cameras would recognize. All the forcers could conclude was that the killer had again hidden away somewhere, then reemerged during regular hours and exited the Hill Way Galleries along with its more innocent patrons.
Miter had found the young junkie sprawled there with his neck and both arms broken. The flesh of his face had been roughly torn, rather than slashed, and both his eyes had been gouged out. They had not been recovered.
* * *
In the antechamber to the Hall of Antiquities, LeBlanc was greeted by a huge iron bust of the deity Raloom, worshiped by the ancestors of this planet’s indigenous people, the Choom. The eyes of the great metal head were hollow, fragrant oil lamps intended to be burned in them. Their gaping emptiness again called to LeBlanc’s mind the image of that junkie with his eyes torn out.
Religion. It was perhaps the last thing he could relate to. There were those who claimed this was because clones had no souls, and LeBlanc could not really protest. He just didn’t know how it felt not to be a clone. He knew he had no sexual desire, had been designed as such, to keep him from being distracted from his duties and perhaps chasing after beguiling, blue-skinned Sinanese women. One thing he could relate to with birthers, as clones called nonclones, was the sensual enjoyment of food. He was currently taking gourmet cooking classes, with half a thought to becoming a chef. Recently his instructor, a man, had kissed him on the mouth when they were alone. LeBlanc had not been aroused in any way, but he had withdrawn from the man calmly, without feeling any hostility either.
LeBlanc moved on, into the Hall of Antiquities, which was actually an extensive series of interconnected rooms. Here, on the walls and on pedestals, on shelves or in showcases, were ancient sculptures, blank-faced mannequins attired in archaic clothing, pottery beautifully intact or in shards, mean-looking weapons and prehistoric tools – spotlighted objects representing a diversity of races, from human to nonhuman.
Every night, LeBlanc was surrounded by other people’s cultures. He, who had no heritage or history, no culture or
It had been one of those infrequent nights when Miter had offered to switch places with LeBlanc, taking floors two and three. Had it not been so, LeBlanc himself would have discovered the body, though he had viewed it after receiving Miter’s near hysterical call over their wrist comps. After the rigorous interrogation the forcers had subjected Miter to, LeBlanc was grateful he hadn’t been the one to discover the corpse, knowing that as a clone, a former soldier, and a fairly new employee, he would have less credibility. As it was, Miter had a hard time explaining how he had missed discovering the corpse earlier, when it lay there in the middle of the floor in the large antechamber to the third level’s Hall of Antiquities, which Miter claimed he had passed through several times previously during his shift.
LeBlanc recalled the victim now, as he strolled toward the same antechamber. The memory did not frighten him – he had seen far more violated bodies during his three intense years of military service – but it did make him vigilant. The victim had been another homeless person, a young male junkie, though they didn’t know where he might have been hiding. The theory was that a homeless companion had killed him in a quarrel, and fled. But fled where? Cameras were trained on every entrance to the museum, and while they and all the other cameras in the building (any one of which could be accessed on security’s wrist comps at any time) only viewed and did not record, the entrance/exit cameras were programmed to sound an alert at the sight of any unfamiliar body that appeared in their range out of visiting hours – aside from the guards, whom the cameras would recognize. All the forcers could conclude was that the killer had again hidden away somewhere, then reemerged during regular hours and exited the Hill Way Galleries along with its more innocent patrons.
Miter had found the young junkie sprawled there with his neck and both arms broken. The flesh of his face had been roughly torn, rather than slashed, and both his eyes had been gouged out. They had not been recovered.
* * *
In the antechamber to the Hall of Antiquities, LeBlanc was greeted by a huge iron bust of the deity Raloom, worshiped by the ancestors of this planet’s indigenous people, the Choom. The eyes of the great metal head were hollow, fragrant oil lamps intended to be burned in them. Their gaping emptiness again called to LeBlanc’s mind the image of that junkie with his eyes torn out.
Religion. It was perhaps the last thing he could relate to. There were those who claimed this was because clones had no souls, and LeBlanc could not really protest. He just didn’t know how it felt not to be a clone. He knew he had no sexual desire, had been designed as such, to keep him from being distracted from his duties and perhaps chasing after beguiling, blue-skinned Sinanese women. One thing he could relate to with birthers, as clones called nonclones, was the sensual enjoyment of food. He was currently taking gourmet cooking classes, with half a thought to becoming a chef. Recently his instructor, a man, had kissed him on the mouth when they were alone. LeBlanc had not been aroused in any way, but he had withdrawn from the man calmly, without feeling any hostility either.
LeBlanc moved on, into the Hall of Antiquities, which was actually an extensive series of interconnected rooms. Here, on the walls and on pedestals, on shelves or in showcases, were ancient sculptures, blank-faced mannequins attired in archaic clothing, pottery beautifully intact or in shards, mean-looking weapons and prehistoric tools – spotlighted objects representing a diversity of races, from human to nonhuman.
Every night, LeBlanc was surrounded by other people’s cultures. He, who had no heritage or history, no culture or
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