Tesla's Stepdaughters Page 3

  “Not really. We’re still very parochial. Even though men have been gone from most of society for years, there is the tradition around the world of women not going out unescorted. So women like Agent Wright and Alexa Rothman, faux-men, are tolerated and even encouraged. With no men to escort women, someone just had to take their place. Sex in some ways is really just an extension of that, but nobody talks about it. Women pretend that faux-men are men and for the most part, treat them that way. Women who openly have sexual relationships with other women, or at least with other women who look like women, are ostracized.”

  “That’s the other thing that surprises me,” said Andrews. “How women look. Without many men around, I expected to see relatively few women putting on makeup, but you all do… except those pretending to be men.”

  “I imagine that most men and women were surprised to find out how little women dressed up for men and how much they dressed up for each other. It’s all about outdoing each other. That includes painting our faces, and wearing jewelry.”

  “Yes, I knew women pierced their ears, but I wasn’t expecting everything else.”

  “Maybe sometime I’ll show you all my jewelry.”

  This seemed as though it was meant to be suggestive, but Andrews couldn’t find anything particularly arousing in looking through a jewelry box.

  “Besides those who are upset over homosexual content in the music, can you think of anyone else who might have something against you?”

  She stared back, smiled, and then rolled up the bottom of the white corset to reveal her smooth featureless stomach.

  “You mean because I have no belly button—because I’m a vat baby?”

  “That’s one possibility.”

  “That’s hardly my fault. They should blame Anton Dilger, not me… Are you all right?”

  Andrews had turned white and his eyes widened.

  “Are you all right? Do you need the doctor?”

  “No.” He took a deep breath. “No, I’m all right. It’s just that… in the enclaves… we don’t ever say that name. Not ever. It’s worse than any profanity or blasphemy. It’s just not tolerated.”

  Penny nodded, tugging on the ring through her lower lip.

  Sixty years before, during what was still known as the Great War, German-American scientist Anton Casimir Dilger had come up with a plan to keep America from joining the allies. Not content to poison American cattle with Anthrax, he had created a strain of an existing disease, some said influenza, though no one had ever identified the original. With it he had infected several cities along the east coast. Though initially killing almost sixty million men, women, and children, the disease mutated over time to affect only the males of the species. There had been more than 850 million men on earth before he began his sabotage. By 1930, there were less than 200 million, and by 1950 there were less than 10 million. Governments had sent their remaining men to enclaves in the far southern reaches of the globe where the disease didn’t seem as virulent, and there most of them remained. In the last years of his life, the great inventor Nikola Tesla, in an attempt to save the species, had designed and built the baby vats, where girls were grown from their mothers’ cells. The first vat babies had been born just after Tesla’s death in 1943. Penny was born in 1945.

  “Are you sure that you’re all right?” asked Penny again.

  “Yes. Anyone else? Jilted lovers etc.”

  “Oh hell, only about a thousand. You don’t seriously think that’s what it is, do you?”

  “We have to investigate every possibility. If you can make a list for me, along with anyone else you can think of who might have some complaint against you, or a perceived slight.”

  “All right. Can I ask you something?”

  “Yes,” he replied.

  “Do you have plans for dinner?”

  “I believe we’re all eating together in the dining room tonight.”

  “Good.” Penny got up to leave. “Can I ask you something else?”

  “Of course.”

  “Which of us was your favorite?”

  “Favorite… Ladybug, do you mean?”

  “Yes. All the girls had a favorite—one or the other of us. I was just wondering if that was true in the enclaves.”

  He nodded. “Yes. Most guys are in love with Ep!phanee because of her voice. I’ve seen her posters hanging in dozens of boys’ rooms. I always liked her too, but I have to admit that I always had a bit of a crush on you. So, yes; you’re my favorite.”

  She smiled.

  “I have to stay impartial now though, so don’t pass that information around.”

  “Your secret is safe with me.”

  The remaining Ladybug was of course Steffie Sin. She was about five foot six and waif thin. Dark circles beneath her eyes spoke of a hefty amount of stress. Her hair was by far the widest part of her, the platinum blond mass thick with crimped-in waves. Her eyes looked gigantic above a button nose, pierced through the septum. What she lacked in size though, she made up for in attitude.

  “Here’s the deal,” she said. “I answer a question only after you answer one of mine.”

  “All right,” said Andrews. He seemed unfazed by her aggressiveness.

  “Aren’t you afraid of the disease?”

  “No.”

  “Why not?”

  “Ah, but first you have to answer one of my questions. Do you know who is trying to kill one of you?”

  “No. Why not?”

  “There haven’t been any confirmed cases of the disease in almost five years. Some think it’s gone. The male population is up for the first time since 1914. The Science Council is encouraging the slow movement of men back into the world—three hundred thousand have moved north over the past five years.”

  “Then why are they still sending boys to the enclaves?”

  “No, no. You made the rule. It’s my turn again. Have you received any recent threats?”

  “Yes, but nothing out of the ordinary. So why are they still sending boys to the enclaves?”

  “Women are still sending their boys to the enclaves because that’s what they have been doing for the past forty years. There is no law that says they have to, and more and more women are keeping their boys. But it’s become a tradition now. They just do it because that’s the way it has been done all their lives. And I suppose some of them feel like they don’t know how to raise a male child.” He looked her in the eye. “I can assure you that the Science Council will not send someone to take your son away from you.”

  Steffie stared at him, frowning.

  “You’ve not kept it as big a secret as you imagine. You hide in the mountains in Switzerland with him and you think no one knows? It hasn’t been in the news, but people talk about it. There are rumors. How old is he?”

  “Almost seven.”

  “Well you have done a good job keeping it pretty quiet then. On the other hand, while some people know you have a son, most would believe that you got your genetic material from the government. But you didn’t, did you? There’s no record of it in the Science Council files and you didn’t react to me the way the others did. You’ve been around a male before. How is it that you’ve kept that secret?”

  She opened her mouth, then closed it, and then opened it again before speaking. “He’s dead. He died of the disease. It was seven years ago. I went to the Tasmania enclave and met him there. I convinced him to come north with me, but I didn’t want to share him. I thought he would be safe in Switzerland, but he wasn’t…”

  “I see. Where is your son now?”

  “He’s with my sister. I can’t believe how much I miss him.”

  “Of course you do. You know, Miss Sin, far from encouraging women to send their sons south, the government would like to encourage women to keep them. I’m sure they wouldn’t mind having you as a poster girl for the effort, as long as it didn’t put you or your son at more risk. Have any recent threats referenced your son or his father?”

  Steffie shook her head.
Then she sat quietly for a few minutes.

  “Do you have any other questions for me?”

  “What was life like… living in the enclaves?”

  “Well, you’ve been there. It’s not that different than anywhere else. It’s cold, but probably no colder than Switzerland. The boys live in dormitories. It’s like being in a school dorm. Men live in houses—usually small ones, usually by themselves. More and more are getting married as some women move south. A lot of men are still hesitant about moving north, either for fear of the disease or because they’re satisfied where they are or because that’s all they’ve known.”

  “I could have left Simon there. He would have been happy and safe…”

  “You can’t blame yourself for that. I’m sure he didn’t. I’ve told Ep!phanee that you should do a concert in the enclaves, as long as you’re making a world tour anyway.”

  Steffie nodded slowly. “After North America we’re touring Asia and the schedule is already pretty much set in stone, but South America is still in the planning stages. Do you really think it’s possible?”

  “I think the Science Council would welcome it. It would be a chance to encourage more interaction between men and women. Maybe more women would move to the enclaves. Hopefully more men would move back north.”

  “Thank you Agent Andrews.”

  The dining room on the Rosalie Morton had seating and staff capable of serving more than one hundred. There were fewer than thirty at dinner that evening, including the captain and those members of her crew who were free to dine, so only four of the large round tables were in use. The four Ladybugs, the two Science Police agents, and the airship’s doctor sat at the table with Captain Brown. The four musicians seemed far more at ease in the company of a man than they had previously, though the captain and doctor, as well as many of those at other tables seemed to have a hard time taking their eyes off of him. Once during the meal, a server, flushed from coming in contact with him for the first time, had dropped a tray of dishes. They ate sea bass and chicken and discussed current events, including who might be asked to join the Science Council when the nominations for the year were made in October. No one mentioned the explosion of the Lady of Angels or the ongoing investigation.

  Later, as the dirigible dropped slowly toward Chicago, it dodged just as many massive smoke plumes as it had in New York, but neither the darkening night nor the cloudy air could obscure the Chicago skyline. The Sears Tower, the Bell Center, The Thomas Edison building, and the John Hancock Center were all easily identifiable. The airship started a slow approach to the city but then veered off to the north.

  “What’s going on?” asked Andrews, jogging forward to the bridge, his partner following behind him.

  “We’re in a holding pattern,” replied the captain. “O’Hare’s a busy airport.”

  “I don’t like it. Floating around these tall buildings, we might as well paint a target on our ass.”

  “There are at least two dozen dirigibles lined up.” The captain pointed to a string of lights hanging just above the horizon. “We have to wait our turn.”

  “No we don’t. Tell the tower we are exercising a Science Council override. Then take us straight down. I don’t care if we have to land on the front lawn.”

  Captain Brown looked at Agent Wright.

  “You heard him. Do it.” Then she leaned over and put her mouth by his ear. “What do you think they’re going to say about this in Brussels?”

  “I think they’re going to say we got the Ladybugs to Chicago safely.”

  Chapter Four: Chicago Stadium

  Built in 1929, the Chicago Stadium was the largest indoor venue in the world, almost twice as large as Madison Square Gardens. In its forty-six years of existence it had hosted hockey and football games, presidential nominating conventions, rodeos, boxing tournaments, and the 1964, 1965, and 1966 Ladybugs tours. Its seventeen thousand seat capacity made it a far smaller venue than Shea, but being indoors, with a permanent stage, had some advantages. Crews had been working on the laser and lighting systems for weeks. A single song had been switched. Casanova was replaced by Paragon of Virtue, allowing the band to use the fabled 3,663 pipe Baron organ in the Madhouse on the Madison.

  Andrews watched from just off stage as the band was introduced by some local celebrity or other. He hadn’t been at the previous concert, but he had seen the segments on the news. If anything, the screaming sounded louder here than it had at Shea Stadium, but at least when the music started you could hear it. The band was making the transition from Peggy Sue to She’s My Dream when Wright tapped him on the shoulder.

  “Chicago PD says everything is secure.” She had to scream to make herself heard.

  He nodded, and while she hurried back to her position, he took a deep breath, allowing himself to enjoy the experience of seeing his favorite band, the world’s favorite band, play their music. It was easy to see that the girls were more at ease than they had been. During Lonely Girl, Ep!phanee, who played no instrument in the song, began leaping around in circles as she sang, just as she had in the early days. The crowd ate it up. Then during Distortion Penny, Piffy, and Steffie fell into a line and began strutting across the stage with almost military precision, finally sliding toward the audience on their knees as they played the final chords.

  The drum beat continued and the all three took their places to begin Under the Heel. That’s when Andrews saw it. There was a flash of light high up in the rafters above the audience. It wasn’t the flash of a camera bulb, but of reflective light bouncing off a pane of glass—like the end lens of binoculars, or of a rifle scope.

  Ducking around the back curtain and running through the cluttered backstage, he found scaffolding with a metal ladder at one end. Grabbing hold of a rung, he pulled himself upwards. By the time he was twenty feet above the ground, the scaffolding began to sway dangerously with every step, and he still had more than fifty feet to go. When he reached the top he was sure the swaying structure would go crashing to the ground at any second, but he was able to clamber off it and onto the catwalk that ran the length of the stadium.

  The stadium lights were out. All spots were on the performing band. Even if they hadn’t been, Andrews probably wouldn’t have been able to see anything. The catwalk ran above the lighting tracks, and the centermost section, where he had seen the flash, was a long way off. He ducked lower and grabbed the rail, but he didn’t have the luxury of watching from where he was, or even of taking it slow. Hunched over, he ran the length of the clattering, swaying metal walkway. The Ladybugs were playing the last chords of Artificial Man when he saw a human figure, not on the catwalk he was on, but one which intersected it. He ran faster.

  When the song ended the screaming applause continued but it, unlike the music, was not amplified up near the ceiling. Andrews stood up straight, but didn’t slow down. As he ran, he pulled the pistol from his shoulder holster. He flipped on the power and it began to whine as the solenoid charged.

  “Hold it!” he yelled.

  The person turned, saw him, and ran, the catwalk taking her away at a diagonal. Andrews stopped and took aim, but didn’t fire. There was something in the shadowy figure’s hand, but he wasn’t sure it was a weapon. He raced forward to where the two catwalks intersected, then turned and followed the other’s path. By that time, whoever he was following was a tiny figure half lost in the darkness. Andrews ran on, even when he could no longer see the person he was pursuing, secure in the knowledge that they had to be on the catwalk. But then he reached the end of the building to find a short ladder leading to a roof access door. Climbing up the stairs, he put his left hand on the hatch, his right still holding his gun. He quickly opened the door and stepped out onto the roof.

  The moon, fully obscured by smoky clouds, did little to aid him, but Andrews carefully made the circuit around the rooftop, stepping around air conditioning units and other equipment. Suddenly a figure in black jumped up right in front of him.

  “Freeze!”
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br />   “Don’t shoot! Don’t shoot!”

  “Hands in the air!”

  Andrews could now see that it was a woman in front of him, something he had naturally expected. She was in her late twenties or early thirties and she was dressed in an imitation of Ep!phanee’s dark blue costume—spandex leggings and bustier, though her hair was oily brown rather than a bright blue and she didn’t have a nose ring. He grabbed the object she held up in her right hand. It proved to be a Leica 35mm camera.

  “What were you doing on the catwalk?”

  “Just watching the concert. I couldn’t get tickets, but I’m the biggest Ladybugs fan in the world.”

  “Andrews!” Wright called from the roof entrance.

  “Over here!”

  A moment later she arrived with two Chicago police officers in tow.

  “How did you get up there, past the police line?” Andrews asked his prisoner.

  “I have a friend on the force.”

  Wright turned to the officers. “I want that cop’s name and I want her tits in a vise!”

  Both the uniforms looked appropriately chastened as they frisked and then cuffed the suspect.

  “Can I have my camera back?”

  “No,” said Andrews, as he switched off the power on his pistol and stuffed it back in its holster.

  As the woman was led toward the roof access door, Wright turned back to Andrews.

  “Do you believe her? Just another loony fan?”

  “Looks like it. I’m going to have this film developed though just in case. At the very least, I’ll have some new Ladybugs pictures to hang on my wall.”

  She clapped him on the shoulder and they started back down.

  “You are one crazy bitch, climbing up that scaffolding,” she said.

  “How did you get up here?”

  “There’s an access ladder stage left.”

  As the two Science Police Agents reached the floor behind the stage, the band was just beginning Everyone Cries Alone. Like at Shea Stadium they were backed up by a tape track. This song and the one which followed it, The Calliope in Veteran’s Hall, like several others in the set list, had been recorded in the studio and had never been performed live until this tour. The former made use of a choir while the latter required a dozen trumpeters, a calliope, and cannon. The audience didn’t seem to mind that these additions were artificially added. As long as their beloved Ladybugs were there, singing, they would scream enthusiastically.