Rodrigo Garcia y Robertson - Kansas, She Says, Is the Name of the Star

“SuperChimp named Ham. He was my pilot.”

“Your pilot?”

“Damned good one too, named for the first ape in space.” Getting up, the girl smoothed out her dress, saying, “Come on, before Bushwhackers come looking.” They set out, sliding in silence for most of an hour through green tunnels of corn. With no more obstructions or weird depressions, the cornfields went on until they came on a creek, lined with cottonwoods. Here they stopped to drink and rest their hot feet in cool rippling water. Amy asked, “What’s your name?”

“Dorothy,” the girl in gingham replied.

“Means Beloved of God,” Amy observed piously.

Dorothy nodded. “One of the reasons I picked it.”

“You don’t come from around here, do you?” Amy guessed. Girls she knew did not pick their names.

“Heavens, no.” Dorothy smiled at the notion. “I fell out of the sky. Last night, actually. Haven’t been here a day.”

Amy believed it. Dorothy did not act or talk like a little girl, but Amy did not press the subject, since she was pretending to be a boy. “Fell from where?”

“Kansas system.”

Amy had never heard of it. “What county is that?”

Dorothy smiled at her naivet. “Kansas is a G-type star, not far from here. We are actually distant binaries.”

Star travel sounded like something from fairy tales. “What are you doing here?”

“Right now, trying to get home,” Dorothy explained airily. “Got anything to eat?” Amy opened her pack and produced a piece of cake. Dorothy’s sly smile broke into a grin. “Birthday cake?”

“There’s also some hard sausage.”

“Cake’s fine.” Dorothy broke off a bit of frosted corner and stuffed it in her mouth. “So, how old are you today?”

“Thirteen,” Amy admitted.

“Sorry to hear that.”

“Me too.” Amy forgot she was supposed to be a boy.

“So did you run off?”

Amy nodded guiltily. “Do you blame me?”

“Heavens no!” Dorothy hurried to console her. “Barefoot and pregnant is no way to start junior high.” Dorothy broke off more cake. “Is ‘Tip’ a product of whimsical parents, or part of your disguise?”

“My name is Amy. And I am on the run, but I don’t know to where. Last night, I tried to wish upon the first star, and it fell from the sky, trailing fire. I’ve been following it ever since.”

“That was me,” Dorothy declared, happily splashing her feet in the stream. “Couple of saucers got us.”

“Saucers?”

“UFOs,” Dorothy explained. “Those moving lights you see at night.”

“Dad says that’s swamp gas.”

Dorothy rolled her eyes. “See any swamps on your way here?” She hadn’t. Just lots of corn, and summer wheat.

“Saucers are scary smart,” Dorothy warned, “and can see for miles. UFOs are why I was lying low, until those Bushwhackers arrived.”

Amy told Dorothy about her own adventures since leaving home, dodging Wheelers, then Bushwhackers. Dorothy was impressed. “You saw my ship shot down, and came straight here? That shows good sense, and keen navigation.”

Amy was not so sure. “I thought it was a star.”

“Still, you got here, and that’s what counts.” They headed off downstream, walking in the water to confuse their scent, in case the Bushwhackers brought dogs—which they did when they had difficult girls to track. Bushwhackers kept in practice by hunting coons in the dark. This little stream led them to the Republican River, which ran down from Republican County and the Pawnee Nation. They camped on the south bank of the Republican, making a fire, and staring up at the stars, while chewing hard sausage. Amy smirked, saying, “This was going to be my wedding night.”

“Disappointed?” Dorothy asked.

“Not at all.” Thirteen and unmarried. Only that morning Amy thought it was impossible, now it felt wonderful. With nowhere to go, this warm campfire seemed the perfect place to be. “Where is Kansas, the star you came from?”

“You can barely see it from Earth.” Dorothy searched the sky, then pointed, saying, “That dim one, there.”

“I see it.” Amy knew the night sky by heart.

“Kansas is the name of the star. It has two terraformed planets, Wichita and Topeka—but I’m not from either of them. I was born aboard ship.”

“So, how old are you?” Amy asked suspiciously.

“In Earth years?” Dorothy smirked. “Way older than you.” Small surprise, Dorothy acted much older than anyone Amy knew, except maybe Dad. “But you look like a kid.”

“I’m a Munchkin.” Dorothy acted nonchalant. “We are bio-engineered not to mature, or even go through puberty.”

“Why?” That was the strangest thing Amy had heard since leaving home, weirder than flying monkeys.

“Because some folks thought it would be fun.” Dorothy sounded breezy, but still a bit bitter. “Rich pedophiles, high-end pimps, and greedy genetechs. I was rescued from a slaver harem when I was four.”

“Slavers?” One of those words Amy had heard whispered by adults, when she was not supposed to be listening.

“Like Bushwhackers, only worse.”

“So how old are you?”

Sitting in the flickering firelight, Dorothy looked nine or ten, at most. “Thirty-two standard years, not counting relativity effects. I have lived half my life at light speed.”

“So you have no family?”

“Conceived in a lab, and born in an incubator. My earliest memories are of living in a creche, with a bunch of other babies for sale, aboard the slaver Hydra. But I have a perfectly fine foster family on Topeka. They’re the folks who raised me.”

And Amy thought her life was weird.

Next morning they were up with the birds, breakfasting on the last of her birthday cake. As Amy fed crumbs to the sparrows, Dorothy laid out the day. “We can follow the Republican up into the next county. Once we get past Kackley there are no towns to worry about until we get to the pickup point just beyond Jewel City. Ham was supposed to drop me off, then fly me to safety—but in case something bad happened, there are other arrangements.”

Something bad had happened, especially to Ham, spattered all over his cockpit. Now it was just assumed that they were both going to this “pickup.” If Amy had another choice she might well have taken it.

Dorothy sensed her fear. “Just remember, west of Jewel City, tomorrow night, near to dawn. Get there, and we are both okay. What you don’t know, Bushwhackers can’t beat out of you.” A happy thought. Like parents and teachers, Bushwhackers had the authority to thrash the truth out of flagrant liars, or errant runaways. Amy was both.

Heading upriver, they crossed over into Republic County, named for the Pawnee Republic, lying farther upstream. Amy wished the Pawnee would take her in, but late summer was when they had their virgin corn-sacrifice to the Morning Star. Not the best time to go knocking on Pawnee long lodges. Eventually they came to a bridge, and a road crossing it, paved with yellow bricks. Each brick was stamped Golden Brick Company, Jewel City.

They set out down the yellow brick road, talking and laughing. Only to find Kackley full of Wheelers, some headed south into Cloud County, most just speeding around town, kicking up dust. Not a pretty sight.

This meant another miles-long detour through the fields, consuming most of the morning. Twice, Dorothy begged food and DNA samples from farm families. When they got back to the yellow brick road, it was afternoon already, with many long miles to go. At the county line, the road jogged to the south, for a while forming the border; then it turned decisively into Jewel County. Almost at once, their luck changed. They came upon a repair robot mortaring up a pothole—a tin-plated mechanical man, bearing the company motto on his chest, “We Lay Good and Gold Brick.” On his shiny back it said, “Golden Brick Company, Jewel City and County.”