Paul Collins - Earthborn The

Welkin stared at the black hole that gaped before him. He had the disturbing sensation that this was a doorway between life and death, yet nothing in his experience told him which he was leaving and which he was about to embrace.

"Why'd you bring that? — Why'dy' brin'tha.'?"

Fanned out around them in a semicircle, almost surrounding them, was Sarah's family: a ragged, motley gang of Earthborn. Degenerate scum, came the thought before Welkin could stop it. He was shockedto realize that they were all aged between eleven and sixteen, though he had a feeling they were older than they looked, older in ways he couldn't quite grasp.

They were tanned, of course, and oddly worn. He'd seen story vids from Old Earth in which bright young boys went off to war and returned drawn and haggard, an unfathomable look in their eyes, the same look you sometimes saw in the faces of old men like the elders. These Earthborn possessed that strange, unnerving look. Instinctively, Welkin knew they had all passed some terrible rite of passage, otherwise they wouldn't be here, alive and breathing. He wondered if a similar rite awaited him. Or was he already in it?

Most of the family wore scuffed black leather jackets with cutaway denim vests that carried a motif on them. It looked like an animal's head, like maybe a lion or something, with huge saber teeth jutting out from a gaping mouth. Their leggings were shredded, as were their homemade boots. Most of them wore black and red bandannas tied around their foreheads.

The last thing he noticed in those silent seconds was that some of them had ornaments hanging from every feature. Pieces of junk metal tugged at their earlobes, cheeks, eyebrows, and lips.

Welkin shrank back against Sarah and blinked. He was suddenly all too well aware how much his life depended on this Earthborn. Anxiety almost made him run for the door. But Sarah had locked it. Jump for the window? But they were several stories from the ground. Nowhere to run. His hands clutched at Sarah's utilities. He suddenly felt as though he'd slipped into a horror virtual reality program, although unlike any he'd ever played.

Sensing his tension, Sarah shot Welkin a fleeting smile. "It's okay. You're among . . . friends."

The teenager who had challenged Sarah was taller than she and broader by a hand span. He stood facing Sarah with his feet planted wide apart, his thumbs hooked into his waistband. His posture was relaxed, even nonchalant, yet in a subtle way it was also provocative and challenging. The teenager had spiky mud-colored hair cropped short in places. Above all Welkin noticed his manic eyes. He'd seen them before in the faces of the elders.

"Why'd you bring that!" the youth repeated.

"Good to see you, Ilija. I missed you, too," Sarah said coldly. "I've made the rite of belonging with him."

A quick, gasping hiss shot around the room.

"You can't do that!" "Can and did."

Ilija swung back to the others. There were seven in all; some of them peered at Welkin as though he were some new species of animal. And one was the fattest person he had ever seen. He was huge.

Another wore glasses! He didn't think even the Earthborn wore focal glasses anymore. How did they stay on the boy's face?

"She's broken custom! You heard her! She can't make the rite without consent of the family!" Ilija took a defiant step toward Sarah. She stayed her ground.

Suddenly Ilija howled and danced across the room in a complicated but obviously ritualistic series of movements that seemed to act out the story of his displeasure—and something darker.

Sarah stepped in close. Her arm shot out, palm up. The heel of her palm caught Ilija in the forehead and sent him sprawling to the ground. He stared at her through slitted eyes.

"You have cursed us," he said.

"And you're a superstitious fool!"

The fat boy cleared his throat. "Act . . . ually, Il-Ilija, Sar-ah ca-ca-can make the rite with-withhh-out asking us first. It-it's not ac-tually da-done that way, but in emer . . . gencies—"

"Oh, shuddup, Budge! They're the enemy!" He climbed to his feet. "Enemies must be killed. It's us or them!"

There was a murmur of assent. Ilija smiled, puffed out his chest. He had some support, but how much?

"Lay a finger on our friend here and I'll have you," Sarah said in a deceptively even tone.

Ilija looked at her sinewy, tanned body, the dark eyes that missed nothing, and the easy stance that could change instantly into a deadly fighting posture, and he realized that it would be a near thing. Too near for now . . .

He shrugged and laughed derisively. "Fight you over one of your pets, Sarah?"

Sarah smiled and everybody relaxed. She reached out and touched a huge loop that swung from Ilija's left nostril. "Another kill? Good for you!"

Ilija jerked his head away but kept the easy grin on his face. His eyes never left hers. "While youse was pussyfooting it around out there, me and Green mixed it with the aliens."

"They're dangerous, Ilija. We need to keep our distance. They have advanced weapons."

"Yeah?" Ilija smirked. "We'll see about that."

Sarah gazed at her family. She indicated the Skyborn. "This is Welkin. He has been driven out from the sky ship and he is now one of us. His enemies are our enemies, his food is our food. Eyes open, family!"

They intoned back, "Eyes open!" Some of the responses were enthusiastic, some were noncommittal.

Others were sullen.

"So that's settled? He's one of us and he is under my personal protection."

"For now," Ilija said. "But the spaceboy stays out of it." He pushed moodily past the others and paced the room.

Sarah said quietly to Welkin, "Get over there and don't make a sound. They need time to get used to you."

Welkin backed up slowly, hugging the wall to the corner. Any second he expected this pack to turn on him. And Sarah would be unable to stop them. Vague memories of wolf packs shredding their prey sped through his memory.

He kept very quiet and still as he watched his captors. He knew some of these Earthborn hated him.

They resented his presence more than the threat of that huge spaceship that had crash-landed among them and destroyed their day-to-day existence. Because he was here, because he was real. He was something they could lash out against and hurt. Maybe he should have taken his chances with Colony.

He tried to banish these negative thoughts. He was alive and unhurt. And he was going to stay that way if he had anything to say about it! The thought that had come to him earlier returned, flashinginto his mind with a cold and terrible brightness: Whatever it took . . .

It made him shiver, just slightly. It was such an adult thought— and ruthless.

"Only one thing cropped up," said the short, curly-haired youth with the impossible glasses. His curt, clipped voice drew their attention from Welkin, for which he was thankful.

"We've arranged a meet with Bruick. They have some-—" He stopped to look at Welkin. Sarah waved him on. "Some equipment from the sky ship. They'll exchange it for food. I told them we couldn't trade ammunition."

"We've hardly got any food to trade either," another youth said.

"Okay," Sarah cut in. She held up her hand for silence. "What's this equipment they have, Con?"

"They don't know what it does," Con said.

"Give us a break," Ilija said from the back of the room. "What sorta fools do they think we are, the maggots!"

"We'll take a look at it, then make up our minds, shall we?" Sarah suggested.

Con pushed his glasses farther up his nose. "And him?" He glanced at Welkin. His question wasn't unfriendly, merely curious. Welkin knew right away that the boy with the glasses sided with Sarah.