The Historian: A Smolder novel

The Historian

c. 2016 Kathryn Judson

Smashwords Edition

Revised August 31, 2016

ISBN: 9781370590124

All rights reserved.

This is a work of fiction. All characters are imaginary, and not based on real persons, living or dead.

Other books in this series, each focusing on different central characters, are The Smolder, The Birdwatcher, The Unexpecteds, The Hidden, and Notes From Hiding (which takes place several years later than the other books).

/1/

Tomas studied the report on his reader, sensing that something seemed to be wrong with it, but not able to see what.

You think too much, Number 23, a colleague four chairs lower said, in a voice that was neither clearly joking, nor clearly serious.

Tomas hid his concern, smiled the half-smile expected in such circumstances, and shrugged. Too much new stuff today. Haven't got it properly all sorted. But it's coming, he said, with the detached manner that was thought to best portray professionalism and party loyalty simultaneously.

He watched 'Number 27' for a reaction, but couldn't read the man. Unlike the colleague who'd been put before a firing squad the week before, this fellow had never been known to try to destroy men above him so he could move up. But, then, after an execution, there usually was an uncommon amount of jostling and treachery, in Tomas's experience. It wasn't supposed to be that way, of course. Executions were supposed to scare everyone into fuller cooperation. It just had never seemed to work that way.

Tomas looked at the large clock on the wall, to see if he had time to enter into a discussion in enough detail and nuance to secure his position. His colleague also looked at the clock, as did, one by one, every man below them in rank, and maybe half the men higher in rank. This was usual. Everyone had been taught to calculate what sorts of jobs or discussions they might undertake, based on the time left in the workday. Besides, in their dull lives, knowing when they'd be let out to go on to the next assignment at least felt important. Tomas was no longer sure that it was truly important, other than allowing a man to get something to eat so he wouldn't starve to death. Even that no longer seemed highly important, though. The world went on, regardless of who was in it. And it wasn't all that interesting of a world to live in, anyway.

It was close enough to the end of the day, that Tomas thought it safer to not launch a discussion. Discussions that cut off before you could answer any objections were even more dangerous than ones you could stretch out until you were sure you'd been clear, and those were dangerous enough. So he opted to ignore the man four chairs down, and turned back to work.

At just the right number of minutes before the end-of-shift bell, men began to tidy up their work areas, and put things away, including the electronic readers that were restricted for use in the One Hundred Room by the one hundred men deemed the top scholars at the time. Tomas put away his reader, took his regular Informer off the charging stand where it had sat all day, keeping watch on him and his fellows. He put it in his pocket – the special pocket, provided in their uniforms just for an Informer – and when the bell rang he headed for the door with the other 99 favored men, all of whom bore a family resemblance to him. His was a young breed of humans, not yet as standardized in appearance as some, but it was coming along nicely, they had all been told. In the meantime, the individual variations in looks were being overlooked thanks to an uncommonly good standardization in intellectual ability and trainability. In the meantime, too, no one was likely to mistake them for members of another breed, thanks to their uniforms and identical haircuts, and bodies that were sculpted the same thanks to a mandatory exercise program designed specifically for the fledgling Memory Unit Specialist breed.

As he walked to his apartment, Tomas passed other men heading home from work, each breed from its own work area. They exchanged greetings, as a sign of Society Unity, but were careful to not be too friendly, lest they give the impression that they wished to upset the carefully and scientifically based Order that was being perfected, which required that each breed stick to its assigned duties and places.

He walked through his front door to find a trainer waiting for him, with an older female. The female looked a bit frightened, which was usual, but she also had a slight predatory look about her, which made Tomas assume, for safety's sake, that she was tasked with making sure that he wasn't showing signs of wanting to get emotionally attached to a mate. Also, at her age, she might be facing becoming an experson if she failed to get pregnant. Females reaching the end of their breeding years did have that to face, and sometimes it made them a bit crazy. Crazier than usual, at any rate. Females, with their tendency to tie everything together in their minds, were obviously harder to keep on track than males, in Tomas's experience. Why Science had built them that way, he wasn't sure. It seemed to him that if Science could handle developing male and female units, with all the details worked out for breeding successfully outside of laboratories, then something like mental stability should have been easier by comparison. At the same time, he assumed Science was working on it, and would eventually prevail, and so there was no point dwelling on it, much less voicing your observations, for fear of having the observations come across as doubts.

She's been known to bolt, so we're locking the two of you in, the trainer said. But of course you aren't to tell anyone that. Mating every two days. We'll preg-test on the off days. You're both experienced and I have a meeting so I'll skip the usual briefings, and leave it to you. Carry on.

The trainer, studiously no longer paying heed to anyone or anything around him, ambled to the door and out, and Tomas could hear the lock being turned. He turned to look at his new temporary roommate, weighing in his mind how in the world a man was supposed to handle a woman who actually had been known to bolt. That was impossible, after all. Well, not impossible to happen every now and then (humans weren't perfected yet, so sometimes there was a malfunction – it was only to be expected), but for her to still be alive, instead of culled – that had been beyond imagining, before being confronted with it. Grasping at explanations, he latched onto the idea that she must surely be superior breeding stock, with unique characteristics. It seemed unlikely, but no other idea came to mind that wasn't even more taboo than that. His mind briefly tried to follow the trainer out the door, wondering if the trainer had seemed upset, but it came back, firmly, with focus, on the female in the room, presently his until she got pregnant, or until the breeders yanked her for failing to get pregnant.

Do you mind if we eat first? I'm hungry, she said.

That was a new ploy in his experience, although, looking at her, she did look pinched, almost like an experson in the early stages of starving. He waved that thought aside. After all, sometimes actual persons got reduced rations for a while, as a disciplinary measure. He'd even had it happen to him, once, years ago, when he'd allowed himself to get irritable during a time when it was especially in fashion to discipline people with hunger. It wasn't as much in fashion as it had been, but he understood that sometimes it still happened, although usually to younger Citizens, who quite naturally hadn't learned as many tricks for staying out of trouble as their elders had.

Let me check to see what my instructions are, if any, he said, fishing out his Informer, to see if the trainer had sent him notes on specific care of this specimen, such as warnings that she ought not be fed until she had proved compliant. There were no notes from the trainer, which meant that Tomas was left with what he'd learned from previous experiences, none of which aligned with the present situation enough for comfort.

His stomach growled. The woman laughed, quietly. But she also looked at a large clock on the wall. Tomas likewise consulted the clock, and realized that if it were a normal day with no one else on hand, he would be getting ready to have dinner. As dull as routine often seemed, at the moment it seemed more solid than usual, so he opted to go with eating at his usual time. Sometimes he did, anyway, when he had a woman around. It gave a man time to study what he was up against, and sometimes it added something like suspense to the operation. Not that it did, really, add suspense. The two of them were ordered to mate, and they would mate, within the timeframes allotted to them, or else they'd be shot to open up a slot for Citizens who were more obedient.

Again, briefly, Tomas wondered if it was worth it to avoid being shot. The thought flitted off, unwrestled, as he set about getting dinner prepared for the both of them.

What can I do to help? the woman asked.

I can handle it, Tomas said.

No doubt. But I can handle helping, too. And I like to help, she said.

This was another unaccountable thing about females. So many of them actually did seem to perk up when there was a chance of pitching in to help someone else. Some men did, too, in a way. But with women it was different. Deeper. It seemed to be almost a necessity to many of them, in his experience.

Well, if Science had made them that way, who was he to fight it? So he figured out tasks for her, and together they made dinner.

Neither of them dared talk much. Not that there really was much about which to talk, Tomas thought, since he couldn't discuss his work, and had little going on in his life except that. Since it was a night for a broadcast amusement, they sat and watched that while they ate and while their dinners settled. But that was as long as Tomas was willing to wait. Science had had the foresight to make mating feel necessary at times, and sometimes even enjoyable, and usually he felt like he'd accomplished something whenever he'd completed his assignment. The sense of satisfaction didn't generally last very long, but why should it? After the job was done, Tomas slid back into something like boredom again, until it occurred to him that he might be wise to take extra precautions with this woman – this known bolter – before he went to sleep.

The female made his task easier by dropping off to sleep, something like exhaustion etched into her face. For good measure, he shackled her to the bed she was on, dug out a bedroll that was stored in the closet for precisely those times when a man needed to sleep but didn't want to share a bed with an assigned mate, and set up on the floor where he could see her when he was turned toward her. Ordinarily, he set up the woman on the floor and kept the bed for himself, but with the more serious problem cases he liked to anchor the female to the bed. It seemed safer; and a prudent man was appreciated by the breeders, he'd found. For that matter, there were reports that sometimes a female had been known to kill the male while he slept. Officially, it never happened, but in his job, Tomas got to read reports the public would never know about. He knew. Yes, he knew.

'You think too much,' his distracted mind scolded.

To get away from his thoughts, he downed a sleeping draught and went to bed on the bedroll, his back to the woman so she couldn't study his face if she woke, and fell asleep, trying to keep an ear cocked for possible trouble.

In what seemed far too short of a time – he certainly didn't feel rested – he heard someone, some female, singing a Loyalty Song. He rolled groggily onto his back, turned his head, and confirmed that it was his present mate singing, and that it was about three hours too early to get up. Stranger yet, the woman seemed to be singing in her sleep. He gritted his jaw to keep a shout from coming out. For one thing, a sane man didn't angrily yell at someone singing a Loyalty Song. And for another, he was no longer certain that she was really sleeping. Curious, and afraid, he dragged himself more fully awake and went to sit on the bed beside her. As soon as she finished the song, he jostled her shoulder. She pretended to be waking up – her acting was good, but up close and as wary as he was, he could see that she hadn't been fully asleep – and then she stared at him with a questioning look.

You were singing in your sleep, and it's not time to get up yet, he said.

Oh, I'm sorry, she said, in a normal voice. But you were talking in yours, she said, under her breath.

Don't worry about it, he said, as if forgiving her for waking him up.

She nodded as if thanking him for his generosity, and dropped off back into sleep, properly afraid to say or do anything else.

Tomas wondered what he'd said, and how much of it she'd heard. Then he prepared to be a model Citizen for the next few days, until his Informer's surveillance files would go into another cycle and erase tonight's recording – unless he was on a watch list. People who got onto watch lists provided some of the more ticklish situations that he spent his working hours trying to analyze. And talking in your sleep could get you on a watch list. That kept your files on the top of the stack, intact, for as long as the government felt like it. The only way to fight back was to be relentlessly normal for a while, if you could manage it – without being obvious about it, of course.

Awake now, but groggy, he puttered around the apartment. He was prone to insomnia – most of the MUS breed were, at this stage of development, especially after someone higher than them in rank got executed – so he wasn't worried about being turned in for that, unless he prolonged it unnaturally. Eventually, he puttered around to where he could read the label on the sleeping draught, so he'd know to not accidentally take anything like it again, just in case it had caused him to blather when he didn't have his shields up.

He didn't dare stay up too long, for fear the trainers would find out about it, and for fear of being too tired at work to stay sharp enough to survive any of his colleagues who saw an opening to put him in a difficult situation. As a safety measure, he mentally repeated approved mantras over and over as he fell asleep, trying to program his mind on what it should say, in case it got unruly again and decided to be vocal as he slept.

The next morning, once he was awake enough to deal with any hostile moves on her part, he freed the woman and they had breakfast together. He left it to her to clean up, and headed to work. Or tried to. The door was still locked. He tried to not look as rattled as he felt. He'd never been locked in before because of a wild woman, and it had never occurred to him that the door wouldn't be unlocked when it was time to head to work. It was dangerous to not show up on time, so after checking his Informer to see if he'd missed a message, and finding none, he sent a message to the trainer who'd brought the woman.

The trainer sent back a message to sit tight, stay quiet, and wait for him to show up. It seemed an incomplete set of instructions, even though, of course, a trainer was never obligated to explain himself or his orders. Tomas affected an unconcerned air, and poured himself another cup of coffee.

The woman asked if anything was wrong.

Tomas pretended not to have