View Flat HTML
View Metadata
Search Post
At a booth in Milliways sits a woman in her thirties, stirring a cup of tea, watching the stars explode. There is a fat boring-looking lawbook under her elbow, and a barcode across the back of her right hand.
Mark (with kappa)
Ruth (with Maggie)
A brunette in an oddly-styled yellow-and-green blouse and skirt comes in.
She notices the woman and decides to approach obviously enough that if she has any interest in being bothered she can initiate conversation; if she doesn't she won't have to choose between being interrupted and being rude.
She notices the woman and decides to approach obviously enough that if she has any interest in being bothered she can initiate conversation; if she doesn't she won't have to choose between being interrupted and being rude.
Barcode lady glances up. Blinks at her.
"Hello," she says. "What are you reading?"
"Case studies."
"On what?"
"Cloning." She holds up the book so its spine is visible: Reproductive Cloning Law and Opinion: Six Case Studies.
"Oh, is cloning very common in your world? Most people prefer to have kids the old-fashioned way where I'm from."
Lawbook lady looks at the barcode on her hand. "No, people who want kids do that the old fashioned way in my world too, almost all of the time."
"Um. Would it be rude to ask why you have a barcode tattooed on your hand?"
"Because somebody wanted a source of compatible organ transplants, not a kid." Her voice is distant, level. She has explained this so many times that it's only hurting scar tissue.
"...Oh. Fuck, I'm sorry. Do you--you probably don't want a hug from a stranger."
"No thanks."
"I, um. I should have known better. My parents and brother...having a tattoo with a number like that is, um, not a good sign."
"No? Not a fashion statement in your world?"
"Definitely not."
"I get people asking if they should go into tattoo parlors," she says, stretching out her hand, looking at the ink. "And get their own."
"...Is this a common thing? Are there not, like, laws against cloning yourself just for organ transplants."
"No. Quite legal."
The book briefly becomes heavier, before returning to its normal weight. Green-and-yellow girl's hand is forming a white-knuckled fist, and her jaw is clenched.
Lawbook lady drops her lawbook, startling enough to jostle her tea with her other hand. Splish. She saves the book but has to dab some tea off her hand.
"Sorry, sorry, fuck, I haven't lost control like that in years."
"What did you do?"
"Gravity. I do gravity. It's a thing in my world, people having powers, my brother and one of his daughters do magnetism."
"You do gravity?"
"I...alter the universal gravitational constant of two objects with respect to one another."