Partials

She saw motion on the screen and ran to check it; the DORD was already displaying and categorizing some preliminary images. She flipped through the list and opened one for the compound labeled M, a funny little horseshoe-shaped particle. The DORD had found several structures in Samm’s body that it thought might be related to it: one in the nasal cavity and the rest in the lungs. Kira pulled them up, side by side on the screen, and studied them; they looked almost like glands, though not any glands Kira was familiar with. The one in his sinuses was significantly larger, and the DORD had cross-linked it to several other files. Kira opened the list and flipped through it quickly, mildly surprised at what she saw; the DORD had linked that image to every compound it had scanned for thus far. They each had a little gland of their own in the lungs, but they were all connected to the big one in his head.

Kira studied the gland closer while the DORD kept working. What did it do? She couldn’t just ask the computer to guess, but she could ask it to search its database for partial matches. She started the search and looked back at the image again, buckling down for another long wait, but the results were almost instantaneous: no match. She frowned and ran the test again. No match.

Guess I’m going to have to do this manually. Given that each particle had two related structures, the obvious first guess was that one structure created the particle and the other one caught it: a writer and a reader. Which implied that they carried information. She ran another search, this time looking for anything in the database that wasn’t human. The DORD found an old file, pre-Break, where somebody had scanned a dog, and she asked the computer to look for partial matches in there. One popped up almost immediately, displaying a structure remarkably similar, though far simpler, than the one in Samm. It was a vomeronasal organ.

Samm had an incredibly sophisticated pheromonal system.

Kira pulled up more files, reading what she could on pheromones: They were a system of simple chemical communication, like a form of smell but far, far more specialized. Insects used them for simple things like marking trails or warning one another of danger; dogs used them to claim territory and to signal breeding times. What did the Partials use them for?

I may as well try asking, she thought. “Tell me about your … pheromones.” Predictably, Samm said nothing. “You have a highly developed system of chemical synthesizers and receptors; can you tell me about it?”

No response.

“Can’t blame me for trying.” She thought a moment, looking around the room, then opened the medicomp and pulled out the rubber glove Samm had breathed into. She brought it near his face, pricked it with a pin, and squeezed it as hard as she could, propelling the air directly into Samm’s nose. He coughed and spluttered, jerking his head to get out of the stream of air, but Kira watched in wonder as his demeanor seemed to grow more calm—his heart rate rose as he reacted to the forced air, then fell again almost immediately as he reacted to … something else. The pheromones. His eyes relaxed, his expression softened, his breathing became more even.

He seemed, Kira thought suddenly, like he was making exactly the same face he’d made in the morning, when he’d agreed to blow into the glove.

“Kuso,” he said. “That’s not fair.”

Kira put her hands on her hips. “What just happened?”

“You’re using my own data against me, and now I—damn it.” He closed his mouth and looked at the ceiling.

“What data?” asked Kira. “The pheromones? Is that what you call them?” She looked at the glove in her hand, now deflated and floppy. “You just told me something you didn’t want to tell me, didn’t you? You’ve never done that—this was a slip. What did the pheromones do?”

Samm said nothing, and Kira brought the glove closer to her face, examining it closely. She walked to the center of the room, envisioning the way it had been laid out that morning—the DORD over here, the table over there, and Samm on top of it. She’d asked him to breathe into the glove and they’d shared something, a moment of … of something. Of actual communication. She’d made a joke about his name, he’d made one back, and then he’d agreed to help her collect a breath sample. He’d trusted her.

And then just now, after she blew it back in his face and asked him a question, he’d trusted her again—not for long, but long enough for his shield of hostile self-control to falter. He’d answered her question.

The pheromones had re-created the trust he’d felt that morning and forced him to feel it again.