Cryoburn - Lois McMaster Bujold [118]
"I want to show my sphinx to Mom and Mina!" said Jin.
"You mustn't take it into her booth," said Raven, coming alert.
"I know that," said Jin. "But I can hold it up to the glass. Can Roic-san help me cart everything?"
Roic glanced at the empty office and cast Miles a tiny head-shake, bodyguard-conscious again. Vorlynkin caught it, and said smoothly, "I'll give you a hand, Jin."
Raven added prudently, "I'll come along."
"Actually," said Miles, "I think Leiber's still up there; we'll both come."
Tenbury returned then, to continue the interrupted tour; with no more than an eyebrow-twitch from Mark and a farewell smile from Kareen, the three went off toward another exit. Miles followed Vorlynkin, who carried the sphinx-carrier in Jin's train. Plaintive cries of "Aowt! Hum!" drifted back through the stale shadows of the underground garage.
Out. Home. You and me both, Sphinx.
His mother's reaction to the sphinx was disappointing, Jin thought, but not surprising. Familiar, in fact, and comforting thereby.
"Jin, no!" she said, holding her hand to her lips. "Where would you keep it?"
Nefertiti squirmed in a disgruntled fashion under Jin's arm as he hoisted her up on his hip for his mother to see, and attempted to flap her wings, but practice handling the fiercer Gyre left Jin undismayed. "I'll take good care of her! Don't I always? She came with a file of instructions, too, so nothing can go wrong."
His mother rubbed her forehead, in her bed beyond the glass wall. "That's not the point, this time, Jin love."
Mina, who had been lurking on the foot of the bed all day, sat up, interested. "She's huge! Bigger than Lucky and Gyre put together. She sort of looks like Lucky and Gyre put together, really. Oh, say yes, Mommy!" She wriggled down and exited the booth on a slight puff of positive air pressure.
"Did Tenbury get the intercom working?" Jin asked, realizing a bit belatedly that something new had been added. "When did he come by?"
"No, it was Consul Vorlynkin," said Mina, bending to stare into the sphinx's slow blink. "She has a funny face . . ."
"Oh, how?"
"I found the on-switch," said Vorlynkin, leaning one shoulder against the glass wall and watching all this in some bemusement.
Raven-sensei bent to capture Mina's mask and pop it into the sterilizer box for re-use.
Nefertiti flexed her claws and growled, and Jin set her down on her four paws, where she flapped her wings with a burring noise for all the world like one of the chickens.
"Does she fly?" asked Mina, holding out a hand for the sphinx to sniff.
"I don't think so," said Jin. "Her wings are almost the same size as Gyre's, but she's way heavier."
"These custom genetic constructs are usually made to be decorative, not functional," advised Raven-sensei. "Depending on what the buyer orders, of course."
Mina frowned. "That seems mean, to give her wings she can't fly with."
Jin crouched on his heels and scratched the creature's shoulder blades, between the wings, which folded tamely again as she stretched into the caress. She could not lick her fur like a cat, nor preen her feathers like a bird, so Jin would have a lot of interesting grooming to do, according to the care instructions in the file. "I wonder, do they lay eggs, or have live babies? One at a time, or a litter like kittens? I wonder if there are any male ones, left over?" And if he could find one, somehow . . .
"There may not have been any males made," mused Raven-sensei. "I believe sphinxes were traditionally female. But these proprietary constructs normally aren't given the ability to reproduce. You'd likely have to clone her, and hand-raise the babies."
Jin's imagination took fire. Home cloning of small animals wasn't that hard, if you could get the right equipment, from a pet supply place or hobbyist who was upgrading or quitting. Hardly