Octavia E. Butler - Bloodchild and other stories

Patternmaster
Mind of My Mind
Survivor
Kindred
Wild Seed
Clays Ark
Dawn
Adulthood Rites
Imago
Parable of the Sower
Parable of the Talents
Fledgling

1996, 2005 by Octavia E. Butler

Bloodchild 1984 Davis Publications Inc.
First published in Isaac Asimovs Science Fiction Magazine.
The Evening and the Morning and the Night 1987 Omni Publications International
First published in Omni Magazine.
Near of Kin 1979 Octavia E. Butler
First published in Chrysalis 4.
Speech Sounds 1983 Davis Publications Inc.
First published Isaac Asimovs Science Fiction Magazine.
Crossover 1971 Robin Scott Wilson
First published in Clarion.
Birth of a Writer 1989 Essence Communications, Inc.
First published in Essence.
Furor Scribendi 1993 Octavia E. Butler
First published in L. Ron Hubbard Presents Writers of the Future Volume IX.
Amnesty 2003 Octavia E. Butler
The Book of Martha 2003 Octavia E. Butler and SCIFI.com

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including mechanical, electric, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

Published by
Seven Stories Press
140 Watts Street
New York, NY 10013
www.sevenstories.com

In Canada: Publishers Group Canada, 559 College Street, Toronto, ON M6G 1A9

In the UK: Turnaround Publisher Services Ltd., Unit 3, Olympia Trading Estate, Coburg Road, Wood Green, London N22 6TZ

In Australia: Palgrave Macmillan, 1519 Claremont Street, South Yarra, VIC 3141

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Butler, Octavia E.
Bloodchild and other stories / Octavia E. Butler. 2nd ed.
p. cm.
eISBN: 978-1-58322-803-6
1. Science fiction, American. 2. WomenFiction. 1. Title.
PS3552. U827A6 2005
813.54dc22

2005018898

College professors may order examination copies of Seven Stories Press titles for a free six-month trial period. To order, visit www.sevenstories.com/textbook/ or send a fax on school letterhead to 212.226.1411.

v3.1

T he truth is, I hate short story writing. Trying to do it has taught me much more about frustration and despair than I ever wanted to know.

Yet there is something seductive about writing short stories. It looks so easy. You come up with an idea, then ten, twenty, perhaps thirty pages later, youve got a finished story.

Well, maybe.

My earliest collections of pages werent stories at all. They were fragments of longer worksof stalled, unfinished novels. Or they were brief summaries of unwritten novels. Or they were isolated incidents that could not stand alone.

All that, and poorly written, too.

It didnt help that my college writing teachers said only polite, lukewarm things about them. They couldnt help me much with the science fiction and fantasy I kept turning out. In fact, they didnt have a very high opinion of anything that could be called science fiction.

Editors regularly rejected my stories, returning them with the familiar, unsigned, printed rejection slips. This, of course, was the writers rite of passage. I knew it, but that didnt make it easier. And as for short stories, I used to give up writing them the way some people give up smoking cigarettesover and over again. I couldnt escape my story ideas, and I couldnt make them work as short stories. After a long struggle, I made some of them work as novels.

Which is what they should have been all along.

I am essentially a novelist. The ideas that most interest me tend to be big. Exploring them takes more time and space than a short story can contain.

And yet, every now and then one of my short stories really is a short story. The five stories in this collection really are short stories. Ive never been tempted to turn them into novels. This book, however, has tempted me to add to themnot to make them longer, but to talk about each of them. Ive included a brief afterword with each story. I like the idea of afterwords rather than individual introductions since afterwords allow me to talk freely about the stories without ruining them for readers. It will be a pleasure to make use of such freedom. Before now, other people have done all the print interpretations of my work: Butler seems to be saying Obviously, Butler believes Butler makes it clear that she feels

Actually, I feel that what people bring to my work is at least as important to them as what I put into it. But Im still glad to be able to talk a little about what I do put into my work, and what it means to me.

M y last night of childhood began with a visit home. TGatois sister had given us two sterile eggs. TGatoi gave one to my mother, brother, and sisters. She insisted that I eat the other one alone. It didnt matter. There was still enough to leave everyone feeling good. Almost everyone. My mother wouldnt take any. She sat, watching everyone drifting and dreaming without her. Most of the time she watched me.

I lay against TGatois long, velvet underside, sipping from my egg now and then, wondering why my mother denied herself such a harmless pleasure. Less of her hair would be gray if she indulged now and then. The eggs prolonged life, prolonged vigor. My father, who had never refused one in his life, had lived more than twice as long as he should have. And toward the end of his life, when he should have been slowing down, he had married my mother and fathered four children.

But my mother seemed content to age before she had to. I saw her turn away as several of TGatois limbs secured me closer. TGatoi liked our body heat and took advantage of it whenever she could. When I was little and at home more, my mother used to try to tell me how to behave with TGatoihow to be respectful and always obedient because TGatoi was the Tlic government official in charge of the Preserve, and thus the most important of her kind to deal directly with Terrans. It was an honor, my mother said, that such a person had chosen to come into the family. My mother was at her most formal and severe when she was lying.

I had no idea why she was lying, or even what she was lying about. It was an honor to have TGatoi in the family, but it was hardly a novelty. TGatoi and my mother had been friends all my mothers life, and TGatoi was not interested in being honored in the house she considered her second home. She simply came in, climbed onto one of her special couches, and called me over to keep her warm. It was impossible to be formal with her while lying against her and hearing her complain as usual that I was too skinny.

Youre better, she said this time, probing me with six or seven of her limbs. Youre gaining weight finally. Thinness is dangerous. The probing changed subtly, became a series of caresses.

Hes still too thin, my mother said sharply.

TGatoi lifted her head and perhaps a meter of her body off the couch as though she were sitting up. She looked at my mother, and my mother, her face lined and old looking, turned away.

Lien, I would like you to have whats left of Gans egg.

The eggs are for the children, my mother said.

They are for the family. Please take it.