Kiln People

by David Brin

  Well, Gumby owes it, in a bet over whether the head of UK was still alive.

  It seemed obvious! What other reason could Kaolin have for all the schemes, tricks, and betrayals? He had to be dead! Everything pointed. The hermit thing. Only being seen in ditto or holo form. And those shiny platinums getting scarcer every year …

  The memory problems made sense if his copies were stockpiled months or years ago. Each one must study briefings when it’s thawed. Then each golem tries to last as long as possible to maintain the illusion. To keep away the coroner and probate. To prevent folks from crying “ghost!”

  Why else would he pay a fortune to develop dit-replenishment and dit-to-dit, then keep them off the market? It all made sense.

  Yet there he stands, inside the dome, glimpsed by the clever eye in my paw — a gaunt figure with mottled-pale skin that meets every spectral test my clever implant can apply, wearing a white robe while facing a holo display that shows Clara and Gumby … who look dumbfounded as I transmit the news.

  NOT DEAD, my message reads inside their glowing implants.

  From across the meadow float sounds of laughter, tinkling like bells, mocking how certain we were. Everyone but Pal, who made the bet, offering odds and saying -

  “Naw. A trillionaire can afford to be more clever than just dead. There’s got to be more to it than that.”

  “Because I’m actually not dead?”

  The holo image of Kaolin raised an eyebrow. “Did I hear you right, ditective? My motive in this grand scenario is that I’m still alive?”

  Internally, I tried to gird myself. A bluff is a bluff, after all. You must carry it through.

  “That’s right, Vic Kaolin. Because … because the dead-man scenario is too obvious! Someone would put it together and get a writ, demanding to see you in person.”

  “It’s been tried.”

  “Yes, but people will persist, eventually finding cause to invade your privacy screen and demand proof of life.” I shook my head. “No, the immortality we’re talking about isn’t yours. At least not now. Rather, it’s—”

  I paused, buying a few seconds by coughing behind my fist. The man in the holo tilted his head, prompting me.

  “Yes? It’s—”

  “It’s about business!” Clara blurted. “Because … you’re a businessman. And an avowed elitist. You’ve watched your fellow zillionaires, many in their waning years, grow desperate for more time. Why not provide it and make a buck? With renewal and dit-to-dit, your peers can release their dying organic bodies, then continue in a daisy chain of dittos!”

  Clara grinned, barely able to contain herself. “But that’s only part of the plan. It has do be done in secret because—”

  “Because the law says only organics are people!” I exclaimed. “To make it work, your customers have to become hermits, like you, allowing no one near enough to check flesh. And it could look awfully suspicious if more than a few turned recluse at the same time. That limits your market, except—”

  Clara hurried in. “Except for the recent frenzy over those plague missiles that Maharal so nearly launched. All of a sudden, life seems perilous again. Any day, without warning, the air may be filled with nasty viruses. Justification enough for scores of wealthy old eccentrics to order shiny new reflective domes built atop their mansions, swearing to venture forth only in clay … blaming the dangerous world when, in fact, they’re preparing for the pragmatists’ version of life after death. Where you can actually take it with you.”

  The face in the holo display stared at Clara, then back at me.

  “This is the most astonishing scenario I ever … What proof can you—”

  I laughed.

  “Why none at all. Yet. But the scheme counts on two fickle elements, money and secrecy. What about the heirs who stand to lose if Gramps never dies? Some will gladly pay for a real investigation and—”

  Clara gasped, staring at nothing. “What is it?” I asked.

  Her jaw hardened. She turned and glared at Aeneas Kaolin. “We had better not learn those missiles were your idea … sir. Cleverly arranged, in order to set up this very situation.”

  Her tone chilled my ersatz spine. And it rocked our host, who paled as he raised both hands.

  “The … the missiles surprised me as much as anyone, I swear it! I — I’m just taking advantage … the mood of fear … to do a little business.

  “Again, where’s the harm?”

  A great knot seemed to let go where my intestines would be, if I had them. Our new speculation, drawn impulsively from the ruined story we had been so sure of, was on target! In the end, it wasn’t logic that pinned Kaolin — he could have called our bluff — but the raw power of Clara’s personality.

  “We’ll see,” she told the nervous hermit, keeping her momentum.

  “I promise, you’ll have every chance to prove your innocence.”

  73

  Riding the Wheel

  … or learning to steer …

  The kite, fluttering and swooping against the sky, is beautiful. Isn’t it? Like so much in the world. A big part of why you can’t let go.

  Yosil was right about the “anchor” effect. You’ll never do all the ambitious things that he planned, or achieve his goals. Those vast new territories to conquer, to mold by will alone — you’ll leave those for another generation, perhaps a wiser one.

  Still, you understand something that he didn’t.

  Nature is necessary.

  Without a gritty, paradox-free level of reality, bound by implacable physical laws, rich complexity could never emerge. Only fierce selection on an enormous scale could produce human beings — so competent at tooth-and-claw, yet rising to dream far beyond, to qualities like art, love, and soul.

  But evolution clings! Your body yearns for the tingle of fair wind, the sting of rain, the luscious scent and taste of food, the fight-flight rush of adrenaline.

  The rub-slap-tickle of a happy lover.

  The music of laughter.

  You who make the world by observing it — causing the probability amplitudes of stars to collapse and whole galaxies to reify, just by looking at them — you remain wedded to cause-effect because it offers hope! Hope that evolution will play fair. (Though it hasn’t yet.) Hope that you may win, no matter how unlikely it seems. (Because you are descended from generations of winners!)

  Hope to stay alive, though death always waits.

  You know it better than others. For you’ve seen the barren soulscape, where just a few billion algae-colonists struggle at the shoreline, clinging till the very last moment. Then, leaping for a moment’s glory like salmon plunging upstream, they try to achieve some goal beyond reckoning — something religions hint at, the way sketches on a cave wall once flickered by torchlight, almost coming alive.

  Yes, every flicker that launched itself has failed, so far. But falling back, they left impressions. There, in dust.

  And impressions last.

  So, what will you do? Cut loose and try for higher ground? Without the stored energy that Yosil tried to gather, your chances will be slim. His calculations were good, even if his soul was warped.

  Stay here, then? Half in one world and half elsewhere? Share a bed with Clara and the far-more-human version of your former self … the Albert variant who changes bodies, living from day to day?

  It could work. But is it fair?

  Or will you try something else? Something creative. Something never seen … at least in this cosmos.

  The odds seem low. But then, it’s all in the trying, right?

  For creatures rising out of flesh or mud, that’s all there’s ever been.

  74

  Impressionism

  … or learning the finer art …

  Departing the veranda of Aeneas Kaolin’s stone mansion, Clara and I wandered down the back steps, through a rose garden and past an elaborate dovecote, all the way to the grassy verge where Pal and realAlbert flew their kite.

  As expected, they had d
rawn attention — not from the security staff, but people living in an enclave of small houses that lay tucked behind the hill, built for servants and their families. A crowd of children stared, or ran shouting excitedly.

  Even today, there’s something about a well-handled kite.

  Pal was clearly having a ball, controlling it from his medchair. Though golems give him access to the world, I never saw any of them provide such simple joy. Causing the wing panels to warp just right, he sent it swooping, climbing, then diving in mock attacks that drew delighted shrieks from kids and their parents.

  All except one pair of adults who seemed less happy. They kept chivvying at three boys, trying to herd them back toward the small faux neighborhood. I sensed a glaring meanness there. But for now, the kids were having none of it, screaming and running like the others.

  Turning to the platinum ditKaolin, who still accompanied us after his original signed off, I asked, “Are those the heirs?”

  Grim-faced, the ditto nodded. “Nephews. Sons of a half sister who died three years ago.”

  This truth had been part of the price Clara and I demanded.

  “Do they know?” ditKaolin shook his head. “Their mother left me … left Aeneas … with full legal authority. You cannot interfere.”

  Clara sighed. “Well, for now just remember that we know. We’ll be watching.”

  “Of that I’m sure.”

  The golem’s voice lacked any hint of resentment or resignation. I might have felt better if it had.

  It took a while to collect Pal and realAlbert and the little spy-ferret, leaving the kite behind in the hands of some kids.

  I thought about our “victory” during the limo ride back. Despite having cornered the great Kaolin and extracted the truth, I didn’t feel especially elated. Maybe long ago, before the Big Deregulation, we might have nailed him for all sorts of criminal offenses — from fraud to blackmail to extortion. But those were all civil torts now and most of his victims were happily bought off.

  The most we could do was make him pay some more. And put crimps in the worst parts of his plan.

  For one thing, the scattered team from Project Zoroaster would be recombined, along with outside critics, under the auspices of a neutral foundation. The aim: to release those new technologies in the least unsettling sequence, not the most disruptive. Though in truth, much of Kaolin’s social war seemed unavoidable. We were due for interesting times.

  Another foundation, bankrolled by a generous Kaolin Grant, would look into the more “mystical” interests of Yosil Maharal. Not timidly, but with due attention to the raw feelings of millions, who still believe some lines aren’t meant to cross. As if there would be any way — over the long run — to keep folks from crossing.

  Poor Ritu would be cared for, and quite wealthy when she stepped out. Doctors even spoke of teaching her to collaborate with a “rehabilitated” Beta personality. An exceptionally interesting person might emerge … and the world would be well advised to keep a wary eye open.

  As for Kaolin’s new customers, he was welcome to try selling package tours of tomorrow for those who had everything except time. But since the new dittoing techniques won’t be secret anymore, everybody will have a fair idea what’s going on. So then, let heirs and lawyers and advocacy groups and ad hoc juries all thrash it out. Maybe elites will throw their influence behind the emancipators and to get ditimmortality declared legal. Perhaps not.

  So long as the whole thing happens in the open, it’s really none of a ditective’s concern. Is it?

  Pal bid us drop him off at the Ephemerals Temple. He had a date with the volunteer healer there — Alexie — who repaired me twice when I was green. His old flame who, Pal freely admitted, he “didn’t deserve.”

  Perhaps. But who could refuse Pal’s company for very long? Half of him was more alive than most men I’ve known. Certainly more fun.

  The little ferret-golem agreed. After reporting what he’d seen climbing the walls at Kaolin Manor, that small version of me figured he might as well find whatever excitement the world offered during life’s second half — the next dozen hours. So he hopped onto Pal’s shoulder and together they wheeled up the ramp, giving me that familiar old sensation of déjà vu.

  Turning back to the car, Clara and I had a surprise. realAlbert sat inside, smiling as he waited. And we could see him clearly! Even though we stood on the pavement outside.

  In fact, all of the limo walls and panels were completely transparent, not just one narrow, jittery dot per occupant. “Goodness,” Clara murmured. “That means he’s looking everywhere, in all directions at the same—”

  “Yes, I know.”

  When you get right down to it, this was no surprise at all.

  Taking her hand, I glanced back at Pal and the smallest Albert, entering the temple together under the rosette window, past all the injured, broken, and spurned roxes who gather there each day for comfort and hope, passing into a place that welcomed all souls.

  “Where to now?” queried the limo’s automatic driver.

  I looked to my owner, the woman I loved.

  She, in turn, glanced over at realAlbert. His attention might be everywhere at once — omni-awareness — but his smile seemed present right here with us.

  “Home,” he said, in a voice clear and commanding. “Time for everybody to go home.”

  For now, home meant Clara’s houseboat, just a kilometer downstream from Odeon Square … though it felt like years since I schlepped that distance underwater, thinking that I’d be in heaven if only I could unmask the infamous ditnapper, Beta.

  Ah well. Heaven is a state of mind. I knew that now.

  One favor that Yosil Maharal had done for us was forcing Clara and me to finally live together. Sure, I missed my house and garden, but we were both surprised at each other’s willingness to compromise in all the details of sharing a roof. Even one so cramped. Even with there being two of me.

  It was an odd menage, even by modern standards. I mean, with hyperquality blanks and top equipment, I might last quite a while. So could realAlbert. Two halves of a complete husband for Clara. Able to father children. Able to help raise them. But in separate units.

  “Kind of handy,” she said, putting a positive spin on things. But I could see worry. There were careers to balance, her new duties with the Dodecahedron, several kinds of biological and ceramic clocks, and two half-men to love … with no room aboard the houseboat for all the grays and ebonies and such we were going to need.

  Time to get a house. At least now we could afford one. realAlbert was in the tiny forward cabin puttering with the imprinting equipment. I quashed an impulse to go stop him. Though childlike in his state of perpetual distraction, he was no simpleton. In fact, quite the opposite.

  “Dinner is cooking,” the houseboat computer announced to Clara. “I have also prioritized four hundred and seventy-two messages for you and five hundred twenty for Mr. Morris. And the University called to inform you that you received incompletes on all of last semester’s courses.”

  Clara cursed colorfully. The life of a student and part-time warrior was one more thing due to change. Welcome to the life of a full-time professional, dear. C’est la vie.

  Then humming sounds drew our attention toward the bow — equipment warming up. Clara glanced at me as if to say, Make sure he doesn’t hurt himself.

  I hurried forward on time to hear realAlbert mutter happily to himself. Something about how “we’re all bosons in this dust,” or something like it. Arriving at the cabin, I saw him lie down on the platten with his head — our head — between the tetragramatron tendrils, waving gently on all sides. I noticed that the transfer switch was pulled to UNLOAD.

  After staring for several seconds, I asked, “Are you sure?”

  The last time we tried this, there had been a busy signal. The organic brain was full, or fully occupied, with something immensely large. No more room inside. No room for me at all.

  For the first time since Urraca
Mesa — or since our soul-paths separated the Tuesday before — I felt complete attention from those eyes, durable organic eyes, built to last for thirty thousand days, or more.

  “She’s all yours, Pinocchio,” I heard my own voice say, and it had something else — a tone that said farewell.

  There would be room, now, I realized. A clean slate. A home to reimprint with all that I was and all I had become. Everything necessary for this wayward puppet to be a real boy.

  And boy, won’t Clara be surprised.

  Lying down on the other table, the one with a recycling bucket underneath, I took a moment to wish myself a nice trip.

  Then I put my clay head down to begin life once again.

  75

  Soul Comfort

  … or doing what folks always do …

  Acknowledgments

  Kiln People is one of the more challenging works I’ve taken on, expressing different points of view and time through seldom-used authorial tools like second-person, future tense. But that’s just part of the tradition in a genre that thrives on the unusual and loves to take on clichés.

  I’d like to thank those who provided assistance, especially with critical readings of early drafts, and with insights on the historical, literary, and philosophical implications of golems.

  Special appreciation goes to Cheryl Brigham, Beth Meacham, Stefan Jones, Vernor Vinge, Tappan King, Wil McCarthy, Ralph Vicinanza, John Douglas, Lou Aronica, Mason Rourman, Steve Sloan, Mark Grygier, Steve Jackson, Joe Miller, Vince Gerardis, Beverly Price, Stephen Potts, Hodge Cabtree, Robin Hanson, Steven Koerber, Alberto Monteiro, Steinn Sigurdsonn, William Calvin, Trevor Sands, James Moore, Nick Arnett, Ruben Krasnopolsky, Robert Qualkinbush, Jim Kruggel, Tamara Boyd, Manoj Kasichainula, Pat Mannion, Amy Sterling Casil, Daniel Jensen, Rachel Heslin, Alex Spehr, Lisa Gay, Bret Marquis, Brian Sidlauskas, Stella Bloom, Rae Paarlberg, Joshua Knorr, Dr. Globiana, Daniel Rego and Matt Crawford, along with members of the CalTech and University of Chicago Science Fiction Clubs.