The Mammoth Book of Best New SF 17

by Gardner Dozois

  It redesigned the baby’s genotype. It surveyed the damage, analyzed what was lacking, and filled in the gaps with material from its own preloaded DNA arsenal. It plugged healthy chromosome sequences into the mess like deluxe Tinkertoy units until it had an organism with optimal chances for survival. That was what it was programmed to do, after all. But it had never had to replace so much in a subject, never had to dig so deeply into its arsenal for material, and some of the DNA in there was very old and very strange indeed. Those kits were first designed a hundred thousand years ago, after all, when Homo sapiens hadn’t quite homogenized.

  By the time the patcher had finished its work, the embryo had been transformed into a healthy hybrid of a kind that hadn’t been born in fifty millennia, with utterly unknown potential.

  I could see Jabesh managing to reimplant the thing and get the girl all tidy by the time her gruff husband came back. He was telling the husband she needed to stay off her feet and rest, he was telling him that nothing in life is certain, and tipping his tall hat, Good-Day. Sir, and staggering off to sit shaking in his cabin, drinking bourbon whiskey straight out of a case-bottle without the least effect.

  He knew what he’d done. But Jabesh had obeyed the Priority Gold.

  I saw him waiting, afraid of what might happen. Nothing did, except that the weeks passed, and the girl lost her pallor and became well. I could see her crossing at Panama – there was the green jungle, there was the now-visibly-pregnant mother sidesaddle on a mule – and here she was disembarking at San Francisco.

  It was months before Jabesh could summon the courage to pay a call on her. Here he was being shown into the parlor, hat in hand. Nothing to see but a young mother dandling her adored boy. Madonna and child, to the life. One laughing baby looks just like another, right? So who’d ever know what Jabesh had done? And here was Jabesh taking his leave, smiling, and turning to slink away into some dark corner of history.

  The funny thing was, what Jabesh had done wasn’t even against the mortals’ law. Yet. It wouldn’t become illegal until the year 2093, because mortals wouldn’t understand the consequences of genetic engineering until then.

  But I understood. And now I knew why I’d wanted to turn tail and run the moment I’d laid eyes on William Randolph Hearst, just as certain dogs cowered at the sight of me.

  The last images flitted before my eyes, the baby growing into the tall youth with something now subtly different about him, that unearthly voice, that indefinable quality of endlessly prolonged childhood that would worry his parents. Then! Downloaded directly into my skull before I could even flinch, the flashing letters: PRIORITY GOLD. REPAIR AND UPGRADE. Authorized by Facilitator General Aegeus, that same big shot who’d set up Jabesh.

  I was trapped. I had been given the order.

  So what could I do? I hung up the phone, took back my adapter component, pulled on a fresh pair of gloves and took up my scalpel again.

  How bad could it be, after all? I was coming in at the end of the story, anyway. Eighteen more years weren’t so much, even if Hearst never should have existed in the first place. Any weird genetic stuff he might have passed on to his sons seemed to have switched off in them. And, looking at the big picture, had he really done any harm? He was even a decent guy, in his way. Too much money, enthusiasm, appetite for life, an iron will and unshakable self-assurance . . . and a mind able to think in more dimensions than a human mind should. Okay, so it was a formula for disaster.

  I knew, because I remembered certain men with just that kind of zeal and ability. They had been useful to the Company, back in the old days before history began, until they had begun to argue with Company policy. Then the Company had had a problem on its hands, because the big guys were immortals. Then the Company had had to fight dirty, and take steps to see there would never be dissension in its ranks again.

  But that had been a long time ago, and right now I had a Priority Gold to deal with, so I told myself Hearst was human enough. He was born of woman, wasn’t he? There was her picture on the wall, right across from Marion’s. And he had but a little time to live.

  I replaced the old tired implants with the fresh new ones and did a repair job on his heart that ought to last the required time. Then I closed him up and did the cosmetic work, and got his shirt back on his old body.

  I set him back in his chair, returned the editorial he had been writing to his lap, set the dog at his feet again, gathered up my stuff, turned off the opposite lamp and looked around to see if I’d forgotten anything. Nope. In an hour or so his heart would begin beating again and he’d be just fine, at least for a few more years.

  “Live forever, oh king,” I told him sardonically, and then I fled, switching off the hush field as I went.

  But my words echoed a little too loudly as I ran through his palace gardens, under the horrified stars.

  Hearst watched, intrigued, as Lewis slid the Valentino script behind the panel in the antique cabinet. With expert fingers Lewis worked the panel back into its grooves, rocking and sliding it gently, until there was a click and it settled into the place it would occupy for the next four centuries.

  “And to think, the next man to see that thing won’t even be born for years and years,” Hearst said in awe. He closed the front of the cabinet and locked it. As he dropped the key in his waistcoat pocket, he looked at Lewis speculatively.

  “I suppose you’re an immortal too, Mr. Kensington?” he inquired.

  “Well – yes, sir, I am,” Lewis admitted.

  “Holy Moses. And how old are you?”

  “Not quite eighteen hundred and thirty, sir.”

  “Not quite! Why, you’re no more than a baby, compared to Mr. Denham here, are you?” Hearst chuckled in an avuncular sort of way. “And have you known many famous people?”

  “Er – I knew Saint Patrick,” Lewis offered. “And a lot of obscure English novelists.”

  “Well, isn’t that nice?” Mr. Hearst smiled down at him and patted him on the shoulder. “And now you can tell people you’ve known Greta Garbo, too.”

  “Yes, sir,” said Lewis, and then his mouth fell open, but Hearst had already turned to me, rustling the slip of paper I had given him.

  “And you say my kitchen staff can mix this stuff up, Mr. Denham?”

  “Yeah. If you have any trouble finding all the ingredients, I’ve included the name of a guy in Chinatown who can send you seeds and plants mail-order,” I told him.

  “Very good,” he said, nodding. “Well, I’m sorry you boys can’t stay longer, but I know what those studio schedules are like. I imagine we’ll run into one another again, though, don’t you?”

  He smiled, and Lewis and I sort of backed out of his presence salaaming.

  Neither one of us said much on the way down the mountain, through all those hairpin turns and herds of wild animals. I think Lewis was scared Hearst might still somehow be able to hear us, and actually I wouldn’t have put it past him to have managed to bug the Model A.

  Myself, I was silent because I had begun to wonder about something, and I had no way to get an answer on it.

  I hadn’t taken a DNA sample from Hearst. It wouldn’t have been of any use to anybody. You can’t make an immortal from an old man, because his DNA, no matter how unusual it is, has long since begun the inevitable process of deterioration, the errors in replication that make it unusable for a template.

  This is one of the reasons immortals can only be made from children, see? The younger you are, the more bright and new-minted your DNA pattern is. I was maybe four or five when the Company rescued me, not absolute optimum for DNA but within specs. Lewis was a newborn, which is supposed to work much better. Might fetal DNA work better still?

  That being the case . . . had Jabesh kept a sample of the furtive work he’d done, in that cramped steamer cabin? Because if he had, if Dr. Zeus had it on file somewhere . . . it would take a lot of work, but the Company might meet the terms of William Randolph Hearst.

  But they wouldn’t ac
tually ever really do such a thing, would they?

  We parked in front of the general store in San Simeon and I bought five rolls of Pep-O-Mints. By the time we got to Pismo Beach I had to stop for more.

  END CREDITS: 2333

  The young man leaned forward at his console, fingers flying as he edited images, superimposed them and rearranged them into startling visuals. When he had a result that satisfied him, he put on a headset and edited in the sound, brief flares of music and dialogue. He played it all back and nodded in satisfaction. His efforts had produced thirty seconds of story that would hold the viewers spellbound, and leave them with the impression that Japanese Imperial troops had brutally crushed a pro-Republic riot in Mazatlan, and Californians from all five provinces were rallying to lend aid to their oppressed brothers and sisters to the south.

  Nothing of the kind had occurred, of course, but if enough people thought it had, it just might become the truth. Such things were known to happen.

  And it was for everyone’s good, after all, because it would set certain necessary forces in motion. He believed that democracy was the best possible system, but had long since quietly acknowledged to himself that government by the people seldom worked because people were such fools. That was all right, though. If a beautiful old automobile wouldn’t run, you could always hook it up to something more efficient and tow it, and pretend it was moving of its own accord. As long as it got where you wanted it to go in the end, who cared?

  He sent the story for global distribution and began another one, facts inert of themselves but presented in such a way as to paint a damning picture of the Canadian Commonwealth’s treatment of its Native American neighbors on the ice mining issue. When he had completed about ten seconds of the visual impasto, however, an immortal in a gray suit entered the room, carrying a disc case.

  “Chief? These are the messages from Ceylon Central. Do you want to review them before or after your ride?”

  “Gosh, it’s that time already, isn’t it?” the young man said, glancing at the temporal chart in the lower left hand corner of the monitor. “Leave them here, Quint. I’ll go through them this evening.”

  “Yes, sir.” The immortal bowed, set down the case and left. The young man rose, stretched and crossed the room to his living suite. A little dog rose from where it had been curled under his chair and followed him sleepily.

  Beyond his windows the view was much the same as it had been for the last four centuries: the unspoiled wilderness of the Santa Lucia mountains as far as the eye could see in every direction, save only the west where the sea lay blue and calm. The developers had been stopped. He had seen to it.

  He changed into riding clothes and paused before a mirror, combing his hair. Such animal exploitation as horseback riding was illegal, as he well knew, having pushed through the legislation that made it so himself. It was good that vicious people weren’t allowed to gallop around on poor sweating beasts any more, striking and shouting at them. He never treated his horses that way, however. He loved them and was a gentle and careful rider, which was why the public laws didn’t apply to him.

  He turned from the mirror and found himself facing the portrait of Marion, the laughing girl of his dreams, forever young and happy and sober. He made a little courtly bow and blew her a kiss. All his loved ones were safe and past change now.

  Except for his dog; it was getting old. They always did, of course. There were some things even the Company couldn’t prevent, useful though it was.

  Voices came floating up to him from the courtyard.

  “. . . because when the government collapsed, of course Park Services didn’t have any money any more,” a tour docent was explaining. “For a while it looked as though the people of California were going to lose La Cuesta Encantada to foreign investors. The art treasures were actually being auctioned off, one by one. How many of you remember that antique movie script that was found in that old furniture? A few years back, during the Old Hollywood Revival?”

  The young man was distracted from his reverie. Grinning, he went to the mullioned window, and peered down at the tour group assembled below. His dog followed him and he picked it up, scratching between its ears as he listened. The docent continued: “Well, that old cabinet came from here! We know that Rudolph Valentino was a friend of Marion Davies, and we think he must have left it up here on a visit, and somehow it got locked in the cabinet and forgotten until it was auctioned off, and the new owners opened the secret drawer.”

  One of the tourists put up a hand.

  “But if everything was sold off – ”

  “No, you see, at the very last minute a miracle happened.” The docent smiled. “William Randolph Hearst had five sons, as you know, but most of their descendants moved away from California. It turned out one of them was living in Europe. He’s really wealthy, and when he heard about the Castle being sold, he flew to California to offer the Republic a deal. He bought the Castle himself, but said he’d let the people of California go on visiting Hearst Castle and enjoying its beauty.”

  “How wealthy is he?” one of the visitors wanted to know.

  “Nobody knows just how much money he has,” said the docent after a moment, sounding embarrassed. “But we’re all very grateful to the present Mr. Hearst. He’s actually added to the art collection you’re going to see and – though some people don’t like it – he’s making plans to continue building here.”

  “Will we get to meet him?” somebody else asked.

  “Oh, no. He’s a very private man,” said the docent. “And very busy, too. But you will get to enjoy his hospitality, as we go into the Refectory now for a buffet lunch. Do you all have your complimentary vouchers? Then please follow me inside. Remember to stay within the velvet ropes.”

  The visitors filed in, pleased and excited. The young man looked down on them from his high window.

  He set his dog in its little bed, told it to stay, and then left by a private stair that took him down to the garden. He liked having guests. He liked watching from a distance as their faces lit up, as they stared in awe, as they shared in the beauty of his grand house and all its delights. He liked making mortals happy.

  He liked directing their lives, too. He had no doubt at all of his ability to guide them, or the wisdom of his long-term goals for humanity. Besides, it was fun.

  In fact, he reflected, it was one of the pleasures that made eternal life worth living. He paused for a moment in the shade of one of the ancient oak trees and looked around, smiling his terrible smile at the world he was making.

  NIGHT OF TIME

  Robert Reed

  Robert Reed sold his first story in 1986, and quickly established himself as a frequent contributor to The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction and Asimov’s Science Fiction, as well as selling many stories to Science Fiction Age, Universe, New Destinies, Tomorrow, Synergy, Starlight, and elsewhere. Reed may be one of the most prolific of today’s young writers, particularly at short-fiction lengths, seriously rivaled for that position only by authors such as Stephen Baxter and Brian Stableford. And – also like Baxter and Stableford – he manages to keep up a very high standard of quality while being prolific, something that is not at all easy to do. Reed stories such as “Sister Alice”, “Brother Perfect”, “Decency”, “Savior”, “The Remoras”, “Chrysalis”, “Whiptail”, “The Utility Man”, “Marrow”, “Birth Day”, “Blind”, “The Toad of Heaven”, “Stride”, “The Shape of Everything”, “Guest of Honor”, “Waging Good”, and “Killing the Morrow”, among at least a half-dozen others equally as strong, count as among some of the best short work produced by anyone in the 1980s and 1990s and the early Oughts to date. Nor is he nonprolific as a novelist, having turned out eight novels since the end of the 1980s, including The Lee Shore, The Hormone Jungle, Black Milk, The Remarkables, Down the Bright Way, Beyond the Veil of Stars, An Exaltation of Larks, Beneath the Gated Sky, and Marrow. His most recent book is the novel/collection (depending how you squint at it) Sis
ter Alice. Upcoming is a new novel, Marrow 2. His stories have appeared in our Ninth through Seventeenth, our Nineteenth, and our Twentieth Annual Collections. Some of the best of his short work was collected in The Dragons of Springplace. Reed lives with his family in Lincoln, Nebraska.

  Every year, the problem is not so much whether to use a Robert Reed story, but rather which Robert Reed story to use, out of a number of possible choices, any of which would make a respectable selection for a Best of the Year anthology. In the end, I decided to go for the quietly evocative story that follows, which shows that sometimes it’s better to forget than to remember . . .

  ASH DRANK A BITTER tea while sitting in the shade outside his shop, comfortable on a little seat that he had carved for himself in the trunk of a massive, immortal bristle-cone pine. The wind was tireless, dense and dry and pleasantly warm. The sun was a convincing illusion – a K-class star perpetually locked at an early-morning angle, the false sky narrow and pink, a haze of artful dust pretending to have been blown from some faraway hell. At his feet lay a narrow and phenomenally deep canyon, glass roads anchored to the granite walls, with hundreds of narrow glass bridges stretched from one side to the other, making the air below him glisten and glitter. Busier shops and markets were set beside the important roads, and scattered between them were the hivelike mansions and mating halls, and elaborate fractal statues, and the vertical groves of cling-trees that lifted water from the distant river: The basics of life for the local species, the 31-3s.

  For Ash, business was presently slow, and it had been for some years. But he was a patient man and a pragmatist, and when you had a narrow skill and a well-earned reputation, it was only a matter of time before the desperate or those with too much money came searching for you.