Half Past Human (S.F. MASTERWORKS)

by T. J. Bass

  Morning brought Val and Busch grumbling to the dispenser. Bitter set out utensils and distributed her morning ritual hugs – wheedling extra flavors for her platter. She warmed the refresher and set out issue tissue garments for her working men. Old Walter waddled in wearing a wrinkled dusty tunic.

  ‘Sleep well?’ she asked, smiling at Val.

  He nodded.

  ‘I sort of missed our warm meld,’ she pouted.

  Busch growled something about there being other ways of soulsharing besides across mucous membranes. Arthur came in and accepted his calorie-basic from the chute. He paused, waiting for Walter or Busch to OK a flavor allowance . . . flavors from their work-credit allowance.

  ‘Isn’t Jo Jo giving you any flavors these days?’ complained Busch.

  ‘I guess he doesn’t appreciate my efforts,’ said Arthur.

  Walter nodded to the dispenser. It extruded a segmented sandwich of vitamin flavors. When Val stood to leave he glanced around the circle of faces saying his goodbye.

  ‘Where’s Jo Jo now?’ he asked.

  Bitter glanced at Val. ‘Didn’t you see him leave? When I got up to fix the table his cot was already empty.’

  Val shrugged. ‘Must have gotten up awfully early.’

  A fading scream interrupted them – a jumper!

  Busch leaped from his chair and crawled quickly to the spiral. Looking down into the salt-and-pepper crowd at shaft base, he saw ripples around the body of the suicide. Before the ripples closed back over the broken body, he recognized Jo Jo’s tunic.

  Busch returned to the breakfast table and announced jubilantly: ‘Jo Jo is giving a party – right now.’ He went to the dispenser and began ordering expensive high-flavor items as fast as he could. Platters heaped up.

  ‘Right now?’ burped Bitter.

  Val stood in the door awkwardly. Another meld?

  Abruptly the dispenser stopped delivery on Jo Jo’s account. A sensor at shaft base had recorded cessation of life functions.

  ‘Jo Jo has died. His calorie credits go back into the general account,’ announced the class thirteen. The chute closed on the center of a large protein sausage.

  ‘You knew?’ said old Walter – shocked.

  ‘Robbing the dead,’ gasped Val. They stared at the pilferings.

  ‘Of course,’ said Busch. ‘I just wish the crowd had the simple decency not to trample him so soon. He had landed well – horizontal. Had no femurs in his belly. Skull splatter was small. Jumpers from our level usually live a lot longer. A couple of hours at least.’

  Bitter eagerly sorted through the foodstuffs for staple items she could use for bartering. ‘What kind of love is it,’ she rationalized, ‘when you take your calories with you? We were his family, after all. If he wanted to go, the least he could do would be to throw a party first.’

  ‘We all can use a few extra pounds of flavored protein,’ added Arthur, joining in the food-sorting.

  Walter opened his mouth to criticize. Then his own feelings came to the surface.

  ‘I guess I’m as guilty as the rest of you,’ sighed old Walter. ‘Jo Jo was a worker, and I was counting on his flavors after I retired. Now we’re widdled down to a family-4.’

  Bitter stared at Val questioning. He shook his head.

  ‘We need another member for our family,’ she said.

  Walter gathered his wits and ushered Val toward the door. ‘Bitter, you and Arthur stay here and interview applicants for Jo Jo’s replacement. We can’t hold on to a place this size very long without five. Val and I will go with the Sampler to check Jo Jo’s remains for IA and MR. I’ve got to know why he died.’

  Arthur spoke to the screen and returned saying: ‘We should have a replacement for Jo Jo by tonite. Applicants are on the way.’

  ‘Pick one with a good job,’ said Walter in parting.

  An impatient Sweeper meck waited eagerly beside the corpse while the Sampler teck loaded eight vacuum drums into his needle gun. Val and Walter tried to keep the crowd back while he worked.

  ‘Brain,’ said the teck, clicking the first drum in place and holding the needle-gun barrel against the crepitant skull. Snap! The gun jumped. The drum turned pinkish-gray. Fifty grams of sample cooled.

  ‘Heart,’ he said, holding the barrel over the chest. Snap! Red drum. Lungs, blue drum. Spleen, purple drum. Liver, brown drum. Kidney, gray drum. When the drums were full he lifted them out and placed them in a chamber on his cart. Sweep moved over the body, mopping and sucking. Soon the area was scrubbed up – rose-water stains and all.

  The Neurolab was three levels down. Val and Walter watched the Neuroteck load the gray drum into his processor. The optic readout projected a 1,000 X magnification onto a large screen. Little flecks of granular debris came into focus. Jo Jo’s brain cells began to flow by.

  ‘We got this one sampled promptly. There should be ample neurones in the specimen for our tests. Look at those red cells – the biconcave discs. They are about ten microns across. The dark things are just nuclear debris.’

  A large triangular-shaped cell drifted into view. It had many dendritic buttons scattered over its cell membrane. At one point, it led into a thick axon fiber which trailed behind. The teck centered the optic on this larger cell, flooded the chamber with oxygen and nutrients and initiated the testing cycle.

  ‘This looks like a promising neurone,’ he said, pointing to the screen. ‘We can just sit back and wait. The antibody and enzyme reactions will tell us if the brain malfunctioned because of IA or MR.’

  In its high-oxygen-glucose environment the cell’s respiratory quotient slowly rose—0.7—0.8—0.9.

  ‘When the RQ reaches 1.0 the synapses can be checked for blocking agents. See those little buttons? They sit on dendrites and represent synapses coming in from other neurones. There are three neurochemicals in the brain, depending on the function of the synapse. There are many exceptions, of course, but most of the acetylcholine synapses are sensory/motor; the adrenalin synapses are mostly found in autonomic circuits; and the serotonin takes part in what we like to call mentation, or personality functions. The CNS Processor will check for acetylcholine integrity first.’

  Walter adjusted his fat belly on his knees for more comfort. He sat while Val stood. The screen glowed irregularly.

  ‘Cholinesterase, an enzyme, cleans off all the acetylcholine buttons. Isotope-labelled acetylcholine is flooded in. See how it is picked up by some of the buttons? Activity over 90 per cent. Normal,’ explained the teck.

  The view darkened as the chamber was flushed again. Then the same process was repeated. This time different buttons took up the glow when the labelled neurochemical was flooded in.

  ‘These are the adrenalin synapses,’ explained the teck. ‘Again the activity is within normal limits. Next is the critical test – serotonin. Both MR and IA strikes here. Molecular Reward has its effects by altering serotonin metabolism at the neurone. Creates molecular happiness – subjective mental heaven. In IA the sites are blocked by an antibody to ectodermal debris. Here it goes.’

  The view darkened with the flush and then glowed with the isotope wash. A few buttons glowed. The processor’s readout gave the neurone a low grade – 24 per cent of the synapses functioned.

  ‘That is what we expect with a suicide – serotonin block. We will run more cells through to make it significant, but I’ll be very surprised if we come up with anything else.’

  Walter glanced up at the colorful wall chart where a flow sheet of the results was taking shape. The next step was the IA/MR differential. Fluorescent labelled antibodies were used to see what was blocking the serotonin sites.

  ‘Not IA,’ said the teck when he saw a negative take-up for the labelled ectodermal-debris antibody.

  The labelled anti-MR stuck to the inactive buttons, fluorescing brightly.

  ‘That’s it,’ said the teck. ‘Your friend must have thought he was a bird.’

  ‘A bird?’ said Val.

  ‘Sure,’ said the Neur
oteck, filling out his preliminary report and handing a copy to the widdled Walter. ‘We get all kinds of MR – birds, mushrooms and flowers. They die happy.’

  As he waddled out of neurolab, Walter stared at the flimsy report.

  ‘Jo Jo – gone bird on MR,’ he mumbled.

  Val shrugged and went over to the railing. He glanced down and shuddered.

  ‘Shaft base looks pretty frightening to me. My serotonin metabolism would have to be pretty scrambled to make flying-in-the-shaft desirable.’

  Walter’s shoulders hung. Depressed, he said: ‘I guess we should have watched him more closely to make sure he was back from heaven before we all went to sleep.’

  ‘Better MR than IA – at least we know we weren’t melding with a psychotic – letting a nut into our collective soul,’ said Val.

  ‘Still a waste,’ murmured old Walter.

  Arthur and Bitter saw the next applicant – an employed Howell-Jolly body – ¼DPNH.

  ‘Are you the bereaved – the widdled family?’ asked ¼DPNH.

  Arthur nodded and helped her set down her footlocker. The newcomer was a slim, recently polarized female with soft white skin and thin, light brown hair. Her waist was narrow and she appeared frail even for a Nebish.

  ‘My name is One-quarterDPNH. Fourth subculture of the delta pancreas cell line from the original Howell-Jolly body, Nora Howell. My friends call me Dee Pen.’

  Arthur noticed her small size – probably eats little and takes up no room. He smiled and glanced out into the crawlway. A dozen grossly fat applicants waited on their hands and knees in the dust – their footlockers scraping noisily – their heads bumping the low ceiling. He could smell the fetid odors from their intertriginous areas where skin flora flourished in the damp folds.

  ‘Polarized?’ said Arthur. ‘Should be warm in the meld.’

  ‘Oh yes,’ she smiled, ‘I’ve been tested for the sexual flush and myotonia. I can get my pulse up to 160 in a really good meld,’ she answered proudly.

  Female Bitter frowned: ‘But what are you – your job?’

  Dee Pen smiled winningly at neutral Arthur and then turned to female Bitter with a more business-like expression.

  ‘All of us Jolly bodies are Attendants. But I studied philosophy in the stacks, so my Nora Howell DNA vigor is balanced against Big ES intellectualism.’

  ‘You’re polarized,’ said Bitter, pointing to a pair of mediumsized breasts.

  ‘Nora Howell’s DNA vigor,’ explained Dee Pen, ‘But I wear my subcutaneous AO capsule faithfully.’ She pointed to a tiny scar on her left forearm. ‘I can’t ovulate.’

  Arthur explained to Bitter that polarization was necessary in certain Attendant positions where keratinization was desirable.

  ‘Polarization helps your rhythm – dancing,’ he coaxed.

  Bitter was still reluctant.

  ‘We should let her meet the rest of the family before we decide.’

  Arthur took Bitter aside and whispered: ‘Want another fifteen-stone fat furnace like old Walter smelling up the place?’ Bitter raised an eyebrow. He continued sotto voce: ‘Well, take a look out into the crawlway.’

  He helped Dee Pen sort through her footlocker for her flimsy ID while Bitter glanced out the door. As he studied the curriculum vitae he heard Bitter announce that the position had been filled. Arthur smiled: ‘We’ll have your credits transferred and be back on family-5 status for the evening meld.’

  Val and Walter stopped at Hunter Control to meditate on Jo Jo’s tragedy. It was quiet there. Scanner reported the gardens clear. Huntercraft rested in their bays sucking on their energy sockets.

  ‘We have today’s routine optic records of the renegade Harvester near Table Mountain,’ announced Scanner conversationally. The aerial views projected on the screen. Vines entangled the big wheels obscuring the skeletons on the ground.

  ‘Any change in its mental attitude?’ asked Val.

  ‘No answer today,’ said Scanner. ‘It has gone on stand-by. We haven’t been able to trigger it back.’

  ‘Plates still charged?’

  ‘Enough for mentation.’

  Walter listened quietly, then spoke up: ‘What were its last words? Anything about coming back to work for us?’

  Scanner answered apologetically: ‘It said it would rather die than become a slave again.’

  Val frowned: ‘That damn WIC/RAC genius circuit! What could a buckeye do to intimidate a meck enough to give up a power socket. Energy death is only a matter of time now.’

  Walter was more sympathetic toward the wayward meck.

  ‘Perhaps “entice” is a better term. A clever buckeye might have offered Harvester something.’

  ‘Offered what?’ asked Val sarcastically. ‘What do you offer a meck when you want it to bend a prime directive?’

  Walter shrugged his old shoulders. Freedom – he thought. But freedom to do what?

  ‘If I go out there,’ threatened Val, ‘I’ll recharge it and get it moving. It had better come back for WIC/RAC overhaul.’

  ‘You?’

  ‘I know how to handle it,’ grumbled Val. ‘Besides, who else is there? We’re short of Tinkers. All I have to do is get into its neck while it is resting on stand-by. Detach the lower motor web, recharge, and wake it up by remote. If it agrees to come along – fine. I’ll give it enough energy for the trip. If it balks, I’ll just detach the motor web too, and bring it in by remote. We’ll lose its personality that way, but at least we’ll have the chassis. Salvage something. Big ES can’t afford to waste the whole meck.’

  ‘You’d try to bring it in by remote?’ asked Walter, stunned. ‘That’s dangerous, and an awful lot of work. Those mecks are big and powerful. Without its own protective reflexes, its muscles might pull themselves apart, or crush crops or—’

  ‘Or crush me,’ said Val. ‘I expect it would take days by remote – avoiding trees, canals and air vents. But we must try. We can’t leave it Outside as a monument to Big ES failure.’

  Or a freedom symbol – thought Walter, smiling.

  5

  Moses and the Coweye

  Moses Eppendorff sat on a rocky trail petting Dan. Moon and Toothpick climbed a narrow pass to exchange signs with a young buckeye – puberty minus one – who sat guarding the slope with a stout spear. Higher in the foothills they caught a glimpse of a family-sized enclave – a pair of mated, young adults, an elderly, white-haired female, and three more children.

  Communication proved unsuccessful.

  Moon returned saying, ‘Toothpick is having trouble with their dialect. We had better move on before there is a misunderstanding.’

  Moses noted that the Eyepeople varied in their customs and language. But one thing was uniform – their technology was Stone-Age. The hive’s sensors could detect metals at a much greater distance than a warm body alone. Any family that became advanced and worked with metals found itself hunted out of existence.

  Old man Moon led young Eppendorff to a canal and showed him how to forage it. Each canal surfaced near a city as sewage effluent – nutrient rich, but poor in microflora. As it flowed along it matured. The food chain began as algae and tiny crustaceans. When fully ripe there were thick water weeds, large shellfish and the cetaceans. Bony fish and macroscopic crustaceans were all extinct. Old Moon dove into the greenish waters and explored the bottom. Surfacing, he tossed out a large mussel with a writhing, white foot. Moses entered the water cautiously – exploring bottom mud with his toes.

  Soon they were seated on the bank, munching shellfish. A bulky robot straddled the canal silently – an Irrigator. Moses pointed to the robot’s optic pickups.

  ‘Don’t we have to worry about that thing reporting us?’ he asked.

  ‘Toothpick says that it’s only a class eleven. Goes around checking soil moisture and spraying water. No circuits for buckeye detection.’

  Toothpick put in, ‘We must watch out for class tens, though. Anything that can run around without a track usually has enough brains
to detect us. Harvesters, Tillers, Metal Gatherers, things like that.’

  Moses continued to munch thoughtfully. The white flesh of the shellfish had a definite crunchy consistency. It gave him a rich, full sensation – lots of good amino acids.

  The water in front of him rippled noisily. He watched the spot. A large, ugly, humanoid head broke the surface, stared right at him and ducked under again.

  ‘If he comes up again, throw him a chunk of meat,’ said Moon.

  Moses fed the creature and received a bark of appreciation. Soon a noisy, splashing group of fat mammals came around the bend of the canal. Moon smiled. Dan barked back.

  ‘They look almost human,’ said Moses.

  Moon nodded. Dan pranced up and down the bank excitedly. Finally the dog jumped into the water and began to play with the nearest creature. A tiny head, the size of two fists, bobbed up – blinking – and then ducked under.

  ‘That one looked very human,’ exclaimed Moses.

  Then he saw it again – a human child riding the back of a nonhuman dugong. Before he could comment on the genetic arithmetic, the mother – a human female, puberty plus four – left the water and approached. Her wet hair clung in dripping tangles. Streaks of mint-green scum rimmed her neck and chin. Sullen, dark eyes glared. She carried a wooden blade low in her right hand.

  Toothpick called: ‘Back out, men; I detect a golden corpus luteum.’

  Moon jumped quickly to his feet and backed up the canal, picking up Toothpick. Moses followed. She paused to watch Dan leave the water, shake and run after his humans. Then she silently slipped back into the water and crossed the canal below the surface. Moses felt a little sick when he realized that her underwater swimming was probably a defensive reflex against hunters’ arrows.