“What the fuck is this?” Wade whispered, more to himself.
“A womb for whole civilizations,” Besser symbolized. “A processing plant where genetic structures are isolated for their most useful features, bred into one another, regressive genes removed, vital genes amplified. We distill life, combine it, and re create it—all to the Supremate’s specifications.”
Wade’s eyes locked down into the glowing chasm.
“Nature is base, but we’re making it serve a higher purpose. The labyrinth is only one of many; from world to world they go, processing dominant life forms for what will one day effect a flawless realm. We take the best of everything and make it better.”
“For the Supremate?”
“For the master plan. Our world is damned by its own error. War, hate, crime, etcetera. And all the other worlds in this universe, I’m sorry to say, are the same. All except one. The Supremate’s.”
Wade couldn’t look anymore, not into this Grand Canyon of flesh. He backed up, reeling, sick.
“Productivity versus waste,” Besser glorified on. “Mankind is wasteful, here and everywhere else. But the master plan culls the good from the bad, from all worlds, to a single, objective end. What better definition can there be for perfection?”
Wade turned, spied the canisters in the racks.
“And this room is where it all begins. The activeports.”
At first Wade thought they must be fuel cells of some kind, but Besser had said the labyrinth needed no fuel. Wade rolled one of the transparent canisters out. There was a bubble, and he saw something that looked suspiciously similar to a belly button. Whatever mass filled the canister twitched once, quivered. Part of the mass was a human face. Wade put it back in the rack.
“Prototypes are made here. A computer calculates the most useful possibilities, then the best prototypes are removed for further genetic embellishment. We breed females from one world with males from other worlds. Females are fissionizationvessels; males are holotypes—”
That word rang a bell, and Wade didn’t like the sound of it.
“Each target sector is indexed into the Supremate’s intelligence: natural resources, industrial potential, and environmental characteristics. Also indexed are the anatomical characteristics of each species. Then the Supremate calculates which combinations of which species would effect a superior interspecies. Initial prototypes, which we call interspecielmetisunits, are produced very quickly. The entire process involves a complex system of biological acclimations and growth acceleration sciences.”
Wade was leaning against the warm wall, wiping his mouth. “The girl in that thing—she’s from the college, isn’t she?”
“It’s not a thing. It’s an incubreedcatalyzationcapsule, with an expansionbolus to allow for natal growth. And, yes, she’s one of the five surrogate procurements from this planet.”
“What the hell did you do to her?”
“We removed her bones, of course. Antirejectorybifertilization demands some rather drastic acclimations. You don’t just impregnate one life form with the reproductive genes of another and expect to produce an interspeciel. The two physiologies aren’t compatible. So we make them compatible. One thing we do is modify the reproductive systems of the surrogates, but in this forced compatibility they wouldn’t survive the physical stress of intercourse and birth.”
“Like trying to drive a bus through a rabbit hole.”
“Crude, but correct. We remove their bone structures.” Besser picked up a big syringe. “Calciumdecimationliquefactor agents dissolve all bone material in the body, which is then drained off in a suspended state and disposed of.”
Besser pointed to one of the jugs. It was full to the top. Wade remembered seeing Jervis milking white sludge out of the girl in the harness, and how she stretched like putty afterward.
“We can produce primary interspeciels in a matter of hours, and the surrogates can be used repeatedly for future bifertilizations. It’s marvelous.”
Wade was not inclined to agree.
In the next warren, rows of glowing compartments throbbed with feeble movement. The noise was relentless, a raucous rise of squalls and whines.
Wade looked hard. The plump, misshapen things he saw lying there sent him back in an impact of vision. Tiny pudenda wriggled. Chubby arms and legs rowed the moist air. Some seemed to grow even as he watched.
“This is the biomaintenancecarbonsourcehypersaturationvault,” Besser proudly stated.
“It’s a fucking baby ward!” Wade yelled.
“Newborn interspeciels under hyperincubation. In mere days they’ll have sufficiently matured, hosting successfully bifertilized reproductive genes, which will then be transfected again and again until the target species has been produced. Then the desired gene groups will be stored in the cryowarrens until colonization time.”
“When’s that?”
Besser shrugged casually. “Only the Supremate knows. A year from now, or a thousand years. The labyrinth stores interspeciel gene groups for every annexation target.”
“You mean every planet.”
“Yes, and there are thousands, Wade—multiple thousands. Each interspecies, regardless of classification, is genetically created with identical sensor and transception cells. Born in total allegiance to the Supremate’s objectives. Whole worlds, Wade, which will live to serve his will. When the time comes, the stored gene groups will be exogenically mass produced…and dispersed.”
Wade’s brain felt like it was broiling. “Why?” was all he could groan. “Why, why, why?”
“Mass recolonization.” Besser held a finger up. “One day, a new social system will reign over all worlds, myriad populations under one guiding light. No war, Wade, no crime, no aggression. Imagine a world like that, then imagine a thousand worlds just the same. The second phase is merely implementation, and function is the third phase. Perfectly adapted beings will join hands in a new order and live forever.”
“You want to turn the universe into an anthill.”
“No, Wade. We want to make the universe more efficient,” Besser said. “What’s wrong with that?”
A group of sisters came down the warren, their clone smiles sharp in unthinking bliss. Efficiency, Wade thought. They were carrying buckets of defected fetuses to the meat shredder.
“The sisters are just lower order interspeciels. The Supremate activated them for this annexation target because they were best suited for earth’s atmospheric specifications. The actual metisunits that we’ll use for recolonization exist in a multitude of varieties and are much more genetically advanced.”
Wade slumped, looking away. “What’s in it for you?”
“Immortality and governorship, the reward granted to any loyal nativeemissarial.”
“I don’t get it,” Wade said.
“All social orders, even perfect ones, need a chain of command.”
“So for betraying your entire planet, the Supremate’s going to let you and Winnie be his sergeants,” Wade concluded.
“Something like that. But not Winnie, I’m afraid. She’s out of the picture. After recolonization, the earth will need an overseer.” Besser’s eyes shined in glory. “Me.”
But Wade sensed a deeper picture. Didn’t power corrupt, even at the highest levels? “What about Winnie?”
“She outlived her serviceability, so I disposed of her. The Supremate didn’t need her anymore.”
“And when you’re finished with the first phase of your ‘master plan,’ you won’t need Jervis anymore either.”
“Of course not. Jervis will be disposed of too.”
“But you promised him immortality,” Wade reminded.
“We lied. Sometimes deception is necessary for a greater cause.”
“So it’s just you, huh, Prof? You get to rule the world.”
“Yes,” Besser said. “As a disciple of the Supremate, the world will be mine.”
Wade had trouble containing the urge to laugh. He knew a Brooklyn Bridge deal when he saw one.
The Supremate had Besser, in his mad delusions, duped. Hook, line, and sinker.
They extromitted down. The transposition from one place to another felt like passing through a wall of sand. The bizarre light in these lower warrens seemed darker, yet more intense. In an unfitting contrast, Wade actually felt aroused.
“It’s the psilight,” Besser explained, “and it serves many purposes. One effect is the obvious excitation. The Supremate likes to maintain an ambience of fecundity. We’re not rapists, Wade. The progenitors of destiny should be willing. Another effect is simple communication.”
“How does simple communication explain my boner?”
“Think of the psilight as the Supremate’s influence. It’s actually a conduction flux, like static electricity.”
“And I guess you have some ridiculous thirty letter name for it.”
“Exordipathicsignaltrancination. The Supremate feels us with it.” He held up the sensor ring which girded his fat pinky. “It connects us to him telepathically. It’s like the labyrinth’s blood, consolidating all components, be they living, dead, or inanimate. It also transfers power from the stasisfield to the labyrinth’s processing systems. In fact, it was focused wavelengths of the psilight which originally allowed the Supremate to communicate with Winnie and me before the labyrinth arrived.”
So the psilight was like a power line. What would happen to it during the labyrinth’s recharge period?
“Psilight?” Wade said. “Stasisfield. What does this have to do with the agro site?”
“On landing,” Besser explained, “which we call termination of annexation transfer, the labyrinth must retard its reentry by means of electromagnetic counterpulses. Regrettably this activity generates a momentary wavelength aberration which causes irreversible physiological damage in any life form within a limited perimeter. The agro animals were too close to the pulse upon termination. This proximity resulted in instant degeneration of the complex organ systems. They died at once, as did any wildlife within the perimeter. It also caused our first transfection failure. Apparently Penelope was near the site during the labyrinth’s descent. The counterpulse damaged her reproductive faculties. Tom buried her just past the clearing.”
“I’ve seen the cozy little graveyard,” Wade confirmed.
“Then we decided on a more scientific approach. From the campus medical records, we identified the healthiest candidates available for transfection. Can you imagine the catastrophe of inducting a surrogate or holotype that wound up with some inherent biological defect or genetic disorder?”
“No,” Wade said. “I can’t imagine it.” But there was one more explanation he wanted. “The grove. What did you do to the grove?”
“The green fog isn’t really fog,” Besser told him. “It’s a waste by product of the psilight generators. We simply vent the conduction and element cores on occasion. The gasses happen to possess some amusing metamorphic effects on any plant and wildlife that’s exposed to it for a sustained period.”
Yeah, amusing, Wade thought. He remembered the faced mushrooms, the flesh covered trees, and the hideous gilled fog snakes.
Now they stood in a short black warren before a pair of blank door sized rectangles. A small plate hovered between them. Besser touched a button of some sort, and the left rectangle filled with dark kaleidoscopic light. This shifting effect, Wade realized, was something vast beyond the rectangle, something scrolling at incredible speed.
“This is the hold egress,” Besser said, “the access to the main holotype hold. As you can see, we’ve an abundant supply.”
“Access?” Access to what? Wade wondered.
“Meet your new brothers,” Besser bid.
The rectangle pulsed blurred images, like flitting a deck of cards. Wade saw things—living things—in the port, the physical likes of which beggared sane description. Besser slowed the scrollmode’s speed to afford Wade a more detailed inspection. One per second, the cramped, glowing holds switched by. Intent, otherworldly figures crouched close to the repulsion screens. All were different yet exclusively abominable, and most seemed to possess overly prominent genitals.
“Monsters,” Wade uttered, staring.
“Not monsters, Wade. Men. Just like you.”
“Pardon my prejudice, but I don’t have three balls and a forked dick, and I have two eyes in my head, not two dozen. Those things are not just like me.”
“They’re men,” Besser repeated. “They’re just different because they come from different places. I assure you, Wade, you’re as grotesque to them as they are to you.”
Besser halted the scroll to an empty hold. Its stockcode read, in almost epitaphic letters: #1003WADEST.JOHN.
“Beginning to get the picture yet?” Besser asked.
Wade was incapable of response.
“And now that you’ve met the men, it’s time to meet the women.” Besser activated the adjoining port. He flashed the female holds by much more slowly.
Wade looked but wished he hadn’t. The flashing grotesquorium locked his gaze. These were the female counterparts of what he’d just seen, only most had been decalcified. They sat slack in corners like limp sacks, eyes peering out from settled, skull less heads. Gorged breasts hung from collapsed shoulders, and boneless legs lay splayed (many had more than two), joined hiplessly by flaccid pink grooves that could only be vaginas.
Then the scroll stopped. Besser said, “Ah, here she is. Your first date, Wade. Take a good look.”
The hold’s occupant resembled a conical mound of gray, spotted blubber. It seemed collapsing in on itself around a pudgy yellow tongue that emerged to lick a wanton smile. Not one but several vaginas enclustered at its groin. It winked, and raised a sagging loop of an arm and waved.
“Really, Wade,” Besser resumed, “a ladies’ man such as yourself should be delighted by this unique opportunity.” Besser’s sarcastic chuckle sounded like footsteps in muck. “Now, Wade, you’re the ultimate ladies’ man.”
“You’re going to make me have sex with alien piles of blubber!” Wade gasped, spitting bile. “Bimbos from space!”
“Exactly. Didn’t we tell you what an honor this would be? Your sons and daughters will repopulate worlds.”
Besser shoved Wade into the empty hold, then keyed closed the repulsion screen. He tittered, grinning in. “I’ll be back shortly, Wade, with some sisters. We’ll be taking you for your final acclimation regimen. And after that…it’s passion for eternity.”
“You evil fat piece of shit!” Wade yelled into the screen.
“And I’d learn to be more respectful of your superiors. Please don’t call me fat. Remember, I’m your new lord now, forever. If you’re not nice to me, I might decide to have you reassigned to one of the communal holds. The holotypes there aren’t particularly given to gender when it comes to pastime activities, if you get my meaning.”
“Aw, Jesus,” Wade groaned low in his gut.
“So behave yourself. And until we meet again…welcome.”
—YES, WADE, another voice announced. —WELCOME TO MY FAMILY.
—
CHAPTER 34
Symbols, he thought.
Jervis reminded himself to be creative. More and more, he viewed his new life as a progression of symbols. He was not so much doing things as he was wielding the hand of destiny. Everything meant something else, something deeper. But what else could the warm, black cube symbolize but death?
Besser had called it an s classtacticlepyrotechnicserviceordnance—its yield was equivalent to about five hundred kilotons. Jervis understood the importance of the Supremate leaving it behind, but…
Was he actually having doubts, after all he had done, after all the people he’d murdered?
No, it wasn’t doubt. It was despair.
Paragons don’t despair, he thought.
It was Sarah.
Jervis forced the thought shut. It was one or the other. It was destiny or sucking up to the bitch who’d dumped him. Could love be so focused as to dive
rt him from immortality?
“No!” he shouted aloud. “No!”
I will not despair.
The pyrotechnic would kill thousands. It would kill Sarah too.
“I will kill them all,” Jervis said. “But I’ll kill her first, and I’ll do it myself.”
««—»»
Lydia retrieved her Colt Trooper Mark III from Besser’s office, where Wade had dropped it. Even though she knew it was useless, she felt she had to bring it. It was the only good luck charm for a girl who didn’t believe in luck. The office was silent. There was no sign of the exchange that had taken place earlier in the day.
Next she drove back to her apartment. Absurdly she took a shower, brushed her teeth, and put on a new uniform.
Am I really going to do this? she thought. It was still not too late to get on the interstate and blow. Something was giving her a dozen last chances to balk.
She drove the Vette to the student shop. She had the UV spotter, but she didn’t even know if it would work. When she entered the shop, she felt more asinine than scared. “Goddamn you, Wade,” she said to herself. “You better be worth this.”
Tom’s pendant hung around her neck; the extromission key felt warm in her cleavage. Her eyes scanned the wall and found the dot. One last luxurious image lodged in her mind: the Vette cruising swiftly into the next state, the top off, and Lydia behind the wheel, her hair a blond tumult in the breeze. I’m walking to my death, she thought giddily. “Oh, what the fuck,” she said.
She inserted the key into the dot and entered the labyrinth.
—
CHAPTER 35
Wade sat drenched in sweat in the hold. A lot of sisters seemed to be filing by. He knew now, they were just bred to order slaves, like drones in a bee colony. That’s all the Supremate wanted. Unifying the galaxies under one peaceful order was bullshit—he wanted brainless, obedient laborers to harvest the resources off all the planets for the material benefit of his own race, whatever and wherever that was. The Supremate was as diabolical as anyone in a position of power.
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