Guinevere was rearranging her flame-tinted hair, smiling with a radiance he couldn’t entirely ignore.
“Matter of fact, the whole project looks pretty wonderful to me.” He grinned at her and the beautiful vending machine with a momentary admiration. “Something human management would never have had the brains or the vision to accomplish. It took one of our Athena-type computers to see the possibility, and to tackle all the technical and merchandising problems that must have stood in the way of making it a commercial reality.”
“Then you do like me?”
“The directors don’t, evidently.” He tried not to see her hurt expression. “I can’t understand why, but the first part of my job here will be to find the reason. If you can help me—“
He paused expectantly.
“I’m only four ninety-five,” Guinevere reminded him. “You put the money right here in this slot—”
“I don’t want you,” he interrupted harshly. “Just the background facts about you. To begin with—just what’s the difference between a vital appliance and an ordinary human being?”
He tried not to hear her muffled sob.
“What’s the plant investment?” He raised his voice, and ticked the questions off on his skinny fingers. “What’s the production rate? The profit margin? Under what circumstances was the manufacture of—uh—vital appliances first considered by Athena Sue? When were you put on the market? What sort of consumer acceptance are you getting now? Or don’t you know?”
Guinevere nodded brightly.
“But can’t we go somewhere else to talk about it?” She blinked bravely through her tears. “Your room, maybe?”
Chimberley squirmed uncomfortably.
“If you don’t take me,” she added innocently, “I can’t tell you anything.”
He stalked away, angry at himself for the way his knees trembled. He could probably find out all he had to know from the memory tapes of the computer, after he got out to the plant. Anyhow, he shouldn’t let her upset him. After all, she was only an interesting product of chemistic engineering.
A stout, pink-skinned business man stepped up to the vending machine, as the wailing urchin was dragged away. He unburdened himself of a thick briefcase and a furled umbrella, removed his glasses, and leaned deliberately to peer at Guinevere with bugging, putty-colored eyes.
“Slavery!” He straightened indignantly. “My dear young lady, you do need help.” He replaced his glasses, fished in his pockets, and offered her a business card. “As you see, I’m an attorney. If you have been forced into any kind of involuntary servitude, my firm can certainly secure your release.”
“But I’m not a slave,” Guinevere said. “Our management has secured an informal opinion from the attorney general’s office to the effect that we aren’t human beings— not within the meaning of the law. We’re only chattels.”
“Eh?” He bent unbelievingly to pinch her golden arm. “Wha—”
“Alfred!”
He shuddered when he heard that penetrating cry, and snatched his fingers away from Guinevere as if she had become abruptly incandescent.
“Oh!” She shrank back into her narrow prison, rubbing at her bruised arm. “Please don’t touch me until I’m paid for.”
“Shhh!” Apprehensively, his bulging eyes were following a withered little squirrel-faced woman in a black-veiled hat, who came bustling indignantly from the direction of the ladies’ room. “My—ah—encumberance.”
“Alfred, whatever are you up to now?”
“Nothing, my dear. Nothing at all.” He stooped hastily to recover his briefcase and umbrella. “But it must be time to see about our flight—”
“So! Shopping for one of them synthetic housekeepers?” She snatched the umbrella and flourished it high. “Well, I won’t have ‘em in any place of mine!”
“Martha, darling—”
“I’ll Martha-darling you!”
He ducked away.
“And you!” She jabbed savagely at Guinevere. “You synthetic whatever-you-are, I’ll teach you to carry on with any man of mine!”
“Hey!”
Chimberley hadn’t planned to interfere, but when he saw Guinevere gasp and flinch, an unconsidered impulse moved him to brush aside the stabbing umbrella. The seething woman turned on him.
“You sniveling shrimp!” she hissed at him. “Buy her yourself—and see what you get!”
She scuttled away in pursuit of Alfred.
“Oh, thank you, Pip!” Guinevere’s voice was muted with pain, and he saw the long red scratch across her tawny shoulder. “I guess you do like me!”
To his own surprise, Chimberley was digging for his billfold. He looked around self-consciously. Martha was towing Alfred past the deserted ticket windows, and an age-numbed janitor was mopping the floor, but otherwise the waiting room was empty. He fed five dollars into the slot, and waited thriftily for his five cents change.
A gong chimed softly, somewhere inside the vending machine. Something whirred. The shackles fell from Guinevere’s wrists and flicked out of sight.
SOLD OUT! a 3-D sign blazed behind her. BUY YOURS TOMORROW!
“Darling!” She had her arms around him before he recovered his nickel. “I thought you’d never take me!”
He tried to evade her kiss, but he was suddenly paralyzed. A hot tingling swept him, and the scent of her perfume made a veil of fire around him. Bombs exploded in his brain.
“Hold on!” He pushed at her weakly, trying to remind himself that she was only an appliance. “I’ve got work to do, remember. And there’s some information you’ve agreed to supply.”
“Certainly, darling.” Obediently, she disengaged herself. “But before we leave, won’t you buy my accessory kit?” A singsong cadence came into her voice. “With fresh undies and a makeup set and gay chemistic nightwear, packed in a sturdy chemyl case, it’s all complete for only nineteen ninety-five.”
“Not so fast! That wasn’t in the deal—”
He checked himself, with a grin of admiration for what was evidently an astutely integrated commercial operation. No screws loose so far in Athena Sue!
“Okay,” he told Guinevere. “If you’ll answer all my questions.”
“I’m all yours, darling!” She reached for his twenty. “With everything I know.”
She fed the twenty into the accessory slot. The machine chimed and whirred and coughed out a not-so-very-sturdy chemistic case. Guinevere picked it up and hugged him gratefully, while he waited for the clink of his nickel.
“Never mind the mugging, please!” He felt her cringe away from him, and tried to soften his voice. “I mean, we’ve no time to waste. I want to start checking over Athena Sue as soon as I can get out to the plant. We’ll take a taxi, and talk on the way.”
“Very well, Pip, dear.” She nodded meekly. “But before we start, couldn’t I have something to eat? I’ve been standing here since four o’clock yesterday, and I’m simply famished.”
With a grimace of annoyance at the delay, he took her into the terminal coffee shop. It was almost empty. Two elderly virgins glared at Guinevere, muttered together, and marched out piously. Two sailors tittered. The lone counterman looked frostily at Chimberley, attempting to ignore Guinevere.
Chimberley studied the menu unhappily and ordered two T-bones, resolving to put them on his expense account. The counterman was fresh out of steaks, and not visibly sorry. It was chemburgers or nothing.
“Chemburgers!” Guinevere clapped her hands. “They’re made by Solar Chemistics, out of golden sunlight and pure sea water. They’re absolutely tops, and everybody loves ‘em!”
“Two chemburgers,” Chimberley said, “and don’t let ‘em burn.”
He took Guinevere back to a secluded booth.
“Now let’s get started,” he said. “I want the whole situation. Tell me everything about you.”
“I’m a vital appliance. Just like all the others.”
“So I want to know all about vital appliances.
”
“Some things I don’t know.” She frowned fetchingly. “Please, Pip, may I have a glass of water? I’ve been waiting there all night, and I’m simply parched.”
The booth was outside the counterman’s domain. He set out the water grudgingly, and Chimberley carried it back to Guinevere.
“Now what don’t you know?”
“Our trade secrets.” She smiled mysteriously. “Solar Chemistics is the daring pioneer in this exciting new field of chemistic engineering applied to the mass manufacture of redesigned vital organisms. Our mechanized management is much too clever to give away the unique know-how that makes us available to everybody. For that reason, deliberate gaps were left in our psionic education.”
Chimberley blinked at her shining innocence, suspecting that he had been had.
“Anyhow,” he urged her uneasily, “tell me what you do know. What started the company to making—uh—redesigned vital organisms?”
“The Miss Chemistics tape.”
“Now I think we’re getting somewhere.” He leaned quickly across the narrow table. “Who’s Miss Chemistics?”
“The world’s most wanted woman.” Guinevere sipped her water gracefully. “She won a prize contest that was planned to pick out the woman that every man wanted. A stupid affair, organized by the old human management before the computer was put in. There was an entry blank in every package of our synthetic products. Forty million women entered. The winner was a farm girl named Gussie Schlepps before the talent agents picked her up—now she’s Guinevere Golden.”
“What had she to do with you?”
“We’re copies.” Guinevere smirked complacently. “Of the world’s most wonderful woman.”
“How do you copy a woman?”
“No human being could,” she said. “It takes too much know-how. But our computer was able to work everything out.” She smiled proudly. “Because you see the prize that Miss Chemistics won was immortality.”
“Huh?” He gaped at her untroubled loveliness. “How’s that?”
“A few cells of scar tissue from her body were snipped off and frozen, in our laboratory. Each cell, you know, contains a full set of chromosomes—a complete genetic pattern for the reproduction of the whole body—and the legal department got her permission for the company to keep the cells alive forever and to produce new copies of her whenever suitable processes should be discovered.”
“Maybe that’s immortality.” Chimberley frowned. “But it doesn’t look like much of a prize.”
“She was disappointed when they told her what it was.” Guinevere nodded calmly. “In fact, she balked. She didn’t want anybody cutting her precious body. She was afraid it would hurt, and afraid the scar would show—but she did want the publicity. All the laboratory needed was just a few cells. She finally let a company doctor take them, where the scar wouldn’t show. And the publicity paid off. She’s a realies actress now, with a million-dollar contract.”
“One way to the top.” Chimberley grinned. “But what does she think of vital appliances?”
“She thinks we’re wonderful.” Guinevere beamed. “You see, she gets a royalty on every copy sold. Besides, her agent says we’re sensational publicity.”
“I suppose you are.” A reluctant admiration shone through his mud-colored eyes, before he could bring his mind back to business. “But let’s get on with it. What about this Miss Chemistics tape?”
“The contest closed before our management was mechanized,” she said, “while old Matt Skane was still general manager. But when the computer took over, all the company records were punched on chemistic tapes and filed in its memory banks.”
He sat for a moment scowling. His eyes were on Guinevere, but he was reaching in his mind for the tidy rows of crackle-finished cabinets that housed Athena Sue, groping for the feel of her swift responses. The thinking of managerial computers was sometimes a little hard to follow, even for cybernetic engineers—and even when there was no question of any defective circuits.
Guinevere was squirming uncomfortably.
“Is something wrong with my face?”
“Not a thing,” he assured her solemnly. He scratched his chin. “I heard you tell your legal friend, back there at the vending machine, that you aren’t a human being within the meaning of the law. What’s the difference?”
“The original cells are all human.” She dabbed at her eyes with a paper napkin and looked up to face him bravely. “The differences come later, in the production lines. We’re attached to mechanical placentas, and grown under hormone control in big vats of chemistic solutions. We’re educated as we grow, by psionic impulses transmitted from high-speed training tapes. All of that makes differences, naturally. The biggest one is that we are better.”
She frowned thoughtfully.
“Do you think the women are jealous?”
“Could be.” Chimberley nodded uncertainly. “I never pretended to understand women. They all seem to have a lot of circuits out of kilter. Give me Athena Sue. Let’s get out to the plant—”
Guinevere sniffed.
“Oh, Pip!” she gasped. “Our chemburgers!”
The counterman stood rubbing his hands on a greasy towel, staring at her with a fascinated disapproval. The forgotten chemburgers were smoking on the griddle behind him. Her wail aroused him. He scraped them up and slapped them defiantly on the counter.
Chimberley carried them silently back to Guinevere. He didn’t care for chemburgers in any condition, but she consumed them both in ecstasy, and begged for a piece of chemberry pie.
“It’s awfully good,” she told him soulfully. “Made from the most ambrosial synthetics, by our exclusive chemistic processes. Won’t you try a piece?”
* * * *
When they approached a standing cab out in the street, the driver stiffened with hostility. But he took them.
“Keep her back,” he growled. “Outa sight. Mobs smashed a couple hacks yesterday, to get at ‘em.”
Guinevere sat well back out of sight, crouching close to Chimberley. She said nothing,, but he felt her shiver. The cab went fast through empty streets, and once when the tires squealed as it lurched around a corner she caught his hand apprehensively.
“See that, mister?” The driver slowed as they passed a block of charred wreckage. “Used to be one of them mechanized markets. Mob burned it yesterday. Machines inside selling them. See what I mean?”
Chimberley shook his head. Guinevere’s clutching hand felt cold on his. Suddenly he slipped his arm around her. She leaned against him, and whispered fearfully:
“What does he mean?”
“I don’t quite know.”
* * * *
The Solar Chemistics plant was ominously black. A few tattered palms straggled along the company fence. A sharp, yeasty scent drifted from the dark sea of solar reaction vats beyond, and blue floodlights washed the scattered islands where enormous bright metal cylinders towered out of intertwining jungles of pipes and automatic valves.
Chimberley sniffed the sour odor, and pride filled his narrow chest. Here was the marvelous body to Athena Sue’s intricate brain. It breathed air and drank sea water and fed on sunlight, and gave birth to things as wonderful as Guinevere.
The driver stopped at a tall steel gate, and Chimberley got out. The rioters had been there. The palms along the fence were burned down to black stumps. Rocks had smashed gaping black holes in the big 3-D sign on the side of the gray concrete building beyond the fence, and broken glass grated on the pavement as he walked to the gate.
He found the bell, but nothing happened. Nobody moved inside the fence. All those dark miles of solar reactors had been designed to run and maintain themselves, and Athena Sue controlled them. A thousand fluids flowed continuously through a thousand processes to form a thousand new synthetics. Human labor was only in the way.
“Your almighty machine!” the driver jeered behind him. “Looks like it don’t know you.”
He jabbed the bell again, and a
n unhurried giant with a watchman’s clock came out of the building toward the gate. Chimberley passed his company identification card through the barrier, and asked to see somebody in the office.
“Nobody there.” The watchman chuckled cheerfully. “Unless you count that thinking machine.”
“The computer’s what I really want to see, if you’ll let me in—”
“Afraid I couldn’t, sir.”
“Listen.” Chimberley’s voice lifted and quivered with incipient frustration. “This is an emergency. I’ve got to check the computer right away.”
“Can’t be that emergent.” The watchman gave him a sun-bronzed grin. “After all the hell yesterday, the directors shut off the power to stop your gadget.”
Star Science Fiction 3 - [Anthology] Page 21