Otherness

by David Brin

His manner was courteous, his stance and bearing unselfconsciously athletic.

  The clothes he wore showed tasteful reticence, not the bright excess that overcompensating dole clients so often mistook for fashion.

  And, although he was obviously Eastern European in origin, he had the good grace not to wear leather here in the West, where sensibilities now rejected products made from the death of animals.

  For a while they talked about the books she had been studying while awaiting her flight. But soon they were in one of those exciting, open-topic conversations that touch lightly on a fascination with the world itself. Io made no effort to suppress the sudden feelings coursing through her. The methods of emotional control she had learned in school were still too new, too abstract. Anyway, who wanted to damp down anything as pleasant as hope?

  In his rich, cosmopolitan accent, Wiktor offered to buy her dinner. There was plenty of time, and no hint that he wanted or expected anything in return but companionship. She accepted demurely, then hurriedly added a smile, lest he take her shyness for reluctance.

  As she had secretly hoped, he passed his credit card across the face of the robot maitré d' at the first-class dining room, and took her arm as a pink ribbon of light guided them through a maze of candlelit tables to a window setting overlooking the lights of the city.

  He also made mistakes . . . smelling the wine cork instead of feeling it, for instance. Obviously he had dined in class before, but neither was he so accustomed to this lifestyle as to be blasé or patronizing.

  Io knew about wine corks only from having read an obscure magazine in Joey's waiting room. It actually pleased her that Wiktor showed such minor lapses, an almost imperceptible trace of latent, slight awkwardness. She had no ambition to stake a place in the circles of the rich and renowned. But his nodding acquaintance with finer things spoke of relaxed eclecticism, the comfortable worldliness of a professional . . . a man with a real job. Someone who did something.

  Would she, in three years' time, be able to walk into a place such as this without feeling heart palpitations? Would she wear such a relaxed smile? Or order from a menu with such confidence?

  Would she meet the sort of men who made the world move and grow better with their skill? Perhaps one who cared about the same craft she had been studying for so long and hard?

  Naturally, the subject of his profession never came up on this, an initial encounter. Her present trade was obvious from her attire, and from her tumescence, but they never mentioned it. He spoke instead about the aurora, visible even from here, so near the urban lights. A hint indicated that he might once have seen them from above—from space—but he did not follow up on that, nor did Io pursue it.

  It was perfectly all right to speak of Earthly travels, though, since all classes were encouraged tourism. The superconducting rails made it cheaper than many other entertainments people might have demanded, and social planners considered it helpful. Tourists waged few wars.

  Io felt ashamed of how little she had seen, how little she had to tell. But Wiktor made up for her lack. He had been to Merseyside many times, for instance—both Liverpool and Ellesmere Port—and he spoke with fondness of the Lake District, her own favorite place in all the world.

  Against her usual habit when in production, Io allowed herself a single glass of wine. Of course she had memorized the tolerance tables long ago, and knew no harm would come to . . . her toaster.

  Memory of that colorful euphemism triggered a nervous giggle. But then it also caused her to think of Perseph, and that made her suddenly sad. Their parting had been cool. Io had no idea what the future would bring, but the note of finality between them made her vision film as she thought about it.

  Gyrating emotions. Damn. An occupational hazard. But what a time to have an attack of surropreg blues!

  "I—I don't know what's got over me," she said as she wiped her eyes. "Would you excuse me while I—" She gestured in the direction of the lavatories. His smile was bemused, understanding. "Of course," he said. "I will order you that special dessert I mentioned earlier. And"—his grin broadened—"a glass of fruit juice."

  "Thanks. That might be best." She laughed, and departed with a smile.

  He didn't even try to pressure me into having another glass of wine, she mused as she negotiated her abdomen toward the ladies' room. Many men would take it as a challenge to try to get her drunk, even knowing she was leaving within a few hours. Some rites of machismo she never understood, however many times they were explained. Wiktor, though, seemed a gentleman.

  A low wall topped by a decorative hedge separated the dining room proper from the gilt-wallpapered passage to the toilets. On her way out again, Io paused to check her composure. She wanted a friendly openness that would invite him to ask her watchcom number.

  Io took a momentary guilty peek through the shrubbery, feeling like a little girl spying covertly on an older boy, the object of a delicious secret desire. A waiter had just turned away from their table, blocking her view for a moment. Then Wiktor could be seen moving a freshly filled glass of orange liquid to her setting, beside a plate containing something reddish and gold—the promised dessert.

  His quick glance in her direction almost made her duck down. His facial expression puzzled Io briefly as he fussed with his jacket pocket. For an instant he looked relieved. Then Wiktor turned to his left—her right—and seemed to nod to somebody seated among the dim booths and shadowed dining cubbies.

  Had he recognized someone he knew? Hardly surprising, considering the circles he kept.

  Composing her features, Io emerged from behind the wall and smiled as she approached the table. He is old-fashioned, she thought as he rose to hold her chair for her. "What's this?" She dabbed her fork at the creamy eruption on her plate.

  "A surprise. You'll like it."

  A forkful hesitated near her nose. "It smells spicy."

  "It is." He smiled. "That's why I ordered you something to drink. But I'm sure you'll love it." With that he winked and took a portion from his own serving into his mouth. The goggle-eyed pantomime of pleasure that followed made Io laugh.

  The dessert was delicious. It also made her eyes water. "Well!" She coughed. "I certainly won't have any trouble with my sinuses during the flight!"

  "It always makes me thirsty," he said, taking a sip of wine. Watching his eyes, she reached for the brimming glass of orange juice.

  Would she have suspected anything if she had not gone to school? Had she never studied the hard-won wisdom of a century's research, she might never have known about those subtle cues given off by child and man, in eye and face and voice, that betray inner unease.

  But then, Io's knowledge was still abstract. So maybe it was instinct—unreliable but desperately useful when it strikes—that made her notice the intense way Wiktor watched her hand.

  She put the glass down before it was more than an inch high. His gaze immediately flicked to her face. "Is something wrong?" he asked.

  Please. No, she prayed.

  "No, nothing's wrong." She lifted another forkful of the pungent sweet. "I was just savoring the taste."

  He seemed to notice the speculation in her eyes, and averted his gaze. That was a mistake. Now he avoided looking at the juice glass.

  The second spicy taste added power to the first. Io's throat burned, her nostrils felt singed. Still she kept her hand on the table and concentrated on remembering her lessons.

  Speaking with a measured voice, she said, "Actually, I think I will have another glass of wine, after all."

  Rapid impressions she read almost instantly—brief panic-contraction in the pupils . . . a faint, barely noticeable flush wave, crossing his cheeks at an unsatisfactory angle . . . that involuntary frown, quickly compressed into a slightly asymmetrical smile with the practice of an accomplished poseur . . .

  An experienced liar, then. But not a trained one.

  The man Io hoped someday to find would not lie. But he would have taken schooling in what lying does. How
it is seen, detected, known.

  This man, for all his money and worldliness, had never been to school.

  "More wine? In your condition?" He laughed teasingly. A little patronizingly. "Now, Io. Don't try to prove how tough you are. Be a good girl and drink your vitamins."

  My vitamins? Io thought. She reached for the glass.

  Here are my vitamins, you son of a fabricow.

  "Jism!" he cried, leaping to his feet as she spilled the drink across the tablecloth.

  Two confirmations in one action. An innocent man would not have shouted so over only a silly puddle. Nor would a professional use a curse phrase specific to a certain type of freelance artist.

  "You bitch, how did you kn—" He stepped forward, and so came within Io's seated reach. With one hand she grabbed the loose folds of his stylish cotton trousers. With the other she stabbed down hard with her dessert fork. There was a loud tearing of fabric. Shouting for strength she had never used before outside the decanting room, Io yanked.

  The resulting tableau held for a long moment. Staring patrons. Aghast waiters. Io, panting with upraised fork, ready to strike again, this time at a loathsome sight.

  Under the torn trousers, hanging like a broken flag, lay Wiktor's codpiece, the emblem of his calling. His tattooed license told of a costly modification—placental platinum extraction filters of the very latest design.

  No wonder Wiktor knew his way around style. Just one of the altered wrigglers he produced in millions could set a pieceworker on course toward her best bonus ever. And for him a healthy commission.

  "Why?" she whispered.

  Motion resumed. Hurried footsteps approached behind her.

  "Officers!" Wiktor pronounced loudly, for all to hear. "I want to press charges against this madwoman, for assault with intent to injure me!"

  Hands pressed upon her shoulders. The fork was ungently pried from her fingers. Io shook her hair back and looked him in the eyes defiantly.

  "Shall we take the tablecloth along to the police station, then?" She gestured toward the orange stain.

  A quick blinking of the eyes, a bobbing of the Adam's apple as he suddenly swallowed. "Wait!" Wiktor said as the guards began pulling her away. His sour expression was her bitter reward. "I—I have changed my mind. I will forget the incident . . . so long as she boards her flight and gets the hell out of here."

  Oh, I'm sure, she thought, watching him squirm. Men who would poison women—such men had personalities based on contempt for others. Probably until this very moment he had never even considered what might happen if he was caught. Now it was just dawning on him, too late.

  "Who?" Io asked simply, demanding a price.

  He stared at her, then, as if it were costing him his gall bladder, he spat one word. "Perseph."

  Io knew from the look in his eyes that she would have no need for revenge on her former friend. Far from the type of man he had tried to appear to be, this was a cowardly, predatory creature, the sort who preyed exclusively on those weaker than himself. Io felt certain he would never come near her again. Perseph, though—perhaps watching even now from some shadowy corner of the room—had real cause to worry.

  "What was it?" she asked.

  Sweat beaded on his lip and brow. There was an implicit arrangement here, truth in exchange for escape. But in fulfilling his part first, Wiktor knew he was giving himself over fully into her hands.

  "Para—parapyridine four," he whispered rapidly, trying to make the words for her alone.

  Io felt suddenly dizzy. The hand that had touched the juice glass trembled as if defiled. The substance named would not have affected her own health in the slightest. But it would have ruined the product she carried, and made her own eggs utterly useless for anything in the future. She'd be lucky to be able to make solvent filters if she had taken any of that stuff.

  "Why?" She repeated her first question.

  His face was now utterly resigned. "You were getting too damned high-almighty. Wanted to climb out and leave your friends, your guild. We . . . they . . . figured it'd do you good to be brought down a peg.

  "It was for—for your own good . . .," he finished lamely. His handsome confidence was now so completely gone that Io felt stunned that she had ever been fooled at all.

  "Excuse me, madam, is this fellow admitting to having done you some harm?"

  Io turned, noticing the Icelandic policeman for the first time. Obviously, he had followed their low, clipped exchange. Eyes flicked from her surropreg garments to Wiktor's tattoo, to the stained tablecloth, narrowing with dawning suspicion. He spoke English as educated Icelanders do, better than the English. "Perhaps you'd like to file charges of your own, madam?"

  In the policeman's face she saw compassion and more . . . a confidence completely unrelated to arrogance. A serenity that came of skill and sure knowledge of one's own usefulness. Face-to-face with the real thing, Io wondered how she was ever fooled by Wiktor's sham. Inexperience and wishful thinking, I suppose. She would have to talk this over with her teachers.

  "No," Io said softly. "But would you please walk me to my boarding gate? I think I could use a hand."

  Her last word to Wiktor was to thank him over her shoulder for dinner. The evenness of her tone must have been unnerving. She left him standing there, pale and exposed.

  The officer's gentle grip on her arm helped Io walk head high. Somewhere in the restaurant's gloom, she knew she was being watched by one more person—someone lacking the guts to show herself. Io didn't bother searching the shadows for those familiar eyes. She would never see them again.

  7.

  . . . Earlier we have seen excerpts extolling the benefits of an industrial order based on efficient biological assembly processes. There is no doubt that these techniques are in large measure responsible for the relative comfort of today's ten billion human beings, not least the fact that they have not starved.

  The mysticism of the Madrid Catholics, their religious revulsion toward even completely voluntary use of human reproductive systems for industry, is not shared by many others these days. Rather, the right of the poor to use their bodies' talents for their own benefit is enshrined in law, so long as volunteers are qualified and restrict themselves to licensed, nonhuman embryonic material.

  Nevertheless, some dissenting voices have spoken critically of this system from more rational grounds—scientific, biological, economic, and cultural. Some fear that our fundamental attitude toward life itself is changing, as each day passes. These are doubts that must, in all fairness, be taken seriously. . . .

  —from A Survey of Modern Problems,

  New York, 2049.

  . . . The time may come when these peculiarly severe licensing laws may be relaxed. But for now the intrinsic value of this particular product to society—by far the most valuable item produced by any society—has convinced lawmakers and voters alike that one particular career calls for schooling, qualification, and respect above any and all others. . . .

  —from The Certification Act, 2039.

  8.

  Another penalty of eggwork was the lengthy, all too realistic process of labor. Io took the doctors' word for it that it was still a bit easier than the "real thing." But that was small comfort.

  Not that difficulty or exertion held any great fears for her. Io knew what she was doing.

  Still, Joey held her hand through the agony of transition. And afterward he wiped the perspiration from her brow. It was all just part of the agency's service, he told her.

  Io knew better, of course. Joey actually cared, bless him.

  "Did I remember to curse you for getting me into this?" she asked when the worst was over.

  Joey smiled. "Missed your chance. Maybe next time."

  "I told you, Joey, there isn't going to be a—"

  "Hush. We'll speak of it later. Now, you concentrate. Transition may be over, but you still have hard pushing ahead."

  "Okay, Joey."

  Tremors. Foreshadowings. Io focused on her b
reathing and was ready when the next contractions came.

  "Good, good," the industrial midwife told her. A technician in the service of Technique Zaire, she commanded her team with crisp precision. "Now please to be ready for last effort."

  "Ah," Io replied in a sharp exhalation. "Ah!" Then she lost track of time. Moment by moment she did as she was told by those whose job it was to help her. Several times she cried out in ways she had been taught, conserving her strength for the final moment.

  When it came, it was almost anticlimactic. Passage, release, evacuation. A parting of that familiar connection.

  Emptiness.

  The scurrying techs had no attention to spare for her. Even Joey rushed forward, eager to see. When he returned, his eyes beamed. "I—I thought it would be a shipbrain, Io, but I was wrong. It's a starbrain!"