lose all the usual social inhibitions here, and there are only so many
footraces, wrist-wrestling contests, and the like you can do before you run dry.
So you eat, you sleep, and you have whatever sort of sex you wish here. You
cannot get pregnant, and if you were when you came in, you are not now. There is
nothing here but eternal boredom, and even that pales after a while. Then you
just sit and wait until you are called.
Called? Hawks echoed. By whom? For what?
Called by the Institute. Your mind, emotions, body, will—they play with all of
them as they wish. We are their toys, you see. You will see some of their games
here. At first you might be upset with seeing them or lose your appetite, but
after a while it becomes just like that couple back there. You simply don’t
think of them as odd or even unusual anymore. Even when you know they play with
mind and body, cripple and contort, after a while you look forward to being
called. Anything to relieve this. You will see.
How long have you been here? Cloud Dancer asked the blond man.
I truthfully do not know. You start to count the sleeps when you get here, but
you lose count sooner or later, and after a while you don’t try to start again.
Hair grows about six-tenths of a centimeter a month, and I have not cut mine. It
was rather short when I arrived. Still, I have had a few sessions—brief, I
think—at the Institute, so it is hard to say for sure.
At some point, Cloud Dancer noted grimly, we will all go mad.
Oh, even that is not permitted. They look for signs of it and pick it. up quite
well. They then pick you up, treat you, and you are not insane anymore. They
make few slips. They catch it early on, when we haven’t even seen it ourselves.
Hawks shivered. And no one—tries to escape?
How? Through fifteen meters of solid rock with our fingernails and our teeth?
Then what? To the vacuum of space? The only other way out is through that door
you came in, then through a maze of tunnels with countless air locks, all
monitored. Even if you got all the way, which no one ever has, there is an
average of two ships a month in here, and they stay only long enough to do their
business and go. A few hours at best. Access to the ships is strictly
controlled. I heard once that someone did get loose in the Institute and took
some important hostages. The computer security system ignored the hostages and
got the inmate anyway. No, I know of only three ways out.
One, I suppose, is death, Cloud Dancer said, making it sound not at all an
unattractive idea.
Yes. Another is when they finish with you or can no longer use you. Then they
might turn you into a slave, an obedient slave for them in their own quarters.
They have robots and all the comforts, but these are the kind of people who get
a thrill out of having slaves to boss around and pamper their every whim. You
can’t fake it, though. They make very sure of you over here before they recode
you over there.
You said three ways, Hawks noted.
Yes. The rulers here are in many ways just like the ones we grew up under. If
they decide you have something, some talent, some brilliance, that will enhance
their own power and position, they may employ you at the Institute. It’s just as
much a prison as here, but it is not boring.
They approached the boxlike buildings in the center. A number of people were
there, eating off plasticlike trays with a variety of utensils, all rather soft
and pliant. All the buildings were automated and computer-controlled. One put
one’s face into a depression to be scanned and identified. The food building
delivered the food and whatever was needed to eat it, in portions matched to an
individual’s physical needs. The tray and utensils were encoded with the user’s
identification and were to be dropped in a waste disposal box available on the
bottom three levels. No one could get any more of anything from the stores until
everything was accounted for from last time. If a prisoner stubbornly kept an
item, it began to decompose and give off a deliberately awful scent within a few
hours.
Bedding was two sheets and a pillowcase, turned in daily before breakfast could
be dispensed and replaced any time after the third meal. Some basic toiletries
in very small amounts could also be picked up, and a new kit could be issued by
turning in what was left of the old one. The newcomers ate, finding the food
filling though even more tasteless than shipboard meals, then drew their meager
supplies and followed van Dam all the way up to the top dwelling level. They
would, Hawks thought, not lack for exercise.
The apartment, or cell, was spartan but functional. There were two bunk beds on
either side of a rectangular room measuring about three by four meters. In the
rear was a bare toilet, a sink with hot and cold water faucets and a small
basin, a rack to hang the towels and washcloths, a small shelf for the lesser
toiletries, and that was that. Van Dam told them that showers, with real water,
were twice-weekly affairs and that they would be told when they were printed for
a meal to go take one and then return to eat. The showers, in a chamber under
Maximum Security, were fully monitored and could not be accessed except when
ordered there. Anyone who refused to shower was denied food.
There was no door, although a forcefield came down during sleep period.
Prisoners were always monitored and recorded while inside their rooms, van Dam
warned, which was why everybody stayed outside as much as possible. Cloud Dancer
went to the door and looked out at the grim chamber.
I am surprised, she said, that no one has hurled themselves from here. It
would be impossible to stop.
Easy, the blond man responded. Computers think a million times faster than
people. They would snap on a forcefield that would catch you and hold you—in
extreme pain, I might add—until somebody came and got you. Then you’d rate a
trip to the hospital, and when you got back you’d be just the same, but you’d
never think of doing that again. Believe me. I’ve seen it tried. He sighed.
Well, that’s about it. The rest you’ll catch on to in the days ahead. I’ll show
you how to make the bed and use the toilet, and that will be that. We’re never
full, so this level isn’t very crowded. If you want to use any of the unoccupied
rooms until they’re assigned, feel free. The only other assigned ones are some
other newcomers. Been here about two weeks. They’re three down in apartment
forty-two. Two sisters. Chinese, I believe. You might like them. They’re an
interesting pair. Real bad scars, though, so be prepared. Not from here—they
already had them.
The blond man left and made his way slowly back down toward the center. The two
women watched him go, wondering why he was in such a hurry to get anywhere in
this place.
Hawks walked up between the two women and put his arms around them. I’m very
sorry I got you into this. This was all my own stupid fault.
We chose to keep the marriage and to follow you, Cloud Dancer replied. Now we
will do as any Hyiakutt would do. We will survive, and we will wait.
He gave a dry, humorless chuckle. Wait? For what?
For opportunity. For whatever comes. Perhaps, even, for five golden rings.
12. A WAY OUT AND A PLACE TO GO
SHE HAD BEEN IN DARKNESS SO LONG NOW THAT SHE was used to it. It was no longer a
shock to awaken and not see, and the confines of her small quarters were so
spartan and so basic that she now lived within them without so much as a bump or
a stumble. Yet when they took her out of her cell, she was suddenly in a totally
different and frighteningly disoriented world. She knew now that something had
gone wrong near the start, that she was in fact a prisoner, and that the staff
at least knew who she really was, but she had no idea why they had kept her
there, in isolation, and still blind. Her sessions with the psychiatrists and
their analytical computers had been routine but did not seem to be leading
anywhere. This confused her more than ever, since the Presidium ran Melchior,
and Song Ching’s father was a member of the Presidium. Now, again, she was taken
out of confinement and led first into a vast open space, then through doors and
tunnels to the Institute, where she was seated in a large treatment chair. This
time, however, things were different.
My name is Doctor Syzmanski, a woman’s professional voice said off to the
right. We have finally completed our analysis of you, and Doctor Clayben, our
chief administrator, has made his decision.
They had done a lot of deep poking and probing into her mind and her
psychochemical makeup as well as her genetic files. They had found how the
computer had done what it had done, how she had managed to do what she had
accomplished, and much more. They were quite surprised to discover that it was
more than chemical mischief that made her believe she was a male inside. The
re-orientation had triggered a whole set of processes within the mind of Song
Ching, and both the mindprinting and the humbling aboard ship, as well as
contact with ordinary victims, had eaten at the heart of Song Ching’s massive
egocentrism. Another blow, and a telling one, was that she was really fixated on
her father. She had worshiped him and wanted only to have him return some of the
affection and respect. He never had, and that had driven her even harder to
prove herself to him, and she thought she had done so. In return, he had given
her the ultimate slap. He had belittled her accomplishments and then moved to
wipe her forever from his life. She had discovered that no daughter, no matter
how brilliant, could ever be seen by him as more than an object. Only if she
were a man would he take her seriously. This had reinforced the crude basic work
done for the masquerade.
You were conceived here, Doctor Syzmanski told her. Did you know that?
No, but it does not surprise me.
We are the only ones who could do it and allow him to get away with it. That’s
partly what we’re for, how we justify our existence to the Presidium. Your
father and mother contributed the basics, of course, but those were highly
modified here before being carefully combined and then placed inside your
mother. The technique is quite complex and quite revolutionary. Any children you
might have, by any father, would be more or less reengineered to attain the
maximum of physical and mental perfection the genes would allow. We understood
your father’s plan. You see, all the Centers exist to do just the opposite. To
seek out the exceptional, the dreamer, the potential changers of the world, and
either co-opt them into the Centers or eliminate them. Master System demands we
breed only mediocrity or those satisfied with the status quo. Your father wanted
to make the next evolutionary leap. You were part of that plan. Of course, it
wouldn’t have worked.
Huh? What? She was startled.
Your father felt that by removing you from Center and thus from having your
children’s genetic code registered, he would escape detection. He could then
protect the children from his position rather than eliminating or co-opting them
into the system as he is employed to do. His ego kept him from seeing that his
plan had real merit if it were done with two peasants picked at random, or
perhaps fifty. However, he wanted it kept in his own family. He wanted his
descendants to be the ones. You are already registered. Master System is not
blind. It would order your father to recruit or deal with any children you might
have no matter what he did to your mind-set.
But surely he would have known this, been told of this.
The greatest of men can be blinded and brought down by pride and ego. He did
not want to be told. It would have been death or worse to do more than make the
pro forma warning. He shut it out, refused to recognize it, because he could not
accept the truth. We, on the other hand, find much merit in the idea if it can
be removed from him. We are arranging, if we have not already arranged, to have
you killed.
What?
You may already be dead. Positive identification. Frustrated parents, perhaps
some guilt there and even sadness at having caused it. Case closed. All, even
Master System, satisfied. On Doctor Clayben’s orders, you no longer exist.
But Chu Li does. She began to feel some excitement coming back into her.
Only in computer records. Those are easier to fix, but Chu Li must also die,
here, in captivity, and be routinely disposed of. Then no one who was not
actually with you will know. Oh, this Sabatini may think he knows, but we will
deal with him and even adjust the pilot. We have changed identities, forms, all
sorts of things countless times here, but right now you are probably unique in
the Community. You do not exist. We have always thought of you as ours, anyway.
It is only right that you return to us when—ripe.
She began to get a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach. What do you
intend to do with me?
You have turned out exactly as we programmed. You have learned more about
computers and computer mathematics than many three times your age. You have also
shown great courage and the willingness to take major risks for big stakes. That
last is particularly rare. There is no way of knowing what you might accomplish,
but we do not feel that we should destroy that potential. However, it is equally
vital to know if the rest of the genetic programming works. It was far more
complex and experimental. If it does, we can use it here to breed our own
superior race. You are hardly the only one we worked on with this, but you are
the only one we have at the right age and here on station. One problem has been
how to. accomplish all this without you eventually turning our own system back
upon us. We think we know a way, and we believe the great risks are worth it.