NINE TOMORROWS Tales of the Near Future

by Isaac Asimov

  Miss Fellowes said sharply, “Bring me a nightgown for the child!”

  A nightgown appeared at once. It was as though everything were ready and yet nothing were ready unless she gave orders; as though they were deliberately leaving this in her charge without help, to test her.

  The newsman, Deveney, approached and said, “I’ll hold him, Miss. You won’t get it on yourself.”

  “Thank you,” said Miss Fellowes. And it was a battle indeed, but the nightgown went on, and when the boy made as though to rip it off, she slapped his hand sharply.

  The boy reddened, but did not cry. He stared at her and the splayed fingers of one hand moved slowly across the flannel of the nightgown, feeling the strangeness of it.

  Miss Fellowes thought desperately: Well, what next?

  Everyone seemed in suspended animation, waiting for her—even the ugly little boy.

  Miss Fellowes said sharply, “Have you provided food? Milk?”

  They had. A mobile unit was wheeled in, with its refrigeration compartment containing three quarts of milk, with a warming unit and a supply of fortifications in the form of vitamin drops, copper-cobalt-iron syrup and others she had no time to be concerned with. There was a variety of canned self-warming junior foods.

  She used milk, simply milk, to begin with. The radar unit heated the milk to a set temperature in a matter of ten seconds and clicked off, and she put some in a saucer. She had a certainty about the boy’s savagery. He wouldn’t know how to handle a cup.

  Miss Fellowes nodded and said to the boy, “Drink. Drink.” She made a gesture as though to raise the milk to her mouth. The boy’s eyes followed but he made no move.

  Suddenly, the nurse resorted to direct measures. She seized the boy’s upper arm in one hand and dipped the other in the milk. She dashed the milk across his lips, so that it dripped down cheeks and receding chin.

  For a moment, the child uttered a high-pitched cry, then his tongue moved over his wetted lips. Miss Fellowes stepped back.

  The boy approached the saucer, bent toward it, then looked up and behind sharply as though expecting a crouching enemy; bent again and licked at the milk eagerly, like a cat. He made a slurping noise. He did not use his hands to lift the saucer.

  Miss Fellowes allowed a bit of the revulsion she felt show on her face. She couldn’t help it.

  Deveney caught that, perhaps. He said, “Does the nurse know, Dr. Hoskins?”

  “Know what?” demanded Miss Fellowes.

  Deveney hesitated, but Hoskins (again that look of detached amusement on his face) said, “Well, tell her.”

  Deveney addressed Miss Fellowes. “You may not suspect it, Miss, but you happen to be the first civilized woman in history ever to be taking care of a Neanderthal youngster.”

  She turned on Hoskins with a kind of controlled ferocity. “You might have told me, Doctor.”

  “Why? What difference does it make?”

  “You said a child.”

  “Isn’t that a child? Have you ever had a puppy or a kitten, Miss Fellowes? Are those closer to the human? If that were a baby chimpanzee, would you be repelled? You’re a nurse, Miss Fellowes. Your record places you in a maternity ward for three years. Have you ever refused to take care of a deformed infant?”

  Miss Fellowes felt her case slipping away. She said, with much less decision, “You might have told me.”

  “And you would have refused the position? Well, do you refuse it now?” He gazed at her coolly, while Deveney watched from the other side of the room, and the Neanderthal child, having finished the milk and licked the plate, looked up at her with a wet face and wide, longing eyes.

  The boy pointed to the milk and suddenly burst out in a short series of sounds repeated over and over; sounds made up of gutturals and elaborate tongue-clickings.

  Miss Fellowes said, in surprise, “Why, he talks.”

  “Of course,” said Hoskins. “Homo neanderthalensis is not a truly separate species, but rather a subspecies of Homo sapiens. Why shouldn’t he talk? He’s probably asking for more milk.”

  Automatically, Miss Fellowes reached for the bottle of milk, but Hoskins seized her wrist. “Now, Miss Fellowes, before we go any further, are you staying on the job?”

  Miss Fellowes shook free in annoyance, “Won’t you feed him if I don’t? I’ll stay with him—for a while.”

  She poured the milk.

  Hoskins said, “We are going to leave you with the boy, Miss Fellowes. This is the only door to Stasis Number One and it is elaborately locked and guarded. I’ll want you to learn the details of the lock which will, of course, be keyed to your fingerprints as they are already keyed to mine. The spaces overhead” (he looked upward to the open ceilings of the dollhouse) “are also guarded and we will be warned if anything untoward takes place in here.”

  Miss Fellowes said indignantly, “You mean I’ll be under view.” She thought suddenly of her own survey of the room interiors from the balcony.

  “No, no,” said Hoskins seriously, “your privacy will be respected completely. The view will consist of electronic symbolism only, which only a computer will deal with. Now you will stay with him tonight, Miss Fellowes, and every night until further notice. You will be relieved during the day according to some schedule you will find convenient. We will allow you to arrange that.”

  Miss Fellowes looked about the dollhouse with a puzzled expression. “But why all this, Dr. Hoskins? Is the boy dangerous?”

  “It’s a matter of energy, Miss Fellowes. He must never be allowed to leave these rooms. Never. Not for an instant. Not for any reason. Not to save his life. Not even to save your life, Miss Fellowes. Is that clear?”

  Miss Fellowes raised her chin. “I understand the orders, Dr. Hoskins, and the nursing profession is accustomed to placing its duties ahead of self-preservation.”

  “Good. You can always signal if you need anyone.” And the two men left.

  Miss Fellowes turned to the boy. He was watching her and there was still milk in the saucer. Laboriously, she tried to show him how to lift the saucer and place it to his lips. He resisted, but let her touch him without crying out.

  Always, his frightened eyes were on her, watching, watching for the one false move. She found herself soothing him, trying to move her hand very slowly toward his hair, letting him see it every inch of the way, see there was no harm in it.

  And she succeeded in stroking his hair for an instant.

  She said, “I’m going to have to show you how to use the bathroom. Do you think you can learn?”

  She spoke quietly, kindly, knowing he would not understand the words but hoping he would respond to the calmness of the tone.

  The boy launched into a clicking phrase again.

  She said, “May I take your hand?”

  She held out hers and the boy looked at it. She left it outstretched and waited. The boy’s own hand crept forward toward hers.

  “That’s right,” she said.

  It approached within an inch of hers and then the boy’s courage failed him. He snatched it back.

  “Well,” said Miss Fellowes calmly, “we’ll try again later. Would you like to sit down here?” She patted the mattress of the bed.

  The hours passed slowly and progress was minute. She did not succeed either with bathroom or with the bed. In fact, after the child had given unmistakable signs of sleepiness he lay down on the bare ground and then, with a quick movement, rolled beneath the bed.

  She bent to look at him and his eyes gleamed out at her as he tongue-clicked at her.

  “All right,” she said, “if you feel safer there, you sleep there.”

  She closed the door to the bedroom and retired to the cot that had been placed for her use in the largest room. At her insistence, a make-shift canopy had been stretched over it. She thought: Those stupid men will have to place a mirror in this room and a larger chest of drawers and a separate washroom if they expect me to spend nights here.

  It was difficult to sleep. Sh
e found herself straining to hear possible sounds in the next room. He couldn’t get out, could he? The walls were sheer and impossibly high but suppose the child could climb like a monkey? Well, Hoskins said there were observational devices watching through the ceiling.

  Suddenly she thought: Can he be dangerous? Physically dangerous?

  Surely, Hoskins couldn’t have meant that. Surely, he would not have left her here alone, if—

  She tried to laugh at herself. He was only a three- or four-year-old child. Still, she had not succeeded in cutting his nails. If he should attack her with nails and teeth while she slept-

  Her breath came quickly. Oh, ridiculous, and yet—

  She listened with painful attentiveness, and this time she heard the sound.

  The boy was crying.

  Not shrieking in fear or anger; not yelling or screaming. It was crying softly, and the cry was the heartbroken sobbing of a lonely, lonely child.

  For the first time, Miss Fellowes thought with a pang: Poor thing!

  Of course, it was a child; what did the shape of its head matter? It was a child that had been orphaned as no child had ever been orphaned before. Not only its mother and father were gone, but all its species. Snatched callously out of time, it was now the only creature of its kind in the world. The last. The only.

  She felt pity for it strengthen, and with it shame at her own callousness. Tucking her own nightgown carefully about her calves (incongruously, she thought: Tomorrow I’ll have to bring in a bathrobe) she got out of bed and went into the boy’s room.

  “Little boy,” she called in a whisper. “Little boy.”

  She was about to reach under the bed, but she thought of a possible bite and did not. Instead, she turned on the night light and moved the bed.

  The poor thing was huddled in the corner, knees up against his chin, looking up at her with blurred and apprehensive eyes.

  In the dim light, she was not aware of his repulsiveness.

  “Poor boy,” she said, “poor boy.” She felt him stiffen as she stroked his hair, then relax. “Poor boy. May I hold you?”

  She sat down on the floor next to him and slowly and rhythmically stroked his hair, his cheek, his arm. Softly, she began to sing a slow and gentle song.

  He lifted his head at that, staring at her mouth in the dimness, as though wondering at the sound.

  She maneuvered him closer while he listened to her. Slowly, she pressed gently against the side of his head, until it rested on her shoulder. She put her arm under his thighs and with a smooth and unhurried motion lifted him into her lap.

  She continued singing, the same simple verse over and over, while she rocked back and forth, back and forth.

  He stopped crying, and after a while the smooth burr of his breathing showed he was asleep.

  With infinite care, she pushed his bed back against the wall and laid him down. She covered him and stared down. His face looked so peaceful and little-boy as he slept. It didn’t matter so much that it was so ugly. Really.

  She began to tiptoe out, then thought: If he wakes up?

  She came back, battled irresolutely with herself, then sighed and slowly got into bed with the child.

  It was too small for her. She was cramped and uneasy at the lack of canopy, but the child’s hand crept into hers and, somehow, she fell asleep in that position.

  She awoke with a start and a wild impulse to scream. The latter she just managed to suppress into a gurgle. The boy was looking at her, wide-eyed. It took her a long moment to remember getting into bed with him, and now, slowly, without unfixing her eyes from his, she stretched one leg carefully and let it touch the floor, then the other one.

  She cast a quick and apprehensive glance toward the open ceiling, then tensed her muscles for quick disengagement.

  But at that moment, the boy’s stubby fingers reached out and touched her lips. He said something.

  She shrank at the touch. He was terribly ugly in the light of day.

  The boy spoke again. He opened his own mouth and gestured with his hand as though something were coming out.

  Miss Fellowes guessed at the meaning and said tremulously, “Do you want me to sing?”

  The boy said nothing but stared at her mouth.

  In a voice slightly off key with tension, Miss Fellowes began the little song she had sung the night before and the ugly little boy smiled. He swayed clumsily in rough time to the music and made a little gurgly sound that might have been the beginnings of a laugh.

  Miss Fellowes sighed inwardly. Music hath charms to soothe the savage breast. It might help—

  She said, “You wait. Let me get myself fixed up. It will just take a minute. Then I’ll make breakfast for you.”

  She worked rapidly, conscious of the lack of ceiling at all times. The boy remained in bed, watching her when she was in view. She smiled at him at those times and waved. At the end, he waved back, and she found herself being charmed by that.

  Finally, she said, “Would you like oatmeal with milk?” It took a moment to prepare, and then she beckoned to him.

  Whether he understood the gesture or followed the aroma, Miss Fellowes did not know, but he got out of bed.

  She tried to show him how to use a spoon but he shrank away from it in fright. (Time enough, she thought.) She compromised on insisting that he lift the bowl in his hands. He did it clumsily enough and it was incredibly messy but most of it did get into him.

  She tried the drinking milk in a glass this time, and the little boy whined when he found the opening too small for him to get his face into conveniently. She held his hand, forcing it around the glass, making him tip it, forcing his mouth to the rim.

  Again a mess but again most went into him, and she was used to messes.

  The washroom, to her surprise and relief, was a less frustrating matter. He understood what it was she expected him to do.

  She found herself patting his head, saying, “Good boy. Smart boy.”

  And to Miss Fellowes’ exceeding pleasure, the boy smiled at that.

  She thought: when he smiles, he’s quite bearable. Really.

  Later in the day, the gentlemen of the press arrived.

  She held the boy in her arms and he clung to her wildly while across the open door they set cameras to work. The commotion frightened the boy and he began to cry, but it was ten minutes before Miss Fellowes was allowed to retreat and put the boy in the next room.

  She emerged again, flushed with indignation, walked out of the apartment (for the first time in eighteen hours) and closed the door behind her. “I think you’ve had enough. It will take me a while to quiet him. Go away.”

  “Sure, sure,” said the gentleman from the Times-Herald. “But is that really a Neanderthal or is this some kind of gag?”

  “I assure you,” said Hoskins’ voice, suddenly, from the background, “that this is no gag. The child is authentic Homo neanderthalensis.”

  “Is it a boy or a girl?”

  “Boy,” said Miss Fellowes briefly.

  “Ape-boy,” said the gentleman from the News. “That’s what we’ve got here. Ape-boy. How does he act, Nurse?”

  “He acts exactly like a little boy,” snapped Miss Fellowes, annoyed into the defensive, “and he is not an ape-boy. His name is—is Timothy, Timmie—and he is perfectly normal in his behavior.”

  She had chosen the name Timothy at a venture. It was the first that had occurred to her.

  ‘Timmie the Ape-boy,” said the gentleman from the News and, as it turned out, Timmie the Ape-boy was the name under which the child became known to the world.

  The gentleman from the Globe turned to Hoskins and said, “Doc, what do you expect to do with the ape-boy?”

  Hoskins shrugged. “My original plan was completed when I proved it possible to bring him here. However, the anthropologists will be very interested, I imagine, and the physiologists. We have Here, after all, a creature which is at the edge of being human. We should learn a great deal about ourselves and our
ancestry from him.”

  “How long will you keep him?”

  “Until such a time as we need the space more than we need him. Quite a while, perhaps.”

  The gentleman from the News said, “Can you bring it out into the open, so we can set up sub-etheric equipment and put on a real show?”

  “I’m sorry, but the child cannot be removed from Stasis.”

  “Exactly what is Stasis?”

  “Ah.” Hoskins permitted himself one of his short smiles. “That would take a great deal of explanation, gentlemen. In Stasis, time as we know it doesn’t exist. Those rooms are inside an invisible bubble that is not exactly part of our Universe. That is why the child could be plucked out of time as it was.”

  “Well, wait now,” said the gentleman from the News discontentedly, “what are you giving us? The nurse goes into the room and out of it.”

  “And so can any of you,” said Hoskins matter-of-factly. “You would be moving parallel to the lines of temporal force and no great energy gain or loss would be involved. The child, however, was taken from the far past. It moved across the lines and gained temporal potential. To move it into the Universe and into our own time would absorb enough energy to burn out every line in the place and probably blank out all power in the city of Washington. We had to store trash brought with him on the premises and will have to remove it little by little.”

  The newsmen were writing down sentences busily as Hoskins spoke to them. They did not understand and they were sure their readers would not, but it sounded scientific and that was what counted.

  The gentleman from the Times-Herald said, “Would you be available for an all-circuit interview tonight?”

  “I think so,” said Hoskins at once, and they all moved off.

  Miss Fellowes looked after them. She understood all this about Stasis and temporal force as little as the newsmen but she managed to get this much. Timmie’s imprisonment (she found herself suddenly thinking of the little boy as Timmie) was a real one and not one imposed by the arbitrary fiat of Hoskins. Apparently, it was impossible to let him out of Stasis at all, ever.

  Poor child. Poor child.

  She was suddenly aware of his crying and she hastened in to console him.