The Chromosome Game

by Hodder-Williams, Christopher

  Nothing was the same.

  Eagle was gone, and with him the pride of Nembrak. Now there was to be a dumb show.

  Kelda said, ‘Do you think Nembrak will be able to keep up the act?’

  Trell said, ‘He will if we do.’

  ‘We must.’

  ‘Yes.’

  At last the door swung open and Nembrak let them in. He said, ‘I’ve been expecting you …’ — the flash of an embarrassed smile, ‘ … not tonight particularly, I mean. But I knew you’d be around. Do you want the others in on this?’

  Kelda said, ‘We came to talk with you.’

  ‘Okay.’ Nembrak, leaping with agility over a mass of obstacles in his path, led the way to Customer Relations — a claustrophobic cubbyhole heated by electricity swiped from the ship. The heater, like all General Motors’ products, blazoned the company logo and made the room stifling. It looked robust.

  Nembrak was only fractionally over-eager to demonstrate his own vivaciousness. Few would have detected the terrible crevasse of remorse. Like metal-fatigue, it would have lurked undetected by those whose attention hadn’t been drawn to the latent havoc wrought by stress. Nembrak betrayed hesitancy only once. He seemed confused about who should sit where, then tripped when he tried to arrange the seats. He recovered after a quick gulp from a carton on his desk, exhaling as if in routine appreciation of its contents. ‘Own distillery,’ he confided. ‘Not a word to Customs & Excise … Want some?’

  Trell was on the point of refusing, Kelda managed to prompt him with the merest flicker of deflected eyelash. Her lips parted in an imp-smile. ‘My first,’ she said. ‘Now I’m a wanton woman.’

  ‘It had to happen,’ Trell said. ‘I should never have started taking her to cocktail parties.’

  In silence, Nembrak poured. Then his face broke into a smile and the dummy came alive. ‘We call it gin. But when we first decanted it the stuff penetrated two inches of armour-plate.’ He plonked two cartons on the Customer Relations table. ‘What gives?’

  Trell said to Kelda, ‘Let’s get the Insulin matter settled first.’

  Kelda nodded, said, ‘Nembrak, Cass is absolutely panicked. Hallow just told me.’

  Nembrak nodded back. ‘We are making headway. It’s not Insulin, something else. Do you want to know all the scientific crap?’

  Kelda said, ‘Just tell us if it’ll work when you can supply.’

  Nembrak said, ‘The only way of testing it is on Cass.’

  ‘Isn’t that dangerous?’

  ‘Of course. It could be lethal. Still, I tried to induce a kind of a coma in myself —’

  ‘— on yourself?’

  ‘Don’t panic. We tried stimulating comas in small mammals first … rabbits, badgers, everything but elephants. They lived okay, so I thought I would. As you see, I’m not dead yet.’

  Trell said, ‘Evidently.’

  Nembrak said, ‘Of course, not being diabetic I can’t know if it does the pancreatic bit. We didn’t succeed in finding any diabetic animals but chemically the thing makes sense. We have quite an elaborate test bench where the blood sugar process can be simulated. It’s rough and ready but the best we can do.’

  Trell said, ‘When?’

  Nembrak said, ‘Delivery? … At present we only have samples. In quantity we should be in production within four weeks. Will he live that long?’

  Kelda said, ‘I guess he must.’

  Trell said, ‘I uncorked one of the auto-nurses a couple of nights ago. The Computer wasn’t too pleased —’

  ‘— I’ll bet —’

  ‘— but I was acting on the faint hope that those things are equipped —’

  ‘— Insulin would not have kept that long without proper temperature control in any case.’

  ‘I didn’t think of that. Anyway, no dice. If Cass can’t hold out on what there is in his dispenser, that’s it.’

  Nembrak said, ‘So we speed up the processing.’

  ‘Is that possible?’

  ‘Anything’s possible.’

  Kelda said, ‘You’re a saint.’

  Nembrak gazed down to refill his plastic carton. ‘I can prove otherwise.’ He added rapidly, ‘I mean, you ask the other kids here in GM. We live a life of iniquity, it’s delicious.’ — But he hadn’t meant that aspect of things … ‘Now. Let me fill you in. Some time back I get a visit from Sladey, our beloved 555. All smiles, he is, unctuous as engine oil. Doesn’t think us very bright, around here.’

  Kelda said, ‘What does he use for brains?’

  ‘One day we’ll build an X-ray machine of our own, and see.’ Nembrak added, ‘The one on Kasiga is equipped with a safety-device against a lethal overdose. We want none of that.’

  There was a grim silence.

  Nembrak dispersed the spell with a gesture worthy of Toscanini. ‘He comes to us with the blueprint for some weirdo kind of a hut. Parks it on that table, right there — without even realising that what’s right ways up for him is upside down for the guy opposite … I could see it was a boat within four point seven five nanoseconds. He still thinks that we still think it’s a hut, with a crazy keel up top. We built it. They have it. Now they have an engine and they’re ready to roll.’

  Kelda glanced up but couldn’t speak.

  Trell said, ‘I get the message.’

  Nembrak said, ‘Right. I guess it doesn’t take morse code.’

  Trell gave Nembrak a totally steady look. The question simply had to be asked. There was no way out of it. ‘Why did you build the boat, Nembrak?’

  There was no trace of guilt when the answer bounced back. On the logic of his decision, Nembrak was sincere. ‘We let them do our work, Trell. They have the co-ordinates of the dump where the supplies are. We need the supplies for the whole community. So they go fetch ’em, out of loving-kindness, generosity and social-conscience.’

  ‘Fiendish,’ said Kelda, appreciatively.

  ‘Thank you. I didn’t think it too bad myself. I had to change the design of their boat, though. Sladey’s hydro-dynamics leave something to be desired. His idea of a motor-launch was so unseaworthy it would have sunk before he’d dragged it off the shingle. It did occur to me to leave it full of holes — would have been kind of fun to gaze through a telescope and watch the first ripple of Mediterranean crack the thing up and render unto the sharks the best lunch they’ve seen for centuries. The temptation was unbearable.’

  Trell said, ‘I’m glad you held out, though. We’re the ones in need of the meal. I love sharks but they can wait.’

  Nembrak said, ‘We don’t have to keep them waiting too long … Mind, I’m an amateur fiend: the professionals, like Scorda, Flek, that mob … They’ve put in some real dedicated work against you two.’

  ‘We did get rather a cool reception topsides,’ said Trell.

  ‘You would. Sladey asked some earnest questions in company with our esteemed computer, and came out better than Goebbels.’

  ‘Who’s Goebbels?’

  ‘Sladey with eyebrows. We did some research on the Controller’s happy memories — all in core-store and healthy as using plutonium-oxide for talcum powder. Don’t waste your time on it … you can have a happier time in a plague-pit. But the propaganda has been a roaring success with Sladey’s courageous admirers … Didn’t you know? — You’re responsible for the lousy soil we found as soon as we first came ashore. The pathetic harvest prospects are all your fault. You brought the drought before we berthed, the rains that diluted the topsoil before we arrived, the fishes that suffered, first from too little water, then so much they were washed out to sea. You name it, you did it — retroactively … angered the gods. Sladey’s terrific on superstition. They fell for it.’

  Trell said, ‘I think I can just understand why it worked.’

  Nembrak leaned forward, spat out the words. ‘Just don’t forgive it! Listen. You both sweated blood for that mob. No leadership could have been better. Why in hell you think we worked so hard at General Motors? I’ll tell you what mos
t of those sheep are — that’s in case you don’t know already: they’re people with No Excuse. Believe me. They’re leftovers from a rotten civilisation and they have the same rotten standards. You know it; I know it. Why pretend?’

  Nembrak rose, fighting tears. ‘You two have the mandate of General Motors, not a doubt about that … Have we covered the business in hand? We have some work to do here, and also some loving to do … in our own particular way.’

  Kelda said, getting up, ‘It’s obviously a very healthy way, Nembrak!’

  ‘Bananas! It’s a productive way … That’s what counts with General Motors. I’d best show you out. There’s a lot of gear to fall over. Don’t want to get landed with a huge insurance claim. Detroit can’t stand the strain on the balance sheet.’

  Kelda said, ‘Give my love to the others.’

  ‘No time for that. Want to see what they’ve got up to that I’m missing. Very inventive, you know, around this factory. Must keep up with Research & Development. See us soon. We’ve fixed up a phone to the ship. It’ll be working tomorrow. The phone your end is located in Teaching Cubicle E.’

  Nembrak kissed Kelda on the cheek and shut the factory door on them.

  Kelda said, ‘You know where he’s really gone? — to cry his eyes out.’

  ‘Why are people like that so utterly merciless with themselves, Kelda?’

  Kelda said, ‘I know what God would say.’

  ‘What would God say?’

  Her face was contorted. ‘To make up for those who don’t give a damn! He’s right! They don’t give a damn!’

  ‘My information is that God came to much the same conclusion.’

  Zero

  A stray crow, somewhat dishevelled and aerodynamically a bit forlorn, alights on one of the crumbling towers of Carross and folds its unimposing wings as tightly as possible against the icy wind.

  It doesn’t know it, but Evolution is in fact phasing it out, gradually and unobtrusively, so as not to upset the dwindling remainder of the species. The crows are still laying eggs and occasionally these even hatch; but it is really only a gesture on nature’s part, a consolation prize for dullards. Only through modifying their diet have the crows updated themselves. In adaptation they lag pathetically behind the hawks, the thrushes, the swallows and, in particular, the gulls. Now they must quietly pay the price.

  Futureworld demands a more sanguine strain; one that transcends difficulty, faces endurance, adjusts promptly to change. Unlike the vulture, which is certainly on the way out, and about time too, the crow is neither corrupt nor obese from gluttony. Nature will give it a better deal than the grim demise reserved for nature’s cultural slob of all time.

  The Top Brass of the universe — so recently equipped with the new Stellascopes — watch the crow as it scans, bleary-eyed, the newly-ploughed terrain below Carross.

  What’s in it for the crow? Are those the tips of buds showing through the topsoil? — and if so, might the common worm be shovelling around, waiting to be eaten? — playing its part in the overall balance of the biosphere and thereby making things ecologically convenient for disconsolate crows?

  Pursuing their watching-brief from afar, the gods of the universe endure the cutback on expenditure with some distaste. Certainly to the Interrogod it seems misguided to withdraw all active support from those very few worthwhile people who somehow survive on Kasiga.

  But stellar collisions are just plain unfunny; the havoc wrought by a gigantic rift in the Universal Sky — thought to be at least two light-years wide but estimates are still coming in — have impacted thickly inhabited planets, melting other intelligent species into extinction. You just can’t ignore it, you can’t be sentimental in these things — however much you admire the heroes and heroines of Futureworld. You gotta watch priorities: Planet Earth is not in the busted constellation.

  But the gods can still accept high-priority prayers when there’s room in the computer. And some of these prayers raise a celestial eyebrow or two.

  For the skeleton staff at the Hilton remains perplexed at the gloom and pessimism prevailing among the incubants. In their view (and after all, they do run things) a pretty good job has been made on the plains, turning it into land that is both arable and fertile … well, they’re disturbed and sorry at the fading faith in the minds of Futureworld’s dismayed protagonists. Why not listen to us and play your waiting game? We’d send a UFO but they’re all out on emergency calls …

  However constrained in their actions, the galactian moguls take a very different view of the changes — subtle and sinister — taking place within the tortuous, Man-created pseudo-soul of the computer. They are angered indeed; and this has nothing to do with superstition — they certainly don’t go in for that.

  It is now their final and immutable opinion — and this is quite unanimous throughout the constellation — that Twentieth Century Man was, to put it bluntly, a crude-minded fatso whose obsession with all things expedient damned him forever.

  But the Computer is merely a device and is therefore exempt; Twentieth Century Man was a mix between the antediluvian crow and the slithy old vulture. His effort to adapt was executed second-hand — he really thought that as a substitute for his own development he could instead delegate the small matter of human progress to the computer and leave himself free for the more serious business of coming apart at the seams. And amidst the vulgarity of glittering neon he corrupted the female and used her like so much Kleenex. He wined her, dined her, signed her — then tore up the contract the moment she was shop-soiled. He drove his Buick into the future and corroded the minds of progeny he had no right to conceive; then abandoned the wreck of his automobile, leaving the debris obstructing their path. Just as the vulture collapses here in Futureworld from the weight of its goodies, so Man had his final coronary after the last fatty-degenerative supper (on the company slate) and choked on his cigars.

  *

  Certainly, in the view of the more senior guests at the Hilton on Star 47, Sladey-555 was no contender for a second-hand halo. Equally they felt disinclined to excuse him on the grounds that Huckman had levered him — by remote control — into being what he was. The Interrogod himself had reservations regarding the disclaimers inherent in psychiatry … You can’t blame daddy for everything. In fact it was the C-in-C Transpacial Command — in one of his frequent departures from strict procedural syntax in favour of rather ungodlike colloquialisms — who nailed it during an informal review of events as viewed from the Hilton Club Room: ‘Sladey,’ he said, ‘wouldn’t make Corporal in any regiment of mine if he could take an enemy position with a six-inch shell up his ass.’

  The Interrogod commented, ‘Who are you trying to shock?’

  ‘Myself, probably. But I’ve drummed better people than that out of my Command and I bet the Devil himself wouldn’t know which side Sladey was on.’ He squinted sourly over the leader-page of The Celestial Times. ‘But you do know the nature of the Insurance Policy with which Sladey is now providing himself? — he … along with his sycophants and mini-whores?’

  ‘How can I miss it?’

  Though none of the gods missed it, no mortal being outside of Sladey’s exclusive clan had an inkling of this particular issue. Significantly, Scorda-099 was not among the privileged. Sladey had always planned to jettison Scorda once he had ceased to be useful. That eventuality was now becoming imminent.

  *

  Sladey had summoned a gaggle of nonentity-geese to a remote section of Kasiga, two clear weeks ahead of the Estimated Time of Departure for the raid on Corsica. Securely locked behind renovated bulkheads, in a stuffily confined watertight compartment near the bows, he addressed the cadre of a tawdy Master Race in a Swasticated atmosphere almost ridiculous for its emulation of the Third Reich … albeit on a claustrophobic scale which did not lend grandeur to Sladey’s throttled and sibilant mode of speech: ‘It behoves us,’ he proclaimed, ‘to survive. And since this particular obligation is not made any easier by those who specialise i
n chaos — as you will observe, my friends — I have gone to the trouble and vast expense of creating a little cubby-hole all our own. At the drop of a hat — or any other suitable object — those now gathered here together can, and shall, reassemble in this exclusive suite if matters heat up and clog the works. You have been sworn to secrecy. Any breach of this secrecy will lead to instant Eagle-isation. So I wouldn’t advise it.

  ‘We have food, fresh water … even a small library. I apologise about the lack of television but normal service will be resumed as soon as possible …

  ‘It may never be necessary for us to make use of this hidey-hole. We may not know, we cannot tell — Hymns Ancient and Modern Number 555. However, there’s nothing like a bit of caution. Is there?’

  *

  ‘Kelda. You’re shivering. I’ll turn the heat up.’

  ‘It’s not that.’

  ‘You’re wondering about that boatload of thugs. There are enough of us to handle them when they get back.’

  ‘And what then?’

  ‘An open election.’

  ‘We’ll lose.’

  ‘Then we’ll fight in Opposition.’

  ‘Sladey won’t buy that, Trell — Democracy.’

  ‘Once the incubants detect any unfair distribution of the supplies they’ll come out of their euphoria and form an electorate. Even if most of them vote for Sladey, the rest will demand representation.’

  ‘Yes, Trell — if they’re given the right to demand it.’

  ‘If it comes to demanding things they’ll certainly demand the right to survive.’

  ‘What’s that look mean?’

  ‘Kelda, not now.’

  ‘Give.’

  ‘Something Kendip said.’

  ‘Flipping? — or flopping?’

  ‘Can’t be sure. I tried to get through to him. For a short time I thought I did.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘I think it was a figure of speech.’

  ‘But you seem reluctant to tell me the speech.’