Half Past Human (S.F. MASTERWORKS)

by T. J. Bass

  ‘Perhaps we’re in for a long rest – Jupiter will be in that sign for a long time,’ chuckled Val.

  Walter just grunted and coughed. He opened a box of artifacts collected from buckeye campsites. The beads interested him. He held up an intact string – twelve black beads, a ringed bead at one end, and four colored beads in the center.

  ‘What do you make of these?’

  ‘Clan—’ suggested Val.

  ‘What if they represent time?’ said old Walter. ‘Planetary time – zodiacal. If the ringed one is Saturn, then this big white one could be Jupiter in Sagittarius—’

  Val nodded, half interested. ‘But three more beads are with the big white one – a four-planet conjunction just isn’t on any of my star charts here.’ He pulled out projections of future positions – nothing matched the beads for hundreds of years as far as he could tell. ‘If it is a conjunction, it is way off in the future. Can’t see what interest buckeyes could have in that – but any fourplanet conjunction would be significant for someone.’

  ‘Sagittarius? Hunter – or hunted?’ mumbled Walter.

  Val had lost interest already. He was casting a light-hearted horoscope to help him decide which entertainment channel to watch. Walter closed his artifact box with an interruptive bang.

  ‘Well!’ he shouted. ‘We can’t solve any more buckeye problems on this shift. Let’s drop over to my place for a meld.’

  Val shook his head – declining.

  ‘Not tonite. I’m going ’tween walls on a rat hunt. Pick up a few extra flavors.’

  ‘Maybe next time then,’ said Walter in parting. ‘Female Bitter has been asking about you.’

  They went their separate ways. Val had strong feelings about the meld. Rubbing souls with anyone irritated him. He clashed with the polarized and found the neuts too bland. Walter, on the other hand, enjoyed his family-5 and all their little intimacies and pleasurings. He accepted ritual hugs from female Bitter and talked job with Jo Jo and grumpy Busch. Neutral Arthur planned family fun and games. A well-rounded family-5.

  Val sat in his cubicle checking his ratting gear. The coveralls were well worn. They had helped him take many calories. He changed the dust filters and tested the power cell. The helmet light and communicator still functioned, although both had low reliability quotients by now. Picking up the anoxic gas bag he started upspiral to the mid-level gratings.

  ‘Level thirty-five OK, City?’ he asked.

  ‘Go ahead,’ said the cybercity. ‘I’ll track you.’

  He waded into the powdery soot. Cobwebs clung. His lamp picked out a circle of old dry skeletons – humans gone mushroom on Molecular Reward. He gave the location to the city, but Sampling wasn’t indicated for bones.

  He tracked along weight-bearing struts, hollow cylinders, and pipes of all sizes – some pulsating, some hot, others flexible and cold. Underfoot, the black and gray spongy dust averaged ankle-deep, but it drifted in corners and formed friable and pillowy cushions on everything. Thin cables and wires resembled thick columns. He repeatedly swatted away the cottony debris to identify the object being drifted over.

  Deep, snakelike rat trails crisscrossed the dust drifts. Rat droppings were everywhere. As he flashed his light around it was reflected back by hundreds of pairs of beady retinas.

  ‘City,’ he said, ‘you’ve got a lot of rats down here.’

  ‘Most of my citizens are reincarnationists,’ said the voice in his helmet, ‘– don’t eat meat. They see their ancestors in the eyes of the rat.’

  Val smirked: ‘If I were a believer in transmigration of the soul I’d think my ancestors would appreciate having their sojourn as a rat shortened. Besides, we’re the only carnivore the rat has to worry about now, so eating them may be Nature’s Way.’

  His bitter philosophy was wasted on the city. It directed him toward the highest density of rats’ nests. He crawled under a whistling air conduit. Using a heavy girder for hand-holds, he scaled across a deep void on a narrow pipe. When he flashed his helmet light down, vertigo gripped his cardio-esophageal junction. Only an occasional cobweb caught his beam. The blackness of ’tween walls appeared bottomless. Ahead he saw one of the city’s organs – a thirty-yard-diameter sphere with a medusa head of flexi-cables. He touched it. It was warm, dry and silent.

  ‘Found your energy organ.’

  City reviewed its own anatomy. ‘Membrane filters to your right.’

  He dust-waded along the top of a large pipe. It was hollow. Voices and shuffling vibrated. It was a crawlway. The larger rats became more numerous – and bolder. They remained stubbornly in his path until he nudged them with his toe. They wouldn’t be too tasty. The sweet stink of the nests hit him. Moist and dripping, the huge cool sphere of the membrane filters loomed ahead. The city’s sweat condensed and trickled down the sphere’s outer shell – providing drops of drinking water for the rodents. The struts beneath the filter were packed with dark little nests – short tunnels dug into the stringy dust. The hum of the membrane pumps tickled his feet as he approached.

  He hissed nitrogen into his bag and pulled on the heavy ratting glove. Selecting a large nest, he thrust in his hand. Expecting mother-with-food, the soft young rats swarmed onto the glove. He pulled out three handfulls and squeezed them through the sphincter of the anoxic bag. Their squirming and squeaking ceased.

  He worked his way down the moist struts filling the bag. Feeling something heavy on his boot he looked down to see a bold rat gnawing on his sole. He kicked it away. Soon the bag weighed half as much as he did.

  He sat down to rest and brushed the larger gobs of dust from his helmet.

  ‘Is there an access hatch to a crawlway on this level?’

  ‘Behind you – fifty-three yards.’

  The pasty-faced citizens glanced up and got speckled with soot as the hatch moved. A cloud of black feathery particles billowed ahead of him as he dropped into the crawlway. Balancing the lumpy bag on his shoulders he tracked black footprints downspiral to the Watcher’s quarters to pay his tithe.

  The Watcher, a melon-headed neut, patted his pudgy hands together and grinned at the size of the catch. He went to the press and pulled open its heavy door.

  ‘Six hundred degrees before press – and three hundred after?’ asked Watcher.

  Val nodded through his soiled helmet. The Watcher motioned for him to use the public refresher while the meats were processed. Val grumbled at the class thirteen’s slowness in getting the water up to temperature. Then he waded through, rinsed his gear, and took a new issue tissue garment from the dispenser. Sounds of pop frying and smells of scorched fur filled the room while he dressed.

  The press fell with a loud thump that shook the cubicle. Odors of a high protein bake brought out the Watcher’s family-7. Val studied the assortment of polarized females – all ages and sizes. They wore their vented, meld robes with belted waists.

  ‘Calories for the meld tonite,’ said Watcher, clapping his hands loudly and shooing them back into the living quarters. ‘Flavored calories.’

  The press lifted. Steam rose. Val began scooping the nutmeg-colored wafers into his bag. He paused to blow on a hot finger. Watcher used a long-handled spatula to pile his tithe on an ornamental meld platter.

  ‘Care to share our evening meld, brother?’ asked the Watcher.

  Val declined. All that mucous membrane took the edge off his appetite. As he left he heard the wet, smacking sounds of their evening meld/meal. Pressed rat was quite a delicacy. Flavors were good for the soul in the meld.

  Leaving his ratting gear in his quarters he took the pressed rat down to Walter’s. Female Bitter met him at the door and began to fondle the heavy bag of protein. He frowned her away.

  ‘Where’s Walter?’

  ‘Dabbing,’ she said, nodding toward the fat old man’s private cubicle. Val glanced around the spacious thirty-foot living room . . . advantages of a family-5.

  Fat Walter beamed as he waved Val into his little dirty ten-foot cubicle. An in
ch of dry soil covered the floor. In one corner stood a simple clay pot with a clump of thick crabgrass. Adobe bricks were stacked against one wall like hoarded gold.

  ‘You’re a Dabber?’ asked Val.

  Walter nodded, smiling. He wore sandals on his dusty feet. His tunic was so matted and brown Val was sure it must be stored, folded, under the clay pot when not being worn.

  ‘Dirt, adobe and bamboo – DAB,’ said Walter. He offered Val a seat in the room’s only chair – woven bamboo. It creaked as it accepted his weight.

  ‘You are just in time for the ceremony,’ wheezed Walter, taking off his sandals.

  ‘Ceremony?’

  ‘The Changing of the Dirt,’ said Walter, sweeping the dry dirt into a bamboo scoop. When the floor looked reasonably clean he wiped his hands on his tunic and reverently tipped over the big clay pot. Gobs of sticky black earth rolled out. He spread it around with his toes.

  ‘Purified dirt,’ he said, picking up two earthworms and a sow bug. The clump of crabgrass was moistened and examined carefully. Other bugs and worms could be seen crawling and squirming about the tangle of roots. Walter smiled, dumped the old dry dirt in the pot, moistened it and replaced the sod.

  ‘Want to walk in my dirt?’ invited Walter. ‘Protect you from IA. The old house dust mite can’t get you as long as you are surrounded by Nature’s bags and worms.’

  Val smiled weakly. ‘No. No. I just came over to leave you some pressed rat. It was a good Hunt.’

  Walter patted the bag-o-rat and became serious. ‘Really Val, you ought to try DAB. You’ve been pretty tense lately. Nothing gets rid of the old anxiety quicker than a bucket of mud.’

  Val held up a hand cynically. ‘The occult doesn’t move me.’

  Walter watched his little sod creatures for a moment.

  ‘When they flourish I know everything is all right in my cubicle. Did you know that one of my Dabber brothers detected a radiation leak near his cubicle after his dirt creatures failed to reproduce? And there was a case of heavy metal residue on level nineteen. Soil organisms can be a good index of—’

  Val laughed, ‘But what about the food you eat? The air you breathe? The water? You are in contact with so much of the hive – this cubicle is just an insignificant part of your . . .’

  ‘At least I know one place where I’m safe.’

  Val silently offered old Walter a protein wafer. He popped it into his mouth and chewed carefully around the stiff mesh of bone, skin and tail.

  ‘The most important thing . . .’ continued Walter, ‘DAB protects you from is suicide. That is the number one killer. Inappropriate Activity – old IA. Without DAB your ectodermal debris sensitizes you. All your skin scales, hair and skin oils get into the house dust and feed the mite, Dermatophagoides. The mite acquires ectodermal protein antigens. As you live with the mite and breath in dust – mite fragments – you build up antibodies against them. Antibodies against your own ectodermal antigens. When the titre gets high enough the antibody cross reacts with your own neuroectoderm – your brain. Hence the logarithmic correlation between crowding and IA. Between house dust sensitivity and suicide. Humans who nest with rugs, drapes and stuffed furniture have the highest suicide rate. Humans who live with dirt, adobe and bamboo have the lowest.’ Walter moved the tasty mesh around in his mouth savoring the salty fluids, tangy viscera and iron-rich rusty muscle and blood. Forming the residue into a ball he spat it into the crabgrass.

  ‘A treat for my little soil friends,’ he said.

  Bitter stuck her head in the door.

  ‘Meld time,’ she smiled. Her body glowed from her long hot soak in the refresher. Even her finger nails had softened. Her vented robe hung in loose folds without its belt. Umbilicus and areola peeked out.

  ‘Join us,’ invited Walter, nodding with three chins.

  Val started to shake his head – no.

  Bitter hooked her hand under his arm and pressed him with a bony knee. ‘Certainly you’ll stay. You brought the pressed rat. We’ll sauce up the wafers and pour a little liqueur – might even pass around a little Molecular Reward. It will be a real warm meld.’

  Walter took his other arm and the two of them swept a protesting Val into their living room. Neutral Arthur, nude sans genitals, was busy setting up ornate platters and tall goblets. The soft meld pad was unrolled on the floor beside the eating utensils. Jo Jo, young, thin and preoccupied, studied a small amount of sweet aromatic liquid in his glass. Busch, a slightly older, more rough-mannered male, stood against a wall. Val hadn’t noticed Arthur’s neutral body, but when old fat Walter began to struggle out of his muddy tunic his redundant folds of flesh were impossible to ignore. Although Walter was a polarized male, it was impossible to tell; for a fatty apron of meat hung from his belly to his knees – the panniculus. He looked more like an unfinished clay statue than a human.

  ‘Walter, you should never take off your clothes,’ said Val insultingly.

  ‘Just relaxing,’ shrugged Walter. ‘Good for the soul.’ He plopped down on the floor and pulled his feet up under his panniculus.

  Female Bitter laid out the first course – watery soup. She stood back and slipped out of her robe. She was slim. Her puberty-plusnine years gave her one horizontal belly wrinkle and shrunk her breasts.

  ‘Do you think I should leave my clothes on too?’ she asked cloyingly.

  Val thought that another well-placed insult might get him out of what he considered to be a dull evening. ‘I’m afraid I’ve seen more attractive bodies on neuters.’

  Undaunted, she gave him a ritual hug: ‘Neuters aren’t capable of a sexual flush and myotonia.’

  Val frowned. ‘A nipple on a rib is still ugly.’

  Fat Walter smiled placidly and picked up his tunic.

  ‘If Val feels more comfortable dressed—’ he said pulling on the tent-like garment, ‘we can have a nice first-stage hand-holding meld.’

  The other four naked bodies were already thoroughly wrapped up in each other. Val frowned at Walter: ‘I guess I’ve just never seen five people in love before.’

  ‘Don’t apologize,’ said Walter, nudging the tangle of extremities with his toe, ‘you’re our guest. We’ll go at your speed.’

  Bitter gave the meld a parting squeeze and stood up. They pulled on their garments and seated themselves again.

  ‘Want to see heaven?’ asked Bitter, offering a dose of Molecular Reward.

  Val shook his head. MR made him nervous.

  ‘Don’t be afraid. We’ll watch you so you can’t go mushroom,’ she coaxed.

  ‘It isn’t that,’ he said. ‘I just don’t like visiting heaven on a round-trip ticket. Molecular heaven or not, I’d rather not try perfect happiness and have to come back here afterwards. This life would look too bleak by comparison.’

  ‘It’s not that big of a letdown,’ she said. ‘And you can always take another trip—’

  Val shook his head again.

  She started around the circle. Old Walter already had his hand up – shaking his head. Busch preferred his drink.

  Arthur waved her away: ‘Not right now. I have my dance to do – and don’t you take it, Bitter. I need you for a partner.’

  Jo Jo was silent, brooding. He accepted the MR and retired to a corner with his visions.

  Walter turned to Val questioning: ‘You aren’t afraid of MR, are you? It is perfectly safe. We use it all the time for hunters—’

  Val frowned at his senior from Hunter Control: ‘Maybe the hunters really need it. I’ve seen some pretty swollen muscles and dark smoky urine – rhabdomyolysis. I imagine that is very painful. Molecular Reward probably makes it easier on them. The only other place I see it used officially is on the elderly retired. You don’t see many of them around very long.’

  Walter protested.

  ‘MR can’t prolong life. Nothing can. All we can expect from Big ES is a happy life span of twenty-five or thirty years – MR helps bring that happiness. It is one of Big ES’s favorite rewards.’
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br />   Val studied his drink silently. An ounce of viscid red fluid coated the inside of the tall glass. The warmth of his hand raised aromatic vapor.

  Music leaped from the dispenser as neutral Arthur adjusted the sound. The screen flowed with dancing figures.

  ‘We are ready for our dance,’ announced Arthur formally. ‘Bitter—?’ he said, extending his hand to the seated female. She rose and went into his arms. They moved slowly, studying the screen – trying to match the motion of the figures. Val watched for a while, fascinated by their complete inability to match the throb of the base rhythm. Then he concentrated on eating and drinking. Busch fell asleep. The meld lasted well past his usual bedtime.

  ‘Might as well sleep here,’ offered Walter, handing Val a pile of issue tissue bedding.

  Val blinked sleepily and nodded. They helped Jo Jo into his cot and broke up the meld at three hundred hours.

  ‘Want to read from my ESbook before you turn in?’ asked Walter.

  Val was already asleep.

  Blue Bird studied his feather fingers and pink feet. The nest around him contained bright red feathers and fragments of white shell. The sun was warm. Pretty orange and purple flowers danced and flew by on wing-like petals. Mother Bird flew up to the edge of the nest and dropped a delicious chocolate grub into his beak. It tasted brown. A soft wind stirred the pink leaves. Mother called him out. He tried his wings and flew easily – soaring high. Mother led him higher among cottony vanilla clouds that tasted white as he flew through. Blue Bird was happy. When his mother returned to the nest he did not want to stop flying. She scolded. Her cries hurt. Pretty flowers turned ugly. Fragrances became stink. His blue wing-feathers curled up into grotesque bent fingers. Lost, he searched for his mother. She was gone. Below he saw his home nest. Struggling, he tried to return to its soft safety. He dove down toward it. Wind pressed his face, stirring his eyelashes. The nest rushed up to him – changing – slowly – into SHAFT BASE.