O Master Caliban

by Phyllis Gotlieb

  “Even she thinks I am becoming too human.”

  Dahlgren smiled icily. “Twilight man. You cannot eat, sleep, breathe, secrete, excrete, copulate. Your hair does not grow, you cannot spit, shiver or weep. And you are too human for ergs.”

  “I have discovered, Dahlgren, that I can feel. I wish to maintain my being, and the threat to it induces what I call fear, I find I have wishes and wants. I want to live, and also I want to know. There are things that I do not want, and one is for you to ridicule my small claims.”

  Dahlgren said in a quiet voice, “Believe me, I take you seriously. You are certainly less arrogant than I, and that may make you even more human.”

  “Perhaps you are claiming more arrogance than you have right now.”

  “At any rate, it appears that we share pride and fear.”

  Erg-Dahlgren cocked his head in the odd gesture that made him seem to be listening, and moved 14. P-KR3, taking the pressure off his Bishop and applying it to Dahlgren’s. “As a theoretical question, what would you be willing to barter for even a small factor of aid or safety to the boy, the ape, the goat, and the five children?”

  Dahlgren’s heart went at it again, and the air around him seemed to go very thin. He pushed words out, “In a day or two I will begin to rot and you to be reconditioned. I think neither of us has any counters to trade,”

  “Please try to be calm or it will be much sooner. Mod Seven Seven Seven will be here in a few minutes.”

  Dahlgren took the White Knight with his threatened Bishop. He whispered, “What could I possibly have to give?”

  “Your sign-on to the computer.”

  “There’s nothing there for you to use—only a few fragments of notes ... I wiped most of it out before—before everything else was wiped out.”

  “I don’t want to take anything out, Dahlgren. I want to put something in.”

  “Information? Something to hide from—”

  “One of those children has psi—a mechano-sensitive. He has no other talent except for machines.”

  “How do you know?”

  “We linked up by chance and are in communication. We cannot help it. I don’t know how to shield and he is a frightened child without much experience at it. I can block by looping on another subject, but not for long, because she is suspicious.”

  “She made you to obey her,” said Dahlgren. “If you do that I don’t think you will be destroyed.”

  “Now you are testing me. It is you who are taking risks.”

  “I must do that.”

  “Probably I was made too well. I have found she is not to be trusted, and I don’t wish to be broken at her whim.” The lucite casters hummed at the end of the corridor.

  “If she knew about this—this sensitivity—she would know everything they might do to try to defend themselves, and—”

  “They would have no chance at all,” erg-Dahlgren said.

  Erg-Queen swept into the room. WHY SO MUCH COGITATION ON CHESS? WHY SO MUCH DELIBERATE SPEED? YOU ARE NOT PLAYING AN INTERPLANETARY GAME. EVEN THE SAINTED ZNOSKO-BOROVSKY WOULD AGREE THAT THERE IS ULTIMATELY AN ENTRY INTO THE END GAME. She extended a steel claw over erg-Dahlgren’s shoulder to grasp White Queen and 15. take Dahlgren’s Bishop. She placed the mitered trilobite in front of Dahlgren at the table’s edge.

  “That is true,” said erg-Dahlgren mildly. “Still it should be ‘deliberate and at the free will of the player who has the advantage ...’ ”

  He locked eyes with Dahlgren, who pulled his Knight back to N2.

  MAKE SURE THAT YOU KEEP IT, said erg-Queen, and vanished.

  “ ‘Not merely a fortuitous happening or a disagreeable surprise,’ ” erg-Dahlgren finished. He folded his hands and waited for Dahlgren’s decision.

  * * *

  The molds had stopped spreading over the walls once the dehumidifiers were working again, but though the ergs had washed everything down there were still brown stains around the cracks where strange bits of underground life had seeped in. Dahlgren stared at the cracks. There were no windows, and the light in his room was always yellow and sick.

  “You have no proof,” he said.

  Erg-Dahlgren, sitting on the other bed, said, “I cannot reach him at will long enough to gather information in an organized manner—and if I could it would be too dangerous, I can tell you this: the being is named Shirvanian, he is a Solthree child aged ten years—”

  “That is a dangerous being to be playing around with.”

  “He has the ability, and the others must trust him. He has saved them from death at least once. Mod Seven Seven Seven sent out a mechanical bird—a deformed shape to warn them from trying to reach you—”

  Dahlgren looked up. “And that—”

  “He restructured it and sent it back. You saw it, and how she broke it. Shirvanian’s anger opened his communication to me. I hate her, she broke my bird. I don’t quite understand why it happened, but I still don’t know men very well.”

  “You asked me if I hated her.”

  “I was asking myself as well. The answer told me how dangerous it was.”

  Dahlgren’s brow crinkled. “And you want to use the computer—”

  “To store my knowledge of Shirvanian,”

  “To wipe your memory? And then you would be my old enemy.”

  “No. I would still have a distrust of Mod Seven Seven Seven and a determination not to be destroyed. My memory is too complicated to be wiped completely, and I think I am capable of storing that much so she could not reach it. Of course she distrusts me already. I have some connection with the computer, but only for chess information and some data about you, I have no private store, and I have not been allowed anything else. Your store would operate for me in a way analogous to your unconscious; you could put a protect on the information, and if you wished you might restore my access with a code word.”

  “You trust me with all this?”

  “I have trusted you too far for the last hour. If I broke my loop on The Middle Game in Chess I would be a heap of components in ten minutes.”

  Then why not let him? But erg-Queen would find out all he knows first, and perhaps link up with that child in the forest—if it is the truth and not some game in a nightmare. A game at least more interesting than the one on the board.

  Erg-Dahlgren said, “I know you do not trust me any more than she does.”

  “I trust you a great deal more than I do her,” said Dahlgren. “I’ll tell you, it is not simply a case of giving you my code. My store has probably been inactivated by now. You are only allowed on the machine to ask questions about chess—”

  “And about you, but she has told me to stay away from it. And my only other connection with the machine is that it stores the information I receive from your electrochemical system.”

  “Probably she has told the machine not to answer any more of your questions. You have no access so you cannot store. I cannot use my code—”

  “But, Dahlgren—”

  “Do you know Mod Seven Seven Seven’s call signal?”

  “No.”

  “Then there are two problems. To find her call signal and reach the machine. Are there life sensors attached to the computer?”

  “No. There was no need.”

  “Then it will not know the difference between her and me, if I reach it, and if I have her signal.”

  “Dahlgren, that is very bold.”

  “A bold thought is different from a bold act. What is your identification on the computer?”

  “Most of the time just my appellation, Mod Dahlgren One. Occasionally it requests a further key, which is MODAL 1.”

  “Is the Shirvanian child truly intelligent?”

  “He thinks of himself as a genius, whatever that may be.”

  “Ask the genius to pick up erg-Queen’s call signal. If he kn
ew she broke the bird he must have some connection with her.”

  “He is so terrified of her he may become very unstable if he is obliged to contact her. And she may pick him up.”

  “That is your problem, and his. I know how to use a computer, but I don’t know how to tamper with one.”

  “If that is the only way—”

  “It is. But you must approach your Shirvanian very gently, because you will need to ask him how to create a diversion.”

  “I am not sure that I can reach him.”

  “Mod Dahlgren, I believe that with your urgency, you will.”

  * * *

  As he took the first step on the blue brick road Shirvanian screamed “No!” and fainted.

  “Shirvanian!” Esther and Ardagh were beside him, grabbing him under the arms. “The bakri, he must have relapsed!” He fought them, swinging his head from side to side.

  “No, he’s still cool.”

  Shirvanian ground between his teeth, “It’s her name! Her name! Leave me alone! I’ll do—” His eyes opened. He looked at Esther and Ardagh. “I hate them all! I wish—I wish I’d never—”

  “What? What is it?”

  “I wish I’d never touched that bird.”

  * * *

  “He said, ‘It’s her name.’ That’s all.”

  “Her name ...”

  “If I go near him again I’ll make him ill.”

  “Mod Seven Seven Seven?”

  “I suppose so.”

  “That sounds too good to be true.”

  “That is what he said, her name, and I don’t dare contact him again or I will do him some injury.”

  Dahlgren sighed. “But we still need a diver—”

  Thunder rolled in a distant area. Treads shrieked, metal clanged. “What’s—”

  “One moment.” Erg-Dahlgren left the room and came back in a few moments. “A servo has gone out of control, a three-two-one.”

  “That’s a fair size.”

  “Yes, it’s making a lot of noise and confusion.”

  “Did he do that?”

  “It has never happened here before.” He opened the door; Dahlgren waited beside him. A hum approached them.

  “White will sometimes make a series of exchanges in order to bring about the end game,” said Dahlgren.

  “True,” said erg-Dahlgren.

  Two or three small servos, the size and shape of pug dogs, clustered around them. They clicked and tutted. They were used for chassis repair, and their fine multiple arms terminated in tiny screwdrivers, socket wrenches, soldering irons and pliers. Where are you going?

  To play chess.

  Do not do that. That is dangerous. A three-two-one is out of order in the tread-repair chamber. Stay away.

  Certainly.

  “I presume they say we are naughty,” said Dahlgren. “And I suppose they will tell Mother.”

  “Hurry!”

  The door, to the computer hall was open. Erg-Dahlgren half-closed it and turned on the dim light over the main console. “It is too bad we need light. The door is never closed here.”

  “Too bad we’re not somewhere else altogether.” Dahlgren stood before the console he had not approached for nine years. He breathed deeply and pushed a button.

  WHO IS COMMUNICATING?

  EDVALG.

  THAT IS NOT AN IDENTIFICATION. THE STORE DESIGNATED EDVALG HAS BEEN INACTIVATED. IDENTIFY YOURSELF PROPERLY.

  “Now you know my code doesn’t work any longer,” said Dahlgren.

  “Don’t play, Dahlgren! We will have them on us very soon!”

  COMMUNICATOR: MOD SEVEN SEVEN SEVEN.

  THAT IS NOT AN AUTHORIZATION CODE. IDENTIFY.

  Dahlgren’s heart clenched and he coughed. “How do you like that?”

  “He said, her name. Try the numerals.”

  COMMUNICATOR: MOD 777.

  THAT IS NOT AN AUTH—

  Dahlgren slammed off. “Now what?”

  “I don’t know what, he said her name, there must be some, it—”

  “For the Lord’s sake, don’t malfunction! It’s bad for my heart.” He spent a minute, considering. “Are you sure that Mod Seven Seven Seven is her name?”

  “It is what she is called.”

  “But she cannot be the seven hundred and seventy-seventh model of her type if the ergs made her on the specs of one or two scaled-down exemplars my techs designed.”

  “I see what you mean. She is called Seven Seven Seven because, not including the big drones operating outside, she is at the head of over seven hundred servos: skimmers, thresh—”

  “You wanted to hurry!”

  “That’s her cognomen. Her nomen, or genus, is Creator Matrix One.”

  “Ha.” COMMUNICATOR: CREATOR MATRIX 1.

  WHAT IS YOUR REQUEST?

  Dahlgren let out his breath. “Now you get out of here. Order a good meal for me, and take your time.”

  The erg hesitated for a moment, and left.

  “But don’t expect me to eat it,” Dahlgren muttered.

  He wished for a chair, for the moment, because he expected discomfort shortly.

  ACTIVATE EDVALG.

  EDVALG IS ACTIVATED. WHAT IS YOUR REQUEST, CREATRIX?

  Creatrix indeed. ADD SVENSSEN. ERASE EDVALG. THIS STORE IS NOW DESIGNATED SVENSSEN.

  SVENSSEN INSERTED. ERASURE: EDVALG

  INSERT KEY: EDVARD DAHLGREN SON OF SVEN ADOLPHUS DAHLGREN.

  INSERTED.

  IF THIS CODE: SVENSSEN, IS USED HEREAFTER AT ANY TIME BY ANY MACHINE OR PERSONAGE OF ANY ORDER, RANK OR NUMBER YOU ARE TO ... He paused to listen, and thought he heard a steadier and more purposive noise rising. IF THIS KEY: EDVARD DAHLGREN SON OF SVEN ADOLPHUS DAHLGREN IS USED HEREAFTER ... The metallic sounds came closer. Dahlgren went on adding locks, blocks and barriers. UNDER EITHER OR BOTH OF THESE CONDITIONS THIS STORE IS TO BE ERASED. He left himself a minute for the core statement.

  INSERT ALL MEMORY OF THE NAME SHIRVANIAN AND ALL REFERENCES TO AND ASSOCIATIONS WITH THE NAME AND BEING SHIRVANIAN NOW IN THE MEMORY STORE OF MOD DAHLGREN ONE INTO THE STORE: SVENSSEN.

  INSERTED.

  DEACTIVATE ALL MEMORY OF THE NAME SHIRVANIAN AND ALL REFERENCES TO AND ASSOCIATIONS WITH THE NAME AND BEING SHIRVANIAN IN THE MEMORY STORE OF MOD DAHLGREN ONE.

  DEACTIVATED.

  REACTIVATE THIS MATERIAL APPLYING TO THE NAME AND BEING SHIRVANIAN INTO THE STORE OF MOD DAHLGREN ONE ONLY UPON THE UTTERANCE BY THE MAN EDVARD DAHLGREN OF THE VOCABLE “SHIRVANIAN” IN THE HEARING OF MOD DAHLGREN ONE AND ON CONDITION THAT THE UTTERANCE OF THIS NAME “SHIRVANIAN” IS HEARD BY AND INSERTED INTO THE MEMORY STORE OF MOD DAHLGREN ONE. UPON THIS UTTERANCE AND UNDER THESE CONDITIONS ERASE THE STORE: SVENSSEN. VOICE IDENTIFICATION: He picked up the microphone and said, “Shirvanian.” Now I hope that is the correct spelling.

  He switched off at the moment the servos whined through the door, slamming it back so hard it re-bounded in its slide, and wrapped their cold tentacles around him.

  “YOU ALL RIGHT, Shirvanian?”

  “I guess so. I don’t want that thing coming after me again.”

  “Which thing?” Esther asked.

  “The Dahlgren. If he gets his memory wiped maybe he’ll leave me alone.”

  The boy looked sick and exhausted. He made her uneasy, and not him only. “I never thought there’d be a time when I missed the sound of those drones.”

  “That’s only because they’ve switched to flamethrowers.”

  Ardagh thought it was time to change the subject. “Did Dahlgren do a lot of work with apes, Esther?”

  “He was interested in genetic engineering and its influence on behavior, but he was a coordinator, not an intense specialist. Besides, all apes are expensive, and many are protected species, particularly gibbons. I on
ce heard him say he couldn’t bring himself to stuff an ape into a glass box measuring this much by that much with a tube stuck here and a tube stuck there and a lot of nuts and bolts in its skull to hold the electrodes in its brain. He saw too much of that as a student and it made him sick.”

  “How’d he get gibbons?”

  “That was a funny story. On the way out here somebody bound somewhere else smuggled them on board, intending to unload them at a stopover. Just one breeding pair. Dahlgren found out. Gibbon traffic is illegal; he took them away and told the fellow he’d blow the whistle if he didn’t keep his mouth shut. Not very pretty—but those were my parents, and I’d be the ape in the glass box.”

  “And that’s why he picked you, rather than, say, a chimp, for experimental purposes ...”

  Esther jumped to Yigal’s back. The trees were becoming so unpleasant-looking she did not want to swing in them. The leaves were narrow, the branches brittle, the bases had thickened like low palms and grew scales tipped with spines. “No, ma’am. He chose me for my beauty.”

  Ardagh smothered a laugh, and then examined Esther. With her economy of grace and strength, her fine features and vivid character, even with the odd-colored spots on her dark fur, she was certainly beautiful, especially against Yigal’s pure white hair.

  “I’m not joking,” Esther said. “Chimps look like caricatures of men, and their brains are nearly halfway there. Dahlgren’s a show-off. He wanted to start from less and not end up with something people would say was funny and cute. I’m sure as hell not cute.”

  “Neither is Topaze,” said Ardagh.

  Esther laughed. Of them all, Esther, who never failed to groom herself, and Yigal, whom she groomed, looked fit. The rest were ragged, dirty, scratched, reeking of adolescent sweat; Shirvanian drawn with strain, Koz the worst because of his scabbing and slowly healing welts.

  “Take it easy,” said Yigal. Sven was trying to pull him ahead.

  “I want to talk.”

  “What now?” Esther asked.