Flux Tales Of Human Futures Page 11

  interpret some of their facial expressions. As long as I had good words for America,

  I was all right.

  "Yes, Captain Kane Kanea, we and our ancestors have been here from the beginning."

  "Doesn't it get a little cramped?"

  "Not for American soldiers, Captain. For the right to life, liberty, and the

  pursuit of happiness we would sacrifice anything. " I didn't ask how much liberty

  and happiness-pursuing were possible in a hole in the rock. Our hero went on: "We

  fight on that millions may live, free, able to breathe the clean air of America

  unoppressed by the lashes of Communism."

  And then they broke into a few choice hymns about purple mountains and yellow

  waves with a rousing chorus of God blessing America. It all ended with a mighty

  shout: "Better dead than red." When it was over we asked them if we could sleep,

  since according to our ship's time it was well past bedding-down hour.

  They put us in a rather small room with three cots in it that were far too short

  for us. Didn't matter. We couldn't possibly be comfortable in our monkeysuits

  anyway.

  Harold wanted to talk in lingua deporto as soon as we were alone, but I managed to

  convince him without even using my monkeysuit's discipliner button that we didn't

  want them to think we were trying to keep any secrets. We all took it for granted

  that they were monitoring us.

  And so our conversation was the sort of conversation that one doesn't mind having

  overheard by a bunch of crazy patriots.

  Amauri: "I am amazed at their great love for America, persisting so many

  centuries." Translation: "What the hell got these guys so nuts about something as

  dead as the ancient U.S. empire?"

  Me: "Perhaps it is due to such unwavering loyalty to the flag, God, country, and

  liberty" (I admit I was laying it on thick, but better to be safe, etc.) "that they

  have been able to survive so long." Translation: "Maybe being crazy fanatics is all

  that's kept them alive in this hole."

  Harold: "I wonder how long we can stay in this bastion of democracy before we must

  reluctantly go back to our colony of the glorious American dream." Translation:

  "What are the odds they don't let us go? After all, they're so loony they might

  think we're spies or something."

  Vladimir: "I only hope we can learn from them. Their science is infinitely beyond

  anything we have hitherto developed with our poor resources." Translation: "We're

  not going anywhere until I have a chance to do my job and check out the local flora

  and fauna. Eight hundred years of recombining DNA has got to have something we can

  take back home to N£ncamais."

  And so the conversation went until we were sick of the flowers and perfume that

  kept dropping out of our mouths. Then we went to sleep.

  The next day was guided tour day, Russian attack day, and damn near good-bye to

  the crew of the good ship Pollywog.

  The guided tour kept us up hill and down dale for most of the morning. Vladimir

  was running the tricking computer from his monkeysuit. Mine was too busy analyzing

  the implications of all their comments while Amauri was absorbing the science and

  Harold was trying to figure out how to pick his nose with mittens on. Harold was

  along for the ride-- a weapons expert, just in case. Thank God.

  We began to be able to tell one little person from another. George Washington

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  Steiner was our usual guide. The big boss, who had talked to us through most of the

  history lesson the day before, was Andrew Jackson Wallichinsky. And the guy who led

  the singing was Richard Nixon Dixon. The computer told us those were names of

  beloved American presidents, with surnames added.

  And my monkeysuit's analysis also told us that the music leader was the real big

  boss, while Andy Jack Wallichinsky was merely the director of scientific research.

  Seems that the politicians ran the brains, instead of vice versa.

  Our guide, G.W. Steiner, was very proud of his assignment. He showed us

  everything. I mean, even with the monkeysuit keeping three-fourths of the gravity

  away from me, my feet were sore by lunchtime (a quick sip of recycled xixi and

  coc¢). And it was impressive. Again, I give it unto you in abbreviated form:

  Even though the installation was technically airtight, in fact the enemy viruses

  and bacteria could get in quite readily. It seems that early in the twenty-first

  century the Russians had stopped making any kind of radio broadcasts. (I know, that

  sounds like a non sequitur. Patience, patience.) At first the Americans in 004 had

  thought they had won. And then, suddenly, a new onslaught of another disease. At

  this time the 004 researchers had never been personally hit by any diseases-- the

  airtight system was working fine. But their commander at that time, Rodney Fletcher,

  had been very suspicious.

  "He thought it was a commie trick," said George Washington Steiner. I began to see

  the roots of superpatriotism in 004's history.

  So Rodney Fletcher set the scientists to working on strengthening the base

  personnel's antibody system. They plugged away at it for two weeks and came up with

  three new strains of bacteria that selectively devoured practically anything that

  wasn't supposed to be in the human body, just in time, too, because then that new

  disease hit. It wasn't stopped by the airtight system, because instead of being a

  virus, it was just two little amino acids and a molecule of lactose, put together

  just so. It fit right through the filters. It sailed right through the antibiotics.

  It entered right into the lungs of every man, woman, and child in 004. And if Rodney

  Fletcher hadn't been a paranoid, they all would have died. As it was, only about

  half lived.

  Those two amino acids and the lactose molecule had the ability to fit right into

  that spot on a human DNA and then make the DNA replicate that way. Just one little

  change-- and pretty soon nerves just stopped working.

  Those two amino acids and the lactose molecule system worked just well enough to

  slow down the disease's progress until a plug could be found that fit even better

  into that spot on the DNA, keeping the Russians' little devices out. (Can they be

  called viruses? Can they be called alive? I'll leave it to the godcallers and the

  philosophers to decide that.)

  Trouble was, the plugs also caused all the soldiers' babies to grow up to be very

  short with a propensity for having their teeth fall out and their eyes go blind at

  the age of thirty. G.W. Steiner was very proud of the fact that they had managed to

  correct for the eyes after four generations. He smiled and for the first time we

  really noticed that his teeth weren't like ours.

  "We make them out of certain bacteria that gets very hard when a particular virus

  is exposed to it. My own great-great-grandmother invented it," Steiner said. "We're

  always coming up with new and useful tools."

  I asked to see how they did this trick, which brings us full circle to what we saw

  on the guided tour that day. We saw the laboratories where eleven researchers were

  playing clever little games with DNA. I didn't understand any of it, but my

  mo
nkeysuit assured me that the computer was getting it all.

  We also saw the weapons delivery system. It was very clever. It consisted of

  setting a culture dish full of a particular nasty weapon in a little box, closing

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  the door to the box, and then pressing a button that opened another door to the box

  that led outside.

  "We let the wind take it from there," said Steiner. "We figure it takes about a

  year for a new weapon to reach Russia. But by then it's grown to a point that it's

  irresistible."

  I asked him what the bacteria lived on. He laughed. "Anything," he said. It turns

  out that their basic breeding stock is a bacterium that can photosynthesize and

  dissolve any form of iron, both at the same time. "Whatever else we change about a

  particular weapon, we don't change that," Steiner said. "Our weapons can travel

  anywhere without hosts. Quarantines don't do any good."

  Harold had an idea. I was proud of him. "If these little germs can dissolve steel,

  George, why the heU aren't they in here dissolving this whole installation? "

  Steiner looked like he had just been hoping we'd ask that question.

  "When we developed our basic breeder stock, we also developed a mold that inhibits

  the bacteria from reproducing and eating. The mold only grows on metal and the

  spores die if they're away from both mold and metal for more than

  one-seventy-seventh of a second. That means that the mold grows all the way around

  this installation-- and nowhere else. My fourteenth great-uncle William Westmoreland

  Hannamaker developed the mold."

  "Why," I asked, "do you keep mentioning your blood relationship to these

  inventors? Surely after eight hundred years here everybody's related?"

  I thought I was asking a simple question. But G.W. Steiner looked at me coldly and

  turned away, leading us to the next room.

  We found bacteria that processed other bacteria that processed still other

  bacteria that turned human excrement into very tasty, nutritious food. We took their

  word for the tasty. I know, we were still eating recycled us through the tubes in

  our suit. But at least we knew where ours had been.

  They had bacteria that without benefit of sunlight processed carbon dioxide and

  water back into oxygen and starch. So much for photosynthesis.

  And we got a list of what shelf after shelf of weapons could do to an unprepared

  human body. If somebody ever broke all those jars on N£ncamais or Pennsylvania or

  Kiev, everybody would simply disappear, completely devoured and incorporated into

  the life-systems of bacteria and viruses and trained amino-acid sets.

  No sooner did I think of that, than I said it. Only I didn't get any farther than

  the word Kiev.

  "Kiev? One of the colonies is named Kiev?"

  I shrugged. "There are only three planets colonized. Kiev, Pennsylvania, and

  N£ncamais."

  "Russian ancestry?"

  Oops, I thought. Oops is an all-purpose word standing for every bit of profanity,

  blasphemy, and pornographic and scatological exculpation I could think of.

  The guided tour ended right then.

  Back in our bedroom, we became aware that we had somehow dissolved our

  hospitality. After a while, Harold realized that it was my fault.

  "Captain, by damn, if you hadn't told them about Kiev we wouldn't be locked in

  here like this."

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  I agreed, hoping to pacify him, but he didn't calm down until I used the

  discipliner button in my monkeysuit.

  Then we consulted the computers.

  Mine reported that in all we had been told, two areas had been completely left

  out: While it was obvious that in the past the little people had done extensive work

  on human DNA, there had been no hint of any work going on in that field today. And

  though we had been told of all kinds of weapons that had been flung among the

  Russians on the other side of the world, there had been no hint of any kind of

  limited effect antipersonnel weapon here.

  "Oh," Harold said. "There's nothing to stop us from walking out of here anytime we

  can knock the door down. And I can knock the door down anytime I want to," he said,

  playing with the buttons on his monkeysuit. I urged him to wait until all the

  reports were done.

  Amauri informed us that he had gleaned enough information from their talk and his

  monkeyeyes that we could go home with the entire science of DNA recombination hidden

  away in our computer.

  And then Vladimir's suit played out a holomap of Post 004.

  The bright green, infinitesimally thin lines marked walls, doors, passages. We

  immediately recognized the corridors we had walked in throughout the morning,

  located the laboratories, found where we were imprisoned. And then we noticed a

  rather larger area in the middle of the holomap that seemed empty.

  "Did you see a room like that? " I asked. The others shook their heads. Vladimir

  asked the holomap if we had been in it. The suit answered in its whispery

  monkeyvoice: "No. I have only delineated the unpenetrated perimeter and noted

  apertures that perhaps give entry."

  "So they didn't let us in there, " Harold said. "I knew the bastards were hiding

  something."

  "And let's make a guess," I said. "That room either has something to do with

  antipersonnel weapons, or it has something to do with human DNA research."

  We sat and pondered the revelations we had just had, and realized they didn't add

  up to much. Finally Vladimir spoke up. Trust a half-bunny to come up with the idea

  where three browns couldn't. just goes to show you that a racial theory is a bunch

  of waggywoggle.

  "Antipersonnel hell," Vladimir said. "They don't need antipersonnel. All they have

  to do is open a little hole in our suits and let the germs come through."

  "Our suits close immediately," Amauri said, but then corrected himself. "I guess

  it doesn't take long for a virus to get through, does it?"

  Harold didn't get it. "Let one of those bunnies try to lay a knife on me, and I'll

  split him from ass to armpit."

  We ignored him.

  "What makes you think there are germs in here? Our suits don't measure that," I

  pointed out.

  Vladimir had already thought of that. "Remember what they said. About the Russians

  getting those little amino-acid monsters in here."

  Amauri snorted. "Russians."

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  "Yeah, right," Vladimir said, "but keep the voice down, viado."

  Amauri turned red, started to say, "Quem ‚ que cˆ chama de viado!" --but I pushed

  the discipliner button. No time for any of that crap.

  "Watch your language, Vladimir. We got enough problems."

  "Sorry, Amauri, Captain," Vladimir said. "I'm a little wispy, you know?"

  "So's everybody."

  Vladimir took a breath and went on. "Once those bugs got in here, 004 must have

  been pretty thoroughly permeable. The, uh, Russians must've kept pumping more

  variations on the same into Post 004."

  "So why aren't they all dead?"

  "What I think is that a lot of these people have been k
illed-- but the survivors

  are ones whose bodies took readily to those plugs they came up with. The plugs are

  regular parts of their body chemistry now. They'd have to be, wouldn't they? They

  told us they were passed on in the DNA transmitted to the next generation."

  I got it. So did Amauri, who said, "So they've had seven or eight centuries to

  select for adaptability."

  "Why not?" Vladimir asked. "Didn't you notice? Eleven researchers on developing

  new weapons. And only two on developing new defenses. They can't be too worried."

  Amauri shook his head. "Oh, Mother Earth. Whatever got into you?"

  "Just caught a cold," Vladimir said, and then laughed. "A virus. Called humanity."

  We sat around looking at the holomap for a while. I found four different routes

  from where we were to the secret area-- if we wanted to get there. I also found

  three routes to the exit. I pointed them out to the others.

  "Yeah," Harold said. "Trouble is, who knows if those doors really lead into that

  unknown area? I mean, what the hell, three of the four doors might lead to the broom

  closets or service station."

  A good point.

  We just sat there, wondering whether we should head for the Pollywog or try to

  find out what was in the hidden area, when the Russian attack made up our minds for

  us. There was a tremendous bang. The floor shook, as if some immense dog had just

  picked up Post 004 and given it a good shaking. When it stopped the lights flickered

  and went out.

  "Golden opportunity," I said into the monkeymouth. The others agreed. So we

  flashed on the lights from our suits and pointed them at the door. Harold suddenly

  felt very important. He went to the door and ran his magic flipper finger all the

  way around the door. Then he stepped back and flicked a lever on his suit.

  "Better turn your backs," he said. "This can flash pretty bright."

  Even looking at the back wall the explosion blinded me for a few seconds. The

  world looked a little green when I turned around. The door was in shreds on the

  floor, and the doorjamb didn't look too healthy.

  "Nice job, Harold," I said.

  "Gra€as a deus," he answered, and I had to laugh. Odd how little religious phrases

  refused to die, even with an irreverent filho de punta like Harold.

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