Launch Pad (25 page)

“I doubt Anno Domini encourages invention,” I said.

“Worse! Where shall we eat dinner?”

We took a Domino cab uptown to the Central Park Casino, to where Glenn Miller and his band were providing the dinner music. The music must have soothed Diana, since we got through the rib roast and into the crepes suzette before the sociology seminar continued.

“What about people like Glenn Miller here—or Shakespere—who were real people in history? Are they actors?”

“No, they’re mindplants. Each of them has the personality and ability of the character he becomes, to the best of our ability to re-create it.”

Diana sat silent for a minute, considering, her mouth puckered into a tight line and her eyebrows pulled down in concentration. She stared at her spoon. Then she picked it up and waved it at me. “That’s disgusting. You don’t merely cheat them out of the future—you cheat them out of their very lives.”

It was my turn to be silent. I was silent through String of Pearls and Goldberg’s Blues. Diana watched me as though expecting momently to see wisdom fall from my lips, or possibly smoke rise from my ears. I found myself uncomfortably defending policies I had never really thought about before. I tried to think it out, but was distracted by Diana’s stare. I felt that I had to look as if I were thinking and it’s very hard to work at looking the part and think at the same time.

“I would say it’s more productive rather than less,” I said when I had the idea sorted out. “You know our Shakespere has added several plays to the list that the original never got around to writing. Saint Joan and Loves Labours Won, and Elizabeth the First and, I think, Timon of Athens—those are his. We haven’t cheated him. Both he and humanity have benefited from this arrangement.”

“It’s not an arrangement,” Diana stated positively. “It’s a manipulation. It takes two to make an arrangement. Let’s dance.”

O O O

There is something deeply satisfying about two bodies pressed together and moving together. The waltz and the foxtrot are more purely sexual than either the stately minuet before them or the frenzied hump after. We glided about the floor, letting our bodies work at becoming one.

“Christopher,” Diana said.

“Hm?”

“I’m glad we’ve become friends.”

“More than friends!”

“That, too,” she said, squeezing against me. “But friends is something else. I think you’re my only friend.”

“I hope you exaggerate,” I said. “That’s very sad.”

We danced silently for a moment. Then Diana stopped and pulled me back to our table. We sat down. “This is a major thing, isn’t it?”

“Friendship?”

“No. Anno Domini and this whole re-creation. How many different historical times are there?”

“You’re so beautiful and so serious and so young,” I said. “And so intent—and so knowledgeable in some fields and so ignorant in others. Whoever brought you up had strange educational values.”

“I told you I don’t like talking about that,” she said. Her expression could best be described as petulant.

“It requires no conversation,” I told her. “Fifty.”

“Fifty historical periods?” she said, instantly picking up the thread. One of the things I admired, that ability. “But there aren’t that many centuries!”

“Many are covered with more than one set. The really popular ones are started every twenty-five years. All have one, at least. There may be some centuries that appeal not at all to you, but someone has a need for them.”

“What sort of need? Why that word?”

“Ah! Now we speak of purpose: what you asked me before. The past is Earth’s only industry. Its function is to hold together the more than two hundred diverse human cultures, spread out on close to a thousand planets, circling as many suns. Tens of thousands of people from all these planets, all these new directions for humankind, are here at any one time, sharing the one thing they all have in common: the past.

“This maintains Earth’s preeminence in the councils of man and presumably bolsters her prominence in the Parliament of Stars. But more important: it provides a living point of origin for the human race.

“The psychologists decided over four hundred years ago, at the time of the Mabden Annihilation, that this was the best—perhaps the only—way to hold us together. Those of us who weren’t already too far out. There are external threats still, you know.”

“I know,” Diana said dryly. “You mentioned the fear syndrome earlier in this connection.”

“It should be taken seriously,” I insisted. “Here on Earth you feel secure, but it’s only because you’re so far away from the action. The Denzii—”

“I take it very seriously,” Diana assured me. “So seriously that I’d prefer not to talk about it even now.”

“Yes. I didn’t mean to frighten you.”

“Frighten?” Diana smiled gently. “No, you don’t do that. Tell me, what else is there to do in this year, in this town?”

We took the subway to the Battery and walked quietly on the grass around the Aquarium, which was closed and shuttered for the night. Then we took the ferry over to Staten Island and stood in the open on the top deck, letting the cold brinewind flap our coats and sting our cheeks. We waved to the Statue of Liberty and she smiled at us—or perhaps it was a trick of the light. I had my coat wrapped around Diana and she huddled against my chest and I felt young and bold and ready to explore uncharted worlds. We talked of minor things and we shared a cup of coffee, black and four sugars, and I think, perhaps, realized fully that we were in love. The next day we went to the Bronx Zoo in the morning, came back to Manhattan in early afternoon for a matinee of Our Town and then returned to the hotel to dress. A man was waiting in the sitting room of our suite. He was standing.

“Why, Kroner,” Diana said, “how delightful to see you. And how silly you look in those clothes here.” Thus she effectively suppressed the Who are you and what are you doing in my room? that I had been about to contribute to the occasion. Kroner was a short man with too much hair on his head. He wore a onesuit that squeezed around his stocky, overly muscled body. The weightlifter is a physical type I have always disliked. I didn’t recognize the Identification and Position badge he wore, except that it was medium-high status and something to do with education.

“Who is he?”

“Kroner,” Diana said. “My professor—or one of. And this is Christopher Mar.” “Delighted.” clearly he lied.

“Surprised,” I said. We touched hands. “To what do we owe this visit and what may we do for you? Any professor of Diana’s—” I waved a hand vaguely. The current trend toward the vague can be very useful in conversation.

“I suppose you know what you’re doing?” Kroner asked coldly.

“I have no idea of what that means,” I told him. “At which of us are you sneering?”

“Both of you, I suppose,” Kroner said. He sighed and sat down on the sofa. “You’re right, I was being hostile. And there’s no reason. You’re a very important man, Senior Senator Mar—there’s no way I can threaten you. And Grecia knows I’m only interested in protecting and helping her. When she disappeared from Seventeen without notifying us—”

“Who?” I interrupted.

“Grecia. Your companion.”

“Is that right?” I asked Diana (Grecia). She nodded.

“Of course you have a perfect right—”

“What does she call herself?” Kroner asked.

“Diana Seven,” I said.

Diana (Grecia) looked defiantly down at Kroner and remained silent.

Kroner nodded thoughtfully. “Of course,” he said. “A clear choice. Then he doesn’t know? You haven’t told him?”

“No,” Diana (Grecia) said. “Why should I?”

“Of course,” Kroner repeated. “From your point of view, no reason. You’ve always been the most stubborn and independent-minded. No matter how much we strive for uniformity. Not that we mind, you understand—it’s just that the variations make the training more difficult to program. I suppose it will make you harder to predict in action, so it’s all for the best.”

“Haven’t told me what?” I demanded. I tried to picture some horrible secret, but nothing would come to mind.

“Diana Seven is not a name,” Kroner told me, “it’s a designation. Choosing it as her alias is the sort of direct thinking we’ve come to expect from Grecia.”

“It’s a comment,” Diana (Grecia) said.

“Grecia is number seven in an official government program known as Project Diana,” Kroner said. “The number is arbitrary.”

“So is the name,” Diana (Grecia) said. “You know how I was named? Listen, I’ll recite the names of the first seven girls, in order—that should give you the idea: Adena, Beth, Claudia, Debra, Erdra, Fidelia, Grecia. It goes on like that. I prefer Diana Seven, it’s more honest.”

“Diana Seven you are to me forever,” I told her. “I don’t understand, though. What sort of government project?”

“This is going to sound silly,” Kroner said, managing to look apologetic, “but I don’t think you have the need to know.”

“I might not have the—but I do indeed need to know very badly, and I can develop the official Need to Know in a very few minutes realtime.”

“I will tell everything,” Diana said, sitting down on a straight-back chair and crossing her shapely legs. “What do you push to get them to bring up drinks?”

“I’ll do it,” I said, picking up the housephone and dialing. “What would you like?”

“Coffee,” Diana said.

“Another profession,” Kroner said. “I guess you’re right—we’d better talk about it.”

“Something harder than coffee for you,” I said, and ordered a pot of coffee and a portable bar sent up.

“Grecia—”

“Call her Diana—she prefers it.”

Kroner shrugged. He was not very happy. “Diana is a GAM. Project Diana is one of a series of GAM projects that Future is funding.”

GAM = Genetically Altered Man. GAMs were in disfavor now, at least on Earth, as it was felt that no alteration of the zygote could make up for a happy home life, or some such illogic.

“I thought the Bureau of the Future was only involved in long-range planning of city growth and transportation and that sort of thing,” I said.

“And defense,” Kroner told me. “Diana is a defense project.”

That stopped me. I went into the bedroom to take off my tie and think of something clever to ask.

“What do you mean, ‘a defense project’?” I cleverly asked when I returned. The bar was ported in then, so I had to wait for my answer. The waiter tried hard to preserve his air of waiterly detachment and not stare at Kroner, and even harder not to smile.

Kroner glared at him and stood up, flexing his biceps under the skintight onesuit. “What’s the matter?” he demanded. “What are you staring at? Haven’t you ever seen a Frog Prince before?”

The waiter merely gulped and fled the room. We all burst out laughing and I remembered that in my youth one of my closest friends had been a weightlifter. “You really should have dressed for the period,” I told Kroner.

He shrugged. “I was wearing a period overcoat,” he said, gesturing to a crumpled garment lying over a chair.

I fixed our various drinks and we sipped them and stared at each other. “We’ve been keeping an eye on the girls while they were on their travels,” Kroner said. “When Diana took off with you we got worried. Diana has a certain reputation among the staff as a trouble-maker and you are a prominent senator. The combination could be explosive.”

“How?” I asked.

“The projects are played down,” Kroner said. “For us, any press is bad. We’d be caught between two fires; those who are afraid of any GAM projects—the ‘The only good superman is a dead superman’ group—and those who would feel sorry for Diana and her sisters—poor little girls deprived of a home life and mother love and apple pie.”

“It might have been nice, you know, all that stuff,” Diana said, a surface anger in her voice covering some deeper emotion. “Why do people decide they have the right to do what’s good for other people?”

“What?” I asked, feeling ignorant and ignored.

“We didn’t exactly do it because it was good for you,” Kroner said sadly. “We did it because it was necessary for us. We never lied to you about that.”

“Great ethics,” Diana said in a low, clipped voice that had an undertone of controlled scream. “We screwed up your life from before you were born, but at least we didn’t lie to you—and that makes it all all right.” She turned to me. “Did you know I’m a mule?” she demanded.

“What?”

“A mule. Or perhaps a hinny. Except instead of a cross between a jackass and a mare, I’m a cross between a human gamete and a micro-manipulator. Sterile.”

“You mean you’re—”

“No pills, no inserts, no children—no chance. Just me. Dead end. Supermule.”

I went over to hold her, to show I understood, but she drew away. Mulelike, I couldn’t help thinking, in her anger. “I’m on your side, you know,” I said to her. She nodded, but stayed encased in herself.

I asked Kroner, “In what way is this girl a weapon?”

“Not a weapon,” Kroner said. “More like a soldier.”

“A hunting dog,” Diana said. Well, it was a better self-image than a mule.

Kroner nodded. “In a way. Superfast reflexes, for one thing. One of the reasons she’s small: information travels to the brain faster. Nerves react and transmit faster. Eyes see farther into the infrared and ultraviolet. Raw strength is of little use today. You know how old she is?”

I didn’t. “I’m not good at guessing age,” I said.

“Twelve,” Kroner said.

There was, I believe, a long pause then. “Do you mind?” Diana asked softly.

“I am surprised,” I said.

“The tendency in naturally evolved high intelligence is for longer childhoods, not shorter,” Kroner said. “You must experience more, cogitate more, and have more time to experiment—play—to develop a really high intelligence potential. But it is possible to mature a high intelligence very quickly in an extremely enriched environment. Twelve years from birth to adult is about the best we can manage. The body takes that long to grow and mature anyway, if we want a comparatively normal body.”

“Diana is an adult,” I said. “No matter how many times, or how few, the Earth has circled the sun since her birth.”

Kroner nodded. “Diana is a highly capable adult, able to handle herself well in almost any situation.”