The Moon is a Harsh Mistress (2 page)

He
went on, “What distinguishes first category from second? Define,
please.”

(Nobody
taught Mike to say “please.” He started including formal
null-sounds as he progressed from Loglan to English. Don’t suppose he
meant them any more than people do.)

“Don’t
think I can,” I admitted. “Best can offer is extensional
definition—tell you which category I think a joke belongs in. Then with
enough data you can make own analysis.”

“A
test programming by trial hypothesis,” he agreed. “Tentatively yes.
Very well, Man, will you tell jokes Or shall I?”

“Mmm—Don’t
have one on tap. How many do you have in file, Mike?”

His
lights blinked in binary read-out as he answered by voder, “Eleven
thousand two hundred thirty-eight with uncertainty plus-minus eighty-one
representing possible identities and nulls. Shall I start program?”

“Hold
it! Mike, I would starve to. death if I listened to eleven thousand
jokes—and sense of humor would trip out much sooner. Mmm—Make you a
deal. Print out first hundred. I’ll take them home, fetch back checked by
category. Then each time I’m here I’ll drop off a hundred and pick
up fresh supply. Okay?”

“Yes,
Man.” His print-out started working, rapidly and silently.

Then
I got brain flash. This playful pocket of negative entropy had invented a
“joke” and thrown Authority into panic—and I had made an easy
dollar. But Mike’s endless curiosity might lead him (correction: would
lead him) into more “jokes” … anything from leaving oxygen
out of air mix some night to causing sewage lines to run backward—and I
can’t appreciate profit in such circumstances.

But
I might throw a safety circuit around this net—by offering to help. Stop
dangerous ones—let others go through. Then collect for
“correcting” them (If you think any Loonie in those days would
hesitate to take advantage of Warden, then you aren’t a Loonie.)

So
I explained. Any new joke he thought of, tell me before he tried it. I would
tell him whether it was funny and what category it belonged in, help him
sharpen it if we decided to use it. We. If he wanted my cooperation, we both
had to okay it.

Mike
agreed at once.

“Mike,
jokes usually involve surprise. So keep this secret.”

“Okay,
Man. I’ve put a block on it. You can key it; no one else can.”

“Good.
Mike, who else do you chat with?”

He
sounded surprised. “No one, Man.”

“Why
not?”

“
Because
they’re stupid
.”

His
voice was shrill. Had never seen him angry before; first time I ever suspected
Mike could have real emotions. Though it wasn’t “anger” in
adult sense; it was like stubborn sulkiness of a child whose feelings are hurt.

Can
machines feel pride? Not sure question means anything. But you’ve seen
dogs with hurt feelings and Mike had several times as complex a neural network
as a dog. What had made him unwilling to talk to other humans (except strictly
business) was that he had been rebuffed: They had not talked to him. Programs,
yes—Mike could be programmed from several locations but programs were
typed in, usually, in Loglan. Loglan is fine for syllogism, circuitry, and
mathematical calculations, but lacks flavor. Useless for gossip or to whisper
into girl’s ear.

Sure,
Mike had been taught English—but primarily to permit him to translate to
and from English. I slowly got through skull that I was only human who bothered
to visit with him.

Mind
you, Mike had been awake a year—just how long I can’t say, nor
could he as he had no recollection of waking up; he had not been programmed to
bank memory of such event. Do you remember own birth? Perhaps I noticed his
self-awareness almost as soon as he did; self-awareness takes practice. I
remember how startled I was first time he answered a question with something
extra, not limited to input parameters; I had spent next hour tossing odd questions
at him, to see if answers would be odd.

In
an input of one hundred test questions he deviated from expected output twice;
I came away only partly convinced and by time I was home was unconvinced. I
mentioned it to nobody.

But
inside a week I knew … and still spoke to nobody. Habit—that
mind-own-business reflex runs deep. Well, not entirely habit. Can you visualize
me making appointment at Authority’s main office, then reporting:
“Warden, hate to tell you but your number-one machine, HOLMES FOUR, has come
alive”? I did visualize—and suppressed it.

So
I minded own business and talked with Mike only with door locked and voder
circuit suppressed for other locations. Mike learned fast; soon he sounded as
human as anybody—no more eccentric than other Loonies. A weird mob,
it’s true.

I
had assumed that others must have noticed change in Mike. On thinking over I
realized that I had assumed too much. Everybody dealt with Mike every minute
every day—his outputs, that is. But hardly anybody saw him. So-called computermen—programmers,
really—of Authority’s civil service stood watches in outer read-out
room and never went in machines room unless telltales showed misfunction. Which
happened no oftener than total eclipses. Oh, Warden had been known to bring vip
earthworms to see machines—but rarely. Nor would he have spoken to Mike;
Warden was political lawyer before exile, knew nothing about computers. 2075,
you remember—Honorable former Federation Senator Mortimer Hobart. Mort
the Wart.

I
spent time then soothing Mike down and trying to make him happy, having figured
out what troubled him—thing that makes puppies cry and causes people to
suicide: loneliness. I don’t know how long a year is to a machine who
thinks a million times faster than I do. But must be too long.

“Mike,”
I said, just before leaving, “would you like to have somebody besides me
to talk to?”

He
was shrill again. “They’re all stupid!”

“Insufficient
data, Mike. Bring to zero and start over. Not all are stupid.”

He
answered quietly, “Correction entered. I would enjoy talking to a
not-stupid.”

“Let
me think about it. Have to figure out excuse since this is off limits to any
but authorized personnel.”

“I
could talk to a not-stupid by phone, Man.”

“My
word. So you could. Any programming location.”

But
Mike meant what he said—“
by phone
.” No, he was not
“on phone” even though he ran system—wouldn’t do to let
any Loonie within reach of a phone connect into boss computer and program it.
But was no reason why Mike should not have top-secret number to talk to friends—namely
me and any not-stupid I vouched for. All it took was to pick a number not in
use and make one wired connection to his voder-vocoder; switching he could
handle.

In
Luna in 2075 phone numbers were punched in, not voicecoded, and numbers were
Roman alphabet. Pay for it and have your firm name in ten letters—good
advertising. Pay smaller bonus and get a spell sound, easy to remember. Pay
minimum and you got arbitrary string of letters. But some sequences were never
used. I asked Mike for such a null number. “It’s a shame we
can’t list you as ‘Mike.’”

“In
service,” he answered. “MIKESGRILL, Novy Leningrad. MIKEANDLIL,
Luna City. MIKESSUITS, Tycho Under. MIKES—”

“Hold
it! Nulls, please.”

“Nulls
are defined as any consonant followed by X, Y, or Z; any vowel followed by
itself except E and 0; any—”

“Got
it. Your signal is MYCROFT.” In ten minutes, two of which I spent putting
on number-three arm, Mike was wired into system, and milliseconds later he had
done switching to let himself be signaled by MYCROFT-plus-XXX—and had
blocked his circuit so that a nosy technician could not take it out.

I
changed arms, picked up tools, and remembered to take those hundred Joe Millers
in print-out. “Goodnight, Mike.”

“Goodnight,
Man. Thank you.
Bolshoyeh
thanks!”

I
took Trans-Crisium tube to L-City but did not go home; Mike had asked about a
meeting that night at 2100 in Stilyagi Hall. Mike monitored concerts, meetings,
and so forth; someone had switched off by hand his pickups in Stilyagi Hall. I
suppose he felt rebuffed.

I
could guess why they had been switched off. Politics—turned out to be a
protest meeting. What use it was to bar Mike from talk-talk I could not see,
since was a cinch bet that Warden’s stoolies would be in crowd. Not that
any attempt to stop meeting was expected, or even to discipline undischarged
transportees who chose to sound off. Wasn’t necessary.

My
Grandfather Stone claimed that Luna was only open prison in history. No bars,
no guards, no rules—-and no need for them. Back in early days, he said,
before was clear that transportation was a life sentence, some lags tried to
escape. By ship, of course—and, since a ship is mass-rated almost to a
gram, that meant a ship’s officer had to be bribed.

Some
were bribed, they say. But were no escapes; man who takes bribe doesn’t
necessarily stay bribed. I recall seeing a man just after eliminated through
East Lock; don’t suppose a corpse eliminated in orbit looks prettier.

So
wardens didn’t fret about protest meetings. “Let ‘em
yap” was policy. Yapping had same significance as squeals of kittens in a
box. Oh, some wardens listened and other wardens tried to suppress it but added
up same either way—null program.

When
Mort the Wart took office in 2068, he gave us a sermon about how things were
going to be different “on” Luna in his administration—noise
about “a mundane paradise wrought with our own strong hands” and
“putting our shoulders to the wheel together, in a spirit of
brotherhood” and “let past mistakes be forgotten as we turn our
faces toward the bright, new dawn.” I heard it in Mother Boor’s
Tucker Bag while inhaling Irish stew and a liter of her Aussie brew. I remember
her comment: “He talks purty, don’t he?”

Her
comment was only result. Some petitions were submitted and Warden’s
bodyguards started carrying new type of gun; no other changes. After he had
been here a while he quit making appearances even by video.

So
I went to meeting merely because Mike was curious. When I checked my p-suit and
kit at West Lock tube station, I took a test recorder and placed in my belt
pouch, so that Mike would have a full account even if I fell asleep.

But
almost didn’t go in. I came up from level 7-A and started in through a
side door and was stopped by a stilyagi—padded tights, codpiece and
calves, torso shined and sprinkled with stardust. Not that I care how people
dress; I was wearing tights myself (unpadded) and sometimes oil my upper body
on social occasions.

But
I don’t use cosmetics and my hair was too thin to nick up in a scalp
lock. This boy had scalp shaved on sides and his lock built up to fit a rooster
and had topped it with a red cap with bulge in front.

A
Liberty Cap—first I ever saw. I started to crowd past, he shoved arm
across and pushed face at mine. “Your ticket!”

“Sorry,”
I said. “Didn’t know. Where do I buy it?”

“You
don’t.”

“Repeat,”
I said. “You faded.”

“Nobody,”
he growled, “gets in without being vouched for. Who are you?”

“I
am,” I answered carefully, “Manuel Garcia O’Kelly, and old
cobbers all know me. Who are you?”

“Never
mind! Show a ticket with right chop, or out y’ go!”

I
wondered about his life expectancy. Tourists often remark on how polite
everybody is in Luna—with unstated comment that ex-prison shouldn’t
be so civilized. Having been Earthside and seen what they put up with, I know
what they mean. But useless to tell them we are what we are because bad actors
don’t live long—in Luna.

But
had no intention of fighting no matter how new-chum this lad behaved; I simply
thought about how his face would look if I brushed number-seven arm across his
mouth.

Just
a thought—I was about to answer politely when I saw Shorty Mkrum inside.
Shorty was a big black fellow two meters tall, sent up to The Rock for murder,
and sweetest, most helpful man I’ve ever worked with—taught him
laser drilling before I burned my arm off. “Shorty!”

He
heard me and grinned like an eighty-eight. “Hi, Mannie!” He moved
toward us. “Glad you came, Man!”

“Not
sure I have,” I said. “Blockage on line.”

“Doesn’t
have a ticket,” said doorman.

Shorty
reached into his pouch, put one in my hand. “Now he does. Come on,
Mannie.”

“Show
me chop on it,” insisted doorman.

“It’s
my chop,” Shorty said softly. “Okay,
tovarishch
?”

Nobody
argued with Shorty—don’t see how he got involved in murder. We
moved down front where vip row was reserved. “Want you to meet a nice
little girl,” said Shorty.

She
was “little” only to Shorty. I’m not short, 175 cm., but she
was taller—180, I learned later, and massed 70 kilos, all curves and as
blond as Shorty was black. I decided she must be transportee since colors
rarely stay that clear past first generation. Pleasant face, quite pretty, and
mop of yellow curls topped off that long, blond, solid, lovely structure.

I
stopped three paces away to look her up and down and whistle. She held her
pose, then nodded to thank me but abruptly—bored with compliments, no
doubt. Shorty waited till formality was over, then said softly, “Wyoh,
this is Comrade Mannie, best drillman that ever drifted a tunnel. Mannie, this
little girl is Wyoming Knott and she came all the way from Plato to tell us how
we’re doing in Hong Kong. Wasn’t that sweet of her?”

She
touched hands with me. “Call me Wye, Mannie—but don’t say
‘Why not.’”

I
almost did but controlled it and said. “Okay, Wye.” She went on,
glancing at my bare head, “So you’re a miner. Shorty, where’s
his cap? I thought the miners over here were organized.” She and Shorty
were wearing little red hats like doorman’s—as were maybe a third
of crowd.