Mind, Machines and Evolution Part 9

"Maybe a few minor scratches and blemishes," Harry said with a wry grin. "Nothing that some rest and a high-protein transfusion won't cure by tomorrow. You might get some complaints about a few aches and pains if you let it out again today, though."

The girl smiled knowingly. "We'll take care of that, Mr. Stone. I'll put it down for a full checkup, regeneration, and recuperation." She entered some more instructions into the terminal. "Will you require the same accessories on Tuesday or will there be any changes?" she inquired.

Harry thought for a second. "Maybe a thinner suit now that the weather's warming up. How about a light blue with a fine silver pinstripe? I'll leave the matching of the necktie, cuff links, and tie clip to you."

"Jewelry, wallet, cigarette lighter, pocket vipad, and cash?" she asked.

"Fine as they are. Make the cash five hundred pounds, one hundred of it in tens."

"Is there any cash to be credited to the account?"

"It's not worth the messing around. I'll lock it up and pick it up again on Tuesday."

"As you wish." The girl completed her operations at the terminal and smiled over at him again. "If you'd like to go on through, cubicle number six is free. We'll see you again on Tuesday, Mr. Stone."

"Take care."

Harry walked through a door at the back of the reception foyer and into a corridor flanked by a dozen or so doors on either side, all bearing numbers. He entered the one numbered "6" and found himself in a small, cheerfully decorated and warm room that contained little apart from a comfortable leather-upholstered recliner and a small table upon which was an open metal strongbox. He emptied the contents of his wallet onto the table, added the personal items from his pockets, and then placed them all in the box, after which he closed the lid and scrambled the combination lock. Just as he was finishing, a knock sounded on the door and an attendant in a light brown tunic entered.

"Good morning, sir," he said cheerfully. "Lovely day for traveling. Is everything ready?"

Harry pushed the strongbox across the table toward him. "Hi, we're all set. This is for the vault."

"Anything to be forwarded on?"

"No, that's it."

"Very good, sir." The attendant produced a vipad from a pocket of his tunic and activated it to display the format of a standard R.A.B. (U.K.) Ltd. deposit-box receipt already filled in with details that the girl had entered at the reception desk outside. He added the identification number of the strongbox in the s.p.a.ce provided and pa.s.sed the vipad to Harry, who verified the transaction by tapping in a memorized personal code. The attendant took back the vipad, picked up the box, and left the room. Harry made one last check of his pockets and person, then sat down in the recliner and allowed his body to sink back into its soft, enveloping contours.

"Everything is ready, Mr. Stone," a pleasant voice said after a few seconds from a concealed speaker above the door. "Are you ready to leave?"

"All set," Harry murmured absently.

"Thank you. Have a good day."

The helmet that had been covering his head all the way around and down to the level of his chin slid smoothly away and retracted to its storage position above and behind him. He opened his eyes and lay waiting in the darkness. After a few seconds the lighting came on and increased to a low level revealing details of another small cubicle, this one including the usual wall of panels and electronics that he had never understood. He blinked a couple of times, then sat up slowly and sat for a moment on the edge of the couch to give his lungs and circulation time to adjust back to a normal level of activity. Then he stood up carefully, did his best to smooth two days worth of creases from the open-necked shirt and casual slacks that he was wearing, and moved toward the door. He felt cold and a little bit stiff, but that was nothing abnormal.

The first thing he did in the corridor outside was visit the men's room, always first on the list of priorities after coming back. He emerged five minutes later and walked out the door at the end of the corridor that led through to the desk.

The young man at the desk had been expecting him. "h.e.l.lo, Mr. Stone," he said. "How was London?"

"Just fine. It's been cold there, but it's getting warmer. Do you have my charge made up?"

"Right here." The clerk pivoted a flatscreen display around to face Harry, who ran a cursory eye down the details of the account, then verified the charge with his personal code. "And you have another reservation in London for next Tuesday morning." The clerk handed across a white plastic doc.u.ment holder. Harry checked the details, grunted, closed the doc.u.ment holder, and slipped it into the back pocket of his slacks. Then he bade the clerk good day, walked out of the front entrance of the Las Vegas branch office of R.A.B. Inc., and went to have an early-morning breakfast at the all-night restaurant a short walk up the street.

All Harry really knew was that you walked into a cubicle in Las Vegas or somewhere, they put a thing on your head, and a few seconds later you were walking out of another cubicle in London or wherever, inside another body that was yours for the duration of the trip.

Somebody had explained to him once that the bodies rented out at the far end were not legally cla.s.sified as people because they were grown under the control of synthetically manufactured DNA, designed to produce a physical human form complete with all the lower brain functions that took care of subconscious monitoring and regulating of respiration, circulation, and the like, but with no cerebral cortex or any of the higher faculties the law decreed to be essential ingredients of personality. The unused part of the skull contained instead a microelectronics package that collected the information coming in through the nervous system and transmitted it to the nearest R.A.B. office, from where it was relayed across the world by satellite and somehow injected into your brain by the thing they put on your head in a way that shut out the input from your own body. Also, the signals from your brain to control voluntary movements and so forth were short-circuited off from your own body and transmitted back in the reverse direction. So you could see, hear, feel, and move around by remote-controlling a body that was five thousand miles away while your own self stayed in Las Vegas. Harry wasn't sure of the details, but traveling now took no time at all, and it sure beat the h.e.l.l out of being jammed into tin cans for hours on end and having to fight to airports and back again. It was expensive, especially if you went for the deluxe models that came with best quality clothing and accessories, but the business community found it a much better investment than physically shipping executives around the world on short visits and having to handle all the accompanying problems.

Remote-Activated Biovehicles, or R.A.B., had the lion's share of the world market and was referred to popularly as "RentABody," or more frequently, "Arabee." Breakdowns in the system were rare but did happen occasionally, in which case an Arabee walking around somewhere would usually tense up suddenly and keel over. The company had an efficient system for dispatching recovery teams swiftly to deal with such emergencies, and the public had come to accept an Arabee crash as just another part of living that they might have the privilege of witnessing and being amused by one day. In fact there had been a few unfortunate instances in the early days when a case of genuine illness had received less than prompt attention because somebody had misinterpreted the situation. Since then the company had installed warning systems that activated automatically in the event of a malfunction to enable anyone who happened to be nearby to recognize the true nature of the event. All in all the system worked well and proved popular, and problems were few.

Harry never relished the prospect of having to return to the particular brand of domestic bliss that came from being married to Lisa, so he had announced that he wouldn't be back from New York until late that night, intending to spend the day in town. However, his mind had enjoyed little rest, even if his body had been immobile, and he realized over breakfast that he was sleepy. Thus he changed his plans and steeled himself to the dismal thought of confronting his wife early in the morning. So, dismissing fond memories of London from his mind for the time being, he took an elevator up to the roof and boarded a cab to fly the ten miles to his home on the north side of the city.

As the cab descended toward the house minutes later, Harry looked down and saw Max's purple-and-pink flymobile parked in front of the garage. There were no lights showing in any of the windows of the house. Harry groaned to himself and decided he was in no mood for a fight. He told the driver to take the cab back up and head for the Holiday Inn a couple of miles back toward town.

"For Christ's sake, I've got important business scheduled for today," Harry fumed across the breakfast table in the kitchen. "I need a clear head. I can do without this kind of stupidity every time I have to take a trip someplace. Why don't you give growing up a try sometime?"

Lisa stared back at him sourly over her coffee. The skin below her eyes was showing signs of getting dark and slack, and her hair hadn't been touched since she got up. Women had no right b.i.t.c.hing and whining when they let themselves turn into a mess like that, he told himself as he looked at her distastefully.

"What's the matter?" she demanded. "Can't wait to get back to your little p.u.s.s.ycat in New York?" His expression darkened further, and she leered. "Oh, don't tell me that isn't what all this is about, Harry. It's Tuesday and you have to go back to New York already when you were there only last Friday. And you have to stay over again? What do you think-my head's full of rocks or something?"

"Take a look in the mirror and try listening to yourself, then tell me you'd be surprised if I was," he retorted. He glowered down at his eggs, decided he wasn't hungry, and tossed his fork down on the plate with a clatter. Indignation boiled up inside, and he threw out an arm to take in the whole of the house. "You get looked after okay. Isn't a guy supposed to expect anything back the other way? What do you want-body, soul, and a checking account with no strings? If I fool around, it's because I've got enough reasons."

"All I wanted was a man," she threw back. "But I ended up with a small-time slob who thinks he's another Rockefeller." Her face twisted into a sarcastic smile. "Is your p.u.s.s.ycat in New York another little innocent who fell for the same line about Malaysian rubber deals and Zambian copper stocks that I did?

Mister Big Wheel again, huh? Bah! Everything about you makes me sick."

"At least that's one honest thing you've said," Harry grated. "Big money was all you ever did want. So, you've got it. Why is it a rough deal all of a sudden? I don't remember you complaining when you were peeling your clothes off for five hundred a week and probably making it up with extras after hours."

"I like money, sure," she spat. "Who doesn't? I don't like where it comes from or the 'friends' that come with it."

Something in Harry's chest nudged close to boiling point. "What about my friends?" he hissed in a voice that was suddenly icily brittle.

"Is that what you call them? They'd gamble away their own mothers' medical checks."

Harry's grip tightened on his coffee mug. "If that's how you feel, what was Max's flymo doing here at six in the morning?" he shot back. Lisa's eyes blazed furiously, and her mouth tightened into a thin line.

He leveled a finger across the table at her. "I came back early on Friday but changed my mind about coming in. So don't you try any more of that c.r.a.p on me, understand?" His eyes had narrowed, and his voice had taken on the mean note that said he had reached his limit.

Lisa slammed her mug down on the table, got up, and turned away toward the window. "Any attention is better than no attention," she snarled without turning her head. "At least he doesn't make me sound like dirt every day of the G.o.dd.a.m.n week."

"Why should he? He's making out okay."

"Why don't you just get out of here and on your way," she seethed hatefully.

Harry's knuckles whitened around the mug as he heard himself being ordered out of his own house, but he resisted the impulse to hurl it across the room. All he wanted to do was get out, but there was one more thing to be taken care of first and it needed a clear head. He looked down at the table and saw Lisa's pack lying half open with three cigarettes in it. He knew they would be gone within the hour. He picked the pack up and threw it back down on the table with a loud slapping sound. "Don't we have any of my brand in this G.o.dd.a.m.n house?" he raged. "Jesus, is that too much to ask as well?"

"There are some in the den," Lisa told him coldly without looking around.

He waited, but she made no attempt to move. "I never know where in h.e.l.l you hide anything," he said, forcing a note of menace into his voice. He stayed put, and in seconds the tension rocketed to breaking point.

"Oh, for Christ's sake, I'll get 'em," Lisa exploded, and stormed out of the room.

Harry waited a few seconds to make sure that her footsteps were fading away, then reached in his pocket and drew out an unsealed envelope containing an opened pack of Lisa's brand with two missing, and the two that he had treated half an hour earlier, in the way that Sandra had shown him, wrapped separately in a piece of tissue. He unwrapped the treated cigarettes, switched them for two of the three in the pack on the table, put the two he had taken back in the envelope along with the tissue, and returned the envelope to his pocket.

The switch had taken only a few seconds but it had seemed like a slow-motion nightmare; in that short time his heart had started pounding and a sick, heavy feeling had formed in his throat and stomach. He clenched his fists and tried to force himself to calm down. There's nothing to it, he told himself. It's done now. Christ, why wouldn't his hands stop shaking?

He heard the door of the bathroom along the hall outside the kitchen close and lock, and breathed a silent prayer of thanks for the extra minute or two it gave him to pull himself together. He wiped his palms on his thighs, forced himself to take a series of slow, deep breaths, then got up and switched on the wall terminal in TV mode. A blonde with disgustingly perfect teeth was talking about a s.p.a.ce colony or something somewhere. It didn't interest him, and he watched without hearing the words until the sound of flushing amplified suddenly by a door being opened jerked his attention away from the screen. Lisa came in and threw a pack down on the table.

"Only two?" Harry grumbled darkly as he fumbled one to his mouth and lit it. "What are we, dest.i.tute or something? Don't we have any full ones left?"

"Well, I can't find any," Lisa told him irritably. "Get some more when you go out. I'll put a carton on the grocery order when I send it off."

"Why do you always have to wait until we run out?" Harry snapped. "Didn't it ever occur to you to do something when they're getting low? Why don't you try thinking with your head for a change instead of giving it?"

The side of his jaw was still throbbing twenty minutes later as he looked down from a cab on his way to downtown Vegas. But by that time the air around him tasted fresh and free, and the feeling of everything he had just left being about to become a closed chapter in his life was exhilarating. When he next saw that house his troubles would all be over, and there would be only the formalities to attend to before he could begin the new life in London that was his by right because he had earned it. Sometimes making that decision to go for the jackpot and seeing it through was tough, but for the exclusive elite who had what it took, the reward was the moon. And Harry Stone had now proved he was one of them. It was a good feeling.

Sandra lay back in the bed with the sheet covering her up to her waist and beads of perspiration still dotting the skin around her navel.

"I've been keeping a little surprise for you," Harry said. "What would you say to a bit extra on top of the insurance-like maybe a hundred grand, les the death taxes?"

"Sounds good," she cooed. "Tell me about it." Harry began sliding his hand down over her body toward the sheet. She caught his wrist and giggled. "I need to get my breath back, Alex. What's the extra?"

"Well, our friends back home in Surrey will be surprised to learn that my wife has been a stamp collector for years," he said. "I knew, naturally, but I was never that interested, and I don't know much about it.

So I'll be as surprised as anybody when they tell me that she left some very valuable items among her collection. Maybe she never realized what they were worth either. Who knows?" He shrugged. "I guess we'll never find out."

Sandra emitted a delighted laugh. "Alex, you're too much! So what did you do-plant them somewhere? Were they to soak up some cash you had lying around that you didn't want anyone asking questions about?"

Harry brought a finger up to his face and tapped it meaningfully against the side of his nose. "Let's just say that even if they do a lab test on the glue, they'll find it's genuine and has been there for years. It's the little details like that that amateurs trip up over."

"But not Alexander Moorfield, huh?" she said, turning her head and gazing at him admiringly.

Harry lay back and folded an elbow under his head. "How long will it take you to understand that I'm a real professional, baby? When I do things I do 'em right, and I go for the big stakes. That's what you have to do to survive in this world."

"And you sure know how to survive." She moved closer and rested her face on his chest.

"I guess so."

Sandra nuzzled against his neck and nibbled playfully at the lobe of his ear. "You really are a b.a.s.t.a.r.d, Alex," she teased softly. "And it's just what a b.i.t.c.h like me needs."

He thought to himself for a while and then asked casually, "What would you say if I told you I've been a real b.a.s.t.a.r.d?"

She moved her face back a short distance to peer at him curiously, but her eyes were still twinkling with laughter. "I wouldn't be a bit surprised," she told him. "Why? What have you been doing?"

Harry hesitated for a moment, wondering if perhaps he had misjudged the moment, but the half smile dancing on her lips was disarming. He sighed and grinned apologetically. "Honey, I guess you have to know this sooner or later-I'm not really me. I'm an Arabee."

Although he kept his voice relaxed and easy, inwardly he was prepared for her to be shocked, insulted, or indignant, to cry, sulk, throw a tantrum, or do any one of a dozen other things that would have made things difficult. But she didn't do any of them. Instead she stared at him in disbelief for a second or two, then smiled, and then threw back her head and laughed. "You are a b.a.s.t.a.r.d!" she exclaimed. "All this time and you never told me? Christ, I admire the sheer b.a.l.l.s of it!"

"You don't mind?" he asked, not really believing that his luck could be holding out like this.

"You're still the same to me," she replied. "In fact it's quite exciting. Meeting the real you will be like being seduced by a new lover all over again. I like the whole idea."

"Suppose I turn out to be fat, bald, and fifty," he said. "Wouldn't you care about that? You'd better say you would; otherwise I might start thinking you're only interested in the bread. I wouldn't want that much of a b.i.t.c.h. I've only just finished getting rid of that particular brand of problem."

"Of course not," she said. "So now go ahead and tell me it's just as well, because it was only a line anyway."

"No," Harry tossed out a hand carelessly. "It was straight, but I'm getting out of that business. I've got some personal enterprises that I want to develop."

"I knew it," Sandra said, sounding happier. "And I don't believe you are fat, bald, and fifty. It wouldn't go with your personality." She sat up and turned toward him with an intrigued look on her face. "What are you like?"

"Oh, a year or two older than this, maybe, but just as handsome. I've got a little bit of gray at the temples, too. Does that sound okay?"

"Very distinguished," Sandra p.r.o.nounced. She traced her fingers lightly across his chest. "And what about all these beautiful muscles? Are you as good as that, too?"

"Better," he told her. "I used to do a lot of athletics. And I've got a much deeper tan than this." It was all too good to be true, and as the last shreds of apprehension flowed away, he found himself starting to laugh uncontrollably. His laughter triggered Sandra's, and soon they were both writhing helplessly with tears pouring down their cheeks.

"What about those dimples on the sides of your face?" she asked between sobs.

"I've got one on my chin, and it's just as cute." They burst into another paroxysm of weeping. "And don't worry about the rest," he managed between heaves of his chest which was beginning to ache. "It's best American stud."

After a while Harry began to calm down, but Sandra was still clutching her stomach and laughing, if anything, more loudly than ever-almost insanely. He watched and grew puzzled, and as her laughter continued with no signs of abating, his puzzlement changed to concern. "Hey, Sandy, it's not that funny,"

he said. "Cool it, for heaven's sake. You'll get hysterical if you carry on like that."

Sandra wiped her face with the sheet and shook her head as she fought for breath. "It's okay, Alex. I'm not getting hysterical," she gasped. "It's just that you don't-you don't understand how funny this really is."

She wasn't making any sense. Harry frowned and shook his head. "What the h.e.l.l are you talking about?"

"Alex-you see, it's-" She erupted into another spasm of sobbing laughter and bunched part of the sheet to her mouth in a futile attempt to stifle it. Harry's amus.e.m.e.nt turned to irritation as he began getting the feeling that he was being made a fool of somehow, and his mouth clamped tighter as he waited. "You see, Alex, it's funny because-because-" But she never finished the sentence. Her mouth froze half open, her eyes widened in sudden alarm, and she slumped weakly back against the pillows.

"Sandy, what is it?" Harry forgot his anger at once. "What's the matter? Are you sick?"

"I . . . don't know, Alex." Her voice was a dreamy whisper. "Sleepy . . . just hit me . . . Can't keep . . .

my eyes . . . op-"

"Sandy? Sandy, say something!" Harry's voice was close to panic. But Sandra made no further sound.

She lay with her eyes glazed and her mouth gaping as it had stopped in mid-syllable, with every trace of life and movement gone from her body. Harry stared at her, horrified, and instinctively drew away and stood up. After a few seconds, a monotonous synthetic voice began speaking from somewhere in the region of her head.

Please do not be alarmed. This is a malfunction of a remotely animated, nonhuman surrogate owned by Remote-Activated Biovehicles (U.K.) Limited. We regret any inconvenience. A recovery team is already on its way to you. If you need further a.s.sistance, please call 01-376-8877. Thank you . . . Please to not be alarmed. This is a malfunction of . . ."

But Harry didn't hear any more. He backed away in wide-eyed horror, unable to tear his eyes from the lifeless figure draped across the bed. It wasn't the knowledge of what she was that was terrifying him; it was the way it had happened, and when.

Surely to G.o.d it was impossible. He gnawed at his knuckle and forced himself to calm down and think.