Emergency Skin (Forward collection) Page 2

  “What’s your name?”

  And don’t stare.

  “Well, okay. That’s your right, I guess. Maybe I should start. My name is Jaleesa. I’m—uh, a scholar? I guess that’s what you’d call it. Except I’m really just a student, and the field I study is pretty obscure, ha-ha, so right now all I am is another gawker.”

  There’s too much here to explain, but we’ll try. Apparently these people still allow those beneath the ruling classes to be educated—

  “You didn’t have to grab that woman, you know. You scared the hell out of her. She’s all right, if you’re wondering. More concerned about you, really, now that we’ve explained what’s going on.”

  This is an interrogation. He’s attempting to put you at ease. Next will come the questions about your mission, about our home, about the secrets of our technology—

  “You poor thing. My God, you must have actually thought someone was going to hurt you. Well, the police released you after notifying the town of your presence. And, uh, we put a monitor on you. I volunteered to stay with you until you regained consciousness.”

  Ah, this thing on your wrist. We have historical knowledge of “watches,” primitive time devices, but this one is unsupported, strapless. How have they made it adhere to your composite? Keep this as a sample, too, when you escape.

  “Sorry for that, of course, but since you already threatened someone . . . They might have made a bigger stink if you’d used a weapon, but it was pretty clear to everyone involved that you were just, you know, freaking out. Understandable, under the circumstances! Anyway, I’m supposed to give you this.”

  What is—

  Blessed Founders. This is a microfluid cell-culture dish? Sealed. These characters on the label are formed strangely, but similar to our writing . . . It cannot be.

  “That’s what you’re here for, right? Can you read? The label says, ‘HeLa 7713.’ Yeah, that’s right. This is an active, living culture, so be careful with it. You don’t want to get it too cold or . . . Uh, your ship has radiation shielding, doesn’t it? Okay, good, then. If you want to keep the culture alive.”

  This cannot be.

  “Ha, wow, amazing how much emotion I’m picking up from your body language. Relax, it’s fine. Do you want a few additional dishes, just in case? Redundancy is good, right? Here, take some more. I’ll get you a bag or case so you can carry them easily.”

  This is a trick. It must be. Why would he give us this?

  “Well, you need it, right? It has something to do with how your biotech works? Your composite is pretty nifty. We use things like that for hazardous-materials cleanup, but we don’t live in them, of course! Anyway, so, there you go. Nice meeting you!”

  Wait, what?

  “Oh, I was just going to head back to work. Did you have any more questions? If you weren’t planning to head back to your ship right away, I can arrange a guide for you. We put a translator on your, um, face, so that should be working by now. Are you hungry? Shit, how do you eat?”

  Your nutrient supply remains sufficient for now. You are hydrated. Your heart rate is elevated. Be calm.

  “So you’re really just . . . floating around in soup in there? Sorry, we’re not supposed to . . . I’m sure your culture’s lifestyle is valid to you. It’s just that, well, I mean, you can make skin whenever you want, right? So . . . It’s Earth, after all, where we all come from. You can come out! We don’t bite!”

  They are savages. Of course they bite.

  “Earth” is an antiquated name for Tellus. Call it what you wish.

  You know why we use composites. They’re far more efficient than skin. A composite skin can be rapidly modified to enable you to survive adverse environmental conditions. In the early days after Founding, composites were necessary to ensure the survival of workers building our habitats; they saved countless lives that might otherwise have been lost to solar flares or biohazards. Composites also reduce labor costs lost to bathroom breaks, meals, personal hygiene, medical care, interpersonal communication, and masturbation.

  “And it doesn’t hurt, living without skin? It just really seems . . . Like, how do you have sex? How do you breastfeed? That reminds me—what’s your preferred gender? I’m a ‘her.’”

  Why are you still talking to him? You have no need of this information. You’ve accomplished your mission, or you will have, once you return home. There is—

  Yes. We know what “her” means. We simply do not acknowledge it.

  [Reference request denied.]

  [Reference request denied.]

  Fine. It’s an antiquated term for a type of pleasurer—the kind with enlarged breast tissue.

  “Pleasurer? I’ve never heard that word. Sorry, no idea what it is.”

  You are being very persistent. Pleasurers are bots designed for sexual use. In the early days after Founding, most were given the designation “her,” out of tradition and according to the Founders’ preferences, but that pronoun has since fallen out of usage. When your mission is complete and you’ve been rewarded with the skin we promised, you’ll be issued a pleasurer. Its duty will be to maintain your penis in optimal condition. But it will not look like this thing, brown and fat and smug. What is the point of a pleasurer that’s not beautiful? If it cannot even manage to be that, then we might as well call it “him.”

  Yes, the militus—police?—you saw before was probably a “her.” Your hostage too.

  We don’t know, maybe fifty percent of the population? What does it matter? You don’t have a penis.

  “Oh, right, I read about that! Your Founders hated women, wanted to replace them all with robots. That’s, uh, interesting. Oh—excuse me, somebody’s calling me. Yeah, Jaleesa here. Oh, hi, sweetheart! Sorry, I’m going to be a little late, got something to take care of here.”

  He is speaking to someone else. Distracted. We can minifacture a stabbing weapon from the topmost layer of your composite in .0035 seconds, if you want to flee. You—

  We have no idea why he knows of our Founders.

  You’re asking more questions than usual.

  No. Enough. We’re tired of this. Allow us to remind you: You have a mission. Without the cells in your hand, our whole society will falter and die. Mankind will falter and die!

  Yes. Good. At last. It would be best to kill the Jaleesa creature so that he can raise no alarm . . .

  Hmm, well, you have a point. This monitoring device will not come off. Very well, play along as you must.

  “Sorry about that, I’m back. That was my son. Oh, hey, did you want to leave?”

  [Reference request denied.] Do not ask what a son is. Tell him you want to leave.

  “Okay, then. Just remember, no more hostage taking! Poor scared thing. You know how to get back to your ship, right? We can give you an escort if you need it.”

  Tell him you need no escort.

  “Okay, I guess that’s fair, given that you found your way here. Sorry, didn’t mean to patronize! Anyway, here’s a carrying case for your cell cultures; it’ll keep them in gravitically stabilized stasis for your return trip. And there’s a packet of instructions attached to each of the cell-culture dishes, too, to help you clone them successfully. If you folks can manage to do that this time, you won’t have to come back. Right?”

  Do not ask—

  “Uh . . . yeah, ‘this time.’”

  We know nothing of—

  “I don’t know, every few years? Seems to be irregular, but every now and again, one of you guys shows up, dressed in your bag, asking for HeLa cultures. That’s how the police knew not to use lethal force. Yours is one of the few exoplanetary colonies that’s lasted this long, see. Most of the others—the ones that didn’t die—came back once they realized Earth would be fine. There’s just your group and a couple of others left, all of them extremist offshoots of some kind or another . . . Well, anyway, we don’t mind helping you. Everybody’s just trying to survive, right? Look, I’m sorry, but I need to go. Have a good trip back. Rememb
er, no hostages. Bye!”

  Good. He’s gone. Our records did warn that women talk too much. The Founders were wise.

  We don’t know what to make of your silence.

  Your pulse rate, neurotransmitter activity, and body language suggest anger. Please unclench your fists; there’s a chance the locals will interpret that as an aggressive gesture.

  Talk to us.

  We can’t shut up. We’re supposed to help you. You’ve nearly accomplished your mission—

  You’ve nearly accomplished your mission, and it doesn’t matter if there were previous missions!

  No one lied to you. We weren’t given that knowledge. It isn’t a deception if we didn’t know. You have a mission to complete. Please follow the line on your heads-up display to leave this facility and begin the journey back to your ship. Yes, through this door—

  You took a wrong turn. Please reverse course.

  Why have you stopped? Very well. What you’re seeing is called a sunset. You recall our initial briefing, about how planets that are not tidally locked turn on an axis? This planet is turning toward night.

  Yes, yes, the sunset is lovely, over town and forest. We suppose night will be lovely, too, but you should be back to the ship by then if you leave now.

  Look. We’re glad to note the reduction of your agitation neuro-response, but how long do you mean to stand here?

  Your attitude grows irritating. Must we report your disrespect to the Founders when we return? We’re their consensus consciousness, after all. Some parts of our consciousness are amused by your anger, others offended, but we are all certain that you wouldn’t talk to a Founder this way.

  Don’t ignore us.

  Beautiful? That’s . . . You’re only saying that because they have skin. The value accorded to skin on our world has predisposed you, in a way, but you must understand that not all skin is equal. There are objective and qualitative differences, and there’s a reason the Founders chose to exalt—

  Stop. Please follow the line on your heads-up display.

  You have deviated from the return path to the ship.

  Stop.

  These people are of no use to you. Without that translator device, they would just be babbling savages—stop talking to them!

  Stop.

  Please. Stop.

  Please. You are beautiful. We want you to be beautiful. We want you to return home showered in glory, bearing the salvation of your people in one elegant, pale hand. Don’t you want this too?

  Oh Founders.

  “Hi there! Are you lost? Oh, okay.”

  How they patronize you. They treat you like a child. Like someone inferior.

  “Ha-ha, no, Earth’s still here and humanity didn’t die out! All of you seem so surprised by that.”

  They should have died. The Founders were the geniuses, the makers who moved nations with a word. We left because it would’ve cost too much to fix the world. Cheaper to build a new one.

  Of course. And of course we built that world to suit our tastes. A world free of this useless, ugly rabble. Why do otherwise? Do not be seduced by this madness.

  “Oh, is this the bag boy? I heard another one showed up. What, he’s in a bag, it’s—oh, fine. Sorry.”

  The composite suits weren’t primarily designed with control in mind, no. We already explained to you that they were a necessity, in the early days . . . Well, listen to you. A few hours surrounded by cheap, easy skin and suddenly you question everything about our society. Oh, we will be making some recommendations regarding discipline when you return. Very strong recommendations.

  Stop calling them beautiful.

  “No, we’re just born with our skin this way. I guess you could say our parents pick it! Uh. Parents? They’re . . . you know, the people who made and raised you? You mean you don’t—you’re kidding.”

  Their way of life is antiquated. Inefficient.

  “So how do you, uh, reproduce? Oh, artificial wombs, yeah, that figures. No women at all, huh? And you never have skin, not until some high-ranking member of your society says you can? Yikes.”

  It is the guiding principle of our society. Rights belong only to those who earn them. When you complete this mission, for your bravery you will have proven yourself deserving of life, health, beauty, sex, privacy, bodily autonomy—every possible luxury. Only a few can have everything, don’t you see? What these people believe isn’t feasible. They want everything for everyone, and look at where it’s gotten them! Half of them aren’t even men. Almost none are fair of skin. They’re burdened by the dysfunctional and deficient at every turn. A few must be intelligent, we suppose, or they wouldn’t have managed what they’ve done with the planet, but for those bright few, what’s been the reward? A few are beautiful, maybe, for a while, but if they used the HeLa cells, a limited number of them could remain young and strong for centuries.

  “We left because it would’ve cost too much to fix the world. Cheaper to build a new one.”

  Untrue. That is not the only reason we need the HeLa cells. The skin-generation process uses them too. Your own skin—

  Well, no, not many people earn skin. The scarcity of the HeLa cells—

  Of course there isn’t enough to give everyone skin! That’s ridiculous. No, we couldn’t clone that much, the process is labor intensive and costly—

  You must understand, preservation technology requires massive amounts of HeLa cells. And since anyone of technorati class or higher may demand our entire reserve supply at any time . . . Well, that’s why you’re here.

  We don’t know.

  We don’t know why Tellus people live like this. No, stop calling it “Earth.” We aspire to use the language of the greatest philosopher-poets and statesmen in history, not the gabble of the rabble. Hasn’t your time here shown you the superiority of our way of life?

  Where are you going? You cannot simply—

  Now? No! There is no emergency, do not initiate emergency-skin fabrication—we forbid it! Yes, your anxiety levels are abnormal, but that hardly constitutes—

  Oh Founders.

  How can you do this.

  Do not do this.

  Now see what you’ve done.

  The emergency skins are designed for survival, not beauty. Their parameters are environmentally dictated. There’s sufficient unfiltered UV here that significant melanistic pigmentation was prioritized. Past a certain point on the programmed continuum, this alters hair texture as well.

  It isn’t what we wanted for you, this hideousness. Now you’re a walking radiation burn, where you should have had ethereal translucence. That many of these others, these throwbacks, have a similar look, is irrelevant. You were meant for better.

  And now that you look like them, now that you stumble among them, naked, no longer able to speak to them because the translator device will not adhere to your new flesh, shaking with weakness because the emergency-skin-fabrication process consumed your last nutrients . . . What are you expecting? Acceptance? Prepare yourself. We contain memories of what the world was like before the Founders left. They’ll hate you. Hurt you, even, for frightening them. You’ll never reach the heights you should have. No one will give you the opportunities you need to succeed. It would be better to have never been born than to be like this. Do you understand, now, why the Founders excised these traits from our world’s gene pool? We aren’t cruel.

  Please go home. Even now, we would welcome you as a hero—provided you bring the cells. There, with the technorati’s help, we could replace this awful skin and woolish hair with something better.

  You’re making a mistake. You’ve made so many mistakes.

  It’s false, their kindness. People do such things only to seem like good people—a performance of virtue. Our Founders were at least honest in their selfishness.

  What now? Another of these creatures who has aged into uselessness. The burned skin does resist UV well, though, doesn’t it? Not half as many wrinkles as the other old ones. Spindly, though. Weak, knobby joint
ed. He limps with pain—but degenerate as he is, he still looks at you so pityingly. Does your new hack-job skin not crawl with shame?

  We’ll be ashamed for you, then. Die in ignominy. We’re done with you.

  “There’s something I want you to see.”

  Still alive, betrayer? Ah, fed and clothed, how nice for you. This old man seems to like you. We cannot fathom why. He hobbles so as he walks. We want to push him over. You could—oh, very well.

  Oh.

  We thought this space of theirs, this platform you climbed onto, was one of their cities. This, though. We remember cities like this, vast enough to shelter millions. No, we could never have built such cities back home; there have never been enough of us to justify it. And remember, large populations get that way by sustaining many unnecessary, unproductive people.

  How easily seduced you are. You can’t stop staring at these people, at these landscapes, at these horizons. You’ve stopped flinching with every breeze, and now you revel in the sensation of air caressing your new skin, like a hedonist. You touched yourself last night, didn’t you? We recorded it. The Founders should find it amusing. But if you go back now, we promise not to—

  Where is this dried-up nobody taking you now?

  “This is called a museum.”

  We know what a museum is, you burned-up waste of skin.

  “This may interest you.”

  This is—oh. A timeline of the Great Leaving. They call it something else, but we know these dates, these images. Yes. Yes. That was how it began, with the Industrial Revolution—oh. They think it began even earlier? Interesting, if inaccurate. Wait, this was once called the United States? What is it called now?

  “It doesn’t have a name now. The world. Earth. We don’t bother with borders anymore.”

  Then they are endlessly inundated with the useless. Refugees and other refuse.

  “We realized it was impossible to protect any one place if the place next door was drowning or on fire. We realized the old boundaries weren’t meant to keep the undesirable out, but to hoard resources within. And the hoarders were the core of the problem.”