Time Enough for Love (19 page)

“Lazarus, this would not involve that hazard; it would be done with your own clone.”

“Not bloody likely. Keep talking.”

“Lazarus, this has been tested on animals other than H. sapiens. It works best in changing a male to a female. A single cell is selected for cloning. Before cloning is started, the Y chromosome is removed and an X chromosome from a second cell of the same zygote is supplied, thus creating a female cell of the same genetic pattern as the zygote save that the X chromosome is replicated while the Y chromosome is eliminated. The modified cell is then cloned. The result is a true female clone-zygote derived from a male original.”

“There must be a catch,” Lazarus said, frowning.

“There may be, Lazarus. Certain it is that the basic technique works. There are several created females in the building you are in—dogs, cats, one sow, others—and most of them have littered successfully…except when, for example, a derived bitch is bred with the male dog who supplied the cell for cloning. That can produce lethals and monstrosities from the high probability of reinforcing bad recessives—”

“I should think it would!”

“Yes. But normal outbreeding does not, as indicated by seventy-three generations of hamsters descended from one created female. The method has not been adapted to fauna native to Secundus because of their radically different genetic structure.”

“Never mind Secundus animals—how about
men?
”

“Lazarus, I have been able to search the literature only on items released by the Rejuvenation Clinic. The published literature hints at problems in the last stage—activating the female clone-zygote with the memories and experiences—the ‘personality’ if you prefer that term—of the parent male. When to terminate the parent male—or whether to terminate it at all—suggests several problems. But I am unable to say what research has been suppressed.”

Lazarus turned to me. “Do you permit that, Ira? Suppression of research?”

“I don’t interfere, Lazarus. But I didn’t know this research was going on. Let’s find out.” I turned to the Administrator for Rejuvenation, shifted to Galacta, and explained what we had been discussing and asked what progress had been made with humans.

I turned back with my ears burning. As soon as I mentioned humans in this connection, she had interrupted me abruptly—as if I had said something offensive—and stated that such experimentation was proscribed.

I translated her answer. Lazarus nodded. “I read the kid’s face; I could see the answer was No. Well, Minerva, that seems to be that. I am not about to attempt chromosome surgery on myself—somebody swiped my jackknife.”

“Perhaps that is not quite the end,” Minerva replied. “Ira, did you notice that Ishtar said only that such research was ‘proscribed’? She did
not
say that it had not taken place. I have just made a most thorough semantic analysis of the published literature for truth-and-falsity implications. I conclude that the probability approaches certainty that much pertinent research on humans
has
taken place even though it may no longer be going on. Do you wish to order it released, sir? I am certain that I can freeze their computer quickly enough to prevent erasure, assuming that an erasure program guards it.”

“Let’s not do anything drastic,” drawled Lazarus. “There may be good reason for a ‘hold’ on this stuff. I’m forced to assume that these johnnies know more about it than I do. Besides, I’m not sure I want to be a guinea pig. Let’s put it on the back of the fire, Minerva. Ira, I’m not sure I would be
me
without my Y chromosome. To say nothing of those jolly hints of how you transfer the personality and at what point to kill off the male.
Me
, that is.”

“Lazarus—”

“Yes, Minerva?”

“The published literature makes one option both certain and safe. This method can be used to create your twin sister—identical rather than fraternal, save for sex. A host mother is indicated, with no forcing to maturity, since the brain would be allowed to develop normally. Would this meet your standards of newness and interest? To watch yourself grow up as a woman? ‘Lazuli Long,’ you might name her—your female other self.”

“Uh—” Lazarus stopped.

I said dryly, “Grandfather, I think I’ve won our second bet. Something new. Something interesting.”

“Now slow up!
You
can’t do it, you don’t know how. Nor do I. And the Director of this madhouse appears to have moral scruples about it—”

“We don’t know that. Mere inference.”

“Not so ‘mere.’ And
I
may have moral scruples. ’Twouldn’t interest me unless I stuck around and watched her grow up…which might send me crazy either through trying to make her grow up just like me—what a fate for any girl!—or by trying to keep her from growing up as ornery as I am when that would be her nature. Nor would I be justified either way; she would be a separate human being, not my slave. Besides that, I would be her sole parent—no mother. I’ve had one crack at trying to raise a daughter alone—it’s not fair to the girl.”

“You’re inventing objections, Lazarus. I’ll give long odds that Ishtar would gladly be both host mother and foster mother. Especially if you promised Ishtar a son of her own. Shall I ask her?”

“You keep your biscuit trap shut, Son! Minerva, place that on ‘pending’—I won’t be hurried into a major decision about another person. Especially one who isn’t, quite. Ira, remind me to tell you about the twins who were no relation to each other. But twins.”

“Preposterous. You’re changing the subject.”

“So I am. Minerva, what else do you have, girl?”

“Lazarus, I have one program which involves low hazard and a probability approaching certainty of supplying one—or more—experiences completely new to you.”

“I’m listening.”

“Suspended animation—”

“What’s new about that? We had that when I was a kid, hardly two hundred years old. Used it in the ‘New Frontiers.’ Didn’t attract me then, doesn’t now.”

“—as a means of time travel. If you stipulate that in X number of years, something truly new will develop—a certainty based on history—then your only problem is to select whatever span of years will, in your opinion, produce the degree of novelty you seek. One hundred years, one thousand, ten thousand, whatever you say. The rest involves nothing but minor design details.”

“Not so ‘minor’ if I’m going to be asleep and unable to protect myself.”

“But you need not go into hibernation until you are satisfied with my design, Lazarus. A hundred years is obviously no problem. A thousand years is not much problem. For ten thousand years I would design an artificial planetoid equipped with fail-safes to insure that you would be revived automatically in case of emergency.”

“That would take quite some designing, girl.”

“I feel confident of my capacity to do it, Lazarus, but you are free to criticize and reject any part of it. However, there is no point in my submitting preliminary designs until you give me the controlling parameter, namely the time span, which in your opinion will produce something new to you. Or do you wish my advice on that?”

“Uh…hold your horses, dear. Let’s assume that you’ve got me in liquid helium and in free fall and thoroughly protected against ionizing radiation—”

“No problem, Lazarus.”

“So I stipulated, dear; I’m not underrating you. But suppose some tiny little fail-safe fails null instead and I go on snoozing through the centuries—and millennia—without end. Not dead. But not revived, either.”

“I can and will design to avoid that. But let me accept your stipulation. In such case, how would you be worse off than you would be if you used your termination-option switch? What do you lose by trying this?”

“Why, that’s obvious! If there is anything to this immortality talk—or any sort of afterlife—I’m not saying there is or isn’t—but if there
is
, then when the ‘Roll Is Called Up Yonder,’ I won’t be there. I’ll be asleep but not dead, somewhere off in space. I’ll miss the last boat.”

“Grandfather,” I said impatiently, “quit trying to wiggle out. If you don’t want it, just say No. But Minerva has certainly offered you a way to reach something new. If there is anything to your argument—which I don’t admit—you will have achieved something
really
unique: the only human being out of many billions to fail to show up for muster on this hypothetical-and-highly-unlikely Judgment Day. I wouldn’t put it past you, you old scoundrel; you’re slippery.”

He ignored my slur. “Why ‘highly unlikely’?”

“Because it
is
. I won’t argue it.”

“Because you
can’t
argue it,” he retorted. “There isn’t any evidence for or against—so how can you assign even a loose probability either way? I was pointing out the desirability, if there happens to be anything to it, of playing it kosher. Minerva, hold that under ‘pending,’ too. The idea has everything you claim for it, and I don’t doubt your ability as a designer. But, like testing a parachute, it’s a one-way trip with no chance to change my mind after I jump. So we’ll look over all other ideas before falling back on that one—even if it takes years.”

“I will continue, Lazarus.”

“Thanks, Minerva.” Lazarus looked thoughtful as he picked his teeth with a thumbnail—we were eating, but I have not mentioned breaks for refreshment, nor will I again. You may assume any food and rest breaks that make you feel comfortable. Like Scheherazade’s tales, the Senior’s anecdotes were chopped up by many irrelevant interruptions.

“Lazarus—”

“Eh, Son? I was daydreaming…of a far country and the wench is dead. Sorry.”

“You could help Minerva in this search.”

“So? Seems unlikely. She’s better equipped to conduct a needle-in-a-haystack search than I am—she impresses me.”

“Yes. But she needs data. There are these great gaps in what we know about you. If we knew—if Minerva knew—those fifty-odd professions you’ve followed, she might be able to cancel several thousand possibility pockets. For example, have you ever been a farmer?”

“Several times.”

“So? Now that she knows that, she won’t suggest anything relating to agriculture. While there may be sorts of farming you have never done, none would be novel enough to meet your stringent requirements. Why not list the things you have done?”

“Doubt if I can remember them all.”

“That can’t be helped. But listing what you do remember may call to mind others.”

“Uh…let me think. One thing I always did every time I reached an inhabited planet was to study law. Not to practice—not usually, although for a number of years I was a very criminal lawyer—on San Andreas, that was. But to understand the ground rules. Hard to show a profit—or to conceal one—if you don’t know how the game is played. It’s much safer to break a law knowingly than to do so through ignorance.

“But that backfired once and I wound up as High Justice of a planetary Supreme Court—just in time to save my bacon. And neck.

“Let me see. Farmer, and lawyer, and judge, and I told you I had practiced medicine. Skipper of many sorts of craft, mostly for exploration but sometimes for cargo or migrant transport—and once art armed privateer with a crew of rogues you wouldn’t take home to mother. Schoolteacher—lost that job when they caught me teaching the kids the raw truth, a capital offense anywhere in the Galaxy. In the slave trade once but from underneath—I was a slave.”

I blinked at that. “I can’t imagine it.”

“Unfortunately I didn’t have to imagine it. Priest—”

I had to interrupt again. “‘Priest’? Lazarus, you said, or implied, that you had no religious faith of any sort.”

“Did I? But ‘faith’ is for the congregation, Ira; it handicaps a priest. Professor in a parlor house—”

“Excuse me again. Idiomatic usage?”

“Eh? Manager of a bordello…although I did play the pianette a little, and sang. Don’t laugh; I had a pretty good singing voice then. This was on Mars—you’ve heard of Mars?”

“Next planet out from Old Home Terra. Sol Four.”

“Yes. Not a planet we’d bother with today. But this was before Andy Libby changed things. It was even before China destroyed Europe but after America dropped out of the spacing business, which left me stranded. I left Earth after that meeting of 2012 and didn’t go back for a spell—which saved me much unpleasantness, I shouldn’t complain. If that meeting had gone the other way—No, I’m wrong; when a fruit is ripe, it will fall, and the United States was rotten ripe. Don’t ever become a pessimist, Ira; a pessimist is correct oftener than an optimist, but an optimist has more fun—and neither can stop the march of events.

“But we were speaking of Mars and the job I had there. A fill-in job for coffee and cakes—but pleasant, as I was also the bouncer. The girls were all nice girls, and it was a pleasure to throw out some slob who was misbehaving toward them. Throw him so hard he bounced. Then blacklist him so he couldn’t come back. One or two like that every evening and the word got around that ‘Happy’ Daze demanded gentlemanly behavior toward the ladies, no matter how big a spender a man was.

“Whoring is like military service, Ira—okay in the upper brackets, not so good lower down. These girls were constantly getting offers to buy up their contracts and get married—and all of them did get married, I think, but they were making money so fast that they weren’t anxious to grab the first offer. Mainly because, when I took over, I put a stop to the fixed price the governor of the colony had set, and reinstated the Law of Supply and Demand. There was no reason why those kids shouldn’t charge every ruble the traffic would bear.

“Had trouble over that until the Governor’s Provost for Rest and Culture got it through his thick head that slave wages won’t work in a scarcity situation. Mars was unpleasant enough without trying to cheat those few who made it tolerable. Or even delightful when they were happy in their work. Whores perform the same function as priests, Ira, but far more thoroughly.

“Let me see—I’ve been wealthy many times and always lost it, usually through governments inflating the money, or confiscating—‘nationalizing’ or ‘liberating’—something I owned. ‘Put not your faith in princes,’ Ira; since they don’t produce, they always steal. I’ve been broke even oftener than I’ve been wealthy. Of the two, being broke is more interesting, as a man who doesn’t know where his next meal is coming from is never bored. He may be angry or several other things—but
not
bored. His predicament sharpens his thoughts, spurs him into action, adds zest to his life, whether he knows it or not. Can trap him, of course; that’s why food is the usual bait for traps. But that’s the intriguing part about being broke: how to solve it
without
being trapped. A hungry man tends to lose his judgment—a man who has missed seven meals is often ready to kill—rarely a solution.