While one could spend hours alone examining the astonishing variety of trees in Monsa’s gardens, there were just as many impressive varieties of flowers in every color imaginable and with equally impressive uses. There were flowers that emitted light at night, flowers that ate pesky insects (but not the helpful ones, such as collectors), flowers that were processed into all manner of drugs for both human and product consumption, and even flowers for the very old yet still profitable perfume trade. Pueet, their little hostess, explained in a clear voice. “The flowers in the inner sanctum are not for production use; they are just prototypes. We have many production labs distributed throughout House Monsa and her subsidiaries.”
Although plants made up the bulk of the life in the gardens, there were more active denizens that walked, crawled, slithered, or flapped. The most conspicuous products were the general humanoid laborers sprinkled everywhere, their purpose to keep the garden tidy. They did most of their work using only old-fashioned hand tools rather than modern ones, as the doctor preferred the aesthetic of old-time gardening.
Despite this handicap, the massive gardens were immaculately kept, and it was no wonder. The gardeners were remarkably productive, oblivious to the heat of the midday artificial sun and indifferent to the cold of night. They required only two hours of sleep per day, and when they slept they needn’t walk back to any sleeping quarters; instead, they would simply lie down under the shelter of some luxurious plant. Nor did such workers require breaks to eat because there was plenty of fruit and enormous, plump, and delicious bugs of all sorts, which they scooped up deftly as they worked.
All of the workers were identical in appearance. They were hairless men with dark skin weathered by exposure, and every one of them carried around their neck a small blue vial containing repellant against the garden cullers. When Lyra pointed out the vials, Pueet informed them that when the workers got old or otherwise outlived their usefulness, the doctor would simply cut off their supply of repellant. However, such turnover was low since the food in the garden on which the workers subsisted was chock-full of goodies that slowed the aging process.
Among the human-based products that attracted the most attention from the men in the party were the concubines. A full harem of women, spectacular in their nudity, lounged about in a silver-pooled grotto. They stared back at the voyeurs, some of them demurely, some intensely. Djoser asked if these prototypes required any further “testing,” volunteering for the job with a lewd smile. Pueet warned him to leave them alone, as the same traits that mimicked passionate love could easily turn to violence.
Pueet went on to say how Sara, Dr. Monsa’s personal concubine, the one who the night before had stuck a fork in another dinner guest’s hand, was one of the doctor’s early and unsuccessful attempts in this line of work. “But Sara formed an imprint bond with Father, and despite her madness, he grew fond of her,” she said. “Well, maybe not exactly fond of her, but affectionately familiar with her over the years.”
Pueet then informed the tour group that the concubines were not allowed out of their plexi cage. “We used to allow them to wander freely, but eventually they would get bored and try to seduce the garden workers or whoever else they could find. It was shamefully disruptive.”
“What about rent-a-boys? Do you grow them as well?” Lyra asked while elbowing Djoser in the ribs.
Pueet laughed girlishly. “Yes, although we lock them up also, away from the concubine protos. Otherwise they would simply wear each other out. In the early days we actually lost a few of them from exhaustion. We do still allow controlled visits for testing purposes.”
Spurred by Lyra’s interest, Pueet showed them the rent-a-boy sphere. Like their female counterparts they were nude, exposing their perfectly shaped and muscular bodies. Upon seeing the visitors, some of the products whistled at Lyra and Pueet and shouted out invitations over one another. Others leaned stoically against the plexi as though posing. A few smiled shyly and hid themselves. Apparently, there was a type of man for all tastes.
“I noticed you do not separate them from one another,” D_Light commented. “Do they get along so harmoniously all the time?”
Pueet pointed to three small empty spheres off in the distance. “No, occasionally we get a violent phenotype or one whose copious sexual urges are misdirected at others in the cell. However, as you can see, the isolation spheres are empty now. We rarely make such rookie mistakes in our designs anymore.”
“Misdirected sexual urges?” Djoser asked. “You do not make homosexual rent-a-boys and concubines?”
“Oh, there really isn’t much of a market for those,” Pueet answered while twisting her mouth slightly. “The rampant genetic engineering of humans leading up to the time of the bottleneck-coupled with modern fetus incubation tanks-has nearly wiped that market out.”
“Interesting,” D_Light said. “I had no idea.”
Pueet nodded. “Yeah, House Yi-LingYu specializes in that niche market, and Father does not think the potential profits are worth the extra R amp;D it would take to challenge Yi-LingYu’s strong position.” Pueet sighed. “I’ve thought of putting a line together myself. It would be a fun game, but I do not know if I will ever get around to it.”
Pueet then took the tour party to see House Monsa’s most advanced and expensive product line, the analysts. Like Hal, the analyst they had met the night before, the male analysts looked very similar to the common garden worker products in that they were hairless, and they were remarkable only in that they did not resemble anyone in particular. It was as though they were merely templates of a person. The women analysts were hairless also, making them somewhat repulsive to D_Light. The analysts were one of the most driven products. When looking into their eyes one might at first think that they were dull, given their blank stare; however, in reality they were simply in a state of unbroken trance. They were so committed to their thoughts that nothing in the silly “real” world mattered a pin to them.
Like Hal, many of the analysts had tubes that sprung up around them like wet quills of a porcupine, the skin folding circularly like an anus where the tube interfaced with their body. Nectar, drugs, and other substances that D_Light did not ask about flowed in through some tubes, and dark liquid waste trickled out of others. Unlike the ebony tans of the garden workers, the skin of the analysts was nearly translucent from their subterranean existence. Their domicile was deep within a windowless dro-vine mound. They stood in long bays, one after the other. Their mind interface chips were hooked directly to machines, but this apparently did not provide enough input because their otherwise minimalist bays had dozens of monitors which displayed a great deal of things that D_Light could not even guess about. Pueet told them that the monitors were as much for those supervising the analysts-the proctors-as they were for the products themselves. Since these analysts were prototype models, it was important for proctors to observe, measure, and validate their work.
The proctors also appeared to be products. One proctor was another of Dr. Monsa’s cloned daughters, identical to Pueet, Love_Monkey, Curious_Scourge, BoBo, and every other “daughter” they had seen, except that this one had a dark ribbon in her hair. The girl ignored the tour group as she scanned the monitors, and the analysts, likewise, were oblivious to her. Another proctor was an analyst himself, presumably a graduated one. This one was walking along with his tubes hooked into a hovering machine that trailed behind him, always staying just close enough to stay out of his way while still maintaining some slack.