“Earth’s legislation back then was highly distrustful of genetic engineering. And virtual minds had no rights whatsoever.”
“And look at all the rights you got on Edem!”
The boy’s face grimaced as in pain. Alex quickly added, “Why don’t we continue this discussion in different surroundings? I have a little time… and I’d like to find out a few things.”
“All right, Mr. Pilot.” The boy raised his hand. The dragon roared piteously, and the fairy tale world vanished.
Now it was an ordinary room, furnished in a style of at least a hundred years ago. Amorphous plasticate chairs, picture windows, a waterfall chandelier whose sparkling streams vanished without a trace right at the level of the floor.
Edgar, too, had changed.
Alex looked at the heavyset old man sitting in front of him and nodded.
“I recognize you. That’s the way you looked in the films.”
“I can turn totally decrepit… the way I looked when I left the human world,” said Edward Garlitsky ironically. “But it’s not a very appetizing sight. What is it you want to know, pilot-spesh Alex Romanov?”
“Were you really incarcerated?”
“Yes.” Edward’s face contorted with emotion. “Those scumbags… those low-life bastards! I was stupid—I didn’t start growing myself a new body immediately. I was thrilled by the idea of first constructing the greatest body-shell ever and then taking up residence in it. To bring forth… the beginning of a new race. Of super-humans, not the wretched speshes of today… I beg your pardon.”
“I’m not offended.” Alex sat down in one of the armchairs, which bubbled beneath him, as it searched for the most comfortable shape to take. After a brief hesitation, Edward moved closer to him.
“I was going to make a universalist-spesh. To combine all the best features that could be combined in a human body. I would have been human—outwardly. But I would have been able to breathe underwater and function for hours in vacuum, pilot spaceships and write poetry, repair kitchen stools and manage a gluon reactor. I wanted to squeeze the human genome for absolutely everything it could possibly give! And take what it couldn’t from other earthly and extraterrestrial life forms!”
“And that was why they imprisoned you?”
“Yes. No one wanted that. It scared them. I had come up with a system of surgical recombination of the genome, and I was very close to achieving a result. I even ordered them to start growing the first body… and that was when they stopped me. I was tried… posthumously. And sentenced to be incarcerated in the crystal indefinitely to do socially beneficial work. The Emperor personally banned the creation of super-humans. And I… I was ordered to work on new specializations for the Empire.”
“How could they order you around? Did they threaten to destroy the crystal?”
“Alex…” The geneticist laughed. “You cannot imagine what a multifaceted hell you can organize in virtual space. I could show you… but you’d jump out into the real world immediately. And I had nowhere to go! They would hook my gel-crystal up to another, more powerful one—it would take over… and a nightmare would start. I don’t know who they had hired to do it. But he had a fabulous imagination.”
“I believe you,” said Alex.
Edward threw up his hands.
“Believe it or not. That’s the truth. I broke down. I agreed to live in the virtual world until I received a special pardon from the Emperor… and keep building new speshes. I was thinking up pilots, fighters, gardeners, and hairdressers… At times, I would feel I was losing my mind. I tried to spite the customers… have you ever met a street sweeper-spesh?”
“Of course.”
“That’s not a human being. It’s a parody of a human being! Hands touching the ground, fingers covered with fur to play the role of brooms! A chest-pocket for garbage! A soft, quiet voice and a kindly disposition. And despite all this, the intellect is left completely intact!”
“I remember, everyone respected our street sweeper very much,” said Alex. “He was so kind, so personable. Really loved the kids, gave us rides around the yard up on his shoulders…”
“Oh, Lord! So even that little detail worked?” Edward burst out laughing. “The street sweeper I knew as a kid was always chasing us off, so I endowed my street sweeper-spesh with a special affection for children… The very idea was meant as a mockery! But they put it into production.”
“So who exactly is Kim?”
“My salvation.” Edward immediately got serious. “Twenty years ago I managed to… in a very sly way—I had willy-nilly become an experienced hacker—to get onto the galactic web. I was searching for opposing trends. Searching for people who might be able to help. Searching for access to public opinion. Then I realized that there was no way out. No opposition existed—if you didn’t count some insane religious sects and a few planetary governments that had recently grown in power. But there was no one who could help me, no one to go against the Imperial powers and the Edemian parliament. So I decided to create a person who would help me escape. It was impossible to work with the masses, but when an order was placed for an agent-spesh, an eternally charming, clever girl with special capabilities… I played around with her genes a little bit. My work was being closely watched, but nobody caught on this time. They even thanked me for completing the assignment so masterfully. But I waited till the girl grew up a little, and then started meeting her in some virtual worlds. Made up this touching legend for her… I love Kim very much, Alex. I don’t even know who she is to me—my daughter, my sister, the woman I love…”
“You created Kim to suit yourself?” asked Alex.
“Of course. I had no illusion that she’d be faithful to me forever. I had time enough to rid myself of the ancient moral attitude… almost. According to my original plan, Kim would rescue me when already a grown woman, with sound savings and solid covers. But the lab was being modernized, the communication lines were changed, and I realized I was about to lose contact with the girl. So I had to improvise, but it turned out very well. I took over the controls of one of the service robots. It carried the gel-crystal out and set fire to the laboratory. The crystal was considered destroyed, when in reality Kim was taking care of it. But then almighty chance came into play. Kim’s mother caught her with the crystal. Realized it wasn’t just a collection of sex entertainments or romantic stories. You know the rest. We ran away.”
“And you took the risk of trusting your life to a girl on her very first foray into the galaxy? Who knows what all could have happened to her!”
“Like what?” Edward shrugged. “Yes, she is attractive! But she is also a fighter-spesh with a whole lot of other capabilities. If someone tried to rape her… I wouldn’t envy him! Even if she were tied up hand and foot.” The smile that appeared on Edward’s face was the unpleasant smile of a person who knows something unknown to anyone else.
Alex frowned.
“So you deliberately made her this way? Smart, beautiful, sexy, and at the same time a merciless killer?”
“And what’s wrong with that, Alex? These are the things the Empire lives on. Every government creates the citizens it wants. Every large firm with serious intentions for the future puts in an order for speshes of the type it needs. Parents, choosing the future for their kids, pay for this or that specialization. How are my actions any worse? I worked really hard for Kim. So the fact that she’s rescuing me is… well, a kind of natural gratitude, perhaps!”
“If she were rescuing you knowingly! If you weren’t feeding her all these lies!”