Drum forced a grin as he picked it up—bland paste with a rare crunchy particle. Flavour—just burned grease, hardly a delicacy. Shrugging, he packed the other sticks into his kit.
“Where do you wish to go?”
“Visit Grandmaster Ode, push wood, try out my Accelerated Dragon Defence again.”
“Sorry to discourage you,” said Dispenser, “but commuter density is three point two on the Spiral and four point one on the tubeways. Rush hour. It is advisable to wait until “between shifts” for your Rec travel.”
Drum sat down slowly—arthritic. His commuter priority had been lost with his job, confining him to cubicle whenever density rose above two point zero Citizens per square yard along the Hive’s arteries. Shrugging off his disgust, he called Ode on the screen. “Got time for a game?” he queried, unrolling his board.
Ode’s image flickered and jumped—an older but harder Citizen—higher colour index in his bald scalp, steady clear eyes. He did not comment on Drum’s brusque manner, for he understood retirement traumas.
“Pawn to king-four,” said Ode.
Drum studied the board quietly, still irritated. The pawn in front of the right king had moved two squares. He replied by moving his own worn pawn into the Sicilian Defence. As the dragon took shape, Ode tightened the Marcozy bind with his queen-bishop pawn and queen-knight controlling his queen-five square. Drum had to break out by exchanging knights. He moved woodenly until the mid-game tension washed away his depression. He rode into battle on his remaining knight. Rooks clashed magnificently and a pawn fork took the survivor. A nervous king fidgeted in his castled position until his reign was ended by a pair of bishops. For the moment, the game took on a meaning bigger than life itself.
On the following morning Drum awoke a bit more philosophical. He was ready to accept his new status for what it really was, but Dispenser had other plans.
“Give me a view of the jammed tubeway.” Drum smiled. “I want to appreciate the quiet of my cubicle.”
Screen stayed blank: standby.
Drum’s smile slipped.
“What is the density today—three?—four??”
A dry female appeared on the screen. Drum didn’t like her air of efficiency. Thin lips clashed with gaudy smock. “Recertification time,” she said with her pasted-on smile.
Drum’s mouth opened and closed—wordless.
“Earth Society has run a little short of calories,” she continued. “Water table dropped and the harvest reflected it. We must cut back on the warm—the consuming population—for the duration. Please vote for those Citizens with whom you want to share next year. Hurry, now. Your friends need your vote to avoid being put into Temporary Suspension—TS. Remember, however, that you must not vote for yourself or your clone litter-mates. No blood prejudice allowed.”
Drum smiled nervously. He had done this before when he had his job vote to protect him. In the past his votes went to his favourite conductor and various Venus attendants who pleased him; but now he was more concerned with his cubicle’s vitals: air and plumbing.
“My votes go to the Tinker who keeps my refresher, the Pipe caste member who services this wing of the city—and Grandmaster Ode.”
The screen played a geometric dance as tallies ran up. The thin-lipped female reappeared long enough to announce: “You failed to receive the necessary three votes, so it is TS for you.”
Drum stared as his Temporary Suspension order was printed out.
“But I’m retired,” he objected. “My CQB is paid up for life.”
Screen remained blank. Dispenser’s mechanical voice answered his pleas. “Recertification has nothing to do with wealth. In Right to Life, only criterion is Love. Only Love can give Life.”
“My funds…”
“Your retirement CQB remains in your name while you are in TS. When harvests improve, you will be rewarmed and can continue consuming where you were interrupted. Hurry. You are to report to Clinics immediately. The air you are breathing belongs to somebody else.”
The sign read: “Voluntary Suspension to the Left, Temporary Suspension to the right.” Drum lined up with the TS—unloved, healthy, mixed ages. On his left was the line of VS candidates—elderly, sick Citizens hoping to survive their Voluntary Suspension long enough to awaken in the Golden Age when their infirmities could be cured. Drum shuddered as he realized how hopeless the VS statistics were.
Grandmaster Ode joined him in line.
“Couldn’t gather enough votes either?” asked Ode.
Drum shook his head bitterly. “I wish they would just lower the birth-rate during these pinches. It would be much less traumatic.”
Ode shook his head. “Job requisitions protect all term embryos. If no Tinkers were born today the Hive would feel it ten years from now when there would be no trainees. Of course, if job quotas drop, the embryos lose their protection like anyone.”
A job hawker walked between the lines, shouting: “Get your job vote here. Work outside your caste. Many rewarding positions available. Apply now.”
Drum sneered: “Work beneath your caste is what he really means.”
Ode shrugged. “At least we’d be warm.”
“But we’ve fulfilled our life-work quotas,” argued Drum. “TS isn’t so bad. Just like going to sleep: not much real danger of tissue damage. When things get better, we can wake up and continue our retirement.”
“…And if things don’t get better?” asked Ode letting the words hang.
The two old Citizens eyed each other for a moment, then Ode dragged Drum out of line and waved at the job hawker: “Two volunteers right here.”
A ceiling optic recorded the issuance of work vouchers—Sewer Service—dark, wet work. Their status was recorded in the warm census and the CO—the class-one computer that balanced Earth Society’s books—confirmed their unfrozen assets.
“Sewer Service,” groaned Drum. “There goes my skin.”
Job orientation was brief for retreads—a short tour. “Sewage is a valuable by-product of living,” droned the guide. “Sludge is fermentable, a source of bacterial substrate and raw material for Synthe. Effluent is basically water. Different degrees of decon makes it suitable for irrigation or drinking.”
They stood on a catwalk beside a Separator Plant. The words were drowned out by a steamy waterfall. Warm clots of yellow foam drifted up in the mists. Following a maze of colour-coded pipes, they entered a quiet, windowed booth filled with dials and control valves.
“Here is where we shunt nutrients up to our Plankton Towers in the Gardens. Only—we have no more plankton. Genetic fatigue wiped out our cultures.”
Ode peered into the transparent tube. A thin white ribbon occupied its fluid-filled lumen. “What is in there?”
The guide smiled proudly. “That is our Syncytial Planimal, genetically engineered to give us both plant and animal proteins. When light strikes it, chloroplasts are activated. It also has primitive muscle cells and germ cells to give us iron and fats. When it matures into a fat green ribbon it segments into convenient, bite-sized morsels that can be dried, fried, or eaten fresh with hot sauce.”
Ode smiled. “A genetically engineered perfect food! It feeds on sewage, and we feed on it. There must be some brilliant personnel down in the Bio Labs—working with Gene Spinners.”
The guide frowned. “It wasn’t such a hard job. They just took a bunch of tapeworm nuclei and added the DNA condons for chloroplasts. Some developed into the Syncytial Planimal. Others just remained tapeworms.”
“Tapeworms!” exclaimed Drum.
“Sure,” said Ode, with a artificial grin. “Tapeworms already flourish in faeces. The step to sewage was a small one. As for eating them—well, we must keep the nitrogen cycle as small as possible.”