Charles Sheffield - Dark as Day

Kate’s disgusted glance at Alex’s clothing said everything. Her only comment, however, was, “Your mother is outside. I don’t think you should keep her waiting.”

The model’s internal clock had reached 2143. Soon they would be at the half-century projection mark. “Will you keep an eye on this run?”

“I’ve been watching it closely since the moment it started. Don’t worry, Alex. It will not lack my attention.”

No enthusiasm in Kate’s tone, no suggestion that this could be an historic event in the field of predictive modeling. Alex nodded, swiveled on his heel, and squeaked out.

Lena Ligon was indeed waiting, with an expression more of curiosity than impatience. “So you actually work here. In an office.”

“Yes, Mother. Is there anything wrong with that?”

“Oh, no. If that is what amuses you.” Her glance took in and rejected the metal walls, harsh lighting, and worn floor tiles. “And that was the famous Kate Lonaker. She is taller and better-looking in person than her video would suggest. Interesting, if it is all-natural and without modifications.”

It was not an actual question. Alex remained silent. He allowed his mother to lead the way, through the labyrinthine inner tunnels of Ganymede, then onto an elevator that ascended rapidly more than four hundred kilometers. By the time they reached their destination level, the effective gravity had increased appreciably.

Alex assumed that his mother had dropped the subject of Kate, as beneath consideration. But Lena said suddenly, “She does not talk about you in a typical supervisor-employee way.”

“Oh?”

“No. I sensed that she was angry with you about something. She has airs above her station.”

“I had to leave for this meeting, right when I was in the middle of making computer runs of my prediction models.”

“This meeting is important. Anyway, not that sort of anger. Something more personal.” His mother flashed a glance at Alex from clear gray eyes, their whites almost luminous with health. “Are you two doing what these days is known as co-orbiting, but in my simpler youth was known as fucking each other?”

“No.” That was currently a true statement. Fortunately Lena did not go on to more detailed questioning.

“Good,” she said. “Keep it that way. One of your problems, Alex, is that you do not appreciate the vast gulf between you and the Kate Lonakers of the world. Ever since the time of your late great-uncle Sanford, we Ligons have followed a strict selection procedure for child-bearing. The genetic material brought into the mating from outside the family comes not from a single individual, but is a carefully-chosen chromosomal synthesis from several donors. Kate Lonaker is, I feel sure, the product of some indiscriminate, one-Y, single-father breeding. To her and to women like her — females with no family, pedigree, property, or prospects — you represent a catch of almost unimaginable value. It would not be necessary for her to extort promises from you. She could merely beguile you into ignoring all precautions, allowing her to become pregnant with your child with or without your knowledge… I assume that you remain on long-term prophylaxis? There is, after all, such a thing as loyalty to family tradition.”

Alex felt a brief uneasiness. He had asked Kate at the outset if she was fertile, and she had replied that at the moment she preferred not to be. He had believed her implicitly, and still did; but he had not asked her recently.

His stronger emotion, however, was disgust at his mother’s hypocrisy. How dare she lecture him about family tradition, when her own decision to become a Commensal, like that of Great-aunt Agatha and Cousin Juliana, had been made without regard to family needs? Commensality conferred, along with health and protection from almost every disease, an irreversible sterility. Alex, walking a pace behind his mother, surveyed her slender form. She had made the choice and now had the appearance and energy of a twenty year old, combined with a formidable libido. Her features and figure were perfection.

Lena Ligon was also, in specific ways that made Alex nervous but apparently worried Lena not a bit, no longer quite human.

It made Alex’s own skin crawl to think what lay underneath his mother’s epidermis. A hundred tailored organisms shared space in the interior of a Commensal. The one that Alex found most disgusting was the giant schistosome, a mature and genetically-enhanced worm that lay alongside and within Lena Ligon’s liver. The original parasite had been the source of weakness and debility for hundreds of millions of people. This one now guarded its terrain, the lower intestines, against all infestations. A lung fluke did the same for the chest and upper body cavity, a third genemod parasite inhabited one of the larger sulci of the brain and warded off tumor growth, Parkinson’s, and Alzheimer’s. These were just the three big ones, many centimeters long. Scores of other body-dwellers in a Commensal ranged in size from a millimeter or two down to a handful of specialized cells. Put them all together, with their own needs and priorities, and it was no longer clear who or what controlled the agenda of Lena Ligon’s life.

It was not even clear that the changes to Lena were safe. The technology in its present form had been applied for less than three years. If the methods had been developed in a Ganymede or Mars medical research center, that would have been some reassurance; but the Commensals were leftover Great War technology, discovered in the drifting remains of a Belt weapons shop. Reputable rejuvenators hesitated to use it. Who knew the original objectives? Who knew the undocumented long-term side effects? But Lena Ligon’s feelings were fairly typical. “My dear, long-term effects are who-cares effects. We want to look good and feel good now.”

The worst thing of all, from Alex’s point of view, was Lena’s new smell. It was not exactly unpleasant, rather the opposite. His mother’s body and breath exuded a subtle, musky perfume of modified pheromones. But the odor was different. A kiss on the cheek from Lena Ligon was now a creepy experience for Alex, to be avoided whenever possible.

“Remember,” his mother said, as though reading Alex’s thoughts, “even if you find the sight, sound, and smell of this young woman rather strange, you must behave properly. If she smiles at you, smile back. If she offers you her hand, kiss it. If a subject seems distasteful to her, drop it at once. We can discuss any problems later, within the family. During the meeting, take your cues from me.”

Was his mother suggesting that Lucy-Maria Mobarak might also have become a Commensal?

It was a bit late to discuss the point. They were there. They had risen and risen, to a level of Ganymede higher than Alex had ever been except on obligatory school trips to see the stars at first-hand. This was the very highest level, with the actual surface no more than twenty meters above their heads. Alex’s first thought, that Cyrus Mobarak must have odd tastes to live in such a place, changed after a moment’s thought. The principal business of Mobarak Enterprises was fusion plants, and in the Outer System the fastest-growing use of fusion plants lay in transportation. While the number of colonized worlds grew linearly, transportation needs grew quadratically. The production of the Mobies had to be at the surface, or out in space itself.

As they stepped out onto the final level, the light changed. Alex instinctively looked up. Above his head, no more than ten meters away, stood a window with a glittering starscape beyond. His first thought — this is dangerous! — lasted only a split second. He realized that whatever the material of that window, it would be designed to withstand anything that hit it. The new Mobarak synthetics could supposedly tolerate a direct whack from a meteorite traveling at thirty kilometers a second. They could also dissipate impact energy so fast that only the top few centimeters of material were vaporized, while at the same time they photo-darkened so rapidly that the flash of light was no more than startling even from as close as ten meters.