"Kiln People" - читать интересную книгу автора (Brin David)

6 It’s Not Easy Being Green

I hate getting off the warming tray, throwing paper garments over limbs that still glow with ignition enzymes.

Not only am I a copy today, I’m the greenie.

Damn.

After a thousand times, it still feels like I’m being punished. Given a long list of nasty chores. Sent to take all sorts of risks you’d never put Lord Protobody through.

I start this pseudolife filled with dark feelings.

Ugh. What a mood. Archie must really be tired to start me off with a Standing Wave as gloomy as this. Any worse and I might’ve been a frankie …

Well, shrug it off! Today you’re an ant.

And green, at that. Leave philosophy to your betters.

Well, last night another green took on Beta’s henchdits, and won. A hero-duplicate, who slogged through hell to bring back vital news. So a green can matter! Even if today’s job is to fetch groceries, clean toilets, mow the lawn, and other horrors.

Grays get fancy realtime recorders. But I gotta do quick dumps into an old microtape ring. Post hoc. Don’t know why I bother. If Archie wants to know what I did today, he can inload and find out.

I rode into town behind gray number one, keeping both eyes tight shut while he swerved like a maniac, risking both of our carcasses, and nearly wrecked our last Vespa. Schmuck.

Left him in a park, waiting to meet the UK limo they’re sending over. He’ll see the beautiful Ritu soon, and talk to Vic Kaolin, and maybe investigate a murder.

And later, maybe tonight, realAlbert will get lonesome. He’ll go thaw the sybarite Clara left for us in her freezer. I felt a wave of irrational jealousy about that. A temptation to drive over to her houseboat and use it myself!

Of course I didn’t. Her dit would take one look at me and refuse to waste itself on the coarse senses of a green. Anyway, what’s the point? If I inload, I’ll rejoin Albert and share it all in realflesh. And when Clara returns from the front, I’ll share that reunion, too.

So I went about my chores. Visited the market, adding some fresh items to the normal delivery — fruits and deli stuff, plus a gourmet dish or two. Should arrive by the time Archie wakes from his nap. I hope I’ll like the herring. It’s Danish.

Dropped by the bank and updated my level three passcodes. Everyone does a monthly update in person, with biometric and chemical scans to verify you’re you. But for weeklies a ditto will do. No one can fake a personal Standing Wave. Anyway, it’s been years since the Big Heist. Some analysts think cyber crime is already passé.

That may be. But villainy still worries citizens. It comes up as a top priority every election. There must be nearly a hundred real cops in this city alone. If Yosil Maharal was murdered, that makes twelve homicides in the state so far this year. And summer’s barely half over.

I don’t fear being unemployed soon.

Oh, the phone rang while I was shopping. It was Pallie, needing some attention again.

Albert grumbled. “I’ve got three dits running around on errands. One will drop by, if time allows.”

Three dits?

Gray number one is busy with Ritu Maharal and Vic Kaolin — a big case, maybe a real moneymaker. Gineen Wammaker may tie up gray number two all day.

Care to bet I’ll be sent to hear Pal’s latest conspiracy theory?

Crum. What’s a greenie for?

Had to pick up the lawn mower from fix-it shop. Repairs cost eight-fifty, plus abatement fees for the old gas engine. Tied it securely to the back of the Vespa, but that messed the scooter’s balance. Nearly cracked up in a fast curve on the way home. Got a five-point violation, too. Crap.

At least the mower started right up. (Mitch, the repair guy, knows his stuff. He was there in person, this time.) Soon I had the lawn edged better than that orange-striped “gardener” everyone else in the neighborhood hires. Things grow on my tiny patch of earth. Roses. Fresh carrots and berries. I like growing things, same as Clara needs to hear water lapping on the hull of her houseboat.

Next, tackle the pile of dishes in the sink, then toilets. Might as well clean the whole damn house while I’m at it. Except vacuuming. Lord Archie’s gotta nap.

Ho-hum.

Some days I weigh existential matters. Simple ones a green can grasp. Like, should I volunteer NOT to inload tonight? I mean, why remember this banality? Albert’s already experienced nearly a hundred subjective years, counting golem recollections. Some techies put a theoretical max at five centuries. So why not conserve?

I’ve debated this with myself lots of times, and recall always deciding to inload. Well, duh! Only those dittos who chose continuity became part of continuing memory. But Nell says more than a hundred and eighty of my copies chose oblivion instead. Dispirited deputy-selves who endured dreary days that I’m better off forgetting.

Heck, there are days I had in person that I’d erase, if I could. An ancient problem, I guess. At least nowadays you get a little choice in the matter.

Pausing at Archie’s work screen, I looked over our ongoing cases — about a dozen routine investigations, tracked by priority and progress charts. Most can be pursued by Net — making remote enquiries, sifting data from public sources, or persuading the owners of private streetcams to share their posse archives without a court order. Sometimes I send out my own spy-wasps to follow suspects around town. I couldn’t afford to stay in business if everything had to be done in person, or even by golem-duplicate.

Half of the cases involve my specialty — snaring copyright violators. Pros like Beta offer endless aggravation, but fortunately most rip-offs are done by amateurs. The same goes for face thieves, who send out dittos with illegally forged features, pretending they were roxed from other people. Troublemaking kids, mostly. Catch ’em. Fine ’em. Teach ’em to behave.

Then there are jealous spouses — a private eye’s standby, since the days of ragtime.

Some modern marriages are complex, admitting new partners by joint consent. Most folks prefer old-fashioned monogamy. But what does that mean nowadays? If a husband sends a ditto to fool around while he’s busy at work, does that constitute fantasy, flirtation, or outright infidelity? If a wife rents a little whitey to get through a lonely afternoon, is that prostitution, or a bit of harmless diddling with an appliance?

Most people think flesh-on-flesh still feels best. But clay can’t get pregnant or pass disease. It lets you rationalize, too. Some partners draw the line at inloading memories after a dittosex affair. If it isn’t remembered, it didn’t happen. No recall, no foul.

But if you can’t remember it, what was the point?

All the complications can get confusing for creatures with jealous whims that formed in the Stone Age. Anyway, hurt feelings aren’t my concern, just facts. The crux is that civilization fails without accountability. What people do with it is their own concern.

Scanning the screen, I see I’ll need four dits tomorrow. Two just for stakeouts and tails. The freezer is well stocked with blanks, but our scooter situation is dire.

Onscreen I see that gray number two just requested more Turkomens. I prefer Vespas, but who listens to a green?

Looking around the house, I see more cleaning to do. Pencils to sharpen and notes to file. More grotty chores, so the real me can spend precious fleshtime being creative.

I’d let out a long sigh … if this body were equipped for it.

To hell with all this. I’m going to the beach!