Cerberus: A Wolf in the Fold Page 6

  Were there old people here? I wondered. And if not, where did all the new, fresh bodies come from?

  After another meal, they interviewed each of us in turn and had us take some basic placement tests, a few of which were familiar. The interview went smoothly enough, since their file on Qwin Zhang was no better than the one fed me and I could be creative where necessary with little fear of tripping up. But the personality tests, both written and by machine, were much, much more difficult. I had spent many months in classes and exercises learning how to get around such things, how to give the examiners the picture I wanted them to have—it involved - knowing everything from the theory of testing to the exact nature of the psych probe machines used, as well as sell-hypnotism and total body control—and I felt reasonably certain that nothing thrown at me was not properly and correctly countered.

  Later still we were holographically photographed and fingerprinted, had our retinal patterns taken, that sort of thing, and were also hooked up to a large machine the operative part of which looked like a test pilot’s crash helmet This, then, was the imprint-taker. A bit later we were taken in and a small headset with three fingerlike probes was lowered on our foreheads and a check made on a computer screen. Apparently the big apparatus was used only for the recording of the imprint; the little device would be the familiar control mechanism for checking it. There was no sensation with either device, and therefore no way to figure put how they operated, something I very much wanted to know. Unless you could fool or defeat that system any authority could trace your life exactly—where you were, whom you were with, what you bought, literally everything.

  In the evening they brought in cots for us. Apparently we were to remain there several days—until the Warden organism had “acclimated” itself to us—while they decided what to do with us. A book on the basic organization of the planet was provided, too. Dry but fascinating reading, including a great deal of detail about the social and economic structure.

  Politically there were several hundred boroughs, each with a central administration. Some were quite small, others huge, and seemed to be based on economic specialties as much as anything. The Chief Administrator of each borough was elected by the Chairmen of the Syndicate Councils in each borough. The syndicates were also economic units, composed of corporations of similar types, all apparently privately owned stock companies. The economic system was, then, basic corporate syndicalism. It works rather simply, really: all the like companies—steel, say—get together to form a syndicate headed by a government specialist on steel. The needs of the government and the private sectors are spelled out, and each steel company is given a share of all that business based on its size and productivity, guaranteeing it business and a profit, that margin also set by the syndicate and government expert—the Steel Minister, let’s call him. The only competitive factor is that a corporation within the syndicate which markedly increases productivity—does a better job, in other words, perhaps for less and thereby increasing its profits—will get a bigger share of the next quarter’s business.

  Extend this to every single raw materials and basic manufacturing business and you have a command economy, thoroughly under government control and management, that nonetheless rewards innovation and is profit-motivated. Only on the retail level would there be independent businesspeople, but even they would be under government control, since with profit margins fixed all wholesale prices would also be fixed. Then, using something as simple as borough zoning and business licenses, the government could apportion retail outlets where the people and need was. Because no money changed hands and the government handled even the simplest purchases electronically, there could be no hidden bank accounts, no stash of cash, nor even much barter—since all commodities would be allocated by and kept track of by the syndicates.

  Nice and neat. No wonder there were so few crimes, even without the ultimate punishment angle.

  From the individual’s viewpoint, he or she was a free employee. But since the ultimate control was the governments, you’d better not make the syndicate mad or you might find yourself unemployed—and being unemployed for more than three months for reasons other than medical in this society was a crime punishable by forced labor. It seemed that those basis raw materials came mostly from mines and works on several moons of Momrath, and the mining syndicate was always eager for new workers.

  To do anything you needed your identity card, which contained all your physical data, including your photo, but no name or personal details. That was on a programmable little microchip in the card itself which could be changed automatically should someone else find himself or herself in your body. Not to report a change was a crime punishable by being locked in an undesirable body and packed off to a lifetime of meaningful labor under the shine of beautiful Momrath.

  The next day I asked our hosts how it would be possible to lock someone into a body, and was told that some people, through sheer concentration and force of will, could essentially “cut off” your Warden beasties from sufficient contact to make a switch. These people, called judges, were on call to the government; they didn’t judge but merely carried out sentences. Top judges working together could actually force a transfer, too.

  And of course there it was. Older, undesirable bodies were always around, and you could reward the faithful with a young, new body while shipping the malefactor off to Momrath until he or she dropped dead.

  Chief industries were light manufacturing in general, computers and computer design, weapons, tools, all manner of wood products, seafood protein, and fertilizer. They even exported some of this stuff beyond the Warden system, something I hadn’t realized was possible. It was even possible to “sterilize” some types of things, mostly inorganic compounds, and keep them together and working. That led to an obvious connection. That very human robot that had broken into the defense computers, for example. Was it possible that somewhere here among the more primitive machines, at least one place was turning out these sophisticated robots to some alien-supplied design? And if so, was there here some sort of programming genius capable of turning out robots so real they would fool even close friends and family, as had the alien robot? It sounded and felt right. No violent criminals here, they said. Only technological ones. The best.

  By our fourth day all of us were becoming bored and restless. As much as could be learned in any brief period bad already been taught us, so obviously we were being kept here at this point only for reasons not yet revealed by our hosts. For me, the wait was getting dangerous, since several of the prisoners had formed casual liaisons and I’d been propositioned repeatedly. Pressure mounted as I became a “challenge” to a couple of the men. I had no desire for any such experience, not in this body, but the situation was causing a social gap to open between me and the others. I wanted this waiting over with and for us to be out in the world as soon as possible.

  I also wanted classification, something they certainly should have been able to do long before now, considering all the tests. I’d tried to angle the aptitude parts heavily toward computers and math, since not only was that consistent with the individual I was supposed to be but also that was where the greatest potential for moving up and finding out things might be. Besides, I’d listed a high level of expertise on many of the older-type computers in use here.

  Near the end of the fourth day it hit me just what we were waiting for. Obviously, if some measure of control was needed, they didn’t want to throw us Cerberan virgins out before we knew just what the Warden facts of life would be. Close proximity, they’d said.

  All those cots all close together.

  Acclimation, they’d told us, took three or four days, so it was about right. They were waiting, then, until the morning when all or most of us woke up in different bodies.

  That thought brought up a mental dilemma for me. If we had to switch to leave, I’d rather leave as a man—but because of the personal problem I noted, I’d been sleeping off in a corner nearest the other women but more or less
to myself. How many days would it take? I wondered. And did I have the skill and the guts to get on with this? I finally decided I had to give it a try or be trapped on the wrong side. So I picked my man carefully with an eye to age, looks, physical condition, and the like. Fortunately, my candidate, Hull Bruska, was a shy, somewhat gentle-seeming man who had caused me the least problems. His crime was even more remote from people than Qwin’s had been. Apparently he’d managed electronically to tap and shift small parts of planetary budgets into frontier accounts, all from a small repair service on one of the civilized worlds. He was somewhat proud of his accomplishment, and not at all hesitant to talk about it The cause of his downfall, ironically, was that he was too successful. Too much money showed up in the accounts of several frontier banks, the kind that attracts security, police just because of the size of the assets. Obviously he needed to use more than the four banks he did to spread it out. When a bank’s assets quadruple in less than two years without apparent cause, you know somebody’s going to ask how, but Bruska’s forte was machines, not the fine points of getting away with the spoils.

  Curiously, he had no real plans for the money. He’d done it, he told me, mostly out of boredom. After nine years of repair and redesign of financial computers he’d simply worked it out as a mental exercise, “more or less for fun.” Then when he’d put his plan into action just to see if it would work, and it had, doing it again became sort of irresistible, almost to see how much he could get away with. “I wasn’t really hurting anybody,” he explained, “and there was a tiny bit of satisfaction in fooling the whole Confederacy, of putting one over on them. Kinda made them human.”

  I liked Bruska, who also enjoyed talking about himself enough that we never got through the hand-holding stage that night. He was shy enough as a man that maybe, I hoped, becoming a woman would open up a whole new social life for him.

  We slept very close, my cot against a wall and his next to mine to minimize any risks on my part. I fell asleep that night hoping against hope I’d get lucky, and quickly.

  DATA REPORT INTERRUPTION. END TRANSMISSION DIRECT TRANSCEIVER, AS SUBJECT LEFT. ORIGINAL BODY, ORGANIC TRANSMITTER LINK BROKEN. SUBSEQUENT REPORTS VIA READOUT BY SUBCONSCIOUS DEEP-PROBE HYPNOTIC COMMAND INTO DEVICES SUPPLIED, CUED, NATIVE AGENTS IN OUR EMPLOY. RUN NEXT SEQUENCE READOUT. SUBJECT UNAWARE OF COMPULSION OR READOUT.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Settling In

  All but four of us changed bodies during that fourth night. Luck being with me, I was once again young, male, and Confederacy standard, although Bruska didn’t really accept the swap with good grace. They separated all of us quickly to minimize the trauma, and I was assured that good psychs would help those who needed it to adjust

  They did a complete set of tests once again, mostly on the psych side, to determine if any of us not showing severe distress were actually hiding it. Naturally I passed with flying colors. I was overjoyed at my carefully planned result.

  I also found that the two most objectionable men had changed with their female partners during that night, which I considered poetic justice. Let them find out how unpleasant men like them could be from the other side; then perhaps if they got to be men again they’d be better and more considerate.

  The small ID card was simply placed in a slot. I was told it would work from any slot for it, in stores or even to unlock doors, if you first called the number of the Identity Placement Bureau and told them which slot you were using. Basically, Bruska’s name and computer code were erased from the little chip and mine were placed there. They did a check with the brain-reading machine to make sure all worked okay, and it had, so at last I was given an assignment.

  “Tooker Compucorp in Medlam needs programmers,” I was told, “and your experience fits that bill. Two hundred units have been credited to your account compliments of the government, which will be enough to get you there and get you settled. It’s a good company and a good location if you like the tropics. Warm there most of the year.”

  And with little more than this and some instructions on how to buy things like clothes and tickets and who to see, I was off.

  I found that the little three-pronged gadgets were literally everywhere. To get on the shuttle to Medlam you walked up, put your card in the slot, and put on the little device. If everything checked, the fare was deducted from your account and your card returned to you, and in this case a physical ticket was printed. Very efficient and very simple.

  I also found that a number of small purchases worked just with the card—newspapers, confections, that sort of thing.

  It was a long ride with a lot of stops and several times I had to keep myself from dozing off—the situation could get serious if somebody else was dozing too. Fortunately the shuttle had a small food service dispensing system where you could get stimulant drinks, including a Cerberan version of coffee and another of tea, and snacks. I drank a lot of stimulant drinks along the way and needed all of them.

  I arrived late in the afternoon, but got a robocab to the Tooker offices anyway on the off-chance that I wouldn’t be too late for that day.

  The place was imposing, that was for sure. Glassy windows lined towering tree trunks all around, and in between, cradled like some play treehouse for the impossibly rich, an imposing all-glass-fronted office building that connected to all the vast trunks. This, then, was Tooker.

  The main offices had already closed for the day, but the night staff was very cordial and recommended a nearby hotel for the night. The hotel, entirely in a massive trunk, was modern and luxurious inside. Nervously, I called the Central Banking number to see how much I still had left after all this, and was surprised and relieved to find that I still had 168.72 units in my account.

  The only unusual thing about the room was that there was a switch in the headboard of the bed with a sign that read: turn before sleeping. I discovered that turning it raised plating around the bed from floor to ceiling, plates of some thin but firm plasticlike substance through which ran metal threads of some sort.

  Claustrophobia, then, was a real problem on Cerberus. The shield was obviously there to ensure a good night’s sleep with no unexpected exchanges. I wondered what sort of distance would be the maximum range for a sleep -exchange and decided I’d have to know that. I asked one of the desk employees about it, and he, upon finding I was new, told me that the shields weren’t necessary in the hotel and that almost nobody used them, but they were there because some big shots became paranoid. Although in some cases, an exchange could take place at up to twenty meters, the walls, floor, and ceiling of all rooms were treated to shield. That made me feel a little better, and I didn’t use the shield again that evening.

  The room vision monitors were no help, since they seemed composed of years-old bad programming from the civilized worlds and some really horrible and amateurish local programming, but I got a print-out of the local paper and looked it over. Not much there, either—not big-city scope at all; more like the vacuous weeklies produced in some rural areas. The only unique item was a small column back with the classifieds for personals and announcements called “switched,” followed by a double column of names—maybe a dozen pairs. One way to know who your friends really were here, I reflected.

  In fact, the ads were the only things of real interest There was evidently a small but thriving competitive sector on consumer goods allowed between the corporations, assuring a variety of goods at less than totally uniform prices. On the civilized worlds, of course, there were few brands of anything. For example, the best tested and most recommended toothpaste was everybody’s toothpaste, perhaps in three or four flavors, and there were no brands or competition. Here there was, for the first time since I’d been on the frontier, and I found I kind of liked it

  There were also banks, although they were not such full-service institutions as those with which I was familiar. Apparently you could take some of your units out of the master account and place it with a bank at interest, and also borrow money from such banks. T
here was therefore a semi-independent subeconomy here, and that too was worth noting.

  Judging from the want ads, Tooker was the big employer, but many other places also advertised, so some movement was possible on one’s own. The independent merchants advertised a lot for part-time help, too, suggesting some economic disparity and also indicating that, even if the executive offices closed in the late afternoon, Tooker operated around the clock in many divisions.

  To my surprise, some churches were listed—in fact, a fair number of them for just about every belief under the sun, including some new to me that sounded pretty bizarre. Also part-time schools to better yourself or your position, lots of the usual stuff like that.

  That brought up a point, and I checked the local phone directory. No schools for the young were listed anywhere, nor were there any headings for day care or other services for children or parents. Obviously I still had gaps to fill in for this new culture.

  Medlam, being subtropical, seemed to have a number of resorts and tourist-oriented stuff, including several for “Thrilling Charter Bork Hunts!” whatever a bork was.

  Interestingly, nowhere, not in the briefing, not in the guide book, nor anywhere else was there reference to Wagant Laroo. The Lord of Cerberus certainly kept a low profile.

  The next day I checked out bright and early and showed up at the Tooker personnel office. They were expecting me and quickly processed me into the corporation. The job was thirty-eight hours a week at 2.75 units per hour, although that could increase up to 9.00 units with seniority in my assistant’s position and even more should I move up. I definitely intended on moving up. I was told, too, that I was a Class I Individual, which was reserved for those with special skills. Class I’s kept the same job regardless of body. Class IPs kept the same job regardless of who was inside the body. There was also a Class III for unskilled workers who could switch jobs if they and their employers agreed—a sort of safety valve, I guessed. Idly I asked what happened if a I and n switched, and was told matter-of-factly that in that case the decision on who did what was made by the government, usually getting judges to switch them back forcibly.