Wingrove, David - Chung Kuo 02 (36 page)

Hal went over to
the desk and sat, the strain of standing for so long showing in his
face. "Is that so bad, Ben? Surely you have the same in any art
form? You know that the book in your hands is just paper and ink, the
film you're watching an effect of light on celluloid, a painting the
result of spreading oils on a two-dimensional canvas. The medium is
always there, surely?"

"Yes. But
it doesn't have to be. Not in this case. That's what's so exciting
about it. For the first time ever you can dispense with the sense of
'medium' and have the experience direct, unfiltered."

"I don't
follow you, Ben. Surely you'll always be aware that you're lying
inside a machine, no matter how good the fiction?"

"Why?"
Ben buttoned the shirt, pulled on his pants and trousers, and went
over to his father, standing over him, his eyes burning. "What
if you could get rid of all the distractions? Wouldn't that change
the very nature of the fiction you were creating? Imagine it! It
would seem as real as this now—as me talking to you here, now,
you sitting there, me standing, the warm smell of oil and machinery
surrounding us, the light just so, the temperature just so.
Everything as it is. Real. As real as real, anyway."

"Impossible,"
Hal said softly, looking away. "You could never make something
that good."

"Why not?"
Ben turned away a moment, his whole body fired by a sudden
enthusiasm. "What's preventing me from doing it? Nothing.
Nothing but my own will."

Hal shrugged,
then looked back at his son, a faint smile of admiration lighting his
tired features momentarily. "Perhaps. But it's not as easy as
that, Ben. That little clip you experienced. How long do you think it
was?"

Ben considered.
"Two minutes. Maybe slightly longer."

Hal laughed,
then grew more serious. "It was two minutes and fourteen
seconds, and yet it took a team of eight men more than three weeks to
make. It's a complex form, Ben. I keep telling you that. To do what
you're talking about, well, it would take a huge team of men years to
achieve."

Ben turned,
facing his father, his face suddenly very still. "Or a single
man a lifetime?"

Hal narrowed his
eyes. "What do you mean?"

"I mean
myself. My calling. For months now I've been experimenting with the
morph. Trying to capture certain things. To mimic them, then
reproduce them on a tape. But this ... these
pai pi
... . .
they're the same kind of thing. Stores of experience. Shells, filled
with the very yolk-of being. Or at least they could be."

"Shells ...
I like that. It's a good name for them."

Strangely, Ben
smiled. "Yes. It is, isn't it. Shells."

Hal studied his
son a moment longer then looked down. "I had another reason for
showing these to you. Something more selfish."

"Selfish?"

"Yes.
Something I want you to help me with."

"Ah . . ."

The hesitation
in Ben's face surprised him. "There's something I have to ask
you first," Ben said quickly. "Something I need from you."

Hal sat back
slightly. So Beth was right. Ben
was
restless here. Yes, he
could see it now. "You want to leave here. Is that it?"

Ben nodded.

"And so you
can. But not now. Not just yet."

"Then
when?"

Again, the
hardness in Ben's voice was unexpected. He had changed a great deal
in the last few months. Had grown, become his own man.

"Three
months. Is that so long to wait?"

Ben was still a
moment, considering, then shook his head. "No. I guess not.
You'll get me into Oxford?"

"Wherever
you want. I've already spoken to the T'ang."

Ben's eyes
widened with surprise.

Hal leaned
forward, concealing his amusement, and met his son's eyes defiantly.
"You think I don't know how it feels?" He laughed. "You
forget I was born here, too. And I, too, was seventeen once, believe
it or not. I know what it's like, that feeling of missing out on
life. I know it all too well. But I want something from you in
return. I want you to help me."

Ben took a
breath, then nodded. "All right. But how?"

Hal hesitated,
then looked away. "I want to make a
pai pi... a
shell.
For your mother. Something she can keep."

Ben frowned. "I
don't understand. Why? And what kind of shell?"

Hal looked up
slowly. He seemed suddenly embarrassed, awkward. "Of myself. But
it's to be a surprise. A present. For her birthday."

Ben watched his
father a moment, then turned and looked back at the ornate casing of
the machine. "Then we should make a few changes to that, don't
you think? It looks like a coffin."

Hal shuddered.
"I know . . ."

"We should
get workmen in . . ." Ben began, turning back, then stopped as
he saw how his father was staring down at his hands. Hands that were
trembling like the hands of a very old man.

Ben's voice was
almost a whisper. "What's wrong?"

He saw how his
father folded his hands together, then looked up, a forced smile
shutting out the fear that had momentarily taken hold of his
features. "It's nothing. I ..." He stopped and turned. Meg
was standing just behind him. She had entered silently.

"The man's
come," she said hesitantly.

"The man?"

Meg looked from
one to the other, disturbed by the strange tension in the room; aware
that she had interrupted something. "The man from ProsTek. He's
come to see to Ben's hand."

"Ben's
hand?" Hal turned, looking across at Ben, then he laughed. A
brief, colorless laugh. "Of course. Your mother said."

Ben's eyes
didn't leave his father for a moment. "Thanks. Tell Mother I'll
be up."

She hesitated,
wanting to ask him what was wrong, but she could see from the look of
him that she was excluded from this.

"Ben?"

Still he didn't
look at her. "Go on. I told you. I'll be up."

She stood there
a moment longer, surprised and hurt by the sudden curtness in his
voice. Then, angered, she turned and ran back down the space between
the racks and up the steps.

At the top of
the steps she stopped, calming herself. Hal had said no. That was it!
And now Ben was angry with her, because she didn't want him to go
either. Meg shivered, her anger suddenly washed from her; then,
giving a soft laugh of delight, she pushed the door open and went
through.

* *
*

THE HAND LAY on
the table, filaments trailing from the precisely severed wrist like
fine strands of hair. It was not like the other hand. This one shone
silver in the light, its surfaces soft and fluid like mercury. Yet
its form suggested heaviness and strength. Meg, staring at it from
across the room, could imagine the being from which it had been cut:
a tall, faceless creature with limbs on which the sunlight danced
like liquid fire. She could see him striding through the grass below
the cottage. See the wood of the door splinter like matchwood before
his fist.

She shuddered
and turned, looking back at the man kneeling at Ben's side. As she
looked he glanced up at her and smiled: a polite, pleasant smile. He
was a Han. Lin Hou Ying, his name was. A tiny, delicate man in his
sixties, with hands that were so small they seemed like a child's.
Hands so doll-like and delicate, in fact, that she had asked him if
they were real.

"These?"
He held them up to her, as if for her appraisal. Then he had laughed.
"These hands are mine. I was born with them. But as to what is
real. . ."

He had almost
finished removing the damaged hand by now. As she watched, he leaned
close, easing the pressure on the vise that held the hand, then bent
down and selected one of the tiny instruments from the case on the
floor beside his knee. For a moment longer he was busy, leaning over
the hand, making the final few adjustments that would disconnect it.

"There,"
he said, finally, leaning back and looking up into Ben's face. "How
does that feel?"

Ben lifted his
left arm up toward his face, then turned it, studying the clean line
of the stump. "It's strange," he said, after a moment. "The
pain's gone. And yet it feels as if the hand's still there. I can
flex my fingers now and they don't hurt."

Lin Hou Ying
smiled. "Good. That's a sure sign it was only the unit that was
damaged. If you had twisted it badly or damaged the nerve connections
it might have been more difficult. As it is, I can fit you with a
temporary unit until the old one is repaired."

"That thing
there?"

Lin glanced
across. "Yes. I'm sorry it's so ugly."

"No. Not at
all. I think it's quite beautiful."

Meg laughed
uncomfortably. "No.
Shih
Lin's right. It's ugly. Brutal."

"It's only
a machine," Ben answered her, surprised by the vehemence, the
bitterness in her voice. "It has no life other than that which
we give it."

"It's
horrible," she insisted. "Like the morph. Like all such
things."

Ben shrugged and
looked back at Lin Hou Ying. "Does it function like the other
one?"

The small man
had been studying the hand in the vise, probing it with one of the
tiny scalpels. He looked up, smiling.

"In certain
ways, yes; but in others it's a vast improvement on this model here.
Things have changed greatly in the last five years. Prosthetics among
them. The response time's much enhanced. It's stronger, too. And in
that particular model"— he indicated the hand on the table
with a delicate motion of his head—"there's a remote
override."

Ben stared at it
a moment, then looked back at Lin Hou Ying. "Why's that?"

Lin stood and
went across to the carrying case that stood on the floor beside the
table. Earlier he had taken the hand from it. "Look," he
said, taking something from inside. "Here's the rest of the
unit."

It was an arm. A
silver arm. Ben laughed. "How much more of him have you?"

Lin laughed,
then brought the arm across. In his other hand he held a control box.
"Some of our customers have lost far more than you,
Shih
Shepherd. The arm is a simple mechanism. It is easy to construct one.
But a hand. Well, a hand is a complex thing. Think of the diversity
of movements it's possible to make with a hand. Rather than waste our
efforts making a single unit of hand and arm together, we decided
long ago to specialize—to concentrate on the hands. And
this"—he handed Ben the control box—"controls
the hand."

"Can I?"

Lin lowered his
head slightly. "As you wish,
Shih
Shepherd."

For a while Ben
experimented, making the fingers bend and stretch, the hand flex and
clench. Then he turned it and made it scuttle, slowly, awkwardly,
like a damaged crab, on the table's surface.

Ben set the box
down. "Can I keep this?"

Lin bowed his
head. "Of course. And the arm?"

Ben laughed,
then looked across at Meg and saw how she was watching him. He looked
down. "No. Take the arm."

Just then the
door at the far end of the room opened and his mother came in,
carrying a small tray. Behind her came the kitten, Zarathustra.

"Refreshments,
Shih
Lin?"

The small man
bowed low. "You honor me,
nu shi
."

Beth started to
put the tray down on the table beside the silver hand, but as she did
so, the kitten jumped up on the chair beside her and climbed up onto
the table.

"Hey..."

Meg made to move
forward, but Ben reached out, holding her arm with his right hand.
"No. Leave him. He's only playing."

His mother
turned, looking at him.

"There,"
he said, indicating a small table to one side of the room.

He watched her
go across and put the tray down, then looked back at the kitten. It
was sniffing at the fingers of the hand and lifting its head
inquisitively.

"Don't. .
." Meg said quietly.

He half-turned,
looking at her. "I won't hurt it."

"No,"
she said, brushing his hand aside and moving across to lift the
kitten and cradle it. "He's real. Understand? Don't toy with
him."

He watched her a
moment, then looked down at the control box in his lap.
Real,
he
thought.
But how real
is
real? For if all I am
is
a
machine of blood and bone, of nerve and flesh, then to what end do I
function? How real am I?

Machines of
flesh. The phrase echoed in his head. And then he laughed. A cold,
distant laughter.

"What is
it, Ben?"

He looked up,
meeting his mother's eyes. "Nothing."

He was quiet a
moment, then he turned, looking across at the Han. "Relax a
while,
Shih
Lin. I must find my father. There's something I
need to ask him."

* *
*

HE FOUND HAL in
the dining room, the curtains drawn, the door to the kitchen pulled
to. In the left-hand corner of the room there was a low table on
which were set the miniature apple trees the T'ang had given the
Shepherds five years before. The joined trees were a symbol of
conjugal happiness, the apple an omen of peace but also of illness.

His father was
kneeling there in the darkened room, his back to Ben, his forearms
stretched out across the low table's surface, resting on either side
of the tree, his head bent forward. He was very still, as if asleep
or meditating; but Ben, who had come silently to the doorway, knew at
once that his father had been crying.

"What is
it?" he said softly.

Hal's shoulders
tensed; slowly his head came up. He stood and turned, facing his son,
wiping the tears away brusquely, his eyes fierce, proud. "Shut
the door. I don't want your mother to hear. Nor Meg." Ben closed
the door behind him, then turned back, noting how intently his father
was watching him, as if to preserve it all. He smiled faintly. Yes,
he thought, there's far more of me in you than I ever realized.
Brothers, we are. I know it now for certain.