“Carrying rates are for class two—when the Big ES selects the incubator.”
“I know. I know,” said Tinker. “But I don’t know anyone who would carry for me, free.”
The clerk nodded and punched the problem into the Embryomeck. A new flimsy rattled out. It was a direct order.
“Get yourself polarized, Tinker. Then find someone who will love you enough to carry—and do it in six weeks.”
Tinker recognized the tone in his voice. An order from the Big ES. Clicking his heels, he snapped, “Yes, sir. Right away, sir.”
Tinker pushed his way through the rancid, seborrheic crowds on his way to Polarization Clinic. He studied the sea of monotonous, pasty faces, searching for a possible incubator. Gnats and lice clung to the sticky skins of the more sluggish. He saw only vermin and spiritual ugliness. None showed signs of mentation, let alone stimulation. No possible mates.
“Going to swing hetero, honey?” cackled the Pol. Clin. Attendant—an arthritic, toothless old hag well up in her twenties.
“Order from Big ES,” he explained.
She sobered. With Parkinsonian tremors she uncovered her instrument tray. The knife steadied as it dug for the APC in the flesh of his forearm. She removed the time-release mesh.
“Here’s your anti-puberty cocoon,” she said. Knife and mesh clattered onto the tray. Syntheskin was sprayed. Androgen and FSH priming doses were Hi Vol injected. Ten minutes later he stumbled back into the spiral crowds—feeling unchanged. Three weeks later a feeble erection announced that his sacral parasympathetics were polarizing. The boys in Psych charted his bioelectrical response to erotic stimuli—tone improved.
Other than warming his loins, polarization seemed to do little to solve Tinker’s problem of finding an incubator. If anything, it made it even more difficult. His senses were more acute, and he was much more critical of his fellow citizens. He noticed new repulsive odors. The crowded, vermin-infested tubeways were intolerable. On his way to Hunter Control the stench got to be so bad that he vomited—adding his slippery stomach contents to the nondescript slime underfoot.
Tinker walked into Garage and began to empty his sack—placing repaired meck eyes on the bench.
“Polarization is rough,” he complained to Val. “I vomited on the way over today. Never did that before.”
Val picked up an eye, admiring the bright new fittings. “Your neurohumoral axis is getting stronger. Can’t tamper with the gonads alone, you know. Pituitary, autonomic nervous system, adrenals, thyroid—all play their part in polarization.”
Tinker sat down, face pale. “But what has vomiting to do with sex?”
“The reflex is autonomic,” said Val. “Before, as a neuter, you ignored most of your environment—at least your body did. Now, you’re becoming a sexually active male. I suppose it goes back to the jungles somewhere. Primitive creatures needed their senses to find mates and avoid enemies. Your body is looking for a mate now.”
Tinker drank some water. He climbed up onto Bird Dog’s shoulder and plugged in the big eye he had been working on.
“That’s all I need—for my gonads to take me on a trip back down the evolutionary tree. What will that do to my work output? What can Big ES gain from that?”
Val shrugged. “No choice. With the budget so tight the hive can’t afford all class ones. Meck uteri are too costly. And, apparently, your budchild will be needed in about ten years. So a class three is mandatory. Don’t worry about your output. It might even go up if we all ignore some of your peculiarities while you’re changing.”
Tinker felt like they were discussing his transformation into some sort of a beast. “My peculiarities?” he said. “At least I don’t send hunters to their deaths in blind Huntercraft.”
Val raised an eyebrow. “But we must have crop protection. The defective parts are back-ordered.”
“A little first-line maintenance might save a few lives. Or is getting oil on your hands above your caste?”
Val didn’t answer. He just smiled and said: “See what I mean about developing peculiarities. Polarization has certainly made you crusty.”
“Don’t avoid the issue. If maintenance is outside your specialty, why don’t you take one of your own ships out on a Hunt—a real Hunt, not just a shakedown cruise.”
Val smiled and walked away. “Want anything from the dispenser?” he called over his shoulder.
Tinker returned to his work.
Tinker noticed a subtle change in the tubeway crowds. They were no longer a monotonous sea of faces. He was certain that the retinal images were still the same. Only now his visual cortex began to sort those images into neuts and polarized. The neuts faded into the background of Nebish nothings—a pasty collage of empty faces. The polarized, both male and female, instantly attracted his attention—sullen males—shapely fems. About one in a thousand appeared polarized.
His home spiral used to be just mildly unpleasant. That changed too. Rats and lice caught his eye. Maggoty bodies angered him. Then, for the first time, he noticed the begger—fat and edematous. He knew this discovery was due to his new visual sorting, for the begger had obviously been there for months—paralyzed—slowly dying of the wet beriberi. Stretcher-carrying Meditecks searched along the spiral. The begger hid in a dusty access hatch. A Sweeper slurped along cleaning up damp spots left by the begger’s oozing ulcers.
Tinker stopped outside the hatch, listening to furtive movements from ’tween walls. “Poor retired bastard,” he mumbled. He shouldered his way through the food line and ordered a liter of high-thiamine barley soup. Dispenser circuits noted this change from his usual diet. Ignoring suspicious optics, he carried the hot container back to the access hatch. Aromatic steam spread.
“Flavored calories,” he called, softly.
The begger drank with trembling hands while Tinker looked over his shoulder into the dark nest. Unopened packets of calorie-basic were scattered around in the thick dust. No flavors.
“That was nice,” said a female voice behind him.
Tinker turned and saw a very young polarized female. Her soft tunic was gathered by a tight belt. His eyes caressed her face and locked onto a pair of large symmetrical breasts.
“You are focusing,” she said coyly. The apathetic crowd vanished before his eyes. Deep in his pelvis, synapses screamed FEMALE.
“What?” he stammered.
“That was nice,” she repeated. “Giving that old man your food ration—”
His wits returned. Giving of alms was a function of Big ES. If the begger had to beg at all it meant he had lost his credits. Supporting such an outcast was wrong. He felt a flush of guilt—which was quickly replaced by anger.
“I can afford it.”
“It was still nice. Most citizens wouldn’t even notice him.” She approached and leaned against him fingering his Sagittarius emblem. He stumbled back, awkwardly. Body contact was meld activity. It felt wrong in public.
“Who are you?” he blurted.
“I am Mu Ren,” she said distinctly. “One-half MRBL—second subculture, Mu Renal cell line from the BL clone. But that isn’t important. What is important is—that I am ten years old, spontaneously polarized, and assigned to you as a class three incubator.”
He pulled his eyes away from her soft curves long enough to see her footlocker behind her.
“The Watcher assigned me,” she said, reaching for his hand.
Tinker tried to look at her analytically, but the fire in his loins colored his judgment. She did appear to be a complete polarization, and if it had actually been spontaneous then she should make a very good incubator.
“Watcher took me out of the stacks when I polarized. I was assigned to a family-5, but I hesitated in the meld. Because of my youth I was given a rematch. Your request for an incubator came through just in time. I think I could enjoy a family-2.”