“Bubblers are monitored too. We have many pools at City-base. Some carry a fairly clean flow.”
They climbed down through the City’s organs together—the bulky, round-shouldered giant and the tiny hemihuman who alternately walked on his hands and swung from cables.
Hemihuman Larry and Gargoyle Har in one of the City’s larger tracheal air vents. Their bedding of discarded issue tissue formed secure nests that contained their personal treasures salvaged from the Tweenwall depths.
“I like this place,” said the hulking gargoyle, “because that side vent leads to Security. If you crawl about thirty yards and peek through the louvers you’ll see their wall maps—transportation and trouble areas. I sleep better when I know what my pursuers are doing.”
Hemihuman nodded. He sorted through the debris at the bottom of his nest, tossing worthless items aside. “Looks like I’m about out of food.”
“Come on.”
They moved along the struts.
“Those small grape-like cubicles are living quarters. See how similar they are. We are looking for a wide area in one of the main corridors—where Dispensers are located.”
“We just passed one,” said Larry.
“The Dispenser is out of order back there,” explained the giant. “See these gritty brown pipes? They carry the calories-and-quarters basic paste—CQB. I put my hands on them to see if food is coming in. If the pipes are quiet—no food. No sense charging out and exposing ourselves unless there is something to eat.”
“Only one pipe to a Dispenser?”
“Yes. The paste has basic calories and minimum daily requirements of nutrients. The machine adds colours, textures, and sometimes flavours. There are supposed to be some that can change the temperature too, but I’ve never seen one of those.”
Larry’s memory crept back to pre-Suspension experience to recall what hot soup and icy drinks were.
They assaulted a queue and fled into a lighting conduit with gels, pastes, and crumbling bricks. Har leaned against a warm cone-shaped housing and ate.
“This is a ceiling light for Embryo,” he said, gesturing towards the cone. “You can watch Citizens grow in bottles if you just lift out one of those bolts over there. Here, let me show you. See that dark one in the end jar? A hairy fellow. They call that kind a simian. He will be discarded. Those jars with broken covers let in too much light. That can cause big eyes—a gargoyle like me.”
“Why?”
“Like a toad or a frog that embryonates in the light—optic buds get over stimulated and hypertrophy.”
“Oh.”
Two black faces peered through a sooty grating into the sewer. Sluggish fluids moved heaps of trash.
“Where does that go?” asked the hemihuman.
“Don’t know,” said the quiet hulk, Big Har. “Probably a digester or something. These cities are full of organs that can swallow up streams that size.”
“I wish it went to the sea,” moaned Larry. “A tropical sea, far from here, where bananas and coconuts ripen on the tree.”
“What’s a tree?”
“A green thing that grows up into the sky. It has food right on it. And you can pick it without a CQB.”
Big Har just shook his head. “Food comes from Dispensers—from machines.
Trees do not exist—except in your dreams.”
“Trees did exist once,” said Larry. “I can remember them clearly: tall, with coarse woody bark and soft, slick leaves. Many things grew on trees.”
Big Har stopped shaking his head. Larry’s word pictures built a dream in the giant’s head—colours, flavours, textures, scents, and freedom.
“Where were these trees—a long time ago?”
“Outside,” said Larry.
“Are they still there?”
“Maybe. I think so. Yes! I’m certain they are.”
“Could you take me there?” asked the giant.
“I think it would be the other way around. Lift me up, and we’ll see what is Outside.”
Big Har put the hemihuman on his shoulder and they started climbing up through the City. The next day they reached an access hatch above the laminar flow generators.
“We must be near the top. There is hardly any traffic on the Spiral Walkway,” said Larry.
Big Har grunted.
“If I am right, there should be some sort of door to the Outside up here. Let’s stay in Tweenwalls until we’ve circled the City. I don’t want to attract Security.” Larry tried to decipher the maze of pipes: water, air, sewage, and vital Dispenser lines.
“I don’t have any idea how to get out from Tweenwalls. Let’s just walk up the Spiral. That must go somewhere.”
The black giant stepped out into the light of the corridor, sprinkling soot and grime. The hemihuman rode his shoulder, giving him a grotesque, two-headed appearance. Nebishes scattered and fainted.
“I think we’d better hurry,” said Larry. “We’ve caused quite a disturbance. It looks like we’re still a long way from the top—two more turns of the Spiral.”
The panic-stricken crowd ahead of them melted into crawl-ways. All had been standard Citizens—fifty inches of poor protoplasm, soft, white, lethargic. Har’s head towered above the trembling Nebishes. Larry rode even higher—brushing the ceiling at ninety inches. Cobwebs and soot caked them, hiding Larry’s identity as a separate individual.
The City’s Watcher circuits located the disturbance and took readings. A screen activated in Security. The Squad Leader studied the fuzzy black image.
“What is it?”
“An intruder on the Spiral,” said Watcher.
“Looks more like a compound monster—two heads, four arms, and two legs. Has there been any loss of personnel or material?”
“No—”
“Then notify Bio. I’m certain they’d be interested. Security isn’t.”
“But—”
The Squad Leader stretched out on his cot, waving the Watcher to silence. “Try Bio,” he repeated. “All my men are out on an important assignment—confiscating Garden seedlings at Synthe. Some careless Embryoteck found a mutation with perfect flowers: ovule-loaded pistils and pollen-producing stamens. You know how dangerous they could be… plants capable of living outside the Hive and producing food… Let us tend to our important work, “Security”. Call Bio about your monster.”
Watcher switched channels.
Apprentice Wandee looked up from her scope—soft, wide, blue eyes. She climbed over a clutter of dusty containers and tapped the buzzing screen.
“Yes? Bio here!”
Watcher composed himself to sell the disturbance to another department. “I have an interesting specimen for you.”
Wandee nodded and went to her collection table. “How big?” She sorted through nets and containers.
Watcher winced as the readings danced along the screen. He wished that there were some way to minimize the problem until it was out of his hands. “COMPOUND MONSTER, HUMAN, NINETY INCHES, THREE HUNDRED POUNDS.”
Wandee put down the little half-pint container and turned back to her screen. Multiple stills were displayed—front, side, and rear views. A Citizen was included for scale. The thermogram was a mottled 92- to 99-degree geographic pattern that bore little relationship to segmental anatomy. “Too much dust,” she commented. Close-ups of the two heads were matched for bone structure. “No doubt about it,” she said with a smile. “Monozygotic twins—fused into a compound monster.”
Watcher relaxed. “I leave it in your capable hands…”
“Certainly,” she sputtered. The screen froze with the City coordinates. The last digits changed slowly, marking the monster’s migration up the Spiral. “For a specimen this size I’ll need my slumbergun, nets, and—let’s see—about six assistants.” She assembled the darts, pouring the aromatic sedative into the spring syringe. “I wonder if it has a common circulatory system. If there are just a few small venous communications it might need two shots. I’d better take an extra set of small doses, just in case.” She hit the intercom for six assistants. They stalked up-Spiral.