alternatives, of course, no imaginable alternatives to anything, but still he withheld himself, and questioned. Only in the first few days after treatments was he really the member he pretended to be.
One thing alone in the world was indisputably right: Karl’s drawing of the horse. He framed it—not in a supply-center frame but in one he made himself, out of wood strips ripped from the back of a drawer and scraped smooth—and hung it in his rooms in Usa, his room in Ind, his room in Chi. It was a lot better to look at than Wei Addressing the Chemotherapists or Marx Writing or Christ Expelling the Money Changers.
In Chi he thought of getting married, but he was told that he wasn’t to reproduce and so there didn’t seem much point in it.
In mid-Marx of 162, shortly before his twenty-seventh birthday, he was transferred back to the Institute of Genetic Engineering in IND26110 and assigned to a newly established Genie Subclassification Center. New microscopes had found distinctions between genes that until then had appeared identical, and he was one of forty 663B’s and C’s put to defining subclassifications. His room was four buildings away from the Center, giving him a short walk twice a day, and he soon found a girlfriend whose room was on the floor below his. His adviser was a year younger than he, Bob RO. Life apparently was going to continue as before.
One night in April, though, as he made ready to clean his teeth before going to bed, he found a small white something lodged in his mouthpiece. Perplexed, he picked it out. It was a triple bend of tightly rolled paper. He put down the mouthpiece and unrolled a thin rectangle filled with typing. You seem to be a fairly unusual member, it said. Wondering about which classification you would choose, for instance. Would you like to meet some other unusual members? Think about it. You are only partly alive. We can help you more than you can imagine.
The note surprised him with its knowledge of his past and disturbed him with its secrecy and its “You are only partly alive.” What did it mean—that strange statement and the whole strange message? And who had put it in his mouthpiece, of all places? But there was no better place, it struck him, for making certain that he and he alone should find it. Who then, not so foolishly, had put it there? Anyone at all could have come into the room earlier in the evening or during the day. At least two other members had done so; there had been notes on his desk from Peace SK, his girlfriend, and from the secretary of the house photography club.
He cleaned his teeth and got into bed and reread the note. Its writer or one of the other “unusual members” must have had access to UniComp’s memory of his boyhood self-classification thoughts, and that seemed to be enough to make the group think he might be sympathetic to them. Was he? They were abnormal; that was certain. Yet what was he? Wasn’t he abnormal too? We can help you more than you can imagine. What did that mean? Help him how? Help him do what? And what if he decided he wanted to meet them; what was he supposed to do? Wait, apparently, for another note, for a contact of some kind. Think about it, the note said.
The last chime sounded, and he rolled the piece of paper back up and tucked it down into the spine of his night-table Wei’s Living Wisdom. He tapped off the light and lay and thought about it. It was disturbing, but it was different too, and interesting. Would you like to meet some other unusual members?
He didn’t say anything about it to Bob RO. He looked for another note in his mouthpiece each time he came back to his room, but didn’t find one. Walking to and from work, taking a seat in the lounge for TV, standing on line in the dining hall or the supply center, he searched the eyes of the members around him, alert for a meaningful remark or perhaps only a look and a head movement inviting him to follow. None came.
Four days went by and he began
One thing alone in the world was indisputably right: Karl’s drawing of the horse. He framed it—not in a supply-center frame but in one he made himself, out of wood strips ripped from the back of a drawer and scraped smooth—and hung it in his rooms in Usa, his room in Ind, his room in Chi. It was a lot better to look at than Wei Addressing the Chemotherapists or Marx Writing or Christ Expelling the Money Changers.
In Chi he thought of getting married, but he was told that he wasn’t to reproduce and so there didn’t seem much point in it.
In mid-Marx of 162, shortly before his twenty-seventh birthday, he was transferred back to the Institute of Genetic Engineering in IND26110 and assigned to a newly established Genie Subclassification Center. New microscopes had found distinctions between genes that until then had appeared identical, and he was one of forty 663B’s and C’s put to defining subclassifications. His room was four buildings away from the Center, giving him a short walk twice a day, and he soon found a girlfriend whose room was on the floor below his. His adviser was a year younger than he, Bob RO. Life apparently was going to continue as before.
One night in April, though, as he made ready to clean his teeth before going to bed, he found a small white something lodged in his mouthpiece. Perplexed, he picked it out. It was a triple bend of tightly rolled paper. He put down the mouthpiece and unrolled a thin rectangle filled with typing. You seem to be a fairly unusual member, it said. Wondering about which classification you would choose, for instance. Would you like to meet some other unusual members? Think about it. You are only partly alive. We can help you more than you can imagine.
The note surprised him with its knowledge of his past and disturbed him with its secrecy and its “You are only partly alive.” What did it mean—that strange statement and the whole strange message? And who had put it in his mouthpiece, of all places? But there was no better place, it struck him, for making certain that he and he alone should find it. Who then, not so foolishly, had put it there? Anyone at all could have come into the room earlier in the evening or during the day. At least two other members had done so; there had been notes on his desk from Peace SK, his girlfriend, and from the secretary of the house photography club.
He cleaned his teeth and got into bed and reread the note. Its writer or one of the other “unusual members” must have had access to UniComp’s memory of his boyhood self-classification thoughts, and that seemed to be enough to make the group think he might be sympathetic to them. Was he? They were abnormal; that was certain. Yet what was he? Wasn’t he abnormal too? We can help you more than you can imagine. What did that mean? Help him how? Help him do what? And what if he decided he wanted to meet them; what was he supposed to do? Wait, apparently, for another note, for a contact of some kind. Think about it, the note said.
The last chime sounded, and he rolled the piece of paper back up and tucked it down into the spine of his night-table Wei’s Living Wisdom. He tapped off the light and lay and thought about it. It was disturbing, but it was different too, and interesting. Would you like to meet some other unusual members?
He didn’t say anything about it to Bob RO. He looked for another note in his mouthpiece each time he came back to his room, but didn’t find one. Walking to and from work, taking a seat in the lounge for TV, standing on line in the dining hall or the supply center, he searched the eyes of the members around him, alert for a meaningful remark or perhaps only a look and a head movement inviting him to follow. None came.
Four days went by and he began
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