Part 15 (1/2)

This year Bart got more attention from his s.h.i.+pmates than had been usual his last few days. Edris and Helsa looked at his teeth and wondered out loud if the s.h.i.+p shouldn't be straightening some of them for him.

”Oh, they're not terribly crooked. But it did as much for some of us when we were kids.”

After lunch there was a general discussion of his future, carried on at times as if he were not there.

Ranjan said: ”I still think the s.h.i.+p plans to provide him with a bride one of these days, one of these years.

Maybe it's already tried to hatch other people from the artificial wombs and something's gone wrong, so it's got poor Bart just marking time.”

Another adult asked: ”You still think there's a good supply of human genetic material on board?”

”Bound to be. Else the s.h.i.+p wouldn't have sterilized us, right?”

There was general agreement on that point, but on little else. One body of opinion held that the s.h.i.+p really wanted the people to take over, now that its own computers had grown crotchety and unreliable with breakdowns and damage. But some kind of glitch prevented it from simply saying what it wanted.

Schizophrenic, it fended off their attempts to gain control with one hand, while feeding and caring for them with the other.

The discussion soon got over Bart's head, but he listened intently, trying to weigh everything they said.

He listened for something that might give him confidence, but heard it not.

Twenty-nine.

”I know you've seen our biology lab before,” Galina told him. ”But I think you ought to take a real interest. All our futures may lie in this room.”

He ceased scratching his back against the door-frame. ”How so?”

”Sit down, Bart.” When they were seated, she looked at him with concern. ”Bart, if the machines never provide you with any people your own age-with a fertile female specifically-then it's going to be up to us to find some way to everitually produce more people, so that the human race can go on. I'm not sure that there are any people left alive on Earth.”

”I see.” He nodded seriously.

Galina spoke slowly and kept studying him for his reactions. ”We know that when the s.h.i.+p was launched there was a large supply of human sperm and ova stored on board, all coded to genetic types, so that people could be conceived and raised by machines when the end of the voyage drew near.”

”Uh-huh.”

She sighed. ”I myself suspect that most and perhaps nearly all of this genetic material was lost in some kind of accident that evidently disrupted the voyage in other ways as well. The s.h.i.+p speaks always of a revised schedule for the mission, a revised plan.”

”I know.”

”There's further evidence.” She paused. ”I said all the human seeds and eggs were coded as to type and potential? There's some indication in the available records that all of us now alive-except you, we don't know where you came from-were conceived from materials not considered of the highest quality. Not that we have any grave genetic defects, of course, no seriously defective material would have been placed aboard. But-not the best. This suggests to me that all the best material was somehow destroyed, and also that there may not be much material left.”

Bart nodded, not knowing what else to say or do.

”Except you, Bart, as I said. There may have been a human crew aboard before the accident-whatever the accident was. You may be its only survivor. But I suppose your origins make little difference. Here you are and here we are, and there's the future to be faced. A future to be created-perhaps for the whole human race-out of whatever we have on hand. Would you like to learn something about biology?”

”I guess I'd better,” said Bart.

They had a pretty good first lesson, distinguis.h.i.+ng plants and animals, marking the first great branches of the tree of life.

”What are those marks on your face?” Bart asked on impulse a few hours later, as they were leaving the lab to go to dinner. He felt he knew Galina pretty well now and wasn't shy about getting a little more personal.

”What marks?” She raised tentative fingers to her cheek.

”Those little lines in the skin, going out from the corners of your eyes.”

Thirty.

Today marked a standard month since the s.h.i.+p had roused Bart from his first period of suspended animation. When he awoke, a machine equipped with measuring devices was waiting at his bedside. It quickly got busy to check his height and weight, looked into his eyes and mouth, listened to his chest.

”How much taller am I than a month ago, s.h.i.+p?”

”Approximately seventy millimeters,” said the expressionless voice.

”And how much heavier?”

”Approximately ninety-five grams.”

”Is that good?”

It wouldn't say. But it did adjust his diet, adding a delicious, creamy drink to that very breakfast, served in his room.

When he joined the other people he found Olen half bald, and learned that Basil had gone back to communing with the stars.

Galina gave him another biology lesson, more technical and duller than the first.

Thirty-one.

Today Bart heard that Dierdre was in her bed, too sick to get up.

”She always liked you, Bart,” said Chao sadly. ”Go in and talk to her a little.”

He went into Deirdre's room, and found her looking much sicker than any human being he had ever seen before. She also seemed too dazed to talk very much.