Chapter 10

Year Two: Day Fifty-Five: Saturday

The image of the naked translucent creature rapidly cleared from Shem 553's mind as the third harmonic tone sounded announcing the impending arrival of an individual of importance. Shem 553's olfactory appendage hardened as the last molecules of the psychotropic stimulant were cleared from his system. About the same time his six eyes regained their ability to individually focus, he could hear the muted shuffle of the appendages of his dedicated clone-body, Shem 554, approaching.

Shem 553, more formally known as Shem Prime, was visibly upset with the interruption. He had almost reached pre-cognitive sexual awareness from the new stimulant. His research into the precise stimulant needed to create sexual cognizance in higher life-forms remained just beyond his grasp. None of the other stimulants had ever affected his olfactory, tactile, and cerebral senses to the degree of the last sample. He was certain that he was close to finding the catalyst that had stimulated their primitive ancestors to sexual union. Finding that catalyst would allow him to kneel before the Grand Council and outline a possible hypothesis into the pre-clone method of reproduction. Many thought even thinking about such a possibility to be the gravest heresy. Still, there were no other examples in the natural universe of a being created strictly by cloning. True, those beings did not breed true and failed the test of true intelligence because of their lack of individual racial memories. Some however did use histories and learning in a way that almost gave them the ability to emulate true intelligence.

His clone-body finally reached his life station allowing Shem Prime to more closely adsorb the fear emanating from his very pores. He was so attuned to the simple forebrain of the clone-body that he immediately imprinted the cause of that fright. Altir Prime, Shem's immediate senior, was moving purposely towards Shem's life-station. Such a direct confrontation was almost a breach in protocol in itself. Shem knew that the only impetus for such a breach must have something to do with Shem's assigned part of Altir's own research. How could an individual with such a distinguished history of achievement allow himself to become so enamored with the process of semi-sentient development? Why the council allowed continued funding of that project was beyond all reason. Still, Altir was his immediate senior and had demanded that he devote all his necessary energies to guiding the exploration of the 24th galactic sector.

It was a mindless job better suited to a subordinate AI. Looking over towards the AI console Shem was surprised to see that only a few of the indicators were feebly glowing, indicating that the AI was offline. Reaching out with his mind he could barely feel the presence of the resident AI in the living memory of the console. Something was most definitely wrong. Resorting to physical manipulation of the controller he searched for the holo that would show the research progress. Finding it only took a moment as the holo took up sixteen zettabytes of prime cellular memory, almost as much as the resident AI. It should be an easy task to have that active when Altir arrived, although he couldn't expect a holo of that size to remain actively engaged all of the time. Shem could correct the problem with the resident AI after Altir's visit.

As Shem opened the holo he was surprised to find the display interface flashing red, indicating that it needed upper level input for required computational corrections. The screen indicated the AI was locked out until those corrections were made. In setting up the surveillance Shem had not foreseen a situation where the resident AI would be unable to make any computational corrections. For the first time Shem began to emit a pheromone that others of his race would recognize as fear. He held onto the hope that Altir would surely understand that he had other important work of his own and couldn't be expected to spend all of his time monitoring this holo. As he was forming what he recognized as an excuse he requested information on the length of time the holo had been requesting computational corrections.

Shem's aftertail slithered in a vestigial fear reaction when he received the answer; slightly over a hundred and three units. Shem thought, 'Bodily excrement is going to strike the oscillator when Altir sees this. My only hope is to make the corrections and hope that he fails to notice the error when he arrives.'

The AI began to awaken as soon as the corrections were made. The AI took point one six sub-units to come to full awareness and begin data transmission.

The nano-bodies circling the third planet, near the edge of a rather small galaxy, made a minor change in their shared memory arrays immediately as the signal from the reactivated AI was received. The programmer who had designed the nano-bodies many thousands of units in the past had contemplated that the units might have to take independent action. In the absence of a response from the controller the nano-bodies had a preset system of failsafe defaults. The nano-bodies began their existence as a weapon system during one of the early stellar wars. That failsafe reset the third-level mission code sub-array to the direct action mode from the defaulted direct observation mode. This created a paradox between the action the nano-bodies had taken and the new programming instructions. Although the nano-bodies didn't register their past actions as an error, they did immediately report the effect of those actions to the AI.

Shem was accessing the effects of the minor failsafe action when a prime level harmonic announced the arrival of Altir. Shem could see his clone-body hastily move out of harm's way back to its storage cubicle. The fear induced pheromones that filled the atmosphere of the life station didn't dissipate completely as the clone-body left. Shem belatedly realized that some of the pheromones were of his own creation.

Shem's mind was busily digesting the effects of the aborted programming sequence when Altir moved into his life station. Shem immediately redirected his attention to Altir as required by protocol. Shem noticed that Altir's vestigial aftertail was pulsing deep ochre indicating a level of anger well beyond what he had expected. The level of fear pheromones quickly escalated as Shem saw Altir's focus had shifted to the operating log of the holo.

Altir's transmission was a terse accusation. "Shem Prime, you are in violation of Council Directive Three, direct disobedience of a superior. Call your clone-body."

Shem's aftertail involuntarily fluttered as he saw the stubby barrel of the transference inducer pulled from Altir's cloak. Shem first transmitted the call to his clone-body and then transmitted a plea to Altir Prime. "We can fix this minor error. It should not affect the fulfillment syllabus. I have already..."

Shem Prime's plea was cut short as his clone-body arrived and Altir initiated the transference. The clone-body twitched as the life force that had been Shem Prime's activated the clone-body's sterile central cerebral cortex. It was in a malleable state during the transference which allowed the transferor to modify certain priorities. Altir had already sequenced the parameters of this change. Shem 554, becoming the new Shem Prime, would be less inclined to devote wasted time to his own research, at least during the first several thousand units of his existence. The transference fog would place the transforming clone-body out of action for twenty units but this was to be expected.

As Shem 554 adjusted to its altered state and began the metamorphosis towards becoming the new Shem Prime it moved off towards its own rest cubical.

Altir immediately began to sense the corrections needed to mitigate the damage done by Shem's inattention to duty. This would have to be reported to Council. Altir's own fear pheromones emerged as he saw the results from the aborted directional signals. This might necessitate a revision to the internal dataset of all of the operational nano-bodies. The data from the nano-bodies indicated the near extinction of a borderline sentient race. Only the failure of dissolution cones to blanket the entire surface area of the planet left some hope that the species might recover.

Altir mused that the Grand Council would surely want a report on the likelihood of that occurrence as well as the logic response pattern of the nano-bodies hive memory arrays. That response had been triggered by overwhelming data indicating that the dominant species on the planet had been previously visited several times by sentient beings and exhibited a class twelve xenophobic response. The species was not only xenophobic but internally predisposed to a class nine fear reaction to observed differences in other races of its own species. The log indicated that one of the nano-bodies had allowed itself to be observed and then captured by members of the race occupying a low orbit space platform. That nano-body had observed the reactions of the species to its presence and then transmitted this information to the shared memory arrays of the nano-bodies. Those reactions, along with the errant default setting, had been responsible for the activation of the dissolution cones.

Altir had checked on the status of his own clonebody before entering the Grand Council audience chamber. He knew that council members would not be impressed with the success of the other 432 sectors when he reported this outrageous breach of operating protocol. As he thought through his dilemma over the past several days he had secreted enough fear pheromones to make all of his close associates extremely nervous. He could only hope that Counselor Stellis, who had always been an advocate of his project, would deflect the criticism of the other counselors.

Counselor Stellis ingested the report on the state of Altir's research. Immediately the shrewd counselor realized that something didn't taste right. The data fields for Sector 24 were almost barren. An immediate check of the reference grid showed that although the sector covered by this holo was smaller than the mean, it should have still contained over 100 times more information than was present. Counselor Stellis internally searched for the meaning of this non-correlation as it began probing Altir. "What is the meaning of the dearth of data reported on Sector 24?"

The guilt and fear pheromones given off by Altir after that question raised the olfactory appendage of every council member. Prime counselor Belat crossed his third and fourth eyestalks at Altir's reaction. Every council member moved forward waiting for Altir's response. Counselor Stellis, being more familiar with Altir's work than most on the council found the cause of the discrepancy first. His vestigial aftertail went rigid when the implication of the data loss became clear. As was the custom, Stellis transmitted the inevitable conclusions to the other council members. The members linked intellects for their judgment. Counselor Stellis gasped when the judgment was rendered. Not since Mellor 127 had the council been so shamed.

Counselor Stellis shifted his weight even further forward and using his voice, as was the custom, stated the verdict. "Altir Prime, you have been found in non-conformance with the Eternal Directive. No excuse can be accepted for your actions. To cause the extermination of 5,948,781,236 near-sentient beings is inexcusable. Work on your hypothesis will be restricted until the proper safeguards and a proper director can be found to continue them. This council is charged by the Eternal Directive with doing as much as can be done to right the wrong you have, by your inaction, allowed. It is the combined decision of the council that you be terminated along with your clonebody. Further, Shem Prime, along with his newly generated clonebody, will receive the same fate. This will reduce our number to 99,878. Your name will be forever linked in shame to that reduction."