Pygmalion Unbound Read Free Page B

and research position out to the Rocky Mountains for a six-month sabbatical.”
    “It is.”
    “Not quite human, you said. How did you create her?”
    Crane glanced at Franklin, who nodded. “We did borrow some ideas from the ESI work — American Cybernetics was involved in that research.”
    “Were you personally?”
    “No. Not directly. It took years to work out the theory, and about as long to do the actually engineering. Start with a ceramsteel endoskeletal frame, an exact duplicate of the human skeleton, but ten times tougher; we can do a scan of a template and re-create it, do variations by sex, and ethnicity. Take muscle tissue and clone it with some modifications.”
    “Such as?”
    Crane turned and tapped keys on his desk, and the monitor picture cut from Maria’s room to a corner shot of a laboratory. Figures in self-contained clean suits moved around a large central tank with the lid open. A central platform on the tank held a gleaming white skeleton. The cleansuits began attaching wispy strands of muscle tissue to the ceramsteel bones.
    “Genetically engineered to cut reaction time, and augmented for human-plus strength. We graft the tissue onto the skeleton, drop it in a nanomachine nutrient bath, and let it grow.”
    The cleansuits immersed the body in a thick sludge, then withdrew it. Red bands of muscle were growing on the human form.
    “Organs cloned as well?”
    “Precisely. But augmented, making the digestive system more compact and efficient, borrowed from ruminants — she can live on hay if she has to. We’re working on cross-species engineering with the visual and olfactory nerves for greater sensitivity. We’re close to creating eyes that can see in ultraviolet, electromagnetic and infrared spectra. Maybe even radar or microwave detection capabilities. She also has boosted auditory sensitivity.”
    More grafts on the screen, another immersion, and Maria rose from the tank, the slimy sludge sloughing off her, her hair plastered to her head.
    “Skin also grafted, cloned from donor cells. We’ve placed carbon nanotubes in her skin — carbon filaments that are a few nanometers wide. The potential uses are almost limitless. For now we’ve used them as piezoelectric receptors, allowing her to pick up small changes in organic and nonorganic objects. It permits her to measure small changes that result from mechanical stress.”
    “Meaning?”
    “She can anticipate movements and react accordingly.”
    “Like duck a punch,” Kelly said. “Maybe even a bullet. So far, it doesn’t sound any different than an ESI. How do you get around the ban?”
    “Read it,” Crane turned and tapped more keys, slid the mouse, and a dense text appeared on his monitor. “The ban, as passed four years ago, outlawed all genetic engineering enhancement work on, and I quote, ‘human embryos or fetuses, or gametes or diploid cells.’ The term ‘human’ is defined as ‘being derived by fertilization or parthenogenesis, or any other means from one or more human gametes or human diploid cells.’ Maria is excluded on at least two grounds that I can see. Maybe more, if I were a lawyer.”
    “So you don’t define her as ‘human.’”
    “Not in the sense that you and I are human,” Crane said. “Since we borrowed from other species, maybe eighty-five, ninety percent.”
    “So she’s what — human derived?”
    “If you must put a name to it, that’s as good as any. The term we use is android, or droid for short.”
    Kelly mulled his words, with an uncomfortable gnawing in her stomach. There was so much wrong here, so much that could be abused, it was clear even after a short introduction. But so much right, as well. The screen flickered back to the live feed from Maria’s room, where she was examining the blocks again with a childlike intensity, building a small multicolored tower.
    So vulnerable , Kelly thought. She has no idea what she represents .
    “And the brain? I presume that at least is