Kiln People

Mesh and prepared clay merge under enormous rotary presses, kneading and forming a pasty union, squeezing out surplus liquid, then popping yet another doughy humanoid shape onto rolling conveyors. On and on they come, pre-dyed to signify cost and built-in abilities. Some roll onward for custom feature installation. Other basic models, state-subsidized, are so cheap that even the poor can afford to replicate, living larger lives than their ancestors could have imagined. Across the globe, similar factories replenish half the ongoing human population, dispatching short-term bodies to a billion home coolers, copiers, and kilns.

A miracle stops being remarkable when you give it to everybody.

Watching titanic presses spit out ditto blanks — hundreds per minute — I’m hit by an absurdity.

Irene and Gineen say I should look for hidden industrial breakthroughs here at Universal Kilns. But that can’t be the real reason they sent me!

Think, Albert. UK has competitors. Tetragram Limited. Megillar-Ahima’az of Yemen. Fabrique Chelm. Companies who licensed Aeneas Kaolin’s original patents, till they expired. Wouldn’t they care about hidden i

Yes, evil thrives on secrecy. It’s what drives Albert on. Expose villainy. Find truth. Yadda. But is that what I’m doing, now? Hell, nobody can run a really big conspiracy, nowadays, when whistle-blower prizes tempt your henchmen with cash and celebrity status. Countless smalltime scams still flourish, keeping me in business. But could anyone hide secrets as major as my employers described?

Why would anyone bother?

Suddenly, it’s plain what all their talk about “hidden breakthroughs” was about. They were appealing to my vanity! Distracting me with hints of exciting new technology. With intellectual puzzles. And with their grating, obnoxious personalities. All ma

The floor rises past me again, bringing a new layer of the factory to view. At first it looks like more of the same vast assembly line, but these presses are more specialized. Blue police models flop limply onto a conveyor belt, pre-equipped with Peace Talons and loudspeakers. Another grunting unit pops out oversize designs, big-muscled and armor-ski

That’s an ache I must quash. She’ll never concern you again, dittoboy. Concentrate on your own problems. Like why did the maestra and her friends hire you?

Not to penetrate Universal Kilns, clearly. That was pathetically easy. (Albert should offer Aeneas Kaolin a spec proposal to upgrade security here!) Wammaker and company didn’t have to pay a guy like me triple fees just to come and have a look around. Collins and Irene could have sent anyone. They could have come themselves.

No, I already did the hard part — the part they hired me for — before ever reaching the front gate. Dodging all the public cameras out there, changing my appearance a dozen times, skillfully muddying my trail so no one would co

Could they have a reason, much bigger than the one they gave me?

Glancing at the nearest wall, I spot a recorder-cam. An absorber, the cheapest kind, laying one quickscan frame into a polymer cube every few seconds till it’s full and needs replacing monthly. I must’ve passed a hundred since arriving. And they read my ID pellet at the entry kiosk. So, there’s been a record from the moment I arrived. If anyone cares to check, they’ll know an Albert Morris gray wandered around. But UK can’t complain if I stay legal. So long as all I do is get “lost” and look around.

But what if I do something bad? Maybe without meaning to …

Damn! What is this thing?

A small bug — like some kind of gnat — flutters before me. It dodges a swat, darting toward my face. I can’t afford distractions, so I use a surge-energy burst to grab the thing, midair, crumpling it in my hand.

Where was I? Wondering if Gineen and the others had some hidden plan. Like maybe for something else to happen while I’m in Universal Kilns? The moving way takes me down to another level where yet more machines rumble. Again, I’m rubbing my injury … now wondering if the glassy bulge in my side may contain more than scar tissue.

Could that be why the thug-gladiator attacked me, in the Rainbow Lounge? No coincidence, perhaps it was all arranged … to make me willing to accept a blank interval during “repairs,” when actually -

Another damned bug flutters before me, then makes a kamikaze dive for my face!

Another muscle surge and it crackles in my hand. Can’t let pests distract me. What I need is some way to check these crazy suspicions.

Hopping off the moving way, I jog alongside a conveyor belt hauling assorted fresh industrial dittos. Gangly window washers, long-armed fruitpickers, sleek aqua farmers, and burly construction helpers, all made for jobs where mechanization is too inflexible or costly, as inert as dolls, lacking any human spirit to drive them. I may find what I need just ahead, where these specialized blanks get wrapped in cocoons of fluffy-hard airgel CeramWrap for shipment.

There! A worker in UK orange stands near the conveyor, watching a vidboard covered with flashing symbols. Quality Control, says a logo stamped in his broad back. Striding forward, I wear a friendly grin while swatting yet another of those pesky, irritating gnat things. (A local industrial infestation?)

“Hello there!”

“Can I help you, sir?” he inquires, puzzled. The few grays who come down here wear UK badges.

“I’m afraid I may be lost. Is this the Research Department?”

A chuckle. “Man, you are lost! But all you have to do is get back on the way and—”

“Say, that’s a nifty diagnostic station you’ve got there,” I interrupt, trying to stay casual. “Mind if I use it on myself for a sec?”

The tech’s puzzlement turns wary. “It’s for company business.”

“Come on. It won’t cost anything but electricity.”

His imitation brows purse. “I need it whenever the system detects a flawed blank.”

“Which happens how often?” Waving off a persistent gnat, I notice that the orange guy isn’t afflicted by the buzzing things.

“Maybe once an hour, but—”

“This’ll take a minute. Come on. I’ll put in a good word for you upstairs.”

Implication? That I’m a VIP visitor. Show me courtesy and I’ll add points to his file. Shame on me for fibbing.

“Well …” he decided. “Ever used a type-eight Xaminator? I better work the controls. Stand over there. What’re we lookin’ for?”

Stepping up to a fluorescent screen, I lift my tunic showing the big scar. He stares.

“Well, look at that.” Turning curious, the tech starts readying a scan. Only now I’m distracted by two of the cursed gnat things.

What the hell are they, and why are they picking on me?

With unca

Damn, it hurts, burrowing inside!

“Give me a few secs,” the orange guy says, fiddling controls. “I’m used to inspecting raw blanks. Got to cancel interference from your imprinted soul-field.”

Slapping the side of my head … I stop when a voice abruptly explodes from within, booming like a wakened god.

“Hi, Albert. Calm down. It’s me. Pal.”

“P-Pal?”

Stu