Realware

"But it could make a person if it had the code?" pressed Yoke.

"Yes," allowed Josef. "And I may as well tell you, Yoke, that during registration your alla did in fact create and store an eidetic map of your body and mind. But Om doesn't allow an alla-owner to arbitrarily use this code. There is no magic command for instant self-reproduction. In order to use an alla to reproduce oneself, it's necessary to understand the working of one mind and body well enough to fully specify the design."

"And I guess you guys are at that high level already, huh?" said Yoke.

"In our first meeting, you have observed how Ptah copied himself," said Josef.

"Oh, right," said Yoke. "Well, let me try making an animal." She knit her brows and looked inward at her uvvy catalog. "Actualize." A scrap of space webbed over with bright lines, grew opaque, and a small writhing object fell to the tabletop.

"A slug?" said Phil. The slug oriented itself and began briskly sliming into the shadow under one of the plates.

"I'll try a jellyfish next," said Yoke. "They're so beautiful." She used the alla to create a little aquarium, then projected into the water a bright-line disk-shape that actualized into a clear bell of jelly--which began steadily beating. "Can I change its color?" wondered Yoke, and produced a shocking pink jellyfish--which quickly dissolved into rags and tatters. She tried a series of variations on the catalog jellyfish, but none of them so much as twitched.

"Life is hard, Yoke," said Josef. "And so is wetware engineering." The unsuccessful customized jellies were floating on the aquarium's surface. Yoke alla-converted them back into water and filled the tank with a selection of other standard catalog life: some more jellies, a shrimp, a clam, a scallop, and a few tropical fish.

"Can the alla make an alla?" asked Phil. "That's the biggest question of all, isn't it? Like in the fairy tale where someone wishes for more wishes."

"Yes," said Josef. "There is a way to use an alla to make another alla. And sooner or later one of you will learn the trick of it. But I am not intending to be the one to teach you. It is better that the knowledge should come to one of you directly from Om."

"Do you plan to give out more allas?" asked Yoke.

"As Om wills it," said Josef. "First we want to watch a bit what Yoke does. And then we'll test it with a few more individuals. And then I suppose Om will tell you how to spread the allas to everyone, human and moldie alike. I think it should work out for the best, but it's hard to be sure. We've never seen a place like Earth, you know. You can't imagine how really pathetic your one-dimensional time appears. I hope that the allas can really help you."

"Hoes for the savages," said Yoke. "Farming tools. What's in it for Om?"

"Om collects copies of sentient beings," said Josef. "By giving out allas and having the users register themselves, Om obtains the exact information codes of the users. As for your analog)' to farming, perhaps an alla is more like a bulldozer than like a hoe. Restraint and caution will be called for. Especially for a race that's limited to a single dimension of time."

"You think there's a chance we'll kill ourselves off with the allas, don't you?" said Yoke. "Is that what you actually want? So that the Metamartians can take over the Earth?"

"Yoke, we already told you that we plan only for one more of us Metamartians to arrive here," said Josef. "Once we are seven, we will have reached the canonical family size. We'll conjugate to create a fresh Metamartian and then we'll move on -- provided we can figure out the right direction toward a region with two-dimensional time. No Metamartian would want to stay here."

"We still haven't talked about the killer powerballs," interrupted Phil. "What's the story with them?"

"The powerballs are but manifestations of our god Om," said Josef. "Be assured that Om is no killer. Those whom Om touches are elevated, not destroyed." Before they could press Josef any further, a large Tongan man came walking over from the veranda. He wore a white shirt, a necktie, and a blue skirt. He was squinting in the bright sun.

"Hi, Ke

"Yis," said Ke

"All right," said Yoke, looking down at the ground. She'd been making lizards and mice and rabbits. They were darting around under the table. On top of the table she'd alla-made a cheerful potted orchid. "The room has two beds. Can I make you anything with the alla, Ke

"No thank you. HRH says the Tongan Navy ship will be arriving in the harbor today. We would like you to fill its hold with gold and imipolex during the night. Will this be agreeable?"

"Can we do it, Josef?" asked Yoke. "Does the alla have enough energy?"

"Quark-flipping is like jujitsu," said Josef. "As if to look at something and then to look at it in a different way. In and of itself, it costs nothing to interconvert protons and neutrons. But, yes, reassembling particles into different sorts of atoms can either create or absorb energy, even if one uses higher-dimensional shortcuts. Om acts as kind of bank for these transformations. Energies flow back and forth through the higher-dimensional vortex threads which co

"It sounds too good to be true," said Phil.

"Consider this: 'The world exists.' I think that also sounds too good to be true," said Josef. "Why is there something instead of nothing? Why is Om? We are only lucky."

"I want to take Phil snorkeling now," said Yoke. "All right?"

"Yis," said Ke

"I only want to swim with a facemask today," said Yoke. "I don't want to bring along any strange moldies. Just Phil and Josef and Cobb and me. Cobb can protect us."

Ms. Teta found two sets of swim-fins, snorkels, and masks. Yoke and Phil walked down the steep steps to the water, followed by Cobb. Josef rode clamped to the strap of Yoke's bikini. The Tongans weren't interested in swimming. And the moldies Tashtego and Daggoo were content to remain puddled atop the island in the sun.

Phil and Yoke slipped into the water together, while Cobb and Josef swam off on their own. Phil felt as if he'd been transported to heaven. The bottom was white sand, and the water incredibly clear. The knobs of small coral heads dotted the bottom, each head surrounded by a school of luscious-colored fish. There were fluttering sea anemones as well, huge irregular pink ones quite unlike the small door-stop sea anemones of California. Striped clown fish idled in the tentacles of the anemones, darting forward as if to greet Phil --though when he looked closer, he saw that their smiling faces were split to reveal tiny rows of teeth. Far from greeting him, they were defiantly defending their turf. Here and there on the bottom were giant clams, meter-wide behemoths with great, crenellated shells. They rested partly open, with the shell gap revealing an incredible fleshy mantle that was differently colored on each clam: some blue, some green, some purple, all of them wonderfully iridescent.

Rising up off the shell of one giant clam was a bumpy stag-horn coral. The clam and coral made a marvelous, unbalanced composition, something nobody would ever think of designing, yet something with a beautiful i