Realware

"Once I git naked, I'll do some harm on you all right," said Randy, crawling forward to rest his head facedown in Shimmer's lap. He inhaled deeply. "The nose knows." This time Randy managed to lay his finger against his nose, but in the process he rolled off of Shimmer's thighs, bounced off the edge of the bed, and clunked his head on the floor. "Ow," said Randy, and fell asleep.

"What a colorful individual," said Shimmer.

"I pick the absolute worst men," said Babs.

"I hope you have some other prospects," said Yoke.

"There's always Theodore," said Babs. "I'm going to do a mental reset, Yoke. Like 'Randy is just a friend and I have no feelings for this man.' Reset, reset, reset. Yes, I'm going to call Theodore today. He's been wanting to take me out to a brain-concert."

"You go, girl," said Yoke. "I wonder if I'm going to have to wash Cobb again."

"What do you mean?" asked Babs.

"He's high on betty. Last time he got like this he almost died. I had to knead him with my feet for ten minutes in the shower."

"Betty's bad," said Babs. "My mother took it once and -- ugh." Yoke recalled that Babs's mother Wendy Mooney was a human/moldie hybrid. That is, Wendy had a tank-grown human body that was run by a scarf-shaped moldie that did all the actual thinking.

Now Babs went back to marveling at the aliens. "Randy's right," she said, petting Peg's mane. "You seem just like moldies. But--prettier. I don't mind if you stay here for a while. I don't really mind the moldie smell, you know. It reminds me of my mother. Tell me more about where you come from. It's called Metamars?"

"Yes," said Josef. "That's where we began. But now we travel forever. Our near-term goal when we depart is to get back to a zone of two-dimensional time." He flew from Yoke's pillow to Babs's shoulder, and started talking to her about higher dimensions, with Haresh and Siss listening and adding comments. While they talked, Yoke crouched down and touched Cobb. He didn't seem nearly so shaky and blotchy as he'd been in Tonga. Presumably this time he hadn't taken an overdose. So she left Cobb to sit there, gri

"So you do enjoy the miraculous alla," said Peg. "And our superb catalog."

"They're okay," said Yoke casually.

"Can I have an alla?" asked Babs, interrupting Josef's science lecture. She'd been closely watching Yoke make her clothes.

"Well..." said Shimmer. She was sitting on the edge of Yoke's bed, keeping an eye on Randy.

"You barged into my house and stole my man," said Babs, not entirely joking.

"It's the least you can do."

"Oh ja, let's give Babs an alla," said Josef. "Om wants us to." Yoke's alla has worked out well enough and Om feels it's safe to try more."

"I'm down with it," chimed in Wubwub. "Allas for the people. Why not one for this Randy-neck too? That could be kinky, you know what I'm sayin'?"

"Here, Babs," said Shimmer, rolling her thumb against her fingers. A subtly flickering silver tube appeared in her hand. "Om made it look different from Yoke's so you don't get mixed up. Take it. You're wearing an uvvy? Good. That's what the alla uses for an interface. An alla registers itself as owned by the first person who picks it up. It'll show a rapid-fire series of images so Om can learn your personality, and then it'll feel around in your body to teach Om your physical form. Once that's done, it's registered."

Babs held the tube in her hand, eyes closed to better see the uvvy visions in her head. "Cathedral window, tree-branch, sand," she murmured, each word faster than the one before, and then she was going too fast to talk out loud. The descriptions sounded familiar to Yoke; probably the alla was showing Babs the same images it had shown her. Yoke could tell when the body-mapping part of the alla registration happened, because Babs briefly twitched all over.

"Stuzzy," breathed Babs, opening her eyes and looking down at the little alla tube. "I've been memorized by Om."

"Now I'll transfer our human-oriented alla catalog to your uvvy, Babs," said Ptah. "Josef and I made the catalog, and it's quite complete. We got it by combining every existing catalog we could find on the Web. Basically, I figured out how to make everything. Here it comes."

"Once you get the hang of it, Babs, you can design original realware of your own," added Shimmer. "And now for Randy's alla."

"Nay, nay!" protested Peg. "That youth is base and foul. His crafting will be full unsavory."

"Peg's right," said Ptah. "I realize that you don't need for me to defend you, Shimmer, but I really feel that this kind of degenerate individual is a serious threat."

"It good practice to include deviant in test population, I think," said Siss. She listened into herself as if silently conversing with something. "And, yes, Om agree."

"I'll do it," said Shimmer. She rolled her thumb against her fingers again, producing an alla tube in gently fluctuating shades of copper. She gracefully leaned over to tuck the vibrant tube into the sleeping Randy's shirt pocket.

"Let's wake him up so he can register it," she urged.

"Don't wake him now," said Yoke. "Not while he's still lifted. I'll make sure he registers it later. And I'll uvvy him a copy of the catalog."

"Whu-Whu-Whu about me?" said Cobb, shuddering away on the floor.

"No," said Wubwub. "We ain't ready to start in with moldie allas too."

"I'm nuh-not a moldie," protested Cobb. "I'm human." It was just like back in Tonga, when Onar had told Cobb he couldn't come to the di

"If you want something, I'll make it for you, Cobb," said Yoke gently. "But for now, you don't get an alla. Especially not when you're lifted. Maybe you should go get in the shower. Wash those spores out."

"Yeah," said the old man moldie. "I gotta shake this betty shit." He shuffled off towards Babs's bathroom.

Meanwhile Babs had been sitting silent on the floor, uvvying around in her alla catalog. And now she produced a bright-line shape that became a cup of coffee in a ceramic mug shaped like the head of an ant. Babs liked ants as much as Yoke did.

"Oh. My. God!" said Babs. "I love it!"

"Don't get so grateful that you let the Metamartians stay here," cautioned Yoke.

"If they don't kill you, someone else will by coming after them. I like Shimmer's idea. The Metamartians should go out and blend in. You don't have to look like exactly a pig, do you, Wubwub? And Peg, could you possibly bag the unicorn thing? I mean why not pass yourselves off as regular moldies? Unless you just want to be birds or insects. Nobody cares about them. Nobody would notice if a bird is plastic."

"I am proud to be a bird," said Haresh. "From sca

Cobb came ambling back from the shower, looking pink and fresh again. "That did me a world of good."