On arriving back at Replimaticon, Sarvik got a message to go up to the directors' level to see Pezamin Greel and Marduk Alifrenz, the two others who were in on the immortality project with him. They knew that the code transferred into the mechanical veech had been extracted from a real veech and that the current experiments were intended merely as a preliminary to extending the procedure to Borijan psyches.
The news was that Prinem Clouth had pulled up anchor as expected and forfeited his stake to head for bluer waters undisclosed. Almost certainly, this meant that he had judged it was time to cash in on the deal he was working on with Toymate and had taken with him copies of the programs that he thought had driven the veech. But the programs would be worthless, since they were decoys Sarvik had prepared for that eventuality. In fact, they were based on routines Sarvik had decoded from Toymate's own products, with some extra gimmicks added to keep its analysts occupied for a while. Neat, heh-heh-heh.
There was some haggling over dividing up Clouth's share. Then Greel and Alifrenz revealed that as insurance they had lined up several alternative sources of supply for other kinds of artificial animals, which came as little surprise to Sarvik, since that was one of the things directors were for. Would Sarvik be needing them? If so, what stage had the project reached, and what kind of percentages would it be appropriate to offer?
Further haggling followed. Sarvik played down the importance of their hand by stressing that there was only so much more they could learn from further animal tests. It was time to move on to the final phase of using actual Borijans. They had talked about it often enough, and they had no need to spell out the details. Essentially, three things would be needed: a suitable artificial host body, an upgraded molecular-circuit brain to drive it, and a donor of a complete set of the Borijan neural code. Since the code-extraction process was destructive, meeting the last requirement was going to be tricky.
"The woman from Universal Robocon is coming next week to go through the spec for a revised prototype," Alifrenz said. UR produced many of the robot types carried by the Searcher ships, which made it the obvious choice for designing a surrogate Borijan body. Every group involved had its own ideas about what an ideal body ought to be like, and Universal had the experience in handling compromises to keep all of them reasonably satisfied.
"And the molecular circuitry?" Sarvik inquired.
"On schedule," Alifrenz assured him. Others in Replimaticon were working on the brain; only the directors were supposed to know who. Sarvik had found out through GENIUS, but there was nothing to be gained from disclosing that fact. By the same means, Sarvik also knew that what Alifrenz had said was true. However, Sarvik also had other arrangements of his own in hand to cover both hardware needs, just in case.
"Regarding the code, I have talked some more with the contact in the Justice Department about getting criminals as volunteers," Greel said, not dropping any names. "There might be possibilities."
Sarvik didn't say anything about his deal with Dr. Queezt. If this immortality thing got to be as big as Sarvik thought it could, he had plans for setting up a connivance of his own that would cut them all out. And in any case, he didn't trust Greel or Alifrenz farther than either of them could carry a zhill.
When Sarvik was on his way back downstairs, his lapel phone beeped to inform him of an incoming call at priority 2. Borijans rarely abused priorities, since claiming a high level without good reason was the fastest way to be ignored the next time.
"Who is it?" Sarvik asked.
"Somebody called Palomec Jindriss," the building's message processor replied. "He says you wanted to talk to him."
"Don't let him go. I'll take it as soon as I get to the lab."
Jindriss was older than Sarvik had imagined. Or maybe that was what being an internationally prestigious scientist did to people, Sarvik thought as he confronted the image waiting on the screen. It was of a man of around middle age, his crest thin and graying prematurely, with furrows that imparted a permanently worried look to both sides of his head. Even the screen seemed to capture a bleak light in his tired, pink-rimmed eyes.
"Naturally, my sister has told me of your conversation," Jindriss said. "What you wanted to talk to us about, I really don't know. But I would very much like to talk to you, Dr. Sarvik. You can't imagine the significance of what you've stumbled on. I can't go into the details from here, but suppose I fly over from Vayso. My schedule is completely flexible. When would you be available?"
No preliminaries. None of the caution and probing that would have been only prudent or any play for notching up an opening advantage. Perhaps that was simply the way academics were, Sarvik thought. For a moment he was too perplexed by the directness to know how to respond. His confusion must have shown.
"Oh, I suppose you're surprised by my failure to follow the customary social maneuverings," Jindriss said. "I don't have the time for that kind of thing, I'm afraid, or the disposition. It may strike you as naive, but I urge you not to pay it undue attention. I can assure you that none of it will matter for very long. In fact, before very much longer nothing will matter at all."