Earth's First Improved Chimp 
Gets Job As A Janitor
(2004)*
John Ringo

	Meanwhile, back on Earth, another story about humanity's closest relatives, by the author of the Posleen Wars series. 

	"No, Mark. You can't." Mark Second had heard those words too many times in his life. The student's dark face did not flicker but the coach still had a wary look in his eye. "It's not my rule, Mark. It's the rule of the High School Sport Board. Anyone with 'excessive enhancement' cannot participate in intramural sports. Period." 

	"Why not?" asked the exasperated teenager. He knew the true answer but he wanted the coach to admit it. His features were as still as granite despite his fury. "Or rather, 'why me?' Half the kids in school have one modification or another. What? You don't think Patty Rice naturally has that curly, platinum blond hair? Do you?" 

	"They're not built from the ground up, Mark," said the heavyset football coach with a cautious shrug. "They're just . . . fixed. They're not specifically designed for . . . physical activity the way you are. They're not—" 

	"Monsters," said Mark, bitterly. "That's not it," said the adult, watching the still, flat, square face across from him carefully. Mark never showed what he was thinking, which was one of the things that frightened people. It was currently frightening the burly former football player. Teachers had learned to worry about the quiet ones, the outcasts. Regular troublemakers were bad enough, but the education system had slowly learned that it was the ones who just took it and never fought back that exploded. And if this one ever went mokker nobody would be able to stop him. "Their changes didn't come from illegal genics. Kids like Patty and 

	Tom have the normal, limited enhancements. The sort of thing that anybody can get done through body surgery. Yours are—"

	"Evil," Mark finished for him, snarling. He flexed a thigh-thick forearm. "Frightening."

	"You keep saying things like that," snapped the coach, becoming exasperated. He gestured at Mark as if to take in the whole picture; the armored forehead, the flat, masklike face with eyes set deep in ripples of bone, the tree-trunk legs, the expanded, armored and massively muscled chest. "The rule was practically designed for you, Mark. Putting you on the field with regular kids would be like them playing a Pop Warner team! You're different; face it!" 

	"So I have to stay the school outcast, huh?" asked the teenager, his face finally starting to show his anger. "Is that the bottom line?"

	"Sports won't change that, Mark," said the adult with a sigh, losing his anger as fast as it had developed. "Only you can." 

	"Get real," snarled the student. "You don't live this life, I do." He stood up, nodded at the coach and stalked out. The coach waited until the door cycled closed and sighed in relief. As the designated enforcement officer for the Delta Wing of the school he had had to take down more than one mokking student. But he was afraid if that one ever cracked it would require a bazooka. 

	Mark walked up to his locker and took a long, cleansing breath. Then another. Stress management exercises were his earliest conscious lessons, even before reading. How to confront and manage the anger, the easy descent into berserk rage, that was his heritage. He took another breath, feeling the trickle of ultraline he had been unable to contain fritter away against the wall of his control. Breathe in, breathe out. Let the rage subside. All in the mind. 

	He looked hard at the poor inanimate locker but finally resisted punching it. Not only would he, probably, break a knuckle, the punch would undoubtedly shatter the security plastic. And he didn't need the resulting whispers added to the current around him. Breathe in, breathe out. He leaned his head against cool plastic, hoping that some lightning bolt would just strike him dead on the spot. Maybe if he just stayed here until the end of school. Or, at least, until the next PE class came in. 

	As it was, he stayed there, leaning on the plastic, until his shoes became wet. "Some super-soldier," opined a gravelly voice. "You've got lousy situational awareness." Mark leaned back and cracked an eyelid. The Imp janitor peered back at him with soft brown eyes as the 

	kid examined the mop resting on his shoes. "I'm not a super-soldier," said Mark, tiredly. "I'm not any kind of soldier. I've never held a gun. I don't want to hold a gun. But I would like you to take your mop off my shoes; you're getting my feet wet." 

	"Okay," said the improved chimpanzee, pulling the mop back. "But I need to mop the floor."

	"Could you maybe give me a minute," said Mark in a low, growling tone. He rarely let himself sound like that because most people found it intimidating. And that didn't help his reputation either. How-ever, he really didn't have any interest in moving. And the damn chimpanzee was getting on his nerves. "Kid, I'm not in the mood for adolescent angst right now," said the unintimidated Imp. "I'd like to finish this floor. See, if I finish the floor, I can go prop my feet up for a few minutes and have a coffee and a banana. But, until I finish it, I gotta stay on my dogs. So, I'd really like you to move. Okay? Just, stand on the bench or something." 

	Mark bemusedly climbed up on the locker room bench as the janitor swept the mop efficiently back and forth. "Aren't there robots to do that?" the student asked. He had sort of noticed janitors around the school, but he'd never really thought about them. However, this was the first person in a long time who recognized him for what he was and didn't act scared. 

	"Yeah," answered the Imp, expertly flicking the butt of a joint out from under the bench and into the mop bucket. The janitor must have been an earlier model; he seemed both quicker and more intelligent than the current norm. Pan sapiens was a diverse species. There had been a variety of early experiments before the current "normal" form was settled on, and then, in the wave of revulsion after the Oligen Incident, locked in by legislation. "But robots are lousy at getting under benches. It's easier to just mop the hard stuff myself and leave the robots for the hallways at night." 

	"Was mine the last gym class?" asked Mark, stripping off his shirt. The sweat-soaked jersey was the result of a few warm-ups and a solid forty minutes in the weight room fast-pumping four times his body weight; nobody was going to ask him to join the scheduled basketball game. 

	"Yep. Then I go get a banana until you brats get out of the buildings. Turn on the robots, turn off the lights and go home."

	"Seems like an easy enough job," said Mark, pulling on a baggy, button-down shirt. The loose cotton concealed his Herculean physique, but nothing could conceal his face. "Sure, sure, kid," snorted the janitor. "Every day's a holiday and every meal's a banquet." Mark slowed in buttoning the top button of his shirt and treated the chimpanzee to a quizzical look. "I've heard that somewhere before." 

	"Well, I didn't say I made it up," said the chimp, dumping the mop in his bucket and regarding the kid mildly. "Tell you what, kid, wanna banana?"

	"I should be getting back to class," said Mark with a sigh. "Screw it," laughed the chimp. "It's algebra. You can afford to skip a day."

	"How did you know what class I'd be taking?" asked the genie, interested. "I got eyes, kid," said the chimp, pointing to his deep-set orbs. "Just like yours. You want that banana or not?"

	"Sure," said Mark, with a nod. "Thanks."

	"De nada," answered the chimp with a gesture. "Us test-tube types gotta stick together."

	"Yeah," said Mark with a rare smile. "I guess. What's your name, chimp?"

	"Charlie," answered the janitor. "Charlie Algernon."

	"Well, my name's Mark," said the genie. He took the proffered paw and squeezed it gently, but was surprised at the strength of the returning grip. "Don't worry, Mark," said the chimp with a broad grin. "One of the reasons I ain't worried about you is chimps is pretty strong, too." 

	Able Tyburn looked up from his reader. "Good morning, Mark," he said calmly. Able and his wife Shari did everything calmly. Which was why they had been chosen as Mark Two foster parents. When the remnants of the Cyberpunk entry team had finally broken through the Mark One defenders of Oligen and taken the nursery, the Terrestrial Union had faced a dilemma. There were forty-eight Mark Twos completed, but they were, to all appearances, human babies. Unlike the chimp derivative Mark One offspring, all of which had been put down, the Mark Twos fell under the rules regarding human genetic modification. They were, despite universal revulsion, held by the Supreme Court to be humans. Therefore, they could not be killed out of hand. 

	But the Mark Two was designed as a high-intensity combat model. They had no purpose beyond entering heavy firefights and winning. They were, effectively, genie tanks. As such their ultraline glands were tweaked to produce at the slightest provocation. The testosterone-adrenaline-nicotine neural enhancer gave them the ability to go into "hyper-state" at a moment's notice. The downside was that they were extremely aggressive. 

	The Terrestrial Union had dealt with this by finding, among its four million residents, forty-eight couples with almost preternatural calm. Couples who could raise and train pseudo-human hand-grenades in a loving and nurturing environment. 

	"Good morning, Father," said Mark, with a smile. He opened the cold-door and pulled out a jug of milk and a bunch of bananas then headed for the door of the apartment. 

	"Where are you going, Mark?" asked his father. The question had no negative overtones; it was a perfectly formed query. Able Tyburn never used a negative tone. "I'm going to go have breakfast with Charlie," Mark answered, grabbing his reader and coat. "I had been meaning to discuss that with you, Mark," said Able, setting down his own reader. The morning news had been mildly distressing, with another outbreak of the Thuggee Cult in California. Unlike the traditionalists in India and Europe, the American branch of the nihilistic religion believed that shedding blood in their executions was the best way to worship their goddess. The slaying in the downtown LA-San school had been particularly bloody. 

	"You understand that we do not want to slow your societal development," said the foster parent, calmly. As he did the house chimp emerged from the kitchen and silently began laying out his breakfast. "However, it would be a preferred condition if you could spend socially enhancing time with a human as opposed to a chimp." 

	"Unfortunately, Father," said Mark, almost automatically suppressing the stab of irritation he felt at the comment, "I have found it difficult to make human friends. As you know."

	"Yes, Mark. I am, sadly, aware of that," said the foster parent. He was, in fact, very aware of that fact. Mark was on the low end of sociability among the fifteen surviving Mark Twos. As the most recent e-mail from The Program had pointed out in no uncertain terms. "However, I am sure that when you begin attending college, and have a larger population to draw from, you will find more companions." 

	"Until then, Father," said the young man, as calmly as a Buddha, "my sole socializing outlet is this chimp janitor you seem to disapprove of."

	"Mark, there is a difference between humans and chimps," said the control. He gestured at the servant who was serving him his cholesterol-free egg--substitute. "I would suggest that you could actually hurt your socialization process by developing skills that are inadequate. The social reactions you develop from interacting with this 'Charlie' are going to be different than those you should be acquiring. This will delay your development. I cannot find this to be a positive outcome." 

	"So," said the student taking a calming breath and suppressing the stab of ultraline that threatened to send him into a berserk rage, "you are recommending that I stop socializing with 'this chimp.' " 

	"Yes," said the father, picking up his fork. "That is my recommendation."

	"I shall take it under advisement, Father," said the student. "But not this morning." He knew that the next step up from advice was orders. 

	"Very well," said the parent. "Have a good day at school, Mark. Remember . . ."

	"Calmness is next to oneness," said Mark. "Be one with the universe and nothing can anger you," said his father with a smile. 

	Mark opened the door to the boiler room and tossed Charlie the bunch of bananas. "Mornin', monkey." 

	"Mornin', freak," said the chimp with a grin. He looked up from the reader he was repairing to catch the bundle. "Whassa word?" he asked, pulling off a piece of fruit and pouring the kid a cup of coffee. "My dad wants me to stop seeing so much of you," Mark grumped. He took the coffee and sipped it appreciatively. "How in the hell do you make such a good cup of coffee?" he asked. "Old secret," winked the chimp, taking his own sip and a bite of banana. "Pinch of salt. It's called 'goatlocker' coffee."

	"Whatever," said the kid. "It's good."

	"I told you Abe would kick up a fuss," said the chimp. "And he's got a point, you do need friends your own age."

	"But I can't make them," said Mark. "And besides, they're not my own age!"

	"Well, there's that too," said the chimp with a grin. "Not many twelve-year-olds in their senior year. But you're basically eighteen in every way but actual years, kid. Don't bitch about that."

	"I won't," said Mark, sadly. "It's not like I'm gonna live to seventy."

	"Oh, I don't know," said the chimp. "All that 'ongenic increase' stuff might be bullshit. They told me I'd be long dead by now when I got uncanned. And here I am."

	"Yeah, but I'm sort of programmed to die in my thirties," said the teenager. "I don't think I can avoid it."

	"Worry about that when the time comes, kid. Geneticists fuck up more than they get it right, trust me," the chimp chuckled. "Me? I was originally designed for intensive loyalty."

	"Really?" asked Mark, looking at him askance. "What happened?"

	"I got over it," said the chimp, with a smile. "The coding was . . . sort of open. So I convinced myself that my 'employer' was . . . not my original one."

	"What did your employer think of that?" asked Mark with fascination. "Well, it was a little company that had just gone out of business," said the chimp. "So I had to find my own way. And I did. And so will you, kid. You just have to figure out what comes natural to you." 

	Mark looked up as Tom Fallon sat down on the seat across from him. The lunchroom was crowded; obviously Fallon felt it was better to sit by "Dr. Demento" than anywhere else. Fallon wasn't a bad guy. Unlike most of the other kids in school he didn't actively reject the big genie. However, he also didn't spend more time in his presence than he had to. 

	"Mark," said the teenager with a nod. "How'cha?" 

	"'Kay," said the genie, taking a big bite of his -peanut-butter and banana sandwich. Charlie had turned him on to the mix and he found it fulfilled a craving he hadn't even realized was there. "You missed algebra the other day," said the other teen, carefully. "I was trying to get the coach to take me in football," answered Mark, equably. "Did it . . . work?" asked Tom, picking at his food. Just because sitting by a human time-bomb was better than the other choices available didn't mean he had to like it. 

	"No," said Mark with a shrug. Charlie had, rightly, pointed out that football wouldn't have been a challenge and that was what he really craved. It was surprising the insights the chimp had. "Oh," said the other teen, as the doors to the cafeteria opened, "okay." Mark never answered, as his ultraline gland opened up full-bore and he dove out of his seat. The first 9mm round cracked just behind his moving body but he was already accelerating too fast for the masked gunman in the doorway to track. His movements were too fast for the human eye to follow as he dove across the serving counter, submachine-gun rounds smashing the sneeze-guards and splashing red blood from the servers across the food. He popped back up halfway down the counter as the gunman turned his attention of the mob of shrieking teenagers. 

	"Hey!" shouted the genie, attracting the gunman's attention. As the masked and body-armored gunman turned to see who the impudent youth was, his larynx intercepted a spinning metal pie-pan. Mark darted through the doors to the kitchen and snatched up a serving knife, still running on ultraline. 

	It was the longest he had ever been under the drug's effect and he was unsure how long the neural enhancer would hold out. For as long as it did, he was four times as fast as an unenhanced human and nearly twice as "smart." Although, at the moment he didn't feel that way. 

	He had not heard an emergency announcement, though. As long as the kids in the school were trapped in their classes they were dead meat. He looked around and spotted the fire alarm. Good enough for now. Once the alarm was shrieking he headed for the principal's office. If he could get on the announcement system he could warn the school. He had seen the red hand on the terrorist's vest; the Thuggees had hit and they would keep killing until a TAC team arrived to stop them. 

	Mark looked both ways and darted across the hallway as distant shots and screaming broke out in D Wing. He tore open the door to the office and threw himself through low, hoping there wasn't a Thuggee on the other side. When no gunfire erupted he sniffed then stood up. He could smell somebody in the room, but it smelled like . . . "Patty?" he called. 

	The blond cheerleader poked her head up from behind the receptionist's desk. "Yes?" she called warily. She ducked back down as another burst of fire broke out. "Who is it?"

	"It's me, Mark Second. It's Thuggees, Patty, make an announcement." 

	"But then they'll know there's somebody here!" she said shakily. Mark had to admit it was a valid argument, but the students and teachers needed to have some warning. He started to walk over to the desk then caught a faint whiff of cordite. 

	Dara Kidwai was not the name the gunman had been born with. But he had had it legally changed the year before when he became a full member of the House of Kali. Participation in the religion was not a crime, despite the horrors being perpetuated in its name. Like Islam in the previous century, the Kali Cult and other religions were simply places for like-minded individuals to meet and gather. And use the mantle of the religion for their own ends. 

	Dara Kidwai was about to do just that. He could see the stupid teen, probably a Kali-be-damned football player from his physique, just beyond the metal door to the office. After he had killed this one he would send everyone else in the office to his goddess. And all the other bastards and bitches in the school. Sacrifice them all to the greater glory of Kali. 

	Mark spun in place as the door opened, catching the barrel of the MP-12 in his left hand and carrying it up and away as he grabbed the back of the cultist's head. The sound of the genie's armored forehead hitting the forehead of the cultist was wet and sodden as blood spurted out of the gunman's nose and ears. 

	"Patty," he snapped, wiping the blood off of his face, "make the damned announcement. Now." He bent down and tried to figure out how to detach the machine-gun from the terrorist's harness. He'd never seen a firearm in his life; The Program had made sure of that. 

	"What happened?" asked the fluff-head, peeking over the top of the desk. "Oh, gross!" she continued, turning to throw up. Mark had to admit it was pretty gross with the blood pooling under the terrorist, but as pumped as he was on ultraline he was pretty much immune to any feeling but anger. He finally figured out how to take off the whole harness and walked over to the desk with the sopping gear draped across one shoulder. He picked up the microphone and keyed it. "Warning, all students and faculty. Kali Cultists in the building. One terminated in office and one terminated in cafeteria. Anyone with a cell phone, please call for Tac 

	Teams. I am on my way to Delta Wing in support. Mark-Two Gen-One Combat System out." Let the bastards chew on that announcement. He wiped at some blood off his front—apparently one of the bullets had hit his sternum plate and bounced—then pulled the gun around to his front. Holding it in one hand, as he had seen on TV, he pulled on the trigger. It put bullets all over the wall. Oh, well. He'd just have to figure it out as he went along. 

	Mark stalked down the empty corridors of D Wing leaving bloody footprints behind him. He had to admit that inviting the cultists to kill him was stupid. But if they concentrated on trying to take him out, they wouldn't be killing the other kids. What the hell, it wasn't like he was designed for a long life. 

	He had just stalked past Mr. Patterson's classroom when he sensed a movement behind him and smelled blood and cordite. He didn't know where the damn Kali had come from but the red-hand bastard had him dead to rights. Mark spun and turned with supernatural speed as the cultist opened fire, but this terrorist was good. Nine-millimeter rounds impacted into the youth's unarmored back and sides as he slammed into the wall, the gun in his hand spraying everywhere but the cultist. 

	The only thing that saved the genie was that both of them were just about out of rounds. Mark's MP-12 and the terrorist's clicked back at almost the same moment. Forgetting that his best bet was hand-tohand, the badly wounded teen scrabbled for a new magazine as he tried to figure out how to reload the gun. 

	The Kali had no such problems. The cultist expertly dropped the thirty-round magazine and slipped in another. He chuckled as he pulled back the slide. "Some gene unit," he said, as a loop of wire dropped out of the ceiling. "Pun . . . urk." 

	The loop of 12-gauge insulated wire snapped up and to the side, expertly breaking the terrorist's neck, and Charlie dropped down on the body. He bent over and started slipping off the terrorist's gear as he shook his head at Mark. 

	"Stupid, stupid, stupid. I thought Oligen made you smart?" 

	"I was trying to get them off the other kids," said the teen, weakly. The ultraline was fading and the bullets peppered throughout his body were starting to hurt. "I was talking about not looking up, kid," said the chimp. "You need to learn to look up."

	"I thought I'd smell him," said Mark, doubtfully. "Yeah, so he put himself by an intake, just like me," said Charlie. The chimp threw the body-armor over 

	his head and looked down with a laugh; the Kevlar-titanium vest dangled to the ground. "Oh, well. Shit happens." He walked over to the teen and reloaded the youth's MP-12 then took all but one spare magazine. 

	"I think I'm going to need these more than you," the chimp commented as he dragged the bleeding genie into Mr. Patterson's classroom. There was a kid huddled in one corner but otherwise the room was empty. "Charlie?" asked the combat-unit. He coughed up a drop or two of blood. "I don't think I'm gonna make it, Charlie." 

	"Bullshit," said the chimp with a grin. "You're a Mark Two, you lucky bastard. Most of that shit will be healed in a couple of days; you're probably already clotting like mad. Just sit there and do your calmness exercises until the medics find you. Oh. And kill any terrorist that comes through the door. Your left hand goes on the stock, you idiot." 

	With that the janitor was gone. As Mark faded in and out he dreamed of a distant one-man war. But the screams were all torn from the throats of adult males. 

	Mark had never seen anyone who looked like him before. The SWAT team commander was a Normal but broad and flat as a human tank. 

	"So, you have no other information about this 'Charlie Algernon'?" the officer asked calmly. Mark had never realized that the calmness of his parents was a positive trait in a tactics team member. 

	But all the SWAT guys that he had been talking with since the incident were like that. Calm, controlled, focussed. These guys did not believe in rage as a character trait. "No. I'd barely gotten to know him."

	" 'Goat-locker coffee,' hmm," said the police lieutenant. "I think that says it all."

	"Why?" asked Mark. "Where did Charlie learn that stuff?"

	"Well, son, you know you're a Mark Two, right," said the lieutenant with a grim smile. "You know what 

	Mark Ones were."

	"Oh," said Mark, his chin dropping. "Yeah. The whole Oligen thing was originally an outgrowth of the Cyberpunk-SEAL program. Their instructors in close combat were all SEALs and Cybers; thus Navy-brewed coffee. Their training was one reason it was so hard for the Cyber team to take the Oligen facility when the Council found out about the Mark Twos and Oligen's plans for a coup. The SEALs thought that they had tracked down and killed all the Mark Ones but at least one apparently escaped." 

	"He told me that he had been designed for loyalty to his 'original owners,' " said Mark. "But he had figured out a way around the conditioning."

	"Maybe by broadening it," said the commander with a sad smile. "I was aware of the conditioning. But, I think, maybe, he decided that since the government paid for the program, his owner was -actually the government. And since it is a representative democracy . . ." 

	"The whole world was his owner?" asked Mark. "Maybe," said the lieutenant. "Sort of like any good soldier; he gave his loyalty to the 'bigger picture.' 

	Anyway, I'm glad in a way that he was killed in that explosion. The termination orders are still active on all Mark Ones. We would have had to put him down."

	"I understand," said Mark, somewhat bitterly. "But I don't have to like it."

	"Neither do I," said the lieutenant. "But it's better this way. We have a toe and some other scraps for a positive genetic ID, but that satchel charge didn't leave much." The officer saw the kid's face harden and thought about the talk he had had with the teen's guidance counselor. Especially with the media play on this attack, the kid was going to be even more ostracized than before. Which was, frankly, stupid. "Hey," said the officer with a faint grin. "After you get out of the body and fender shop, gimme a call." 

	He proffered a card to the genie. "There may be a rule against a Modified in football, but there ain't one against them in SWAT."

	"Okay," said Mark with a returning smile. "I will." It might not make up for bananas and coffee in the morning but it would be something to do while he waited to die. 

	The door was marked "Arthur Commons, Assistant Principal." A heavily-furred hand knocked on it, softly. "Come in," said a voice from the interior. "I understand you need a janitor?" 

The End