Read Online Night Sessions, The by Ken MacLeod - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Ken MacLeod
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dark suspicion. Not when the consequences could be so bad for the Church—for all the Churches, and all the believers.
But she couldn't do nothing. After thinking for some time, she sighed, tapped twice behind her ear, and spoke to the Bishop of St. Andrews.
“Cornelius? Can you give my erectus a lift?”
Cornelius Vermuelen let a smirk fade before he shouted back.
“Sure, J. R. No problem.”
He rounded the corner of Waimangu Visitors’ Centre and made his way to the workshop shed at the back. Its garage-type door was open, the entrance partly blocked by the head and upper neck of an animatronic apatosaurus. Tools were clipped and shelved on the walls. John Richard Campbell was stooped over a worktop in the middle of the floor. On the worktop lay the torso of a humanoid robot, its dark hairy skin folded away from the small of its back, the overlapping steel plates of the lumbar region removed and laid to one side. Campbell's hands moved delicately within the cavity. The robot's microcephalic head, its small brow creased, watched the procedure from a nearby shelf. Beside it on the shelf was a less convincing, and quite inanimate, beetle-browed and prognathous prosthesis. The head had been crudely adapted to fit this mask: its facial features were human, albeit with a skin somewhat worn and mottled, but the cranium was about half the human size, with a heavy brow ridge.
Campbell glanced up.
“Won't be a minute,” he said.
Vermuelen knew better than to believe him. So, by the look that crossed its features, did the robot. Vermuelen sidled over to it, keeping out of Campbell's daylight.
“Back problem?” he said.
The head moved as if trying to nod. “Yes,” it said. “Stripped a gear in my lumbar hinge. Fucking baraminologists.”
“Language,” chided Campbell, not looking up.
“From the Hebrew,” explained the robot head, wilfully misunderstanding. “ Bara min , meaning ‘created kind,’ a very flexible taxon indeed.”
“I don't quite follow,” said Vermuelen. “What have creationist taxonomists got to do with your back?”
“A few weeks ago,” said the head, “they reclassified my kind from ‘fully human post-Diluvial local variety’ to ‘extinct large-brained ape.’ Some littledipshit at the Institute had done a lit review and decided that the bones of the type specimen weren't definitively associated with the stone tools found in the same horizon of the same fucking dig. And furthermore, that the fossil's cervical vertebrae and pelvis weren't well enough preserved to justify giving me an upright stance. So suddenly I've got to start shambling around like a half-shut knife, swinging my arms and grunting. It's demeaning, I tell you. And it's done my back in. I expect my neck will be next.”
“Your neck's fine,” said Campbell. “Just keep applying the WD-40.”
He reached to an oil-filled saucer for a large ball bearing, held it up between thumb and middle finger as if it were a plum he was about to pop in his mouth, and dropped it into the cavity. He made a few turns with a screwdriver, then with a socket wrench.
“Give it a go,” he said.
The headless prone body made a couple of humping motions.
“Feels all right,” said the head, in a grudging tone.
Campbell replaced the array of plates, squirted WD-40 over them, and flattened the skin back into place. The tip of his tongue protruded as he Super-Glued the flap's incisions. He stood back.
“OK,” he said.
The body stood up, walked to the shelf, and placed its head back on. Clunking sounds came from it as various bolts and cables re-established their connections. Campbell tightened a couple of screws at the throat and nape. With visible reluctance, the robot pulled on the prosthesis. Hair hid the join. The ape-like features twitched this way and that, as the simulated face within grimaced its way back into control of the mask.
“Thanks,” the robot said. It turned to Vermuelen, its ape eyelids blinking
But she couldn't do nothing. After thinking for some time, she sighed, tapped twice behind her ear, and spoke to the Bishop of St. Andrews.
“Cornelius? Can you give my erectus a lift?”
Cornelius Vermuelen let a smirk fade before he shouted back.
“Sure, J. R. No problem.”
He rounded the corner of Waimangu Visitors’ Centre and made his way to the workshop shed at the back. Its garage-type door was open, the entrance partly blocked by the head and upper neck of an animatronic apatosaurus. Tools were clipped and shelved on the walls. John Richard Campbell was stooped over a worktop in the middle of the floor. On the worktop lay the torso of a humanoid robot, its dark hairy skin folded away from the small of its back, the overlapping steel plates of the lumbar region removed and laid to one side. Campbell's hands moved delicately within the cavity. The robot's microcephalic head, its small brow creased, watched the procedure from a nearby shelf. Beside it on the shelf was a less convincing, and quite inanimate, beetle-browed and prognathous prosthesis. The head had been crudely adapted to fit this mask: its facial features were human, albeit with a skin somewhat worn and mottled, but the cranium was about half the human size, with a heavy brow ridge.
Campbell glanced up.
“Won't be a minute,” he said.
Vermuelen knew better than to believe him. So, by the look that crossed its features, did the robot. Vermuelen sidled over to it, keeping out of Campbell's daylight.
“Back problem?” he said.
The head moved as if trying to nod. “Yes,” it said. “Stripped a gear in my lumbar hinge. Fucking baraminologists.”
“Language,” chided Campbell, not looking up.
“From the Hebrew,” explained the robot head, wilfully misunderstanding. “ Bara min , meaning ‘created kind,’ a very flexible taxon indeed.”
“I don't quite follow,” said Vermuelen. “What have creationist taxonomists got to do with your back?”
“A few weeks ago,” said the head, “they reclassified my kind from ‘fully human post-Diluvial local variety’ to ‘extinct large-brained ape.’ Some littledipshit at the Institute had done a lit review and decided that the bones of the type specimen weren't definitively associated with the stone tools found in the same horizon of the same fucking dig. And furthermore, that the fossil's cervical vertebrae and pelvis weren't well enough preserved to justify giving me an upright stance. So suddenly I've got to start shambling around like a half-shut knife, swinging my arms and grunting. It's demeaning, I tell you. And it's done my back in. I expect my neck will be next.”
“Your neck's fine,” said Campbell. “Just keep applying the WD-40.”
He reached to an oil-filled saucer for a large ball bearing, held it up between thumb and middle finger as if it were a plum he was about to pop in his mouth, and dropped it into the cavity. He made a few turns with a screwdriver, then with a socket wrench.
“Give it a go,” he said.
The headless prone body made a couple of humping motions.
“Feels all right,” said the head, in a grudging tone.
Campbell replaced the array of plates, squirted WD-40 over them, and flattened the skin back into place. The tip of his tongue protruded as he Super-Glued the flap's incisions. He stood back.
“OK,” he said.
The body stood up, walked to the shelf, and placed its head back on. Clunking sounds came from it as various bolts and cables re-established their connections. Campbell tightened a couple of screws at the throat and nape. With visible reluctance, the robot pulled on the prosthesis. Hair hid the join. The ape-like features twitched this way and that, as the simulated face within grimaced its way back into control of the mask.
“Thanks,” the robot said. It turned to Vermuelen, its ape eyelids blinking
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