Golden Torc - 2 by Julian May Page B

human-Tanu matings speed up the evolutionary process drastically. Given the quality of the latent stock coming through the time-gate. Prentice Brown had calculated that the Tanu would go reliably operant in only fifty generations. Of course, now..."
    "Elizabeth?"
    "Exactly. When we got word of her arrival, Prentice Brown and I recalculated the heritability of the different meta genes based upon Elizabeth's presumed genetic assay and the results were astounding. You can get the details from Prentice Brown himself over at Creation House. He's called Lord Greg-Donnet, you know."
    Bryan couldn't help thinking: Crazy Greggy.
    Again Gomnol laughed, teeth tightly clenching the cigar.
    "Some sooner, some later. Come along through here. The silver torcs are basically similar to the gold. But we've been able to automate a bit in the manufacture of the gray and rama types."
    "How," Bryan asked, "do the Firvulag fit into your genetic enterprise?"
    "They don't, as yet. A great pity from the eugenic viewpoint, as you've already deduced. The Little People are genuine operants, even if their powers tend to be limited. Unfortunately, both races have a horrendous taboo against interbreeding, and no Firvulag would touch a human with a barge pole. But some of us are working on the problem. If we could only convince the Tanu to keep their Firvulag children instead of passing them over to the Little People, we might have a chance of changing the mating pattern. It's fraught with possibilities." They did a quick run through the area where the gray torcs were made. There was more of a factory atmosphere in this workshop, where several simple stamping machines were turning out torc shells and ramas were performing some of the assembly. Gomnol explained that the gray torcs were a variant of the device originally used on ramas by the pioneering Tanu, which he himself had modified into a psychoregulator suitable for humanity.
    "We still have some problems with the torcs, as you heard. But by and large they're much more effective than the docilization implants that were used on sociopaths in the Milieu. And the pleasure-pain circuitry and the farspeak augmentation are completely innovative." Gomnol's eyes darted sidelong. In a neutral tone, he added, "I designed the original docilization device at Berkeley, you know."
    Bryan's forehead furrowed. "I thought Eisenmann-" Gomnol turned away. In a tight voice, he said, "I was a graduate student working under him. A young fool. We had a touching father-son relationship and he was so proud of me. My work was promising, he said, but its potential might remain unrealized because I lacked the cachet necessary to attract Polity funding. However, if I worked under him. .. there would be no problem. I was grateful and he was clever and the work was a resounding success. And now the entire Milieu knows Eisenmann the laureate. A few even remember Eusebio Gomez-Nolan, his faithful little assistant."
    "I see."
    The other man whirled around. "Oh, do you?" he flared. "Do you, indeed? Just forty years, and I've shaped an entire culture, turned these exotics from a path of feckless barbarism toward civilization! If the genetic manipulation with Elizabeth comes about, they could become transtechnological, superior to the Unity of our unborn Galactic Milieu! What would Eisenmann and those Stockholm idiots think if they could see all this?"
    Oh, God, Bryan thought. He tried to keep his own mind as blank as possible. What had Elizabeth told them back at the auberge? Count! Onetwothreefour onetwothreefour onetwothreefour... But Gomnol was not attempting to read the panicked anthropologist's thoughts. He was fully occupied with his own inner vision. "Many years ago, during the time of the Rebellion, a small number of other operants came through the time-gate. I wasn't ready. My position was still unconsolidated and the Tanu culture was in such a state of flux that matters were taken out of my hands before I could act. But I'm ready