Her Smoke Rose Up Forever (S.F. MASTERWORKS) by James Tiptree Jr.
Authors: James Tiptree Jr.
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out of that underground suite, a mobile demand-point draining an omnipresent fieldform. And she does—eighty-nine pounds of tender girl flesh and blood with a few metallic components, stepping out into the sunlight to be taken to her new life. A girl, with everything going for her including a meditech escort. Walking lovely, stopping to widen her eyes at the big antennae system overhead.
The mere fact that something called P. Burke is left behind down underground has no bearing at all. P. Burke is totally unselfaware and happy as a clam in its shell. (Her bed has been moved into the waldo cabinet room now.) And P. Burke isn’t in the cabinet; P. Burke is climbing out of an airvan in a fabulous Colorado beef preserve, and her name is Delphi. Delphi is looking at live Charolais steers and live cottonwoods and aspens gold against the blue smog and stepping over live grass to be welcomed by the reserve super’s wife.
The super’s wife is looking forward to a visit from Delphi and her friends, and by a happy coincidence there’s a holocam outfit here doing a piece for the nature nuts.
You could write the script yourself now, while Delphi learns a few rules about structural interferences and how to handle the tiny time lag which results from the new forty-thousand-mile parenthesis in her nervous system. That’s right—the people with the leased holocam rig naturally find the gold aspen shadows look a lot better on Delphi’s flank than they do on a steer. And Delphi’s face improves the mountains too, when you can see them. But the nature freaks aren’t quite as joyful as you’d expect.
“See you in Barcelona, kitten,” the headman says sourly as they pack up.
“Barcelona?” echoes Delphi with that charming little subliminal lag. She sees where his hand is and steps back. “Cool, it’s not her fault,” another man says wearily. He knocks back his grizzled hair. “Maybe they’ll leave in some of the gut.”
Delphi watches them go off to load the spools on the GTX transport for processing. Her hand roves over the breast the man had touched. Back under Carbondale, P. Burke has discovered something new about her Delphi-body.
About the difference between Delphi and her own grim carcass.
She’s always known Delphi has almost no sense of taste or smell. They explained about that: only so much bandwidth. You don’t have to taste a suncar, do you? And the slight overall dimness of Delphi’s sense of touch—she’s familiar with that, too. Fabrics that would prickle P. Burke’s own hide feel like a cool plastic film to Delphi.
But the blank spots. It took her a while to notice them. Delphi doesn’t have much privacy; investments of her size don’t. So she’s slow about discovering there’s certain definite places where her beastly P. Burke body feels things that Delphi’s dainty flesh does not. H’mm! Channel space again, she thinks—and forgets it in the pure bliss of being Delphi.
You ask how a girl could forget a thing like that? Look. P. Burke is about as far as you can get from the concept girl. She’s a female, yes—but for her, sex is a four-letter word spelled P-A-I-N. She isn’t quite a virgin. You don’t want the details; she’d been about twelve and the freak lovers were bombed blind. When they came down, they threw her out with a small hole in her anatomy and a mortal one elsewhere. She dragged off to buy her first and last shot, and she can still hear the clerk’s incredulous guffaws.
Do you see why Delphi grins, stretching her delicious little numb body in the sun she faintly feels? Beams, saying, “Please, I’m ready now.”
Ready for what? For Barcelona like the sour man said, where his nature-thing is now making it strong in the amateur section of the Festival. A winner! Like he also said, a lot of strip mines and dead fish have been scrubbed, but who cares with Delphi’s darling face so visible?
So it’s time for Delphi’s face and her other delectabilities to show on
The mere fact that something called P. Burke is left behind down underground has no bearing at all. P. Burke is totally unselfaware and happy as a clam in its shell. (Her bed has been moved into the waldo cabinet room now.) And P. Burke isn’t in the cabinet; P. Burke is climbing out of an airvan in a fabulous Colorado beef preserve, and her name is Delphi. Delphi is looking at live Charolais steers and live cottonwoods and aspens gold against the blue smog and stepping over live grass to be welcomed by the reserve super’s wife.
The super’s wife is looking forward to a visit from Delphi and her friends, and by a happy coincidence there’s a holocam outfit here doing a piece for the nature nuts.
You could write the script yourself now, while Delphi learns a few rules about structural interferences and how to handle the tiny time lag which results from the new forty-thousand-mile parenthesis in her nervous system. That’s right—the people with the leased holocam rig naturally find the gold aspen shadows look a lot better on Delphi’s flank than they do on a steer. And Delphi’s face improves the mountains too, when you can see them. But the nature freaks aren’t quite as joyful as you’d expect.
“See you in Barcelona, kitten,” the headman says sourly as they pack up.
“Barcelona?” echoes Delphi with that charming little subliminal lag. She sees where his hand is and steps back. “Cool, it’s not her fault,” another man says wearily. He knocks back his grizzled hair. “Maybe they’ll leave in some of the gut.”
Delphi watches them go off to load the spools on the GTX transport for processing. Her hand roves over the breast the man had touched. Back under Carbondale, P. Burke has discovered something new about her Delphi-body.
About the difference between Delphi and her own grim carcass.
She’s always known Delphi has almost no sense of taste or smell. They explained about that: only so much bandwidth. You don’t have to taste a suncar, do you? And the slight overall dimness of Delphi’s sense of touch—she’s familiar with that, too. Fabrics that would prickle P. Burke’s own hide feel like a cool plastic film to Delphi.
But the blank spots. It took her a while to notice them. Delphi doesn’t have much privacy; investments of her size don’t. So she’s slow about discovering there’s certain definite places where her beastly P. Burke body feels things that Delphi’s dainty flesh does not. H’mm! Channel space again, she thinks—and forgets it in the pure bliss of being Delphi.
You ask how a girl could forget a thing like that? Look. P. Burke is about as far as you can get from the concept girl. She’s a female, yes—but for her, sex is a four-letter word spelled P-A-I-N. She isn’t quite a virgin. You don’t want the details; she’d been about twelve and the freak lovers were bombed blind. When they came down, they threw her out with a small hole in her anatomy and a mortal one elsewhere. She dragged off to buy her first and last shot, and she can still hear the clerk’s incredulous guffaws.
Do you see why Delphi grins, stretching her delicious little numb body in the sun she faintly feels? Beams, saying, “Please, I’m ready now.”
Ready for what? For Barcelona like the sour man said, where his nature-thing is now making it strong in the amateur section of the Festival. A winner! Like he also said, a lot of strip mines and dead fish have been scrubbed, but who cares with Delphi’s darling face so visible?
So it’s time for Delphi’s face and her other delectabilities to show on
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