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Behavioral engineering in all of its enerates into merciless manipulation It reduces all (manipulators and manipulated alike) to a deadly "mass effect" The central assumption, that manipulation of individual personalities can achieve uniform behavioral responses, has been exposed as a lie byeffect than by the Gowachin on Dosadi Here, they showed us the "Walden Fallacy" in ulti: "Given any species which reproduces by geneticsuch that every individual is a unique specimen, all attempts to impose a decision matrix based on assumed uniform behavior will prove lethal"
- The Dosadi Papers, BuSab reference
McKie walked through the jumpdoor and, as Aritch&039;s aides had said, found hi He looked up, seeking his first real-ti of that enclosure All he saas a thin haze, faintly silver, disappointing The sun circle was more defined than he&039;d expected and he knew froraphic reproductions he&039;d seen that a few of the third-ht What else he&039;d expected, McKie could not say, but somehow this milky veil was not it Too thin, perhaps It appeared insubstantial, too weak for the power it represented&039;
The visible sun disk reent necessity, but he postponed that necessity while he exas
A tall white rock? Yes, there it was on his left
They&039;d warned him to wait beside that rock, that he&039;d be relatively safe there Under no circumstances was he to wander froers of Dosadi, but words are not enough Besides, the place is always developing new threats"
Things he&039;d learned in the briefing sessions over the past weeks reinforced the warning The rock, twice as tall as a Hu He went over and leaned against it Sand grated beneath his feet He smelled unfamiliar perfumes and acridities The sun-warh the thin green coveralls they&039;d insisted he wear
McKie longed for his ar and its devices to as were not permitted Only a reduced version of his toolkit had been allowed and that reluctantly, a compromise McKie had explained that the contents would be destroyed if anyone other than himself tried to pry into the kit&039;s secrets Still, they&039;d warned him never to open the kit in the presence of a Dosadi native
"Theyou can do is to underesti around him, saw no Dosadi
Far off across a dusty landscape dotted with yellow bushes and brown rocks, he identified the hazy spires of Chu rising out of its river canyon Heat waves dizzied the air above the low scrub, giving the city a ical appearance
McKie found it difficult to think about Chu in the context of what he&039;d learned during the crash course the Gowachin had given hi spires reached heavenward fro at all"
Aritch&039;s aides had sewn a large su but, at the sa admonitions about "any show of unprotected wealth"
The juent warnings, adding:
"You may have a wait of several hours We&039;re not sure Just stay close to that rock where you&039;ll be relatively safe We&039;ve ements which should work Don&039;t eat or drink anything until you get into the city You&039;ll be faintly sick with the diet change for a few days, but your body should adjust"
"Should adjust?"
"Give it tiers to which he should be most alert
"Stay clear of any Dosadi natives except your contacts Above all, don&039;t even appear to threaten anyone"
"What if I get drowsy and take a nap?"
They&039;d considered this, then:
"You know, thatto do Anyone who&039;d dare to nap out there would have to be damned well protected There&039;d be some risk, of course, but there always is on Dosadi But they&039;d be awfully leery of anyone casual enough to nap out there"
Again, McKie glanced around
Sharp whistlings and a low rasp like sand across wood came from behind the tall rock Quietly, McKie worked his way around to where he could see the sources of these noises The whistling was a yellow lizard almost the color of the bushes beneath which it crouched The rasp came from a direction which commanded the lizard&039;s attention Its source appeared to be a sht he detected in the lizard only a faint curiosity about hi about that hole and the noise issuing froreat deal of concentrated attention
So stirred in the hole&039;s blackness
The lizard crouched, continued to whistle
An ebony creature about the size of McKie&039;s fist eed fros shot from the newcomer&039;s sides and it leaped upward, but it was too late With a swiftness which astonished McKie, the lizard shot forward, balled itself around its prey A slit opened in the lizard&039;s stomach, surrounded the ebony creature With a final rasping, the black thing vanished into the lizard
All this time, the lizard continued to whistle Still whistling it crawled into the hole fros are seldom what they seem to be on Dosadi," McKie&039;s teachers had said
He wondered nohat he had just seen
The whistling had stopped
The lizard and its prey reminded McKie that, as he&039;d been warned, there had not been time to prepare him for every new detail on Dosadi He crouched now and, once s like insects inhabited the narrow line of shade at the base of the white rock Green (blossoms?) opened and closed on the steround all around appeared to be a basic sand and clay, but when he peered at it closely he saw veins of blue and red discoloration He turned his back on the distant city, saw far away ainst silver sky Rain had cut an arroyo in that direction He saw touches of darker green reaching froain, McKie n of threat Nothing he could identify He palmed an instrument from his toolkit, stood casually and stretched while he turned toward Chu When he stole a glance at the instrument, it revealed a sonabarrier at the city Absently scratching himself to conceal the motion, he returned the instrument to his kit Birds floated in the silver sky above the sonabarrier
Why a sonabarrier? he wondered
It would stop wild creatures, but not people His teachers had said the sonabarrier excluded pests, vers are seldom what they seem
Despite the God Wall, that sun was hot McKie sought the shady side of the rock Seated there, he glanced at the sreen lapel at his left breast: OP40331-D404 It was standard Galach script, the lingua franca of the ConSentiency
"They speak only Galach on Dosadi They may detect an accent in your speech, but they won&039;t question it"
Aritch&039;s people had explained that this badge identifed McKie as an open-contract worker, one with slightly above average skills in a particular field, but still part of the Labor Pool and subject to assignment outside his skill
"This puts you three hierarchical steps from the Rim" they&039;d said
It&039;d been his own choice The bottom of the social syste with information based on accurate data, instinct, dream stuff, and as fed from the top with deliberate intent Whatever happened here on Dosadi, its nature would be revealed in the unconscious processes of the Labor Pool In the Labor Pool, he could tap that revealing flow
"I&039;ll be a weaver," he&039;d said, explaining that it was a hobby he&039;d enjoyed for many years
The choice had amused his teachers McKie had been unable to penetrate the reason for their aht now One choice is as good as another"
They&039;d insisted he concentrate on what he&039;d been doing at the tinal mannerisms of Dosadi Indeed, it&039;d been a hectic period on Tandaloor after Aritch&039;s insistence (with the uo personally to Dosadi In retrospect, the arguments remained persuasive, but McKie had been surprised For some reason which he could not now identify, he had expected a less involved overview of the experi abilities of the Caleban who guarded the place
McKie was still not certain how they expected him to pull this hot palip from the cooker, but it was clear they expected it Aritch had been mysteriously explicit:
"You are Dosadi&039;s best chance for survival and our own best chance forunderstanding"
They expected their Legu the Gowachin It was a Legum&039;s task to win for his client, but these had to be the strangest circu the absolute power of destruction over the threatened planet
On Tandaloor, McKie had been allowed just time for short naps Even then, his sleep had been restless, part of hisstrange and not quite attuned to his needs, the odd noises beyond the walls - water gurgling soum, that had been one of his first adjustments: the uncertain rhythms of disturbed water Gowachin never strayed far from water The Graluz - that central pool and sanctuary for females, the place where Gowachin raised those tads which survived the ravenous weeding by the male parent - the Graluz always re put it:
"If you do not understand the Graluz, you do not understand the Gowachin"
As such sayings went, it was accurate only up to a point
But there was always the water, contained water, the nervous slapping of wavelets against walls The sound conveyed no fixed rhythms, but it was a profound clue to the Gowachin: contained, yet always different
For all short distances, swi tubes connected Gowachin facilities They traversed long distances by junetic cushions The cos of such cars had disturbed McKie&039;s sleep during the period of the crash course on Dosadi So rest, he would find himself awakened by voices And the subtle interference of the other sounds - the cars, the waves - ht, McKie would strain forfor vital clues, seeking every nuance in the casual conversations of people beyond his walls Frustrated, always frustrated, he had retreated into sleep And when, as happened occasionally, all sound ceased, this brought hi
And the odors! What ht back to hi of exotic seeds, permeated every breath Fern tree pollen intruded with its undertones of citrus And the caraeli, tiny, froglike pets, invaded your sleep at every dawning with their exquisite belling arias
During those earlier days of training on Tandaloor, McKie had felt ers, constantly aware of the important s were different after the intervieith Aritch McKie was now a trained, tested, and proven Leguent of BuSab Yet there were times when the mood of those earlier days intruded Such intrusions annoyed hi ainst his will, that the Gowachin secretly laughed as they prepared him for some ultimate humiliation They were not above such a jest Co God&039;s people were so ultimately civilized they had coery Look at the way Gowachinone of the rare naps Aritch&039;s people permitted him, McKie had awakened to sit up and try to shake off that depressing s: that the Gowachin flattered hiious respect which they paid to all Legu another truth: the Gowachin had groo period of ti less than candid with hi process and its intentions
There were always unfatho with Gowachin
When he&039;d tried returning to sleep that ti dreareen) all naked and quite defenseless before the onslaughts of gigantic Gowachin e was clear The Gowachin ht very well destroy Dosadi in the way (and for si, endlessly searching, for the strongest and most resilient survivors
The problem they&039;d duhtest inkling of Dosadi leaked into common awareness without a concurrent justification, the Gowachin Federation would be hounded unmercifully The Gowachin had clear and sufficient reason to destroy the evidence - or to let the evidence destroy itself
Justification
Where was that to be found? In the elusive benefits which had moved the Gowachin to mount this experiment?
Even if he found that justification, Dosadi would be an upheaval in the ConSentiency It&039;d be the subject of high draenerations of Hu! Their lonely history would titillate countless beings The li the last drop of emotive essence from this revelation
No matter how explained, Gowachin motives would come in for uncounted explorations and suspicions
Why did they really do it? What happened to their original volunteers?
People would look backward into their own ancestry - Human and Gowachin alike "Is that what happened to Uncle Elfred?" Gowachin phyluone without record!"
Aritch&039;s people admitted that "a very small minority" had mounted this project and kept the lid on it Were they completely sane, this Gowachin cabal?
McKie&039;s short naps were always disturbed by an obsequious Gowachin bowing over his bedog, begging hi sessions which prepared hi sessions! The implied prejudices hidden in every one raised more questions than were answered McKie tried to retain a reasoned attitude, but irritants constantly assailed him
Why had the Gowachin of Dosadi taken on Human emotional characteristics? Why were Dosadi&039;s Hu Gowachin social compacts? Were the Dosadi truly aware of why they changed governmental forms so often?
The bland answer to these frequent questions enraged McKie
"All will be made clear when you experience Dosadi for yourself"
He&039;d finally fallen into a counterirritant patter:
"You don&039;t really know the answer, do you? You&039;re hoping I&039;ll find out for you!"
Some of the data recitals bored McKie While listening to a Gowachin explain as known about Rim relationships, he would find hi in thearea
Once, Ceylang entered and sat at the side of the roory silence which rubbed McKie&039;s sensibilities to angry rawness He&039;d longed for the blue metal box then, but once the soleumic protection around him, the box had been reain unless this issue entered the Courtarena Ceylang re erous Wreave fe? He suspected they allowed Ceylang to watch hih remote spy devices Why did she choose that once to co observed? It had so to do hatever had prompted the Gowachin to train a Wreave They had some future problerooroomed him Why? What Wreave capabilities attracted the Gowachin? How did this Wreave female differ from other Wreaves? Where were her loyalties? What was the &039;Wreave Bet&039;?
This led McKie into another avenue never sufficiently explored: what Hued persistence? A background in Human law? The essential individualism of the Human?
There were no sure answers to these questions, no more than there were about the Wreave Her presence continued to fascinate his about Wreave society not in common awareness outside the Wreave worlds They were, after all, integral and valued partners in BuSab In shared tasks, a caes of information Beyond the fact that Wreaves required a breeding triad for reproduction, he knew that Wreaves had never discovered a way to deter the offspring This for stone in Wreave society Periodically, this person froed for a like person froenetic dispersion and, of equal ihout their civilization With each such linkage went require support in times of trouble
A Wreave in the Bureau had tried to explain this:
"Take, for example, the situation where a Wreave is murdered or, even worse, deprived of essential vanity The guilty party would be answerable personally to millions upon e has linked us, we are required to respond inti you have to this, as I understand it, is familial responsibility We have this familial responsibility for vendetta where such affronts occur You have no idea how difficult it was to release those of us in BuSab froe, this network of responsibility"