CHAPTER NINE
Aggression
During the incubation period, everyone at work tried to concentrate on something but Design 48. I finished fine-tuning the behavioral module and showcased it to the other members of the design team. Evelyn schooled me on some of the finer points of DragonDraft3D. She challenged me with test cases—adapting dragons for various physical environments and lifestyles.
I didn’t know if it was unusual for the Director of Dragon Design to train a new employee, but I didn’t ask. Maybe Evelyn needed something to fill time during the endless wait as much as I did.
The points system in DragonDraft3D made the design process more challenging. I suppose the purpose was to prevent us from creating a super-predator. I could create a big, strong dragon that was too dumb to fly, or a clever dragon that couldn’t claw its way out of a cardboard box. I understood the safety angle, but it seemed to me that the whole system prevented one from designing something that matched people’s expectations for dragons. But that was a problem that only mattered once we cracked domestication. The original Reptilian product, the hog-hunter, fulfilled its purpose well. Only the amino acid deficiency—the ecological failsafe—kept it within the point restriction.
At last, the incubation period ended. I may or may not have been staring at the holo-clock on my desk when Evelyn showed up. “Are you ready?”
“Sure.” I stood and followed her through the airtight doors to the hatchery. Warm air smothered me like a blanket, and I had to shade my eyes against the bright skylights. The sparrow-egg lay on the other side of the Plexiglas, resting on an honest-to-god nest of straw and synthetic grass.
Evelyn and I settled into two of the six conference room chairs that lined the window. I glanced over in time to see her lace her fingers, close her eyes, and whisper something.
“Did you just say a prayer?”
She smiled and looked down at her hands. “Every little bit helps.”
“You really care about your designs, huh?”
Her smile fell away. “It’s not just this design. This company needs a domesticated dragon, or we won’t stand a chance at hitting our sales target.”
“How can that be? No one else makes dragons.”
“There’s only so much demand.”
“What about zoos, and wildlife parks?”
“They don’t generally go for animals with a two-week shelf life. Most of our sales are to ranchers and farmers.”
“There are plenty of those, aren’t there?”
“Sure. The only problem is that our dragons are too good at their purpose. Hogs aren’t as big of a problem now.”
I laughed and knew how nervous it sounded. “You’re making me worried, Evelyn.”
“We should be worried. If nothing changes, we’ll be operating a very expensive factory for something no one can buy.”
Oh, shit. “How long do we have?”
“Without domestication? Probably a month.”
“Christ.” I felt like I’d been kicked in the gut. If the company went under, all my recent efforts would have been for nothing.
“Don’t worry, I’m sure we have it this time.” Evelyn checked her watch. “Should be any minute now.”
I forced a chuckle. “Oh, come on. Is it really that precise?”
“Usually.”
I’d never witnessed a dragon hatching, let alone one that I’d helped design. Now that the wait was over, it was hard to imagine that just two weeks ago, I’d watched the egg roll out of the God Machine.
A small part of me fear that nothing would happen. That it had all been some heartless ruse.
Then the egg trembled. I grabbed Evelyn’s arm, probably a little ungently. “Did you see that?”
“You know, I’d forgotten what it’s like to see your first egg hatch.”
I hardly heard her, because a fracture appeared down the middle of the egg. “Look!”
The crack widened, spawning other fractures left and right across the eggshell. Something sharp and triangular poked its way through. My chest hurt, and I realized I’d been holding my breath. I forced myself to breathe.
One of the white-garbed egg handlers entered the hatching pod. Judging by the height and the husky build, it was the one named Jim. Nice guy, but as quiet as they came. He carried a stainless-steel bucket.
“What’s in the bucket?” I asked.
“Raw beef. He’ll try to get the hatchling to eat from his hand.” Her brow furrowed, and she leaned forward.
The dragon’s claws followed its snout, and it ripped the egg in half. Little pieces of it stuck to the dark green scales, which glistened wetly in the sunlight. The dragonet lifted it head, blinking its catlike eyes. A pink tongue flicked out of its dark snout. It turned toward the handler.
“It smells the meat,” I whispered.
The handler drew a long piece of bright-red meat from the steel bucket. He tossed it in a gentle arc. The dragon skittered out of the way.
I chuckled. “He’s quick, isn’t he?”
“That’s the fast-twitch muscle response.”
“The Olympic sprinter gene?” It was called alpha-actinin 3. Years ago, researchers had found that having mutated copies of the gene makes your fast-twitch muscles behave like slow-twitch ones, which makes you a better long-distance athlete. In contrast, almost all Olympic sprinters had two functioning copies, and thus plenty of fast-twitch muscle fibers. “Nice touch.”
“I thought so.”
“We might want to put the endurance mutations in, though, if you’re trying to make a pet. A game of fetch doesn’t exactly require quick reflexes.”
She gave me a side glance. “Maybe you are right, Noah Parker.”
The dragonet put its snout down, tested the meat, then, snapped it up. It tossed its head back to finish it in a single gulp, like a dolphin flipping a fish. The handler took out a second piece but didn’t throw it. Instead, he held it out so that it swung back and forth, a tempting high-protein pendulum.
“Now’s the real test,” Evelyn said.
I nodded, too anxious to talk.
The dragon’s head moved back and forth in time with the meat. It spread its wings, then folded them along its back. And crept forward, tasting the air. The handler stood motionless, the proffered meat held out at arm’s length.
“Come on, buddy,” I muttered.
The dragonet crouched. Oh my God, he was going to eat it! I made a fist in pre-emptive celebration. Then it leaped past the meat and clamped its jaws around the handler’s arm.
Evelyn gasped. “Oh, no.”
The handler stumbled back into the wall, shaking his arm. The dragonet held on, thrashing against him. Bright red points of color bloomed in the white sleeve. The door flew open, and two men in khakis ran in. One had a wooden pole with a wire loop at the end. He slid this around the dragonet’s body and pulled it taut. Held the thing still while the other one approached and jabbed a syringe into the dragonet’s neck. It slumped to the floor while the bleeding handler made a hasty exit. I suppose he went right to medical. The two guys in khakis lifted the dragon’s unconscious form—at least, I think it was unconscious—and carried it out.
Evelyn and I sat there in silence, almost shell-shocked.
Finally, I said. “So, I guess we haven’t cracked domestication.”
“That was nearly as bad as design 32.” She shook her head, and sighed. “Know what this means?”
“Back to the drawing board, I’m guessing?”
She didn’t answer but bit her lip and looked away. Which surprised me a little, given that she’d been in this position forty-seven times before. Hell, I’d have thought that my present might even be a boon: maybe I could help make the design even better. But she didn’t look excited at the prospect. If anything, she looked worried.
What isn’t she telling me? “Come on, it’s not like this is the first design that didn’t work.”
“Exactly. The board’s patience with us won’t last forever.”
Her tone gave me a chill inside. I had another card in my back pocket, but I wasn’t sure I wanted to play it yet. Then again, if things were really so precarious, then Evelyn needed a win. “What if my simulator could predict behavioral traits?”
“You told me it didn’t.”
“That’s true. But a while back, I did some tinkering with a module for basic temperament.”
“Define ‘tinkering.’”
“It’s still experimental, but it attempts to simulate basic behaviors.”
“How quickly could you get it up and running?”
She hadn’t asked if the module actually worked, which was a hell of a compliment. “Assuming I can find the code, just a few days,” I said, hoping both parts were true.
“We could design a few models and choose the one with the best temperament,” she said, almost to herself.
“Is that a yes?”
“It’s a yes, Noah Parker. But work fast.”