Dr. Monsa’s garden was enormous, although it was more of a collection of smaller gardens than one large one. There was the English garden with its traditional, orderly plots of roses and symmetrical walkways; the Japanese garden with its stonework, well-manicured tree branches, and hidden brooks; the French garden, sporting dense hedges sculpted into ornate geometrical patterns; and a walled-off paradise garden that featured waterworks like fountains, canals, ponds, and waterfalls. As it were, these labels were little more than vague descriptions, as the gardens contained very few original plants from those olden times; this was fitting considering that the nationalities themselves-English, Japanese, and French-had long since faded into irrelevance.
Many of the plants found in the garden had been designed in the inner sanctum itself and were either being tested or served as living reminders of past successes. The priest pretended to lead the tour, but it soon became evident that the child-framed clone girl named Pueet was the most knowledgeable, and she would often cut in whenever the priest seemed to stammer over the answers to questions.
Although the entire garden was nothing short of spectacular, perhaps the most glorious of the plant life were the colossal nectar trees. These marvels of engineering were ten stories high and bore massive trunks and beefy branches that supported immense orbs of leaves and flowers. The soothing hum of countless collectors buzzing or crawling about was always present. These insects were designed to harvest the abundant sugars produced by the nectar trees and bring this precious juice by way of a pheromone trail to a place determined by their master. After taking their fill, the coin-sized insects set off, bobbing uncertainly under their load, along the chemical trail set down for them. Once they reached the invisible trail end, they would deposit their load into catch tubes, and the sugars were then shunted off to locations where they could be metabolized.
The dro-vine that made up House Monsa required a constant supply of food. It needed energy to regulate its temperature and to optimize its air quality and humidity. Whatever the house did not eat could be fed to the countless creatures that inhabited it, including those people who were either too frugal or too busy to obtain food in some other manner. There was no shame in eating and drinking nectar. Indeed, nectar optimized for animal consumption came in many flavors and contained all the essential proteins and vitamins for optimum health. Even the highest scoring players did not shun nectar, although it did become boring over decades of consumption. Nectar could even be used to fuel organic machines like familiars or robots that were responsible for mundane industrial work. However, such machines typically consumed the most potent nectar (and most terrible tasting to humans), which was super-compressed into dense cubes.
It was the heavy demand for variety in nectar production that drove much of the point revenue of House Monsa. Any new strain of nectar that, for example, offered a different taste, was metabolized more easily, or simply came from an aesthetically pleasing tree would find a ready market. Indeed, nectar trees were so common on earth-and increasingly on other planets and moons-that a house could expect to sell millions, if not billions of trees with every new variety it created.
Beside the grove of nectar trees were the fast-growing poplar trees that set off a soft and even melodious groan as their trunks rose up nearly fast enough for the naked eye to watch in action. Although most dwellings were grown rather than built, the wood these trees produced was still used in a variety of classic products, from paper to furniture.
While one could spend hours alone examining the astonishing variety of trees in Monsa’s gardens, there were just as many impressive varieties of flowers in every color imaginable and with equally impressive uses. There were flowers that emitted light at night, flowers that ate pesky insects (but not the helpful ones, such as collectors), flowers that were processed into all manner of drugs for both human and product consumption, and even flowers for the very old yet still profitable perfume trade. Pueet, their little hostess, explained in a clear voice. “The flowers in the inner sanctum are not for production use; they are just prototypes. We have many production labs distributed throughout House Monsa and her subsidiaries.”
Although plants made up the bulk of the life in the gardens, there were more active denizens that walked, crawled, slithered, or flapped. The most conspicuous products were the general humanoid laborers sprinkled everywhere, their purpose to keep the garden tidy. They did most of their work using only old-fashioned hand tools rather than modern ones, as the doctor preferred the aesthetic of old-time gardening.
Despite this handicap, the massive gardens were immaculately kept, and it was no wonder. The gardeners were remarkably productive, oblivious to the heat of the midday artificial sun and indifferent to the cold of night. They required only two hours of sleep per day, and when they slept they needn’t walk back to any sleeping quarters; instead, they would simply lie down under the shelter of some luxurious plant. Nor did such workers require breaks to eat because there was plenty of fruit and enormous, plump, and delicious bugs of all sorts, which they scooped up deftly as they worked.
All of the workers were identical in appearance. They were hairless men with dark skin weathered by exposure, and every one of them carried around their neck a small blue vial containing repellant against the garden cullers. When Lyra pointed out the vials, Pueet informed them that when the workers got old or otherwise outlived their usefulness, the doctor would simply cut off their supply of repellant. However, such turnover was low since the food in the garden on which the workers subsisted was chock-full of goodies that slowed the aging process.
Among the human-based products that attracted the most attention from the men in the party were the concubines. A full harem of women, spectacular in their nudity, lounged about in a silver-pooled grotto. They stared back at the voyeurs, some of them demurely, some intensely. Djoser asked if these prototypes required any further “testing,” volunteering for the job with a lewd smile. Pueet warned him to leave them alone, as the same traits that mimicked passionate love could easily turn to violence.
Pueet went on to say how Sara, Dr. Monsa’s personal concubine, the one who the night before had stuck a fork in another dinner guest’s hand, was one of the doctor’s early and unsuccessful attempts in this line of work. “But Sara formed an imprint bond with Father, and despite her madness, he grew fond of her,” she said. “Well, maybe not exactly fond of her, but affectionately familiar with her over the years.”
Pueet then informed the tour group that the concubines were not allowed out of their plexi cage. “We used to allow them to wander freely, but eventually they would get bored and try to seduce the garden workers or whoever else they could find. It was shamefully disruptive.”
“What about rent-a-boys? Do you grow them as well?” Lyra asked while elbowing Djoser in the ribs.
Pueet laughed girlishly. “Yes, although we lock them up also, away from the concubine protos. Otherwise they would simply wear each other out. In the early days we actually lost a few of them from exhaustion. We do still allow controlled visits for testing purposes.”
Spurred by Lyra’s interest, Pueet showed them the rent-a-boy sphere. Like their female counterparts they were nude, exposing their perfectly shaped and muscular bodies. Upon seeing the visitors, some of the products whistled at Lyra and Pueet and shouted out invitations over one another. Others leaned stoically against the plexi as though posing. A few smiled shyly and hid themselves. Apparently, there was a type of man for all tastes.
“I noticed you do not separate them from one another,” D_Light commented. “Do they get along so harmoniously all the time?”
Pueet pointed to three small empty spheres off in the distance. “No, occasionally we get a violent phenotype or one whose copious sexual urges are misdirected at others in the cell. However, as you can see, the isolation spheres are empty now. We rarely make such rookie mistakes in our designs anymore.”
“Misdirected sexual urges?” Djoser asked. “You do not make homosexual rent-a-boys and concubines?”
“Oh, there really isn’t much of a market for those,” Pueet answered while twisting her mouth slightly. “The rampant genetic engineering of humans leading up to the time of the bottleneck-coupled with modern fetus incubation tanks-has nearly wiped that market out.”
“Interesting,” D_Light said. “I had no idea.”
Pueet nodded. “Yeah, House Yi-LingYu specializes in that niche market, and Father does not think the potential profits are worth the extra R amp;D it would take to challenge Yi-LingYu’s strong position.” Pueet sighed. “I’ve thought of putting a line together myself. It would be a fun game, but I do not know if I will ever get around to it.”
Pueet then took the tour party to see House Monsa’s most advanced and expensive product line, the analysts. Like Hal, the analyst they had met the night before, the male analysts looked very similar to the common garden worker products in that they were hairless, and they were remarkable only in that they did not resemble anyone in particular. It was as though they were merely templates of a person. The women analysts were hairless also, making them somewhat repulsive to D_Light. The analysts were one of the most driven products. When
