Free The Administrator by S. Joan Popek Page A

wasn’t necessary that he have all four fingers to do the work he had been genetically altered to do. The fiery crash that stormy, summer night had taken one finger of each hand, both of his feet, both eyelids, his ears, his nose and one eye. It had left one damaged eye and destroyed all the hair follicles on his small body. Physically, he had ceased growing as his charred skin was grafted and re-grafted with living tissue that was not exactly skin. It was pliable and soft but didn’t stretch as real skin would, so the doctors had slowed down his metabolic process.
    The procedure had advantages. Although he remained just under four feet tall, only growing about an inch every five years, it also slowed down the natural aging process. In fifty years he had only aged about twenty. Chronologically, he was fifty-nine, but metabolically, he was still in his late twenties, and although he was a scientific genius, his emotional innocence bordered on emotionless indifference.
    The light above the entrance flashed its warning that someone was coming to see him. He turned his chair away from the computer and prepared to greet his visitor. He didn’t usually care if anyone came or not. Since he had never experienced companionship, he had not learned the concept of lonely and actually preferred to be left alone to work in solitude. However, today was different. Today he had questions. Questions that he felt he already knew the answers to. Except ... Why?
    His latest mentor, Dr. Kate, entered as the panel slid aside. She smiled and pushed her glasses back into place with a slender index finger. They never seemed to stay in place on her thin nose. “Hello, Adam. How are you tonight?”
    “Fine, Dr. Kate. Please sit down. I have something to ask you.”
    She ran her fingers through her short auburn hair that was just beginning to gray at her temples. The touch of silver accented her high cheekbones and gave her thin face a bird like effect. “Is something wrong, Adam?”
    “Possibly,” he answered. “Please sit.”  
    She pulled the only chair in the small cubicle in front of the metal cot resting against a corner wall and settled gracefully into it. She looked tired, but only a small frown creasing her forehead betrayed her faint worry at his tone. “What’s wrong, Adam? The staff tells me that you haven’t been sleeping much lately. Would you like some medication to help you sleep?”
    “No. No drugs. I haven’t been sleeping because I’ve been working on a project of my own.”
    She glanced at the closed circuit monitor in the ceiling. “Your own? You didn’t tell me about any special project.”
    “I didn’t tell anyone. It really began as curiosity, a diversion when I wasn’t assigned any work to do. It became a mystery to solve, something to pass the time. Now I need some answers.”
    “I’ll help any way I can, Adam.”
    “Why didn’t they ever give me feet?”
    “Excuse me?”
    “Feet. They replaced my eyes, my skin, and last year, they replaced the tendons in this arm with electronic ones.” He held his left arm out toward her and flexed it rapidly to demonstrate. “But they never gave me feet. Why?”
    Her brown eyes widened in surprise at the question. She glanced at the monitor again and said, “I ... I guess I never thought about it. I really don’t know, Adam.”
    “Is it because if I don’t have feet, I can never walk out of here? Never run away?”
    She stood abruptly and took the few steps to close the distance between them in the small cubicle. She placed a hand on his shoulder.
    Instinctively his shoulder muscles tensed, but he didn’t pull away.
    “Oh, I’m sorry. I keep forgetting that you don’t like to be touched.” She moved her hand and let it fall loosely at her side. “Adam, I’m sure that’s not why you were not fitted with prosthetic feet. I really don’t know why, but I will bring it up to Colonel Gordon tomorrow.”
    He grimaced a gesture that would have been a smile if