Supertoys When Winter Comes

by Brian W. Aldiss


In Mrs Henry Swinton's garden it was not always summer. Monica had ventured  out
into the crowded city  with David and Teddy  and bought a VRD  for 'Eurowinter'.
Now the  almond trees  were barren  of leaves.  Their branches  were loaded with
snow. The snow would never melt as long as the disk kept playing.

So on the fake walls and windows of the Swinton simulation house the snow  would
remain lodged for ever on the windowsills. The icicles hanging from the  gutters
would never melt as long as the disk kept playing.

The frosty blue winter sky would remain  for ever the same, as long as  the disk
kept playing.


David and  Teddy were  playing by  the frozen  ornamental pond.  Their game  was
simple. They slid from opposite sides of the pond and narrowly missed each other
as they passed. This always caused them to laugh.

'I nearly hit you that time, Teddy!' David cried. Monica watched from the window
of her living room. Bored by  their repetitive actions, she switched the  window
off and turned away. The  synthetic serving-man hobbled forward from  his alcove
and enquired gravely if there was anything he could get her.

'No thank you, Jules.'

'I'm sorry to see you appear to be still grieving, ma'am.'

'It's quite all right, Jules. I shall get over it.'

'Perhaps you would like me to ask your friend Dora-Belle over?'

'That is not necessary.'

Henry  Swinton had  recently equipped  the serving-man  with an  update. It  had
affected his walking  skills, which were  now less certain.  It made him  appear
quite realistically as an older man, and so had not been corrected. He now spoke
in a more human way, and Monica liked him better.

She called Henry on the Ambient. His face came up smiling in the globe.

'Monica, hi! How's tricks? It looks as if the take-over is going to happen.  I'm
due to talk to  Havergail Bronzwick in nine  minutes, EST. If we  can clinch it,
the deal  will make  Synthmania the  biggest synthetics  company on  the planet,
bigger than anything in Japan or the States.'

Monica  listened  alertly, although  she  realised her  husband  was mouthing  a
rehearsed speech he was about to deliver to Bronzwick.

'When I think where we've come from, Monica ... If this deal goes through,  I'll
- we'll - immediately be three million mondos richer. I already have great plans
for us. We'll move to a better place, sell off David and Teddy, get some of  the
new batch of synths, buy an island ...'

'Will you be home soon?'

The question brought Henry's  excited talk to a  halt. He said cautiously,  'You
know I have to be away this week. I hope to get back Monday ...'

She switched off.

Sitting in  her swivel  chair, hands  clasped, she  caught a  movement from  the
corner of her eye. David and Teddy were still sliding on the pool, giving  their
small  cries of  merriment. Perhaps  they would  continue for  ever. She   rose,
pressing open the window, and called to them.

'Come in now, children. Go upstairs and play.'

'All right, Mummy!' David  called. He climbed from  the frozen pool, turning  to
help his clumsy friend over the plastoid lip.

'I'm getting so fat, David,' said Teddy. He laughed.

'You were always quite  fat, Teddy. That's what  I like about you,'  said David.
'It makes you cuddly.'

They  scampered  through  the  front door,  which  squelched  shut  behind them.
Upstairs they went,  simulating jollity between  them. 'I will  race you!' David
called to Teddy. It was so childlike. Monica saw with a certain melancholy their
heels disappear between the bannisters.

The clock of her Ambient chimed five and switched on. She turned to the  machine
and was soon networking. All round the planet, other people, mainly women, began
to discuss religious issues. Some despatched their electronic thoughts to arrive
on paper. Others showed photomontages they had made.

'I need God because I am alone so frequently,' said Monica to the multitude. 'My
baby died. But I don't know where God is. Maybe he doesn't visit cities.'

Answers poured in.

'Are you mad enough  to think God lives  a country existence? If  so, forget it.
God's everywhere.'

'God is only a prayer away, wherever you live. I will pray for you.'

'Of course you are alone. God is just a concept, invented by an unhappy man. Get
a life, darling. Check up on the neurosciences.'

'It's because you think you are alone that God cannot get to you!'

She worked through the answers, recording them, for two hours. Then she switched
off the Ambient and sat in silence. Silence prevailed upstairs also.

One day, she was determined, she would make an analysis of all the messages  she
received. A synthesis would be valuable. She would compose an Amb-production  of
the results. Her name would become known. She would dare to walk - with a  guard
- in the city streets. People would say, 'Why, that's Monica Swinton!'

She shook herself from her daydream. Why was David so quiet?

David and Teddy were sprawling on the floor of their room together, looking at a
vidbook. They giggled at the antics  of the performing animals. A chubby  little
elephant in tartan trousers kept falling over a drum which rolled down a  street
towards a river.

'He  is  going to  go  in that  river,  sooner or  later!'  said Teddy,  between
chortles.

The pair of them looked up when Monica appeared. She stooped, picked up the book
and snapped it shut.

'Haven't you  tired of  this toy  yet?' she  asked. 'You  have had  it for three
years.  You  must know  exactly  what's going  to  happen to  that  silly little
elephant.'

David hung his head, although he was used to his mother's disapproval.

'We just like  what's going to  happen, Mummy. I  bet if we  watch it again Elly
will roll right into the river. It's so funny.'

'But we won't watch it if you don't want us to,' Teddy added.

She repented her  outburst; after all,  she knew their  limitations. Setting the
vidbook down on the carpet, she said with a sigh, 'You'll never grow up.'

'I  am trying  to grow  up, Mummy.  This morning,  I watched  a natural  history
science program on DTV.'

Monica said that that was good. She asked what David had learnt. He told her  he
had learnt about dolphins. 'We are part of the natural world, aren't we, Mummy?'

When he lifted up his arms to her for a cuddle, she backed away, her mind choked
with the thought  of being imprisoned  for ever in  an eternal childhood,  never
developing, never escaping.. .

'I expect Mummy's ever so busy,' said David to Teddy, when Monica had left.

They sat there, the two of them, looking at each other. Smiling.


Henry  Swinton  was dining  with  Petrushka Bronzwick.  A  couple of  decorative
blondes were accompanying them at the  table. They were in a restaurant  with an
anachronistic live  quartet playing  nearby. Synthmania's  friendly takeover  of
Havergail  Bronzwick  PLC was  proceeding  satisfactorily; lawyers  were  due to
complete all documents by the day after the morrow.

Scene: a restaurant only for the  wealthy. Boast: a real window in  the ceiling,
letting in summer light sullied only slightly by pollution.

Petrushka and Henry,  with their ladies,  were tucking in  to two small  sucking
pigs,  turning  on  spits  beside their  table.  The  pigs  sizzled and  dripped
goodness. The diners washed everything down with vintage champagne.

'Oh, this  is so  good!' exclaimed  the blonde  who called  herself Bubbles. She
belonged to  Petrushka Bronzwick.  She mopped  her chin  with a  lawn napkin. 'I
could go on eating for ever, couldn't you?'

Leaning forward with knife and fork  poised, Henry said, 'We have to  keep ahead
of the competition, Pet.  Every cubic centimetre of  the cerebral cortex in  the
human brain contains  fifty million nerve  cells. That's what  we're up against,
you realise.  The day  of synthetic  brains is  over and  done. Forget it. We're
manufacturing real brains from yesterday on.'

'Sure,' agreed  Petrushka. She  leaned forward  to cut  herself another slice of
belly, waving away the waiter who came forward. 'Waiters are always so stingy in
serving.' Her silvery laugh  was famous, and dreaded  in some quarters. She  was
just into  her twenties,  already on  Preservanex, spectrally  thin, with  short
multi-coloured hair,  blue eyes  and a  slight twitch  in her left multicoloured
cheek. 'And we're talking one hundred  million nerve cells. But since we  junked
silicon  we're on  our way  to win  out. The  question, Henry,  remains one   of
funding.'

Pushing  a  succulent  mouthful  into  his  face  before  replying,  Henry said,
'Synthmania's Crosswell tape will take care of that little item. You've seen the
figures. The GNP of Kurdistan is  peanuts in comparison. Production is up  again
this year,  fourteen per  cent. Crosswell  was our  first big-selling line, back
when we were Synthank. It's conquered the Western world. The Pill has nothing on
the Crosswell.'

'Sure, I've got a  Crosswell in me,' said  Angel Pink. She pointed  downwards to
her lap with a dainty finger. She  was the one Henry fancied. For emphasis,  she
added -sideways glance at Henry - 'it's in me all the time.'

Leaning  towards her,  Henry granted  her a  twinkle and  one of  his  favourite
spiels. 'Three-quarters of  this over-populated world  of ours are  starving. We
are lucky  to have  more than  enough of  everything, thanks  to the  capping of
population-production. Obesity is our main problem, not malnutrition.'

'So so true!'  sighed Bubbles. Red  lips, white teeth,  she champed on  a golden
strand of crackling.

'Is there anyone who  doesn't have a Crosswell  working for them in  their small
intestine?' Henry asked, shaking his head by way of answer to his own  question.
'Jim Crosswell was a nanobiologist of genius. I was the one who found him,  gave
him a job. This safe parasitic worm enables anyone to eat up to one hundred  per
cent more food and still keep his or her figure, right?'

'Sure, one of yesterday's  great inventions,' said Petrushka,  looking spiteful.
'Our Senoram is just about as profitable.'

'Costs more  for one  thing,' said  Bubbles, but  her remark  was drowned out by
Angel Pink clapping her  pretty little hands. 'We're  going to make a  killing!'
She raised her glass. 'Here's to you two clever people!'

In responding  to the  toast, Henry  wondered where  she got  the 'we' from. She
would pay for that error. He would see to it.


Monica was about to go skiing. The synthetic serving-man accompanied her to  the
cabin installed in the  callerium. He proffered his  arm in a courteous  manner.
She accepted  it. She  loved that  touch of  grace. It  evoked for her a distant
half-forgotten childhood where there had been . . . She had forgotten what there
had been. Perhaps a loving father?

Once  in the  cabin, she  hooked up  and dialled  the 'Mountain  Snow'  picture.
Immediately,  down  came  the  snow, blizzard  force.  Visibility  was  bad. She
laboured uphill. It was scary. She  was utterly alone. A rare tree  was shrouded
in white.

Once she gained the shelter, she  went in and rested, panting, before  strapping
on her skis. The challenge was  the cold, the remorseless elements. She  had met
it, beaten it. The  snow storm was tapering  off. Before plunging downhill,  she
set the  mask on  her face.  In that  great exhilarating  rush, her  body braced
itself against the mad, the roaring, the furious, the insupportable air.  Behind
the mask, her mouth opened  in a shriek of purest  joy. This was freedom -  this
embrace of gravity!

It was over. She stood alone, naked, in the enclosing cubicle.

When  she  was dressed,  she  emerged. Time  perhaps  for a  sip  of vodka.  She
preferred the United Dairies Vodka, which came with milk ready mixed.

David and  Teddy were  standing there  uneasily. 'We  were only playing, Mummy,'
said David.

'We didn't make a noise,' said Teddy. 'It was Jules made a noise, falling over.'

Turning, Monica saw Jules lying on  the floor. His left leg was  slowly kicking.
In his fall, he had reached  for support and brought down Monica's  reproduction
Kussinski of which she was proud - of which she always spoke whenever her friend
Dora-Belle  called.  It  lay shattered  beside  the  serving-man's cranium.  The
cranium had split open, revealing the auditory and speech matrix.

As Monica fell  to her knees  beside the body,  David said, 'It  doesn't matter.
Mummy. We were only playing when he tripped. He's only an android.'

'Yes, he's just an android. Mummy,' said Teddy. 'You can soon buy another.'

'Oh God! It's Jules. Poor Jules! He was a friend to me.' She pressed her hand to
her face. She shed no tear.

'You  can  soon buy  us  another, Mummy,'  said  David. He  timidly  touched her
shoulder.

She turned on him. 'And what do you think you are? You're only a little  android
yourself!'

As soon as the words were out, she regretted them. But David was emitting a kind
of scream, among which words were entangled. 'Not . . . not an android . . . I'm
real . . . real like  Teddy . . . like you.  Mummy . . . only you  don't love me
... my program ... never loved me .  . .' He ran in small circles and,  when the
words had given out, ran for the stairs, still emitting his kind of scream.

Teddy followed him.  They disappeared from  sight. Monica rose  to her feet  and
stood trembling over the body of the serving-man. She covered her eyes with  her
hands. Her despair was not so easily shut out.

A  series  of  crashes  came  from  the  rooms  above.  Monica  went  warily  to
investigate.

Teddy lay sprawled flat on the carpet, arms outstretched. David knelt over  him.
He had opened Teddy's tummy, and was investigating the complex mechanisms of its
interior.

Teddy saw Monica's look  of horror. 'It's all  r^ght, Mummy. I let  David do it.
We're trying to find out if we're real or just - urrrp-'

David had removed  a plug from  high in the  bear's chest, near  the stabiliser,
where the heart's left ventricle would have been in a human.

'Poor Teddy! He's dead! He really was a machine. So that means-'

As he spoke, he was waving  his arms uncontrollably. He fell back,  striking his
face. It cracked, revealing plastic working beneath.

'David! David! Don't grieve! We can repair-'

'Stop speak!' He shouted the words forcibly as, jumping up, he rushed past  her,
fled from the room  and leaped down the  stairs. She stood over  the inert teddy
bear, listening to David crashing about below. Of course, she thought, his  eyes
can no longer focus on the same object. His poor little face has come apart.

Fearful, she approached  the stairs. She  must call Henry  for help. Henry  must
return home.

A  brilliant  crackling  sounded. The  intense  splutter  of freed  electricity.
Dazzling light. Darkness.

'David!' But she was falling.

David had struck  the house's control  centre, wrenching it  from the wall  in a
fury of pain and despair. Everything stopped playing.

The house disappeared,  and the garden  with it. David  stood in the  midst of a
skeletal structure of wired scaffolding, bedded here and there in breeze blocks.
Rubble lay underfoot. Acrid smoke drifted at ground level.

After a long stretch of immobility, he made his way forward, treading where  the
house had been, treading where the snowy garden had been, where he had played so
often with his friend Teddy.

He stood in an alleyway, in an unknown world. Old pavement was slimy  underfoot.
Weeds grew between slabs.  The detritus of an  earlier epoch lay before  him. He
kicked a crushed can labelled 'oka-col'.

A drowsy light prevailed  over all; the summer's  day was coming to  a close. He
could not see  clearly but, with  his right eye,  caught sight of  a sickly rose
growing by a crumbling brick wall.

Crossing to the plant,  he plucked a bud.  Its beauty and softness  reminded him
once more of Mummy.

Over her body he said, 'I am human,  Mummy. I love you and I feel sad  just like
real people, so I must be human ... Mustn't I?'
