The Lord of Opium

All of them shaded their eyes and looked. The building was perhaps half a mile away, and Matt suggested that they go there. But Listen was unwilling to walk farther, and Fidelito backed her up. Chacho wanted to get back to Ton-Ton. So Matt went on by himself through ragtag bullhead vines and grass awakened by the recent rain. The walls of the building changed color several times as clouds passed overhead.

Close up, he saw that even when the walls were dimmed he could see inside. Vague shapes moved among tables, and long pipes snaked under a ceiling. A constant chuffing spoke of some kind of machinery. Matt opened the door to a small entryway, and an eejit handed him a gauze mask.

Now he understood what this was. Cienfuegos had been busy—very busy—to go by the size and complexity of the place. Beyond the second door was a forest of mushrooms, some growing in boxes of soil, others sprouting from logs or beds of wood chips. The walls dripped with condensation, and the air was thick with the odor of rotting wood. The Mushroom Master and Cienfuegos were inspecting a giant log covered with parasols of cream-colored fungi.

The Mushroom Master had been persuaded to exchange his white tunic for trousers and a shirt. He was wearing moccasins, having no doubt discovered the folly of walking barefoot over bullhead thorns.

“Caught in the act,” the jefe said cheerfully, looking up. “I was going to tell you when we were further along. Isn’t this wonderful, mi patrón? It only cost us a ton or so of opium.”

Matt was almost speechless. A ton of opium? Millions of dollars? It cost “us” that much money? There is no “us” involved here. Cienfuegos isn’t the Lord of Opium. “How dare you go behind my back,” he finally managed to say.

“I didn’t go behind your back,” Cienfuegos said quickly. “You wanted to clean the soil around the eejit pens, and this is how we’re going to do it. The Mushroom Master inspected them last month and told me which fungi to use. He has methods for getting the mycelia to sprout quickly.”

“The what?” Matt asked weakly.

“Mycelia,” the Mushroom Master said. “It’s like roots, only for mushrooms.” Both of the men looked immensely pleased with themselves. They reminded Matt of Listen and Fidelito after the children had pulled off some glorious prank.

“You can’t take people out of the biosphere.” Matt pointed at the white-haired man who was thoughtfully nibbling one of the cream-colored fungi. “¡Por Dios! It was kept isolated for eighty years, and now you act like it’s your private playground.”

The two men looked at each other. “I made the suggestion to leave,” said the Mushroom Master. “I’m one of the few scientists left in the biosphere and almost the only person who knows that a world exists outside. It was decided long ago that we had to adjust to being imprisoned in a small world. We created our own civilization.”

“The Brat Enclosure, the Dormancy period,” said Matt.

“Yes. We give our immatures a happy, loving childhood so that they grow up contented with their lives. Then, when the time comes, they are put into a kind of sleep where their brains are receptive to learning. They become cooks or weavers, beeherds or frogherds, and they emerge as adults. A few of us learn the old-fashioned way, because Dormants aren’t creative. We few cope with emergencies and keep the system going.”

Matt put his hand down on a table and recoiled when he felt something slimy. “You program children like robots.”

“It isn’t that heartless,” said the Mushroom Master. “How could children be happy, knowing they were prisoners? It was better for them to believe that the world ended at the wall. By the time the armed guards outside went away, generations had passed and our new civilization was established.”

Cienfuegos plucked a cream-colored fungus from the log. “This is an oyster mushroom, mi patrón. They’re very tasty except when they’ve been feeding on pesticides. I like to fry them in olive oil, but raw ones have that spicy background flavor.” He held one out temptingly. Matt took it, but was too distracted to eat it.

“People out here need me,” said the Mushroom Master. “Of what use is the biosphere if we allow the rest of the world to die?”

Of course he was right. Matt had to agree with him. But it made him uneasy that you could program children into being whatever you liked. It wasn’t that far from being microchipped.

“Don’t people notice when you leave the biosphere?” the boy asked.