The Pillars of Eternity

His musculature was marvellously flexible and strong. It was a new, delightful experience to be able to poise his body on one foot, to stride across a room, to bend and reach out without danger of falling over. But it was remarkable how quickly he adjusted to his new condition. To his surprise, it was no longer new after a day or two; it was normal.

Only then did they bring in mirrors.

After a week they took him back to the operating theatre and put him to sleep to check out his bones on the mass of testing equipment they had there. It was like switching on a new kind of engine; if it didn’t run right, there could be damage.

He woke up back in the recuperation center. Hyton was there to greet him. Everything was in order. The switching on could begin.

It was something he had to do himself, but he had to be shown how, and it was necessary to be cautious. In all, the bones had eight functions; but for the present he was to be shown only the preservation function and the felicity function, and the latter he would only be shown how to raise to Grade Three on a scale of ten.

The preservation function was simple off/on. It was, however, the only function intended to be left permanently on, and it was, moreover, the greatest triumph of the bonemaker’s art so far. By supplementing the natural repair systems, it endowed the physical organism with an unprecedented ability to withstand shock and injury, even rendering organs capable of regenerating themselves to some extent, after the manner of the liver (previously the only organ able to do so). It prolonged life, slowing the biological clock.

The felicity function was of a psychological type. It engendered a state that would also be obtained – but temporarily – through the use of drugs, and which was faintly foreshadowed in the side effects of the mental exercises Boaz had received from Madrigo. Like them, the function worked on the feelings. Hyton also referred to it as ‘the joy function.’

Its action was to open a direct conduit between sensory perception and emotional life. The sight of any scene or object, the hearing of any sound, was greeted with feelings of joy, wonderment, pleasure, happiness. Nothing was bland or mundane. The universe came to life: it glowed with radiance and meaning, from every drop of water to every spacious landscape.

The felicity function was, as Hyton had promised, like possessing another mode of perception. Boaz chuckled with delight as he gazed around him at setting two. The even, light tangerine color of the wall – how hopeful, how genial it was! The flashing mirror, with its surround of sheened bluemetal – why, it struck him at once with its sense of self-confidence, its ability to return and project images of any hue! It warmed his heart to see it!

And when he looked out of the window at the garden beyond and at the daffodil sun low in the sky – the ravishing scene made his heart burst with happiness. Just to know that all this existed!

‘May I raise to setting three?’ he asked.

‘Very well, but be careful.’

Switching was accomplished by means of mentally intoned syllables. So far, Boaz had been told six – two on/off pairs and the two additional settings for felicity. In his mind he spoke the syllable for the third setting – and immediately gasped at the shock-flood of emotion that the glowing, blazing scene before his eyes evoked in him. Hastily he reverted to setting two.

‘You must raise any function only to the level that your consciousness is able to handle,’ Hyton warned him. ‘The danger with silicon bones is of being swamped, even eradicated, by the strength of some of the functions. Generally speaking we shall install bones only in people who have had philosophical training.’

Boaz switched off felicity and came down to ground level. ‘What are the other functions?’

Hyton smiled. ‘There is adjusted chronaxy, which alters the minimum duration of nervous excitability and therefore controls the time sense by lengthening or shortening the specious present. There is also adjusted rheobase, which alters the galvanic threshold of nervous excitability; this heightens or lowers the intensity of sensory impressions. By the same token adjusted rheobase should affect the range of mental associations, provoking new chains of thought – as to that, we shall see.’ He paused before continuing. ‘There is also a sexually oriented function which I will not go into now. Then there is the kinesthetic function which makes one more alert to movement and the shapes of edges much as certain predatory animals are; dances should prove particularly entertaining when viewed with this function….’

Hyton chattered on, but Boaz understood scarcely a word of what he was saying. ‘Why isn’t there an ataraxy function?’ he asked.

‘Ataraxy is not a function,’ Hyton told him. ‘It is a primary condition. You have eight-function bones; they are experimental to a degree. Later models may have more functions, but ataraxy will not be one of them. Nor can it be.’