fugue, you need to stop thinking about anything specific.”
“Oh. Right,” said Mendoza, and closed her eyes again. “Well, good night, Lewis.”
“Good night.”
He ate one more guava, slowly, wondering why the mortals he’d scanned hadn’t so much as a flea bite among them. What if they, alone of all their people, had some genetic characteristic that helped their ancestors survive an epidemic? He knew that Native Americans were dying, in the millions, of smallpox and other European diseases. They died, not because they were especially weak and susceptible, but because they were more genetically alike, one to another, than the mongrel Europeans.
So suppose, he thought to himself as he lay down, this one family were just different enough to live through the plague? Some kind of favorable mutation. They might have decided they were gods. But then, with no one else with which to breed, they’d have fallen into the same trap of genetic homogeneity…ah, the ironies of history…shallow gene pool, just like the cheetahs…
He thought over the absurd parade of requests he’d received from the mortals. The contrast between their royal expectations, and what was most likely to happen, was painful to contemplate.
If Dr. Zeus followed usual policy, every byte of data Lewis was absorbing would be wrung from him, and from Mendoza, too, as though they were a pair of sponges; then a team of anthropologists would be sent in, masquerading as Maketaurie and his entourage, no doubt.
These last survivors, with their culture, would be studied, collected, and packed off to some Company facility like so many rare butterflies. How would they adjust to life as mere Company dependents?
Too sad to dwell upon…
Lewis turned and watched Mendoza, intending to offer her helpful advice should she be finding it difficult to go into fugue. To his amazement, she appeared to have succeeded on the first try. Stiffly upright there in the darkness, she had taken on the immobility of a dead branch or a pillar of stone; she seemed nearly transparent, a shade among shadows. Her features were drawn, almost deathly, and yet there was something ecstatic in her expression.
It frightened him, for no good reason he could name. Lewis felt an irrational urge to leap up, to put his arms around her and carry her away from that inhuman void into which she slipped with such terrifying ease.
Perhaps she’s meeting him there, thought Lewis. Perhaps the void is Nicholas Harpole.
Guilt, and regret, and weariness so overcame him that he turned his face away. He tried to remember a place he’d been happy once, a wine shop in Piraeus with a view of the sea, and he’d sat there with a fresh copy of Menander’s Dis Exapaton all one sunny afternoon, with never a care in the world …
Dawn came with a thousand birds crying, and Lewis opened his eyes to an empty room. He started up, panicked; but after a moment of scanning he picked up Mendoza’s signal down on one of the terraces. She was pulling weeds again.
Are you all right? he transmitted.
Yes! Lewis, it worked. What a great way to rest! I can’t think why we don’t fugue out more often.
I believe it’s frowned on if you’re posted in an urban environment around mortals, said Lewis. The argument is, you might as well slap a big sign saying CYBORG across your forehead.
Mendoza responded with a cheerful obscenity. Lewis sighed, got to his feet, and wandered out into the palace courtyard.
Orocobix sat there, gazing out at the morning. On a block of stone at his feet, the flamecube flickered away; someone had scrupulously cleaned it and figured out how to switch it on. It diffused a pleasant heat against the early morning chill. Little Tanama was just offering her grandfather a cup of something steaming. He accepted it, smiling, and bowed a greeting to Lewis.
“Good morning, child. I must say, the palace roof has never been so well repaired.”
“Thank you,” said Lewis, accepting a cup from
“Oh. Right,” said Mendoza, and closed her eyes again. “Well, good night, Lewis.”
“Good night.”
He ate one more guava, slowly, wondering why the mortals he’d scanned hadn’t so much as a flea bite among them. What if they, alone of all their people, had some genetic characteristic that helped their ancestors survive an epidemic? He knew that Native Americans were dying, in the millions, of smallpox and other European diseases. They died, not because they were especially weak and susceptible, but because they were more genetically alike, one to another, than the mongrel Europeans.
So suppose, he thought to himself as he lay down, this one family were just different enough to live through the plague? Some kind of favorable mutation. They might have decided they were gods. But then, with no one else with which to breed, they’d have fallen into the same trap of genetic homogeneity…ah, the ironies of history…shallow gene pool, just like the cheetahs…
He thought over the absurd parade of requests he’d received from the mortals. The contrast between their royal expectations, and what was most likely to happen, was painful to contemplate.
If Dr. Zeus followed usual policy, every byte of data Lewis was absorbing would be wrung from him, and from Mendoza, too, as though they were a pair of sponges; then a team of anthropologists would be sent in, masquerading as Maketaurie and his entourage, no doubt.
These last survivors, with their culture, would be studied, collected, and packed off to some Company facility like so many rare butterflies. How would they adjust to life as mere Company dependents?
Too sad to dwell upon…
Lewis turned and watched Mendoza, intending to offer her helpful advice should she be finding it difficult to go into fugue. To his amazement, she appeared to have succeeded on the first try. Stiffly upright there in the darkness, she had taken on the immobility of a dead branch or a pillar of stone; she seemed nearly transparent, a shade among shadows. Her features were drawn, almost deathly, and yet there was something ecstatic in her expression.
It frightened him, for no good reason he could name. Lewis felt an irrational urge to leap up, to put his arms around her and carry her away from that inhuman void into which she slipped with such terrifying ease.
Perhaps she’s meeting him there, thought Lewis. Perhaps the void is Nicholas Harpole.
Guilt, and regret, and weariness so overcame him that he turned his face away. He tried to remember a place he’d been happy once, a wine shop in Piraeus with a view of the sea, and he’d sat there with a fresh copy of Menander’s Dis Exapaton all one sunny afternoon, with never a care in the world …
Dawn came with a thousand birds crying, and Lewis opened his eyes to an empty room. He started up, panicked; but after a moment of scanning he picked up Mendoza’s signal down on one of the terraces. She was pulling weeds again.
Are you all right? he transmitted.
Yes! Lewis, it worked. What a great way to rest! I can’t think why we don’t fugue out more often.
I believe it’s frowned on if you’re posted in an urban environment around mortals, said Lewis. The argument is, you might as well slap a big sign saying CYBORG across your forehead.
Mendoza responded with a cheerful obscenity. Lewis sighed, got to his feet, and wandered out into the palace courtyard.
Orocobix sat there, gazing out at the morning. On a block of stone at his feet, the flamecube flickered away; someone had scrupulously cleaned it and figured out how to switch it on. It diffused a pleasant heat against the early morning chill. Little Tanama was just offering her grandfather a cup of something steaming. He accepted it, smiling, and bowed a greeting to Lewis.
“Good morning, child. I must say, the palace roof has never been so well repaired.”
“Thank you,” said Lewis, accepting a cup from
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