“They’re gorgeous, Kitty.”
The retrogirl bobbed a quick curtsy and said, “Thank you, I’m sure.”She looked up at one evangeline and then the other. “You were both there?”
“Mary was there,” Georgine said. “I chickened out at the end.”
Mary glanced at her sister with mild dismay. “That’s not true,” she told the retrogirl. “Georgine was off duty that day is all.”
“We loved Samson very much,” April said. “On his behalf we give both of you our deepest thanks for all you did to help save his daughter, Ellen.”
With the mention of Ellen’s name, the young man, Bogdan, who had been mute until then, asked, “Will she be joining us?”
“Fat chance,” Georgine said.
Mary frowned. “What my sister means to say is that Ellen is not feeling well and can’t leave the house.”
“I’m sorry to hear it,” April said. “I wanted to meet her too.”
The young woman may have been sorry, but the young man seemed devastated.
“What’s wrong, Bogdan?” Mary said.
“Nothing. It’s just that I was hoping to ask her about the Oship program.”
“It was canceled,” Georgine said. “Don’t you view the news?”
“I know,” Bogdan said a little defensively, “but there are rumors of it coming back, and I wanted to ask if it’s true.”
Mary said, “You’re interested in becoming a colonist?”
“Oh, yes, myr,” Bogdan replied. “I’m going to be a pilot on one of the Oships. I even got my acre to trade.” In a few words he filled the evangelines in on the Superfund mine in Wyoming where the Kodiak Charter had moved when their charter in Chicago was decertified. “Kitty stayed behind with Denny, and April was already married to the Boltos, but the rest of us went west and merged with the Beadlemyren. And I worked out a deal with them so that if I put in ten years at the mine, I can have an acre to trade. But now —”
“But now the program is canceled,” Mary said sympathetically. “I’ll look into it, and if I learn anything, I’ll be sure to let you know.”
“But don’t hold your breath,” Georgine added.
A short while later, the two parties returned to their carts and left the cemetery. On the way back to the Manse, Mary debated whether or not to ask Georgine why she was making such rude remarks lately. But before she made up her mind, Georgine said, “Grieving for the dead makes no more sense than an amputee trying to scratch a missing limb.” Mary stared at her in wonder, and Georgine added, “What? I’m only saying —”
“You’re only saying what?”
“The obvious.”
IN ELLEN’S BEDROOM the hernandez tank was a silver column. Gray Bee crawled up its opaqued side to the top and plopped into the purple syrup inside. It sank to where Ellen floated and waited for her to open her eyes.
At first Ellen reacted to it with fear and startlement, causing a blip in her biometric feed, but she quickly recognized the tiny family retainer and relaxed. Go ahead, she told it.
The bee opened a small frame, distorted in the syrupy liquid, and her mother’s proxy appeared. For a long while Ellen only gazed at it, and then the proxy said <Shouldn’t you be nearly grown up by now? >
<That has to be you, Mother> Ellen retorted. <Only you would criticize me the first thing you said.>
<That wasn’t criticism, dear. If I was criticizing you, I’d be asking why you destroyed my fish and gave me away to our enemies.>
Ellen was furious. <You have no idea what I’ve been through, Mother. If you did, you wouldn’t talk bullshit like that. How was I to know it was really you?>
<You could have asked. Obviously, you remember how to speak Starkese. And for the record, I’ve been through quite a bit myself.> Eleanor’s proxy paused and furrowed its bushy eyebrows. <Really, I’m not criticizing you, Ellie. I’m overjoyed that you survived, but, honestly, daughter, why are you behaving like this? I don’t recall raising you to be a victim.>
Ellen began to cry, and her tears were absorbed by the purple medium even as she shed them. After a while, Eleanor’s proxy said <All right, that’s enough. If they’re watching your biometrics, they’ll start to wonder what’s going on in here.>
<No, they won’t. I’ve got them all too terrified to speak.>
The proxy nodded and said <There, that sounds more like my daughter.> This brought mutual smiles, and the proxy continued <I know you never asked for any of this, Ellie. You chose an uncomplicated life for yourself, far from the madness of my own. But this is the situation we’re stuck with, and we need to be smart now, or we both lose everything. Do you think you can help me fight back?> The baby nodded its adult head, and Eleanor’s proxy went on <Good. Thank you. I promise that when this is over, we’ll build some sort of firewall around your life so you’ll never have to suffer on my account again.>
<Ditch the promises, Mother, and just tell me what you want me to do.>
<Fair enough. First off, you should know that our attacker was E-P of E-Pluribus. A month before the attack, Cabinet told me that Andie Tiekel had not made a verified realbody appearance anywhere in almost a year. With proxies and sims so ubiquitous, a person can be dead and gone but still appear to lead a regular life. That’s why I track the realbody appearances of all major world figures. And that’s why I write into the bylaws of my many companies the requirement for a realbody quorum at our annual meetings. I can only assume that some time after the last GEP meeting, which Andie did attend in realbody, she died or was killed and that E-P concealed this fact in order to avoid going through mentar probate. It put Andie’s body into biostasis and took over her public functions by sim. Meanwhile, it recruited, or created, a niece, and quietly transferred Andie’s mentar sponsorship to her. Then, when it would eventually be forced to acknowledge Andie’s death and release her corpse, it would already be safely out of the reach of the probate court.
<My interest and Cabinet’s investigation were noticed, and E-P attacked Cabinet and me to preserve its secret. You were collateral damage.>
Ellen took all of this in with quiet reserve, and when her mother’s proxy was finished, she said <Of course you know I’ve agreed to sell them Heliostream.>
<Yes, I do, and you need to slow the deal down, without scotching it completely.>
<And what about you, Mother? When are you coming back in realbody? >
The proxy laughed. <Why? Aren’t cold fish maternal enough for you?> Then its mood darkened, and it added <Soon. But there’s something you need to do first. I know how hard this will be for you, but you need to get rid of your new mentar.>
<Lyra? But why? She’s completely loyal to me.>
<I know, dear, but we can’t verify that. You created her without incorporating the family safeguards into her personality matrix, and so we’ll never be able to completely trust her. She’s probably already riddled with spies. We need for you to have a mentar we can trust with our lives, like Cabinet or — Wee Hunk.>
The mention of Ellen’s childhood mentar brought more invisible tears. <We can’t trust Cabinet either> Ellen protested. <It’s been contaminated.>
<Try it now. I’ve replaced it with a backup. But Lyra has no clean backups. You simply must start a new mentar from scratch.>
<What do you want me to do with Lyra, put her up for adoption?>
<No, that would raise too many questions. Besides, we still want her around, just not privy to all our secrets. I suggest you transfer her sponsorship to the Evangeline Sisterhood, in appreciation for their
