dictates of natural selection. Evolution cares
Tarek gripped the lectern tightly, but continued in the same calm voice. “You’re so gloriously, indisputably right: if there is sentient life behind the border, we should wipe these creatures out of existence, on the mere chance that they might do the same to us. Then we can learn to predicate everything else we do on the same assumptions: there is no other purpose to life than an eternity of grim persistence, and the systematic extinguishment of everything?—?outside ourselves, or within us?—?that stands in the way of that goal.”
He stood in place for several seconds. The room had fallen silent again. Tchicaya was both heartened and ashamed; he had never imagined Tarek taking a stand like this, though in retrospect he could see that it was an act of constancy, not betrayal. Perhaps Tarek had left his own family and friends behind solely in order to fight for the security of their future home, but in the very act of coming here, he’d been transformed from a member of that culture into an advocate for something universal. Maybe he was a zealot, but if so, he was an idealist, not a hypocrite. If there were sentient creatures behind the border, however foreign to him, the same principles applied to them as to anyone else.
Tarek stepped back from the podium. Santos, another of the newcomers, stood and delivered an impassioned defense of Murasaki’s position, in similarly chilling language. When he’d finished, half a dozen people rose to their feet simultaneously and tried to shout each other down.
Tarek managed to restore order. “Do we have more questions for Rasmah and Tchicaya, or is this the time to proceed with our own debate?”
There were no more questions. Tarek turned to them. “I’ll have to ask you to leave now.”
Tchicaya said, “Good luck.”
Tarek gave him a reluctant smile, as if to concede that the two of them finally could mean the same thing by those words. He said, “I don’t know how much longer this will take, but we’ll keep going until we have a decision.”
Out in the corridor, Rasmah turned to Tchicaya. “Where are those people from? Murasaki and Santos?”
“I don’t know. It’s not in their signatures.” He checked with the ship. “They both came via Pfaff, but they haven’t made their origins public.”
“Wherever it is, remind me not to visit.” She shuddered and wrapped her arms around herself. “Do we have to wait here for the verdict? It could be a while. And they will make it public.”
“What did you have in mind? I don’t think I could face the Blue Room.”
“How about my cabin?”
Tchicaya laughed. “You have no idea how tempting that sounds, right now.”
“That’s how it was meant to sound.” Rasmah took his hand; she hadn’t been joking. “These bodies are very fast learners, especially when they have memories of a prior attraction.”
Tchicaya said, “I thought we’d put an end to all that.”
“This is what’s known as persistence.” She faced him squarely. “Whoever it is you’re still hung up about, I promise you I’ll make an impression that will erase all memories of the competition.” She smiled at her own hyperbole. “Or I can try, if you’re willing to make the same effort.”
Tchicaya was tongue-tied. He liked everything about her, but some deeply ingrained part of him still felt as if it was a matter of principle to back away.
He said, “I’m seven times your age. I’ve had thirty-one children. I have sixth-generation descendants older than you.”
“Yeah, yeah. You’re a battered old creature, on the verge of slipping out of sentience into senility. But I think I can drag you back from the brink.” She leaned closer; the scent of her body was beginning to regain significance for him. “If you have scars, I’ll kiss them away.”
“I want to keep my scars.”
“That’s all right. I can’t actually erase them.”
“You really are sweet, but you hardly know me.”
Rasmah groaned. “Stop dividing everything by four thousand years. Your age is not the natural unit of time, by which all else must be measured.” She leaned forward and kissed him on the mouth; Tchicaya did not pull away.
She said, “How was that?”
Tchicaya gave her his best Quinean wine-judge frown. “You’re better than Yann. I think you’ve done this before.”
“I should hope so. I suppose you waited a millennium to lose your virginity?”
“No, it just felt that way.”
Rasmah stepped back, then reached out and took both his hands. “Come and wait with me for the vote. We can’t do anything you don’t want to do; it’s biologically impossible.”
“That’s what they tell you as a child. But it’s more complicated than that.”
“Only if you make it complicated.” She tugged on his arms. “I do have some pride. I’m not going to beg you. I’m not even going to threaten you, and say this is your last chance. But I don’t believe we’re wrong for each other, and I don’t believe you’re sure that we are.”
“I’m not,” he conceded.
“And didn’t you just deliver a speech about the folly of making decisions without sufficient information?”
“Yes.”
She smiled triumphantly. He wasn’t going to argue his way out of this. Logic had nothing to do with it; he simply had to make up his mind what he wanted. One instinct told him that he should turn her down, because it was a decision he’d made so many times before that it seemed like a betrayal of himself to do otherwise. And another told him that if he didn’t change, there was no point living even one more century.
Tchicaya said, “You’re right. Let’s put an end to our ignorance.”
They went to Rasmah’s cabin and lay on the bed together, still dressed, talking, occasionally kissing. Tchicaya knew his Mediator would make the vote known to him instantly, but he couldn’t help but remain distracted. He’d done everything in his power to see that the Preservationists heard the whole case for the far side, but he couldn’t rest until he knew whether or not they’d been persuaded.
Almost two hours after they’d spoken to the gathering, the news came through: the moratorium had been approved. No percentages had been released, but the Preservationists had agreed unanimously before beginning their debate that the majority decision would be binding.
Tchicaya watched Rasmah’s face as the information registered. “We did it,” she said.
He nodded. “And Tarek. And Sophus.”
“Yeah. More them than us. But we can still celebrate.” She kissed him.
“Can we?” Tchicaya wasn’t being coy; he couldn’t tell by mere introspection.
“I’m positive.”
As they undressed each other, Tchicaya felt a rush of happiness, beyond sex, beyond his affection for her. Whatever hold he’d imagined Mariama had over him, it was finally dissolving. Their conspiracy over the power plant might have ended any chance that he could be truly at ease with her, but that hadn’t poisoned everything he’d admired in her. He hadn’t forfeited the right to be with someone who had the same strength, the same ideals as she’d once had.
Rasmah stroked the scar on his leg. “Do you want to tell me about this?”
“Not yet. It’s too long a story.”
She smiled. “Good. I didn’t really want to hear it right now.” She moved her hand higher. “Oh, look what we made! I knew it would be beautiful. And I think I have something that would fit here, almost perfectly. And here. And maybe even…
Tchicaya gritted his teeth, but he didn’t stop her moving her fingers over him, inside him. There was no more vulnerable feeling than being touched in a place that had not existed before, a place you’d never seen or touched yourself. He lay still, and allowed her to make him aware of the shape, the sensitivity, the response of each
