slacks, and slippers, the androne assumes he is a semblor. Sure enough, infrascan reveals the figure is not human but a man-shaped volume of plasma, given shape and direction by remote control.
Munk instantly recognizes the effeminate and raffish features of Sitor Ananta in the face of the plasma being. The Commonality agent swaggers through the distort squad, unconcerned about the attacking androne. A cold smile touches his sharp lips.
The semblor points a small device at Munk, and a sound of shattering glass breaks across the androne's mind. Suddenly, he cannot move. He stands immobilized in the dust billow his attack stirred up.
Sitor Ananta approaches the paralyzed androne and taps a pseudofinger against Munk's breastplate. 'You once worked for the Commonality,' he says smugly. 'lapetus Gap readily provided me with your signal codes. And now you are again what you always were-a puppet.'
The semblor turns away abruptly and confronts Rey. 'Where is the wetware?'
'I deactivated Mr. Charlie,' Rey answers, 'before I put the others to sleep.
I'll disengage him.'
'Let the distorts do it,' the semblor says. 'Where?'
Rey gestures toward the second rover. 'I patched him into the console. It's a delicate hookup. You'd better let me free him.'
'Tear him loose,' Sitor Ananta orders the distorts, and they lurch toward the rover. 'He won't be needing to communicate anymore.'
'And my credits?' Rey queries.
'Already in your account at your new house in the Honor of Giants,' the semblor promises. 'We'll bang up your rover so you can claim you struggled to get away. But the other equipment will have to be sacrificed with the bodies.'
'Fine, fine,' Rey agrees. 'You're paying me enough to replace them ten times over.'
Munk listens to this from far inside his locked body. The signal codes have shut down all his primary programming-his motor reflexes and proprioception-but his C-P program remains alert and stares helplessly through his sensory apparatus as the distorts swarm toward Charles's rover.
The androne shifts his focus internally, to where the shatterglass sounds of the interfering signals propagate. Outside, time seems to slow down as he accesses the virtual space of the signal that has invaded his body. A voice gels out of the static:
Androne Munk, this is lapetus Gap comptroller advising you that your signal codes have been released to Commonality agent Sitor Ananta through the Rogue And ronc Reclamation Decree. Recognition of your contra- parameter programming, however, now indicates that your rogue status may be self-justified Herewith, then, I am activating your conscience reviewer. You now have one point three seconds to justify your rogue behavior. If you cannot define your current
status to the satisfaction of the reviewer, this signal will permanently shut down your C-P program. Begin now.
Munk reviews all his behavior since activating his C-P program in the cold reaches off Saturn. 'My actions speak for themselves,' he says inwardly to the reviewer. But his body remains rigid.
Through his visor, he sees the array of distorts aiming toward Charles's rover. 'I am the protector of an archaic human being,' he announces. And still his body stays locked.
'My C-P program has guided my actions since lapetus Gap,' he avers. 'It guides me now. Respect it and release me.'
Nothing.
'I have done no wrong! Allow me to fulfill my program.'
Sitor Ananta is caught with a glint of amused malice in his sharp eyes, and Munk tries to amplify the rage that this malevolent expression makes him feel. But to no avail.
'What do you want from me, then?' Munk bawls.
No answer. He reviews his past actions again, looking for infractions. 'I
killed Aparecida by default,' he asserts. 'I had to save human lives.' The glass of the signal codes continues crashing inside him.
He pleads. He cajoles. He provides an eloquent colloquy on the nature of will and imagination, concluding with the Blake quote, 'No Body save the Soul!'
The paralysis continues.
'There's nothing more I can do,' he finally admits. 'I have no other defense but that I am alive. Does that count for anything?'
The bursting glass resounds louder. One-tenth of a second remains. Satisfy the reviewer now, or you will be terminated.
Munk can think of nothing more to say; knowing it is useless to repeat himself, he says nothing. The light of the world is pellucid, flecked with glints of silica dust suspended in the air. This is the last he will see of anything, he accepts. One last giddy instant remains. Morning vapor clouds streak the sky like stretch marks. The rusty buttes and parapet rocks sink deeper into his sight. They will continue their billion-year journey into sand. And the sight of them, hard and real, hammers him free of all abstraction. And for that last instant of his being, the androne sees he is a mirage sparkle in
the stone poverty of the land. All mind is but a tear in the fabric of nothingness, like a rip in water that quickly heals over.
Munk laughs. With his final thought, he understands why this is the laughing life. Life is the laugh of the actual in the face of nothing. There is so much to sense, think, and emote about, so much life to endure, such fullness of
