Bear, Greg - Moving Mars by Bear Greg

Author:Bear, Greg [Bear, Greg]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2011-10-30T15:42:34+00:00

Generated by ABC Amber LIT Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abclit.html

"But perhaps disgrace, as well. The Council will conduct hearings. You will be asked embarrassing questions."

"That isn't what makes me so angry," I said.

"Then what?"

250Greg Bear

"A man with your responsibilities," I said. "You should have known. About your problems and the trouble they might cause."

"What, and have myself therapied?" He laughed bitterly. "How Terrestrial! How fitting a Martian should suggest that to me."

"It happens on Mars all the time," I said.

"Not to a man of my heritage," he said. "We are as we are born, and we play those cards, and none other."

"Then we'll lose," I said.

"Perhaps," he said. "But honorably."

I said my farewells to Alice in the suite an hour before we left for the spaceport. For a time, Alice had withdrawn, refusing to answer our questions about her contamination. She would not even talk with the advocate chosen for our lawsuit, or his own thinker. But that changed, and she seemed to accept her new status—a beloved member of the family who could not be employed as she had once been.

"I have been replaying parts of the sim you shared with Orianna," she told me as she tracked on her carriage into my room. My suitcase and slate lay on the field bed, squared with the corners. I am sometimes excessively neat. "You kept all of it?" I asked.

"Yes. I have observed fragments of created personalities undergoing portions of the sim. It has been interesting."

"Orianna thought you might find it useful," I said. "But you should delete it before the Mind Design thinkers check you over."

"I can delete nothing, I can only condense and store inactively."

"Right. I forgot."

Suddenly, Alice laughed in a way I had not heard before. "Yes. Like that. I can temporarily forget."

"I'm going to miss you," I said. "The trip home will seem much longer without you."

MOVING MARS251

"You will have Bithras for company, and fellow passengers to meet."

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