Beggars and Choosers by Nancy Kress

Author:Nancy Kress
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub, pdf
Tags: Science Fiction, General, Fiction
ISBN: 9780312857493
Publisher: Tor Books
Published: 1994-09-15T07:00:00+00:00

* * *

III

OCTOBER 2114

The test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much; it is whether we provide enough for those who have too little.

—Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Second Inaugural Address

Ten

DIANA COVINGTON: EAST QUANTA

The most remarkable thing about being in an off-line dump like East Oleanta was my realization that the GSEA didn’t know where Miranda Sharifi was. They were a sophisticated and determined agency, but apparently they didn’t know where I was either. I wasn’t using any of the identities that Colin Kowalski had issued me, and I had changed personae three times on the way to East Oleanta. “Victoria Turner” had credentials with the IRS, the state of Texas, the bank where her family trust was stashed, educational software franchises, the National Health Care Institute, grocery stores… My larcenous friend was good at what he did. Good enough to convince Huevos Verdes… who knew? But I felt confident the GSEA didn’t.

The second most remarkable thing was that I didn’t call up the GSEA and tell them where I was and what I suspected. I put this down to hubris. I wanted to be able to say, “Here is Miranda Sharifi, latitude 43°45’l6” longitude 74°50’86“, it’s an illegal genemod lab, go get her, boys,” instead of saying, “Well, I think she’s here someplace nearby, possibly, although I have no proof.” If I were a regular agent, my silence would have been intolerable. But I wasn’t a regular agent. I wasn’t a regular anything. And I wanted, once in my ineffectual life, to succeed at something by myself. I wanted that very badly.

Of course, like the GSEA, I didn’t exactly know where Miranda was, either, although I suspected she was underground somewhere in the wooded Adirondack Mountains near East Oleanta. But I didn’t have the faintest idea how to actually find her.

Until Lizzie Francy.

==========

I went back to see Lizzie Francy the same evening I first told her about simple computer operations, the day after I’d put a medpatch on her. I’d seen how Billy Washington changed color when I’d asked about Eden. That old man was the worst liar I’d ever seen. He knew something about Eden; he was hopelessly in love with the much tougher and more conventional Annie; Lizzie could do anything with him she chose. Poor Billy.

Lizzie still sat on the spectacularly ugly plastisynth sofa, dressed in a pink nightshirt, her hair in sixteen braids tied with pink ribbon. Electronic parts lay scattered over her blanket. I viewed her around Billy, who opened the door but didn’t want to let me in.

“Lizzie’s asleep, her.”

“No, she isn’t, Billy. She’s right there.”

“Vicki!” Lizzie cried in her little-girl voice, and something unexpected turned over in my chest. “You’re here!”

“She’s sick, her, too sick for no company.”

“I’m fine, me,” Lizzie said. “Let Vicki in, Billy. Pleeeaasse?”

He did, unhappily. Annie wasn’t around. I said, “What have you got there, Lizzie?”

“The apple peeler ‘bot from the cafe kitchen,” she said promptly, and without guilt. Billy winced.

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