"She goes around in a fog," Topaz was saying as if to herself. "She barely paints anymore. And there's something odd in her eyes."
Chrys's scalp prickled at the thought. She averted her own eyes, then made herself face Topaz. "Does she go to the Underworld?"
"She always did, but she managed okay. Now I find too much credit missing."
"How much?"
"Five hundred, just this evening."
Not that bad yet, Chrys thought. Not bad enough. "Does she want to go clean?"
Topaz stared. The namestone twirled smoothly in her nanotex, like a whirlpool one could drown in. "She wants to 'manage.' Like you."
"Then see the doctor."
"It's too late for that."
You never listen to me, Chrys thought. You never did.
Suddenly Topaz caught Chrys at the shoulders. "Chrys—whatever it takes, get her clean. She's scared of that clinic. But you can get her there."
Topaz's hands felt warm, her face so near Chrys could feel her breath. Suddenly she thought, with Pearl out of the picture, Topaz would come back to her, just like their school days. Then she looked away, ashamed. Love was cruel, as cruel as Endless Light.
Drawing back, Chrys blinked at the dot of purple. Selenite answered, from a simian neighborhood down two levels. "Unless she seeks help, there's nothing we can do," Selenite told her. "I'm on another call, but I'll send you a medic just in case."
"Send me? But—"
Behind Selenite, vines of plast climbed a neat rowhouse. "You're trained. Do the best you can."
"But—" Chrys had not yet completed training, certainly not for this.
The door chimed. "Pearl is home."
Topaz gripped Chrys's arm like death. The door hissed open. Pearl looked well enough, a bit thin even for her. She glanced one way, then the other. "Why Topaz," she exclaimed, not quite looking at her. "I've had such a good—" Seeing Chrys, Pearl stopped. Her irises flashed white, then her face froze in terror. "What's she doing here?"
"The masters warned us off," flashed Jonquil's words of gold.
"A hard lot," admitted Rose. "They want nothing to do with us. But a few will always attempt reform—"
Pearl backed against the wall. Then she screamed and caught her head between her hands, almost as if trying to twist it off. "Get her out of here! Please—get her out—"
Topaz caught Pearl by both arms, but she twisted her head away. "Pearl, listen—it's your last chance, you hear?"
Pearl's nails dug into the wall, leaving deep grooves in the plast, and her muscles stood taut with pain. Chrys backed off, uncertain. Daeren had not told her much about pain; she wondered why.
In her window flashed the sprite of a worm-face. Doctor Flexor, female, the ID flashed helpfully in her window. Chrys stepped outside the house to meet her. "Pearl can't even look at me. What can I do?"
Doctor Flexor listened, her face worms twining and twisting, catching the pallid light of the street. From behind, Pearl's screams subsided. "Wait it out," Flexor advised. "After a few minutes, the masters will think you've gone forever. Then try again."
Back in the house, Topaz whispered intensely to Pearl. Pearl was shaking her head, her hair tossing around her face. "Just let me be," she groaned. "I'm fine now."
"What do you mean you're fine?" hissed Topaz. "You can't even look someone in the face."
"I'm fine, I said; just let me—Oh!" Catching sight of Chrys again, Pearl sobbed and tried to bury her face in the wall. Chrys felt numb.
"We try," reported Rose, "but now they refuse all contact."
Chrys knew Rose's style. "Maybe you need to try nicer."
"They know too well what they face. Corrupt though they are, they'd rather die than join our degenerate society."
Chrys went out again. "This is no good," she told Flexor, waiting by the lightcraft. "Nobody told me what to do for pain."
"Pain makes it easy," said the worm-face. "These masters must be inexperienced. Pain sends humans to the doctor."
Topaz came out, her curls all askew, but she still had that take-charge sense about her. "Look," she told the doctor, "can't you give her something to take off the edge?"
"Of course." The worms lifted. "As soon as she accepts treatment."
"That's right," said Chrys. "If she can face me and consent, I'll give her ... something."
Topaz's eyes narrowed. "Why you? Why not the doctor?"
"Damn it, for once just listen."
Topaz turned and went back. "Pearl," said Topaz firmly. "You accept treatment, or I'll turn you out." Pearl's head whipped violently back and forth. "I'll turn you out and freeze the accounts, you hear?"
"No," she wailed.
Topaz stopped and lowered her voice. "Pearl, I love you. I want you back. Does that mean nothing?"
Pearl's eyes rolled. Her face shone with sweat, and she took short, shallow breaths. "I don't know." Her voice broke. "It hurts too much."
"Just get treatment," urged Topaz. "Just say yes, and the doctor will make it better."
At that Pearl seemed to freeze. Chrys moved closer, dreading to start her off again.
"Say yes, Pearl," Topaz repeated. "Tell her."
Pearl looked at Chrys. "Yes," she gasped.
Chrys blinked to record the statement. Then she got out the green wafer, her hand shaking so it nearly fell. "Take this. Hurry."
Pearl grabbed the wafer and stuffed it in her mouth. Within minutes she was calm. Her arms relaxed, and she looked from one to the other, with a slight frown. "That sure helped. Why didn't you do that before?"
"It won't last," Chrys warned. "Keep fixed on my eyes." She had to give Rose one more chance to talk them into giving up.
"What are you?" Pearl asked curiously. "You're undercover, aren't you."
Chrys put a patch at Pearl's neck. A few would defect, never more. What if one day they all did? she wondered. A carrier, even a tester, was never allowed to increase her population more than 10 percent.
Flexor came inside. Her face worms extended into long tendrils around Pearl's head and neck. The nanoservos would tear every arsenic atom out of her tissues, and out of any micros that were left.
"It's coming back," Pearl gasped. "The pain—"
"The micros messed up your pain circuits. They need to heal." Flexor added to Chrys, "The pain saved her. When they're too smart for pain—"
Pearl's cry split the night. The worm-face got her into the light-craft and to the hospital; a five-minute ride, it felt the longest Chrys ever took. At the door to the clinic, she stopped. Pearl still moaned, her head turning back and forth to find relief that would not come. Topaz looked back toward Chrys as if to a lifeline.
"No farther for me," Chrys told her. "The clinic is a micro-free zone."
"A what?"
Doctor Flexor drew them in and the door closed.
"Our defectors have settled in," reported Jonquil. "Not the brightest, but they work hard. When do we get to build Silicon?"
In the window Chief Andra appeared, irises glimmering violet, standing tall as an ancient Sardish warrior. "Chrys, you've done well." She must have watched the whole time. "We'll put you on call."
Chrys swallowed and said nothing.
FIFTEEN
Jonquil could never forget her expedition to that vast New World, strange-tasting, wildly beautiful, terrifying. The macrophages she had to outswim, evading the viselike grip of antibodies, only to behold the words of a new god. A god awaiting people.