After that every boy in the room wanted to have one dance with Catlin, and it was funny as hell, because all the girls in the room didn't know whether to be jealous of an azi or not.
So Maddy Strassen flounced over and asked Florian, and the other girls started asking him, and the few older CIT kids who had azi their own age began showing them the steps, until the thing got all over the House by the next morning.
"You know," uncle Denys said about it at breakfast, "there areazi that could bother. You really ought to be careful."
"Seely was there," she said, tweaking uncle Denys just a bit. "And a lot of Security. They could have stopped it, anytime."
"Probably the music paralyzed their judgment. They were there to stop Abolitionists with grenades. They needn't have worried. They couldn't get past the noise."
"Well, none of the azi got pushed. Some would dance, some wouldn't, nobody pushed anybody. Florian said Catlin thought it was interesting. She's supposed to protect me, right? And she's not as social as Florian. But she can imitate anything physical and she can actlike anybody. So she was having a great time out there. She was psyching everybody and getting the feel of how they moved and they never knew what she was doing. Want to know what she said?"
"What?"
"She said they were all soft and they were generally real vulnerable in their balance. That she could take out any one of them with an elbow."
Uncle Denys sneezed into his orange juice.
xi
More shots. They brought her period on. She swore she was going to get Dr. Ivanov. A call at his door at night and blam! a gift from Florian.
He probably had enough of her blood to transfuse most of Novgorod.
"I think I want a different doctor," she said to uncle Denys.
"Why?" uncle Denys asked, over his reports, at the supper table, which was the only place she saw him—at breakfast and at supper.
"Because I'm tired of getting stuck with needles. I'm going to be anemic."
"Dear, it's a study. It got started when you were born and it's a very valuable study. You just have to put up with it, I don't care what doctor you have; and you'd hurt Petros' feelings. You know he's very fond of you."
"He smiles very nice, right before he gives me something that makes me want to throw up."
"You know, you have to watch, dear, your voice does tell what's going on with your cycles. That's something you don't want to make that public, isn't it?"
"I don't know why not! I don't know why they don't put it on the news! Why don't you hand the news-services the tapes from my bedroom? I bet I can give them some real thrills if I work at it, I bet the Security techs just love it!"
"Who said we were taping? That's a Security system."
"Florian and Catlin are House Security, remember?"
Uncle Denys put down his reports, suddenly very serious.
So was she, not having intended to bring it up. Yet. Till they found out some other things. But he was off his balance: she had her opening; she Got him with it.
Good.
"Dear, all right—yes. There are tapes. They go into Archive, no one accesses them. They're just a historical record."
"Of me having my period."
"Ari, dear, don't be coarse."
"I think it's coarse! I think it's a damn coarse thing to do to me! I want that system shut down,uncle Denys! I want it off, I want those tapes destroyed, I want Florian and Catlin to rip out that entire unit, at the control board"
"Dear me, they areobservant, aren't they?"
"Damn right they are."
"Ari, dear, don'tswear. You're not old enough."
"I want that unit off! Iwant it out! Iwant those tapes burned! Iwant to move up to myapartment and I want Florian and Catlin to go over thatand have access to all the control boards in all the secret little rooms in Security!"
"Ari, dear, calm down. I'll have them turn it off."
"The hell! You'll just relocate the board somewhere else you think Florian and Catlin can't find it."
"Well, then, you'd have a problem, wouldn't you? You have to believe me."
"No, I don't, because I'll know if that unit is running."
"How?"
"I'm not going to tell you. Ask Seely. I'm sure he can explain it."
"Ari, dear, your temper is running a bit high today, I'm sure you've noticed. And I really, really don't want to discuss things with you when you're onlike this. I'm very, very fond of you, but no one likes to listen to a cultured twelve-year-old swear like a line soldier, and no one likes to be called a liar—as you once said in a very public place. So do you think you could lower the volume a little and discuss this rationally, or shall we say I'm sure Seely is still a little ahead of Florian? —If I wanted to continue the surveillance against your wishes. I appreciate the fact you're not a little girl anymore. I know there are very good reasons why you don't want to be taped in your bedroom, and the fact that you've objected is enough. We can't get any value out of a study if the subject is acting for the cameras, now, can we? So the taping will stop, not because you have the power to take out the units, but because it loses its value."
"I want the tapes burned!"
"I'm sorry, not even we can get at them. They've gone into the Archive vault, under the mountain out there, and they're irretrievable as long as you're active in the House computer."
"You mean while I'm logged in?"
"No, as long as you're an active CIT-number in the files. As long as you live, dear. Which is going to be a long, long time, and then you won't care, will you, whether somebody has a tape of a twelve-year-old girl in her underwear?"
"You've seen those tapes!"
"No, I know the twelve-year-old, that's quite enough. The taping will shut down. Florian can verify it, if you like, and Florian can remove the unit himself, with, I trust, some reasonable care not to damage the rest of the system."
"Today."
"Today." Uncle Denys looked very worried. "Ari, I amsorry."
He was acting with her. Working her. The way he had been Working the whole situation and trying to get her to believe him. The way she Worked him.
He was probably good enough to spot that too. If Seely was ahead of Florian, uncle Denys was still ahead of her, she thought. Maybe.
But she could Work him right back by using her upset and letting it go on long enough to let him do the Shut on her, and do it a couple of times so he thought he Had her.
Then she could do what he was trying to get her to do and see where it led, without beingled.
"I'm sorry, Ari."
She glared at him.
"Ari, this is a very bad time for this. I wish you'd come to me earlier."
Dammit, he wanted her to ask. She wanted to Work him to have to tell her whatever he was up to, but that would give it away for sure that she was onto him Working her. Which he might know anyway: you never knew how many layers there were with uncle Denys.
"You know there's a bill up to extend you the first Ari's Special status."
"I know."
"You know it's going to pass. There's not going to be any problem with it. There's no way the Centrists can stop it."
"That's nice, isn't it?"
"It was the one thing the Court didn't hand you with Ari's rights. The one thing they held back. So you'll have that. You'll have everything. You know Reseune is so proud of you."
Flattery, flattery, uncle Denys.
"You are goingto be on your own in a few years. You'll leave this apartment and move to yours, and I won't be with you: I'll go back to being a fat old bachelor and see you mostly in and out of the offices and at parties."