"What are you saying?"
"Stop pretending, damn you!" She pulled away from him and looked into the corner. Suddenly she grabbed her circlet from the table and put it on. She was initiating DR routines, and it came surging into his mind like a shock wave. The deliberate thought patterns, an echo of his own, were broken and a rush of hurt and brave resignation washed through. He was there, mirrored in her mind, knowing; knowing that which he knew, that the truth was somehow a bridge between them that could not be crossed. The realization flooded them that his motivations were strange and complex ones, intermingled in his consciousness in a way that made them impossible to classify as right or wrong. It was clear, however, that she was right in that one thing: the way that he felt did not satisfy her criteria, or even his own, for love. He saw that darker, almost incomprehensible motives were driving him along the courses he had chosen. He knew that, somewhere within him, he wanted Beth to know that at some point he had stopped loving her. Perhaps the whole Deepstar adventure was a ploy to bring them close enough together so that she could know it.
Her own motivations stood out in contrast to his as clear, forthright. The total giving of herself to DR
had been the greatest possible expression of her love for him. But that love had been sullied by his lack of it, almost to the point where it could not be resurrected. She saw that his desire to understand, undoubtedly the strongest force within him, was a corrupting force, an emotion which had profound ramifications for them both, making all things distorted and tentative. It had flowed into her, on top of her already fully realized persona, and had made her question things that could not be questioned. No, he thought. It is not so. I am not as she thinks. She is not as she thinks. These ideas are neither real nor useful. The world is around us, it cannot be denied. The reasons for our actions are directly tied into their outcomes. There was a surge of anger. It must be so.
But within her the small voice cried out. Break off. Break off! This is the profoundest representation of the incompatibilities within us. And it grows worse with each second. End! she cried. End! And she tore the circlet off her head, leaving him to patch the great ragged tears that fluttered into the night. He opened his eyes. "No!" he said. "You've got to listen!" And he grabbed her wrist, pulling her to face him. Her eyes were distant, cold. "It's all a lie. Even in DR, what you know about me is filtered, unknowable. Those things you think about me may be true in one sense, but not the most important one."
"Please leave," she said, collapsing on the bed. He left.
As he pulled on his space suit in the atrium of the CM, John felt numb, driven by the merest tickle of fear that made him keep moving. Had she been right after all? How had something that had started out so well ended in such despair? He knew little about love, that was certain, and less about people. Was it possible that this was what happened so often between men and women, happening again? Just the end of a love affair, breaking off with no rhyme or reason? He could not answer a single question, and finally he made his way out through the domes toward the beckoning night/day of Ocypete. It seemed like forever since he had been Outside. Suddenly he stopped. Was this behavior a function of Beth's personality that had rubbed off on him? He was having difficulty even formulating the idea: in that moment he realized that he was becoming much more spontaneous, much more given to unexamined emotion. He sat down on the lip of the pool and stared out at the clouds near the dome's horizon. It was true—he was losing himself, a little. He couldn't do anything about the chill of fear that percolated into his neck muscles. Could it be that what had happened was because part of her was within him, changing, rationalizing, explaining himself to himself in a new way? The uncertainty of the situation was horrifying. Was it a manifestation of this change that he couldn't really pinpoint what was happening to him? He could only tighten his grip on himself; tell himself that he would have to get used to it. He suddenly resolved to stop sniveling this way. He remembered the night when the vision of becoming Beth had seemed so attractive. It must remain so.
Amid the rubble of excavation, Jana Li Hu sat on the porch of the garage-sized laboratory she had carried with her and surveyed the mess she had made. Frustration and anger bubbled in her mind. Here she was, cataloging the minute changes in the composition of the slurry that had boiled out of the vent nearby—a student's project!—when that damn Sealock was making scientific history. She cursed herself fornot making more detailed observations in the shuttlecraft. Now that they were back there were no hard data to analyze, only speculation, and that was not her forte by any means. She wondered if anyone believed what she had said about anticipating the discovery of the Artifacts. She had to admit, the evidence was certainly there, and if she hadn't been so rigorous she might have seen the truth. Damn them all! She was completely shut out now.
She could, of course, use violence. Right here on her belt was a mini-lance that would suffice. She pulled the elongated cylinder from its holster and hefted it slowly. A quick cut. She let the beam play along the pile of debris she had made, watching it disappear in a twinkle of mist. No, she just couldn't. Which left only the other plan. Her mind went numb with a fear which she could just barely hold in check. I would lose any chance of acceptance either way. If I get my way it will be a fluke. But is there any real difference between being humored and being liked? In the long run, most probably. Oh, what do I want, exactly? I wish I fucking knew! I guess I'll have to be content with what I can get. At least I'll get the pleasure of scaring them all to death. Who's that?
Well above the horizon, riding on the Hyades, the horns of Taurus, and occulting Aldebaran briefly, a tiny man figure decorated the Iris-and-sunless western sky. Even in the full glare of the sun-star behind her it was difficult to make out well. Finally a fold of the suit caught the light and she could see it was red. Cornwell. What does he want? She activated the Shipnet Communications link with a thought.
"What are you doing out here, John? I'm surprised you're not, um, with Beth." John's trajectory was bringing him down, feet first. "We can't do that all the time. I heard your lance's static and came to investigate. Thought it might be a discharge from the ice or something."
"That, John, is very unlikely at this point. How's Brendan doing with his scanner?" John came down surefooted, barely skidding to a two-point landing. Through the bubble of his helmet she saw a strange, uncharacteristic look on his face. "Nothing new. Tem and Sealock have shut themselves into his room and are doing whatever it is programmers do. I imagine they'll approach it a bit more gingerly this time. How are you?"
She was torn between foreshadowing her future action and not letting him see that she was unhappy.
"Not good. I want to be in on all this."
"We all do, I guess. But the present setup is the only one possible. Brendan is the only one qualified . .
."
"You could use your authority. There's absolutely no reason why we're not even getting to look at the stuff that's coming in. If he's closed off the normal Shipnet link, we won't find out what's going on until it's all over."