“Irene was just another dupe, sir. She honestly thought she had hired Albert’s gray as a quasi-legal industrial spy.”

“You mean all that nonsense about looking for the secret of teleportation?”

I glanced back at the pneumo-tunnel construction project — an awful lot of investment that would lose much of its purpose if remote dittoing ever came true.

“The story seemed plausible enough to deceive an Albert Morris gray. Why not her too? Anyway, by this morning Irene realized she’d been set up to take blame for the prion attack. So she chose to check out under her own terms.”

“Another patsy, then. Like you and Lum and Gadarene.” Kaolin snorted. “Did you find any leads to who’s behind it all?”

“Well, her two partners were a plaid ditto who called himself Vic Collins and another one who claimed to be a copy of the maestra, Gineen Wammaker.”

“Is that all? We already knew as much from the gray’s tape recording.”

I didn’t want to say more. Yet Kaolin was still my client … at least till I verified some things. I couldn’t legally or ethically lie to him.

“Vic Collins was a facade, of course. Irene thought he might really be Beta.”

“You mean the golemnapper and counterfeiter? Have you got any proof?” Kaolin’s voice grew a bit more excited. “This could be what I need to bring some real pressure to bear. Force the cops to take that bastard seriously as a real public threat, not just another d-commerce nuisance. We may be able to put him out of business for good!”

My reply was careful.

“I had a similar thought. I’ve been after Beta for three years. We’ve had harsh encounters.”

“Yes, I recall. Your narrow escape on Monday, followed by Tuesday morning’s raid on his Teller Building operation. There’s a lot of bad slip between the two of you.”

“Yes, in fact—”

I could see our destination up ahead. I had to make Kaolin feel comfortable enough not to watch my movements too closely for the next few minutes. Timing would be critical.

“That’s why I’m heading back toward the Teller Building right now.”

Toward. It wasn’t a lie, exactly. It fit our present trajectory across dittotown, in case he was tracking.

“Going to look for more clues, eh? Great!” Kaolin said. I heard muffled voices in the background, demanding the platinum’s attention. “Call again when you learn more,” he told me, then broke the connection without salutation or formality.

Just in time, I noted with some relief.

“Stop here!” I told the cabbie, who was still dividing his attention unnervingly between the road, the war news, and bickering with Pal. How do guys like this keep their hack license? I wondered, tossing him a silver coin and hopping out. Fortunately, Palloid kept to his perch on my shoulder, rather than get into a fight. But it was a close call.

Temple of the Ephemerals, flashed the sign in front. Up granite steps I dashed, past all the forlorn dittos hanging about — wounded, damaged, or otherwise derelict, lacking any hope of being welcomed home for inloading. Most looked worn down, near dissolution. Yet I was by far the oldest! The only clay person present who had any direct memory of Tuesday’s sermon. Not that I was here to attend services.

Only a short queue of haggard copies stood waiting for emergency repair service, led by a lanky purple with half its left arm torn off. Fortunately, the same dark-haired volunteer was on duty, offering succor to the hopeless and downtrodden. Whatever psychological reason drew her to dedicate precious realtime helping those with little life worth saving, I felt glad of it.

“Yipes!” Palloid gasped a shaky squeak upon catching sight of the volunteer nurse. “It’s Alexie.”

“What? You know her?”

Pal’s mini-ditto answered in a low whisper, “Uh … we dated for a while. You don’t think she’ll recognize me, do you?”

I couldn’t help comparing two mental images. One of the real Pal — handsome, grizzled, and broad-shouldered, though missing his entire lower half and confined for life to a sustaino-chair — a picture that had little in common with the agile, grinning little weasel creature on my shoulder except when it came to stuff that really mattered, like memory, personality, and soul.

“Maybe not,” I answered, stepping past all the waiting dittos, heading for the front of the line. “If you keep your mouth shut.”

Several injured golems grumbled as I strode up to Alexie’s treatment station, with its unsanitary table surrounded by cheap barrels of golem-grout, ditspackle, and praydough. She glanced at me — and for the first time I noticed she was pretty, in a darkly severe, dedicated-looking way. She began to insist that I wait my turn, but stopped when I raised my shirt, turning to display a long scar of hardened cement on my back.

“Remember your handiwork, Doc? You sure did a great job with that nasty little eater that was chewing out my innards. I recall one of your colleagues said I wouldn’t last the day. You should collect on that bet.”

She blinked. “I remember you. But … but that was Tues—”

Alexie stopped, eyes widening. No dummy, she went silent as the implications sank in.

Smart, yeah. But then why did she go out with Pal?

Dropping my shirt, I asked, “Is there a place where we can talk in private?”

She gave a jerky nod and motioned for us to follow her upstairs.

Palloid kept uncharacteristically silent as Alexie scanned. She quickly discovered the tracker bugs that Kaolin installed, when he so kindly extended our pseudolives.

She also found the bombs.

Maybe just in time, I thought. Our employer expects us to report from the Teller Building. He may get upset to find out we’ve slipped the leash.

“What pig did this to you?” Alexie cursed, carefully dropping the bombs into a battered-looking containment canister. There are special circumstances when golems can be legally required to carry autodestructs, with triggers operated by radio control. But it’s pretty rare in PEZ. Naturally, Alexie’s group opposes the practice in principle. I refrained from telling her that our bombs were installed by the great slavemaster himself, Vic Kaolin. If she knew, she might go online at once to tell everyone in her community of activists.

I couldn’t allow that. Not yet.

Palloid needed a few repairs, too. While she worked on him, I gazed past her balcony at the stained glass window of the main church. The old Christian symbols had been replaced to show a circular rosette, like a flower whose petals all tapered outward before flaring abruptly at the very end, at right angles, to pointed tips. At first, I thought each figure might be a fish, tail thrust outward. Fish … for arti-fishial? Then I realized, they were square-headed whales — sperm whales, apparently — portrayed gathering together their huge brows in some meeting of cetacean minds.

What was the symbolism? Whales — long-lived, though perpetually endangered — seemed just the opposite of dittos, who faded fast but sprang forth daily in greater numbers, ever replenished by human ingenuity and desire.

It reminded me a bit of the mandala emblem worn by that technician-priest of Final Options, Inc., who presided over the attempted transcendence of Queen Irene. Though clearly different in detail, both groups were struggling with the same problem, how to reconcile soul-imprinting with abiding religious impulse. But who am I to judge?

Okay, I like these Ephemerals folks. Maybe I owe them a couple of favors. Still, I had to play things coy.

Alexie finished and declared us clean. Suddenly, I felt free for the first time since … well, since I met up with Pal and Lum and Gadarene under the shadows of an ancient skooterboard park, getting snared in all this dirty business.