“I’d leave the office,” Grant said, “if it weren’t an interesting question. And I’ve thought about it–what I would do. What I coulddo, if someone threatened him. I told myself I could, and would. I actually take a certain comfort in that.”

“Same,” Justin said, “on this side.”

She nodded. “It’s nice to have somebody that close,” she said. “I do. I’m glad you both do.” She took something from her coat pocket, which turned out to be two com units, and she laid them on the nearest table. “Those are exactly the same as Florian’s, as Catlin’s–a few limitations: they only call Base One, they can only get voice contact if someone calls you back, and if you hit the red button, they’re going to bring down the ceiling, so don’t use that unless you have to. Just carry them and don’t for God’s sake lose them. If you see anything suspicious around you, if you want someone to show up quietly and intervene, hit any button but the red one. If you hit the red one, figure you’re going to get an armed response. Understood?”

“Understood,” Justin said, looking a little mollified.

“I hope you’ll never need them,” she said, “but I’m carrying my own.” She touched the door. “And don’t put yourselves in situations. Please.”

“Like visiting my father?”

“You’ll protect Grant,” she said, “and he’ll protect you. You do what you want to do.”

She left, then.

She’d made Justin mad for a few minutes, and she hadn’t wanted to, but she felt better, knowing Grant wasn’t limited in Justin’s defense. She’d suspected the answer she’d get: but she’d not been entirely sure she’d believe it. Now she did.

And that was good.

BOOK THREE Section 3 Chapter i

JUNE 26, 2424

1528H

Giraud, at nineteen weeks, had bones instead of cartilage, and those bones shaped a face increasingly distinctive from, say, Abban, or Seely. For all of them it was the same story: arms and legs finally matched in proportion. They made urine: kidneys were working.

Giraud’s heart, which one day might betray him, functioned well enough now, on a steady beat. He was just starting to grow the sandy hair that would characterize him in life. His lungs weren’t at all developed, so nothing but the artificial womb could sustain him at this point. His lungs lacked their life‑giving minor passages, and breathing any substance as rarified as air was impossible for him; but he was already getting vocal cords. His brain wasn’t cognitively active, and had nothing like its destined size, but it was acquiring a little organization. Areas of his brain made the most rudimentary start at sensing a touch, tasting, and smelling, though stimuli were much the same right now, and until that organization happened he couldn’t differentiate between touch or smell or sound: it was all the same to him, just a stimulus that got on his nerves.

He’d be a little insomniac throughout his adult life–but he’d begun to have periods of quasi‑sleep, or at least quiet. That, again, was the brain, organizing. And his nerves, which had lacked a myelin sheath, had begun to acquire it, which would be a process not limited to his stay in the womb. As that coating formed, finer and finer organization would become possible. As yet, it was very basic.

His eyes, completely colorless as yet, had begun moving, simple languid muscle twitch, behind sealed lids.

When he was born he would have a restless blue gaze, noting this, noting that, until those eyes fixed, and then one had better take care, even when he was a little boy.

He was nearly halfway to birth, which was scheduled for November 20.

But right now Giraud didn’t see a thing.

BOOK THREE Section 3 Chapter ii

JULY 1, 2424

0928H

I went to see Giraud today. He’s at twenty weeks, and about halfway toward, his birthdate. I don’t know why I went–or I’m reluctant to admit it, but things in the house have changed so drastically that I just wanted to get him in view again and use my brain about him, not my emotions.

He’s just a baby. He’s even gotten to look pretty well like a human being, and I halfway felt guilty about stopping Denys. I’m sure someday he’ll ask about his brother.

And I worry about what I’ll have say to him to explain it. He’ll feel a sense of loss, even for something he didn’t have.

It wasn’t Giraud who really shaped me, after all: it was Denys. It was definitely Denys that tried to kill me, and I’m reasonably sure he killed the first Ari, but I’m still trying to prove that, and I don’t know what the balance is.

Do I have to do to them what they did to me. Do I have to create a mess of an infant’s life to create a man to make a mess of your early life? I’d rather not.

And what if I live as long as the first Ari or longer, and the Giraud I created gets too old and dies, and they have to start over with a new baby Giraud right before you’re born? It’s all crazy. Making everybody all match is going to be impossible if they go on replicating people whenever they die, and so far they’re not saving us all up and starting the eldest first, so it’s going to get all scrambled about the timeline. Giraud might drown in the river before he’s forty. And then where will we be? Again, a total mismatch.

It’s absolutely crazy–and I’m the one–and you’re the one–the universe has to have continually at work, fast as we can.

So I officially give up trying to make things as exact as I was. I know it’s not possible. I don’t think it’s altogether necessary: I hope that it isn’t. The medics were going in blind when they used to take the first Ari’s constant tests and bloodwork and make mine fit her profile in any given week I was due for a major new tape–shooting me full of hormones. Now we have me for a test subject, and Dr. Peterson is writing up the work they did, matching my learning with what I was working on, and with what I needed to be working on. So that will tell us some relevance between hormonal state, particular tape, and test scores.

With Giraud, we know what he studied, and when he studied it, and we’ll still play games with his blood chemistry to make sure he has his brain on line when he studies certain things, but I don’t honestly think it has to be week by week, and I don’t think it has to be that tightly on schedule or sequence: I think the main thing is whether the brain is going to be totally fluxed and doing freethinking with, say, art, or whether it’s going to be absorbing facts on a given tape where facts, fast and exact, are what you want.

Besides, I’m not going to do to Giraud Two what Giraud One’s mother did, which was bear down on Giraud hard to be a genius. Denys was, Giraud wasn’t, and she couldn’t change that. I’m pretty sure she didn’t do Denys any good by coddling him: he could be as odd as he liked and she excused it. She was always hard on Giraud. And when she died he took over being hard on himself. That is a key to what he was, and I’ve got to think about that one in his setup.

I’ve arranged for Yanni to take Giraud: he hasn’t exactly said yes, but I just don’t see him refusing at the last moment, and it’s just a few months to go. And Yanni didn’t say anything when I said I’d backed out of creating Denys. I know he thinks something about it, but he’s not easy to read. I’ve found that out. I don’t think he really wants either of them. He knows he’s going to get Giraud. But I think he feels something about Denys and I can’t get a straightforward answer out of him. He says I know’ what others don’t and I’ll make up my own mind.

Well, I still have seven years to talk to Yanni about it. I don’t want to have Denys back and forth, but I didn’t destroy his geneset. I just sent it back to deep storage.

Maybe it would be a little less crazy if I just threw up my hands and declared everything had to follow program as close as possible, and Denys had to become a thorough bastard and have a maman who was as‑crazy as the originals’ was.