"We're working, Ari. Grant and I have business to do."

"Everybody's working," she complained. "Hello, Grant."

"Hello, Ari," Grant said.

"Maman went to Fargone," she said. In case they hadn't heard.

"I'm sorry," Justin said.

"I'm going to go there and live with her."

Justin got a funny look. A real funny look. Grant looked at her. And she was scared because they were upset, but she didn't know why. She sat there looking up and wishing she knew what was wrong. Of a sudden she was real scared.

"Ari," Justin said, "you know you're not supposed to be here."

"I can be here if I want. Uncle Denys doesn't mind."

"Did uncle Denys say that?"

"Justin," Grant said. And gently: "Ari, who brought you here?"

"Nobody. I brought myself." She pointed. "I came from tapestudy. I'm taking a shortcut."

"That's nice," Justin said. "Look, Ari. I'll bet you're supposed to go straight home."

She shook her head. "No. I don't have to. Uncle Denys is always late and Nelly won't tell him." She kept getting this upset-feeling, no matter how she tried to be cheerful. It was not them being bad to her. It was not a mad either. She tried to figure out what it was, but Grant was worried about Justin and Justin was worried about her being there.

Hell with Them, maman would say. Meaning the Them that kept things messed up.

"I'm going," she said.

But she did it again the next day, sneaked up and popped sideways around the doorframe and said: "Hello."

That scared them good. She laughed. And came out and was nice then. "Hello."

"Ari, for God's sake, go home!"

She liked that better. Justin was mad like maman's mad. She liked that a lot better. He wasn't being mean. Neither was Grant. She had got them and they were going to yell at her.

"I did Computers today," she said. "I can write a program."

"That's nice, Ari. Go home!"

She laughed. And tucked her hands behind her and rocked and remembered not to. "Uncle Denys got me a fish tank. I've got guppies. One of them is pregnant."

"That's awfully nice, Ari. Go home."

"I could bring you some of the babies."

"Ari, just go home."

"I have a hologram. It's a bird. It flies." She pulled it out of her pocket and showed how it turned, and came inside to do it. "See?"

"That's fascinating. Please. Go home."

"I'll bet you haven't got one."

"I know I don't. Please, Ari, —"

"Why don't you want me here?"

"Because your uncle is going to get mad."

"He won't. He never knows."

"Ari," Grant said. She looked at him.

"You don't want us to callyour uncle, do you?" She didn't. It wasn't very nice. She frowned at Grant. "Please," Justin said. "Ari."

He was halfway nice. And she was out of tricks. So she went outside, and looked back and smiled at him.

He was sort of a friend. He was her secret friend. She wasn't going to make him mad. Or Grant. She would come by just a second every day. But they were gone the next day: the door was shut and locked. That worried her. She figured they had either figured out she was coming at the same time every day or they were truly Disappeared.

So she sneaked over on her way to tape the next morning and caught them. "Hello!" she said. And scared them.

She saw they were mad, so she didn't laugh at them too much. And she just waved them goodbye and went on.

She caught them now and again. When her guppy had babies she brought them some in a jar she had. Justin looked like that made him feel better about her. He said he would take care of them.

But when she took the lid off they were dead. She felt awful. "I guess they were in there too long," she said. "I guess they were," Justin said. He smelled nice when she leaned on the desk near him. A lot like Ollie. "I'm sorry, Ari."

That was nice anyway. It was the first time he had really been just Justin with her. Grant came and looked and he was sorry too.

Grant took the jar away. And Justin said, well, sometimes things died.

"I'll bring you more," she said. She liked coming by the office. She thought about it a lot. She was leaning up by Justin's desk now and he had stopped having that bad feeling. He was just Justin. And he patted her on the shoulder and said she had better go.

He had never been that nice since a long, long time ago. So she was winning. She thought he would be awfully nice to talk to, but she wasn't going to push and make everything go wrong. Not with him and not with Grant. He was her friend. And when maman sent for her she would ask him and Grant if they wanted to go with her and Nelly.

Then she would have all the special people and she would be all right on the ship, because Justin was a CIT and he was grown-up and he would know how to do everything you had to do to get to Fargone.

She had a birthday coming. She had not even wanted a kids' party. Just the presents, thank you.

Even that hadn't made her happy. Until now.

She skipped down the hall, playing step-on-the-metal-line. And got Nelly's keycard out of her pocket and used it on the lift. Because she knew how Security worked.

xi

"You damn fool," Yanni yelled, and threw the papers at him. And Justin stood there, paralyzed in shock as the sheets of his last personal project settled on the carpet around them. "You damned fool!What are you trying to do? We give you a chance, we do everything we fucking canto get you a chance, I sweat my assoff on my own fucking timeworking up critiques on this shit you dream up to prove to a hardheaded juvenile-fixated foolthat his brilliant junior study project was just that, a fucking junior study projectthat Ari Emory would have dismissed with a Thanks, kid, but we tried that,if she hadn't been interested in getting her hands on your juvenile body and fucking over your father,son, which you've just done all by yourself, you damned fool! Get this shit out of here! Get yourself back to your office, and you keep that kid out, you hear me?"

It hit him in the gut, and paralyzed him between wanting to kill Yanni and believing for a terrible moment that it was over, that a little girl's spite had ruined him, and Jordan, and Grant.

But then he heard it all the way to the end and realized it was not entirely that, it was not doomsday.

It might as well be.

"What did she say?" he asked. "What did she say about it? The kid brought me a damn jar of fish, Yanni, what am I going to do, throw her out of the office? I tried!"

"Get out of here!"

"What did she say?"

"She asked her uncle Denys to invite you to her fucking birthdayparty. That's all. That's all. You've got yourself a situation,son. You've got yourself a real situation. Seems she's been coming by the office a lot. Seems she's been dodging Security through the upstairs, seems she's been using her azi's keycard to get up and down the lift, seems she's just real attracted to you, son. What in hell do you think you're doing?"

"Is this a psych? Is that it? Denys asked you to run a psych and see what falls out?"

"Why didn't you report it?"

"Well, hell, I have a few reasons, don't you think?" He got his breath back. He got his balance back and stared at Yanni hard and straight. "It's your security she outflanked. How am I to know Reseune Security can't track a seven-year-old kid? I'm not going to be rude to her. No, thanks. I don't want any part of it. Idon't want to be the one to ring up Denys Nye and tell him he's lost track of his ward. You want a kid to get determined about something, you just tell her I'm forbidden territory. No, thanks. Denys said be polite, make nothing of it, avoid her where I can—hell, I started shutting my office when I knew she was due back from tape, what else can I do?"