Nikki napped in the afternoon. While she was sleeping, Richard, Ellie, and Archie often exchanged comments and insights that highlighted the similarities and differences between the two species. “If I have understood correctly,” Ellie said one day after a lively conversation about how intelligent, sensitive beings should handle members of their community who exhibit antisocial behavior, “your society is much less tolerant than ours. There is clearly a ‘preferred way of living’ that is advanced by your communities. Those octospiders who do not embrace that preferred model are not only ostracized early, but also denied participation in many of life’s more rewarding activities and ‘terminated’ after a shorter than normal life span.”
“In our society,” Archie said in reply, “what is acceptable is always clear—there is no confusion, as there is in yours. Thus our individuals make their choices with full knowledge of the consequences. Incidentally, the Alternate Domain is not like one of your prisons. It is a place where octospiders, and other species as well, can live without the regimentation and optimization necessary for the continued
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development and survival of the colony. Some of the alternates live to be very old and are quite happy.
“Your society, at least what I have observed of it, seems not to understand the fundamental inconsistency between individual freedom and the common welfare. The two must be carefully balanced. No group can survive, let alone thrive, unless what is good for the overall community is more important than individual freedom. Take, for example, resource allocation. How can anyone with any intelligence possibly justify, in terms of the overall community, the accumulation and hoarding of enormous material assets by a few individuals when others do not even have food, clothing, and other essentials?”
In the basement Archie was not as reticent and evasive as he had sometimes been in the Emerald City. He spoke openly about all aspects of his civilization, as if the common mission he was undertaking with his human colleagues had somehow freed him from all constraints. Was Archie consciously sending a message to the other humans who were almost certainly monitoring the conversation? Perhaps. But how much of the conversation could Nakamura’s men have understood, since they knew nothing of the language of color? No, it was more likely that Archie, better than any of the humans, realized that his death was imminent and wanted his final days to be as meaningful and stimulating as possible.
One night before Richard and Ellie went to sleep, Archie said that he had something “personal” to tell them. “I do not want to alarm you,” the octospider said, “but I have consumed almost all of the supply of barrican that is in my intake buffer. If we stay here much longer and my barrican runs out, as you know I will begin to undergo sexual maturity. According to our files, I will become more aggressive and possessive at that time.”
“Don’t worry about it,” Richard said with a laugh. “I have dealt with teenagers before. Certainly I can handle an octospider who no longer has a perfect temperarnenl”
One morning the guard bringing their food and water told Ellie to prepare herself and the girl to leave. “When?” Ellie said.
‘Ten minutes,” the guard replied.
“Where are we going?” Ellie inquired.
The guard said nothing and disappeared up the stairway.
While Ellie was doing her best to freshen herself and Nikki, she reviewed with Richard and Archie what she would say if she was able to meet with Nakamura or any of the other colony leaders.
“Don’t forget,” her father stressed in a rapid whisper over in one corner of the room, “although it is all right to say that the octospiders are a peace-loving species, we will not be able to stop any war unless we convince Nakamura that he cannot possibly win an armed conflict. The point must be made that their technology has advanced far beyond ours.”
“But what if they ask for specifics?”
“You wouldn’t be expected to know any details. Tell them that I can supply all the specifics.”
Ellie and Nikki were taken by electric car to the colony hospital in Central City. They were whisked through the emergency entrance and into a small, sterile office with two chairs, a couch or bed used for examinations, and some complex electronic equipment. Ellie and Nikki sat alone for ten minutes before Dr. Robert Turner walked into the room.
He looked very old. “Hi, Nikki,” he said, smiling and squatting down with his arms outstretched. “Come give your daddy a hug.”
The girl hesitated for a moment and then ran across the room to her father. Robert picked her up and swung her around in his arms. “It’s so good to see you, Nikki,” he said.
Ellie stood up and waited. After several seconds Robert put his daughter back down on the floor and looked at his wife. “How are you, Ellie?” he asked.
“Fine,” Ellie replied, suddenly feeling awkward. “How are you, Robert?”
“About the same,” he said.
They met in the middle of the room and embraced. Ellie tried to kiss him tenderly, but their lips merely brushed
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before Robert turned away. She could sense the tension in his body.
“What is it, Robert?” Ellie said softly. “What’s wrong?”
“I’ve just been working too hard, as usual,” he replied. He moved over beside the examination bed. “Would you take off your clothes and lie down here, please, Ellie? I want to make certain you’re all right.”
“Right this minute?” an incredulous Ellie asked. “Before we even talk about what has happened to us during the months that we’ve been apart?”
“I’m sorry, Ellie/* Robert said with a trace of a smile. “I’m very busy tonight. The hospital is terribly understaffed. I talked them into releasing you by promising—”
Ellie had walked around the bed and was standing very close to her husband. She reached down and took his hand. “Robert,” she said gently, “I am your wife. I love you. We have not seen each other for over a year. Surely you can take a minute . . .”
Tears formed in Robert’s eyes. “What is it, Robert? Tell me.” Ellie had a sudden fright. He’s married someone else, she thought in panic. .
“What has happened to you, Ellie?” he said suddenly in a loud voice. “How could you possibly tell those soldiers that you were not kidnapped, and that the octospiders were not hostile? You have made me a laughingstock. Every single citizen in New Eden has heard me on television describing that terrible moment that you were abducted. . . . My memories are so horribly clear.”
Ellie backed up at first when Robert began his outburst. As she stood there listening, still holding his hand, his anguish was obvious. “I made those comments, Robert, because I was, and am, trying to do whatever I can to stop any conflict between the octospiders and us. I am sorry if my remarks caused you pain.”
“The octospiders have brainwashed you, Ellie,” Robert said bitterly. “I knew it as soon as Nakamura’s men showed me the reports. Somehow they have tampered with your mind so that you are no longer in touch with reality.”
Nikki had started whimpering when Robert had first
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raised his voice. She did not understand what the disagreement between her parents was about, but she could tell that everything was not all right. She began to cry and to cling to her mother’s leg.
“It’s all right, Nikki,” Ellie said soothingly. “Your father and I are just talking.”
When Ellie glanced up, Robert had taken a transparent skullcap out of a drawer and was holding it in his hand. “So you’re going to give me an EEG,” she said nervously, “to make certain that I haven’t become one of them?”
“It’s not funny, Ellie,” Robert replied. “My EEGs have all been weird since I returned to New Eden. I can’t explain it, nor can the neurologist on my staff. He says he has never seen such radical changes in an individual’s brain activity, except in the case of severe injury.”
“Robert,” Ellie said, taking his hand again. “The octospiders planted a microbiological block in your memory when you departed. To protect themselves. That could be part of the explanation for your peculiar brain waves.”
Robert looked at Ellie for a long time without speaking. “They kidnapped you,” he said. “They tampered with my brain. Who knows what they may have done to our daughter? How can you possibly defend them?”
Ellie submitted to the EEG and the results showed neither irregularities nor major differences from the routine brain testing that she had undergone during the early days of the colony. Robert seemed genuinely relieved. He then told Ellie that Nakamura and the government were prepared to drop all charges against her and would let her return home with Nikki—under house arrest temporarily, of course—if she would provide information about the octospiders. Ellie thought about the request for a few minutes and then agreed.