Hudro was stationed in Brazil and had taken a few days leave to come down to Bolivia. After hearing the news, he announced that he had to return to his unit immediately. Vrel decided to go with him as far as Uyali. Security would be tightening up, everywhere, and he wanted to make discreet inquiries on his own regarding the options for moving Cade and Marie onward. In the meantime it would be better for them to remain where they were. He would return or send the flyer back for them when he had a firm plan. Vrel and Hudro departed shortly afterward.
The others got back to rehearsing and then recording Cade and Marie’s narration of the material they had gone through with Hudro. Luodine then moved on to the take that she had promised for Tevlak. Finally, she settled down with Nyarl to editing the preliminary version for transmission to her organization on Chryse. “This might start another sensation,” she said as Nyarl worked with the equipment. “Direct news from the front, bypassing the official system. I don’t know if it’s ever been done before.”
“So why are you doing it?” Cade asked her. “Why are you risking your . . . What do you call it. Career? Entitlement.”
Luodine looked at him oddly for several seconds. “Because that’s all we’ve ever lived for. It’s the way we were conditioned. But Terrans find meaning in life beyond whatever it is that our entitlements measure. I want to find it too. So I suppose I’m experimenting.”
“We all are,” Thryase said.
Cade found his curiosity over this strange effect that Earth seemed to have on Hyadeans who spent any time there increasing more and more.
Marie had gone outside. Cade followed and found her standing by the door, taking in the scene of the mountains on one side, the creek running down toward the town on the other. Tevlak was outside the fence with the people who had been waiting there and were now talking excitedly, seemingly all at once, showing him various wares. One of the house guards was standing a few paces behind him.
Marie heard Cade come out and spoke without turning her head. “Why can’t the whole world be more like this? People just living their lives, leaving each other alone. Why does anyone have to care what others believe or think?”
“You tell me. Aren’t you the one who understands causes?”
“I hate it. But what are you supposed to do about the ones who take everything that other people produce, and give nothing back? They couldn’t build a house or make a shoe or even feed themselves without ordinary people like these. . . . Yet because they can steal from them, they call them inferior. I don’t like them getting away with it. It doesn’t matter if they’re ours or Hyadeans.”
The sun was picking out the almost blond parts in Marie’s hair, the sharp angles of her jaw and cheek. She still looked slim and lithe, even in the loose sweater and shapeless dun-colored pants. “Anyway, it may not stay so peaceful for long, by the sound of things,” Cade said. “I guess that’ll slow down all that production we saw yesterday.”
“I wonder who benefits,” Marie said distantly.
Cade moved closer behind her. He could tell that she sensed his nearness, but she didn’t move. “Did you really go to China?”
“Sure. I did the full training routine there: guns and explosives; computers and codes; murder and mayhem. The works. Skiing at Aspen was getting to be so ordinary. You know I have uncommon tastes.”
“I thought they were all totalitarians there. Turn you into marching zombies. Doesn’t it work like that?”
“Oh, that’s all over. They’re discovering individualism now, and hurling themselves into it with the same fanaticism they’ve always shown for everything. They’re like the Arabs—with a tradition of resisting outside influence and interference. That’s why Asia has become the natural center of opposition to what’s going on.”
Cade was about to reply, then snorted. “You see: it isn’t me. You turn everything into politics.”
Marie turned to face him. “But you asked me!”
“About China. You could have talked about the Great Wall, or real wonton soup.”