The Apex Book of World SF 2 Read Online Free

said.
    The Equilibrium
Machine shrieked, and Alternate Girl cried out, as Mechanic loomed before them.
     
"What did you think
to gain?" Mechanic asked.
     
    What did I hope for? Alternate Girl wondered.
    "Let her go," Father
said. "I will do as is required of me. Only let her go."
    "Do you think you
still have the power to intervene?" Mechanic asked. He kept his gaze locked on
Alternate Girl.
    "No," Father said. "I
realise there is no forgiveness for what I chose to do. Still…"
    Mechanic raised his
right hand in a silencing gesture.
    "Forgiveness is not up to you to decide," he said. "Whatever follows lies in the hands of this girl
you have created. She is ready to leave this place, and I am sure she will be
an asset to the Expatriate Programme."
     
Building bridges and
abolishing barriers is central to the Expatriate Programme. Ignorance leads to
misconceptions and stereotypes, hence the lumping together of certain groups of
expatriates. It is hoped that the Expatriate Programme will give rise to mutual
understanding and acceptance of each other's differences.
     
     
Participants to the
Expatriate Programme are given the freedom to appropriate what they deem
necessary in order to achieve the central goal of total integration.
     
—
Understanding the Expatriate Programme
, Mackay and Hill—
     
     
She'd found her
partner on the other side of the gate. It had seemed simple enough to follow
him home and to allow herself to be embraced and joined to him. That union made
it possible for her to slip seamlessly into the pattern of his everyday life.
     
    All the knowledge
fed into her came to good use, and their lives entwined as if by rote. She
became the housewife, and he, her model mate.
    How he spent his days was a mystery to her. She imagined him spending all day behind a desk in
an office somewhere. She thought of him lost in a maze of paperwork, one of the
hundreds of thousands of Numbered Men wearing the same coloured shirt, the same
suit from the same local haberdashery, the same haircut from some local barber,
the same coat, the same tie. She imagined all of them, working together towards
the same goal.
    How many numbers have you added up today? That's how Alternate Girl imagined their conversations went. How many more numbers
before you meet your quota?
     
"If I do as you
wish, will you return Father to me?" she asked Mechanic.
     
    "Already, his body
is good for nothing but the harvest," Mechanic said. "But I can give you the
essence of him. How you choose to restore him lies within your grasp."
    She turned the chip
over in her hand. For all that it seemed small, it contained the entirety of
Father's memories as well as the history of their lives.
    "A simple matter to
appropriate a body," Mechanic's words whispered in her head. "You won't even
need to tell him what you're doing. Let him fall away into an eternal dream, so
Father may return."
    "Won't he feel pain?" She asked.
    "A relative thing," he said. "Such things are unimportant and the outcome relies on your ability to
do what must be done. You have done well, AG. Allowing you to regain Father is
a small reward."
    The chip felt hard
and hot in her hand. She'd made sacrifices working towards this goal,
subjugated her will in order to build a life beyond the shadows of the
Remembrance Monument. Already, she couldn't remember the name of this man whom
she'd shared a bed with for one hundred weeks.
    Should she feel
regret or remorse for what she was about to do?
    She had no answer to
that question. All she could think of was Mechanic's admonition, she could only
hear his voice telling her that she was free to do as she chose. If she chose
to erase her partner's life for the sake of regaining Father, it wouldn't
matter if she could no longer return to Metal Town.
    She listened to her
partner's key turning in the front door, listened to the sound of his footstep
in the hall, listened for the familiar creak of his joints, and turned to
welcome him