To Hold Infinity Read Online Free Page B

guess.
    â€œSorry, ma'am. Er—What can I do for you?”
    â€œPardon me, Mister—” Yoshiko read his name tag. “—Rasmussen. Don't halt the program on my account.”
    â€œUm…Well, I shouldn't have been watching it. But there's a punctuated evolutionary thread running on the biofact that'll take a couple of hours…”
    â€œEspecially on an old delta forty-seven,” said Yoshiko, nodding at the plain black box beneath the workbench.
    â€œWe could do with a Gemini B-series, though reconfiguring for hypertetrahedral architecture can be a real bi—uh, bear.” He stopped.
    â€œGuess you've worked with Advanced Thetas, then.”
    â€œI started on Beta thirties,” said Yoshiko, showing her age. “Oemaru Bios was just taking off. I guess they're on the way down, now.”
    Rasmussen shook his head. “Damned marketing, that's the trouble. Everyone's switching to facet-driven free-pad systems, with the sexy NetEnv interfaces. Never mind whether they can actually do the job.”
    â€œAlways quoting PIPS or EIPS ratings, while the Geminis are optimized for coevolutionary transactions. It's generations per second which counts.”
    â€œDamned straight.” A grin spread over his broad face, and he held out a large callused hand. “Name's Eric. Nice to meet another Gemini bigot.”
    â€œYoshiko.”
    They shook hands.
    â€œYou know,” she added, “that it's field-upgradeable?”
    â€œYeah. Still can't get the budget. But I'll keep trying.”
    â€œGood luck.” She looked at the terminal. “I should let you—get back to work.”
    He laughed. “I've seen it before. She gets rescued in the end.”
    â€œI know. My favourite was the Coolth story, where she met aquatic aliens who lived under a global icecap.”
    â€œAnd her ship was crushed, and she was trapped beneath the ice—”
    â€œâ€”And she reconfigured her own lungs with a reprogrammed portadoc—”
    â€œâ€”And aliens swarmed around, worshipping her—”
    â€œâ€”And their song split the ice.”
    Yoshiko sighed. “That was a while ago.”
    â€œWasn't the music great? It seems like yesterday.”
    She guessed his age at thirty-five. Akira's age.
    â€œListen,” she said. “I shouldn't really be here.”
    â€œI did wonder.”
    â€œI'm just a passenger, waiting for a mu-space ship, due in—” She touched a finger-ring, and orange digits formed in the air. “—thirty hours, or so.”
    â€œYou've time to look around the rest of the bioarea, then?”
    â€œWhy, yes.” Yoshiko smiled with pleasure. “I'd love to.”
    Â 
    The refectory's hubbub almost drowned the sound system's lonely wail, about a drifting spacer, all alone in the dark and cold. Station crew were coming off shift, going on: hurried lunches, tech talk in unfamiliar fields which Yoshiko strained to get a sense of. Bleary-eyed breakfasts, relaxed dinners.
    â€œYou run overlapping shifts everywhere, then,” she said.
    Eric nodded. His counterpart, Jenna, had come on duty while he was showing Yoshiko the goat pens, two hours before his shift ended.
    â€œDon't want people dog-tired if an emergency starts. Although—”
    He leaned forward and lowered his voice. “The station's way too old.
    Dangerous.”
    â€œWhat do you mean?” Yoshiko thought of hull explosions, bodies expelled into space.
    â€œThere's not enough p-suits to go round. Don't tell anyone I told you.”
    â€œWhat?” Yoshiko couldn't believe it. “If you think I'm going to—Oh, you bastard.”
    His roar of laughter caused half the crew to look around. No one complained. His big bearish chest shook with amusement.
    â€œHad you there,” he said, and swigged his ethanol-free beer.
    â€œVery funny.” Yoshiko smiled in spite of herself.
    A beep sounded, and Eric raised