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and shouting, out of a mechanical cantina. "I was thinking about Kate,
wondering why I never tumbled to what was going on. A wife having an
at' air with her boss is a pretty frequent thing, a domestic-life
clichfi, yet I missed almost every damn clue."
"You can't always be a cop or a detective in your own home."
"That's sure what Kate feels I was. Actually, though, I was as dense
"It's very tough, isn't it, for you to admit you're not perfect?" Six
school kids, escorted by a robot nanny whose solid gunmetal legs were
pumping hard to keep up with her charges, came running by from the
opposite direction.
"Sure, I can accept not being perfect. But behaving like a love-struck
teenager with Kate is harder to accommodate."
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"Sometime," she said, her hold on his arm tightening, "we'll have to
compare notes on our fathers--and the effect they've had on our
lives."
"My impression is that you and the professor have an ideal--" "Not
quite, Jake. In some ways he's as tough and unbending as I imagine
your military dad was," she said. "And I'm not always sure lately
that--well, that he's being truthful and straightforward with me."
"Because of the trip to Mexico?"
"What's really exasperating is the fact that my memory cuts off several
days before the actual trip," she said. "I've had the feeling, for the
past day of more, that I was on the brink of finding out
something--something important."
"Such as the fact that your father and Sands had made some sort of deal
that you weren't in on?"
"That's yes, one possibility," admitted Beth with an affirmative nod.
"We learned from Warbride--you did actually--that there never was
actually any crash. It was faked. I'm wondering, really, if my father
might have known in advance."
"That would mean he was definitely planning to sell out to Sonny
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Hokori," said Jake. "But you should've gotten some hint of that."
"Perhaps I did. Especially during those final days that are missing
from my memory."
"Still and all, Beth, it might be better to assume that he..." Jake
stopped talking, stopped walking.
About a hundred yards ahead of them a tall, slim boy of about fourteen
was standing near a rest bench and looking anxiously their way. He had
hair just a few shades darker than Jake's, a grin that was a younger
and much less cynical version of Jake's.
Beth saw that Jake was staring at the boy. "What's wrong?"
"It's got to be him--it's Dan." He waved, laughing, hand high in the
foggy air.
The boy's grin widened as he returned the wave. He started pushing his
way through the people on the pedramp. "Wait, Jake," cautioned Beth,
eyes narrowing. She caught hold of his arm.
"It's my son, Beth." Jerking free of her, he started running. The boy
was running, too, dodging through the crowd. "Dad!"
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"No, don't." Sprinting, Beth caught up with Jake. She gave him a
sudden, rough shove.
He stumbled to his left, fell to one knee. A fat tourist decked with
cameras tripped over him and they became entangled.
Beth kept running. It was she who met the boy.
He tried to avoid her, his face growing dark with anger.
But she threw both arms tight around him. They went staggering against
the nearest plasglass wall.
The wall cracked; a whole jagged section broke free under their
combined weight.
An old man screamed and brought both gnarled hands up to mask his
weathered face; a young sky sailor cried out and made a grab for Beth
and the boy she was hugging. He missed, catching only air.
Beth and the boy went falling over the edge of the ramp. Locked
together, they plummeted down through the swirling gray fog, falling
toward the thousands of blurred lights far below.
Jake had gotten to his feet, gone stumbling and shoving to the gap torn
in the guard wall
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"Why, Beth?" he muttered.
Then came the explosion, while the two of them were still dropping.
A great harsh flowering of intense red and yellow flame that ripped
through the fog. Snarls of harsh black smoke spilling across the gray
night.
The remains of the two of them went flying and spinning, scattered
forever. Twists of metal and plastic, shards of glass, unraveling
ribbons of bright-colored wire.
All the fragments and tatters drifted down and away and were swallowed
by the fog. Silence seemed to spread across the ramp; for a moment
there didn't seem to be a sound in the entire city.
"He wasn't Dan, he was a kamikaze android sent to kill me," Jake said
to himself. "Beth sensed that."
Staring down and down at nothing, he started to cry. After a while
Jake wandered down to the ground level of Acapulco. He thought at
first that he wasn't looking for anything at all, and then for a while
he thought he was hunting for Tek.
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Because once he got hold of a Brainbox and hooked himself up to it, he
could relive the past few hours. On the second go-round, though, Beth
wouldn't die.
And maybe the kamikaze android would actually be Dan. His son
would've run away from his private school up in Mexico City to be here
with Jake.
There wouldn't be anyplace for Kate in the Tek fantasy Jake was going
to have.
"Help me buy a leg, self or A one-legged beggar was perched on a crate
that had once, according to the legend on its side, held
WELFARE FOOD COURTESY SANDS INDUSTRIES.
"How much do you still need?"
"Only thirteen hundred dollars American."
Jake gave him a $10 note. "How long have you been collecting for it?"
\"It will be, senor, seven years this next Christmas. Gracias for
your small contribution."
"De nada."
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Jake turned onto a narrow, ground-level street that smelled richly of
neglected garbage.
"I got what you want, senor."
"Which is?"
The robot was covered with rainbow designs that had been painted on his
dented gunmetal body with thick glopaint. "I got ladies, segor. Young
ones, even a few mature ones," explained the mechanical man.
"Where can I get some Tek?"
"Aw, segor," said the robot pimp disdainfully. "I'm not selling
illusions and escapes from reality here. Don't let my format fool
you.
No, I manage only live talent. Real mujeres, not fantasy ones."
Shaking his head, Jake moved along.
But in front of a burned-out cantina he halted. "If it's obvious to a
robot pimp," he said to himself, "it ought to be obvious to me. Yeah,
I don't think after all I want to escape from reality just yet. There
are a few things to take care of first."
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He started back for the upper levels of the city.
Kate, as always, slept naked. She awakened when the overhead lights in
the big bedroom blossomed. She sat up in the wide oval bed and stared
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