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eBook Category: Science Fiction
eBook Description: How does a robot deal with the realization that his lifetime companion is mortal?

eBook Publisher: Fictionwise.com, Published: Star Child, 1998
Fictionwise Release Date: July 2006

This eBook is part of the following series:

• James P. Hogan's Star Child Series

23 Reader Ratings:

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Available eBook Formats [MultiFormat - What's this?]: eReader (PDB) [57 KB] , ePub (EPUB) [54 KB] , Rocket/REB1100 (RB) [41 KB] , Adobe Acrobat (PDF) [303 KB] , Palm Doc (PDB) [46 KB] , Microsoft Reader (LIT) [95 KB] , Franklin eBookMan (FUB) [112 KB] , hiebook (KML) [154 KB] , Sony Reader (LRF) [68 KB] , iSilo (PDB) [38 KB] , Mobipocket (PRC) [48 KB] , Kindle Compatible (MOBI) [76 KB] , OEBFF Format (IMP) [63 KB]
Words: 13773
Reading time: 39-55 min.
Microsoft Reader (LIT) Format: Printing DISABLED, Read-Aloud ENABLED
Adobe Acrobat (PDF) Format:  Printing DISABLED, Read-Aloud DISABLED
All Other formats: Printing DISABLED, Read-aloud DISABLED

Cyron's former palace had dominated the center of an Aranos that had witnessed ritual mass killings to appease wrathful gods, and staged death duels between prisoners as a spectacle to entertain the public. Now it was preserved as a museum to an age that was now distant, yet needed not to be forgotten. Its spires, once the first part of the city to be seen by a traveler approaching from any direction, had been absorbed into the skyline of metal-ribbed domes and glass-faced towers rising around it. Immediately to the west stood the Multiversity with its marbled arcades and long, stepped terraces--a combination of university and what in bygone times would have been called a temple, devoted to the study and celebration of "Gnoscience," best described as a mingling of science and an intuitive belief system dealing with the common creativity exhibited by Mind and Life. On the far side was the administrative center for the city and its services, which included water, power, and sanitation. A theater hall and school of drama had been built beyond that, where the old central prison had once been, and next to it was a communications building topped by antennas.

Taya's residence lay about a mile north of the central district, in an area still consisting mainly of individual homes scattered amid greenery and trees. Once the town villa of a leather-and-fabrics-importing family who had migrated to tropical regions, it dated from the second decade after the "Advent," as Merkon's arrival had come to be known, and from which official dates were reckoned. It was spacious yet modest in style, as suited her taste, and as well as providing her personal living space, had been extended in earlier years by the addition of rooms for receiving the visitors and emissaries from distant lands who had passed through seeking advice or counsel, her blessing for some new venture, or simply to pay respects. But as Taya felt the need to give more of her time to solitude and rest, those activities had reduced until these days, only one of the reception rooms was used, and her appearances in public were confined to special or symbolic occasions. The remainder had been converted into quarters for just a few occasional guests and the staff she had gathered to assist her through her ailing years. At the same time, the setting was sufficiently secluded to keep from being intrusive the flow of the devout, the curious, and others, who would come out in the course of a visit to the capital with the hope of glimpsing the Sky Mother, or perhaps just stand for a while contemplating her abode, nourishing the feeling of spiritual affinity that came with the sense of physical closeness.

Many Azureans, particularly among the elders whose beliefs remained rooted in the older traditions, still regarded her as the incarnation of a supernatural being. None of the mec-minds, despite their mastery of the physical world and ability to explain in detail how the first of the Star Children had come into being, had seen fit to tell them they were wrong. How could they? For while it was one thing to be able to list the codes that had turned Scientist's first speck of life into a being that grew and thought, they had no more idea where those codes had come from than they had of how the codes had come together that directed the assemblies of the birds and flowers on Azure.

Nothing had changed much in that respect since the earliest days, Kort reflected as he stood in the library scanning the morning's mail flowing into and out from the local Azurenet link node, while at the same time tuning in idly to the current dispute going on between Mystic and Skeptic, with intermittent inputs from Thinker, Biologist, and Evolutionist. Kort wasn't contributing anything himself. The debate went around and around the same circles endlessly, and he was weary of it. Sometimes he thought that perhaps the more traditional of the Azureans had the right idea: Make up your mind once and for all what you believe, and let that be an end to it. Even as he thought it, the part of him that was drawn from Mystic applauded, while the Scientist part writhed in protest. Being the most composite of all the mec-minds might have an advantage in flexibility, but he had learned that another side to it was the inability ever to be absolutely sure of anything. But that could also have its benefits in that it gave him more time to think instead of getting embroiled in interminable, single-viewpoint arguments that never went anywhere. That also applied to Thinker, of course, for being able to formulate any point of view was Thinker's nature. But that very fact made him incapable of adopting any opinion on anything in preference to another, so decisions always ended up being taken by the others.

There were times when Kort felt that he had more in common with the humans of both kinds--Merkonian and Azurean. They seemed to function as composites of fragmented mentalities too, that were constantly in conflict or alliance among themselves, one seemingly gaining control one day, and at some other time another. Psychologist thought that was what gave them their colorful and volatile personalities. The mec-minds had their personalities too, but in a way that was more predictable. When Skeptic, Mystic, and Scientist, for example, became involved in an argument, it was generally easy to anticipate the line that each would take, and they never deviated from it. With humans, you could never tell. It all depended which one of the persons in their head was in charge. Sometimes the other mec-minds told Kort that he baffled them in the same way.

An interrupt from one of the house sensors told Kort that Irbane had come out of Taya's private suite and was heading toward the library. Technically it would have been possible for Kort to follow the proceedings between Taya and the visitors who were inside with her, but he observed the conventional respect for privacy. From the hunched strain of the young man's gait and the tension written into the muscles of his face, Kort read that Irbane was troubled.

Having dispatched the mail, Kort directed the incoming messages for Taya through to her notepad along with a few miscellaneous reminders due that day. The guests who had arrived with Marcala would be visiting parts of the city later, so Kort ran a copy of the local map and directory for them from the printer. A check with the weather channel verified that the afternoon would continue sunny and dry but cooling later. An airing of grievances had been scheduled at the Forum over proposed changes to the land-use laws. The link from Merkon was reporting that Cosmologist had found some intriguing new regularities in the motions of galaxies.