In a Clean White Room

This is not the hard part.

“And what’s work, anyway?”

Only 0.3 lbs!

“Don’t get yourself in trouble now,” Rush said softly, and caught the edge of Wray’s blue track jacket.

“What are ‘whales’?” Varro asked.

This is the way Ginn returns to the river of time.

“Y’fuckin’ patronize me an’ I’ll rewire your heart.”

Brick by metaphorical brick, Young ate away at his own block.

“If it’s not him, opening the gate will destroy us,” Emily whispered.

“A bearing. ” Rush’s voice cracks. “Derived from the nautical term.”

They are coming.

Water runs into the dark.

A ship or a gate or a ship.

“I don’t know, man,” Greer whispers, “Lisa talks shit about tidally locked planets like you wouldn’t believe, but this one doesn’t seem so bad.”

The nature of his problem is a dictionary problem.

Greer releases a shuddery breath and sits a minute, holding his luck tight.

Lightning in the ionosphere.

His mind snapped in half.

“The shuttle just came up on short range. They’re ballistic.”

“Every human being is created from a blend of two others,” Rush said, smiling faintly. “Cooperation and conflict play out on the level of our crystal.”

“Less tea, more sit.”

“Is this an argument?” Rush asked delicately. “Or—” he let the word trail off.

The combination, dressed in black, stood alone in a clean white room that stretched to infinity on all sides.

“Who’s Nick?” He asked the question of the universe itself.

He’d fix this.

Dale Volker misses his cat.

“Daniel was so kind to me.” The AI wiped its eyes. “I thought that meant I was good.”

None of this seemed like chance.

“I am a Cartesian demon, but I’m a nice one.”

“Alignment’s gotta go both ways,” Young whispered, stroking his hair. “Seems only fair, don’t you think?”