Free Counting Heads by David Marusek Page B

ANOTHER eyebrow, and by its tiny light I say, “Ellen.”
    We are living in an armed fortress. Eleanor says we can survive any form of attack here: nano, bio, chemical, conventional, or nuclear. She feels completely at ease here. This is where she comes to rest at the end of a long day, to glory in her patch of Earth, to adore her baby, Ellen. Even without the help of Mother’s Medley, Eleanor’s maternal instincts have all kicked in. She is mad with motherhood. Ellen is ever in her thoughts. If she could, El would spend all of her time in the nursery in realbody, but the duties of a junior Tri-D Governor call her away. So she has programmed a realtime holo of Ellen to be visible continuously in the periphery of her vision, a private scene only she can see. No longer do the endless meetings and unavoidable luncheons capture her full attention. No longer is time spent in a tube car flitting from one city to another a total waste. Now she secretly watches the jennys feed the baby, bathe the baby, perambulate the baby around the fish pond. And she is always interfering with the jennys, correcting them, undercutting whatever place they may have won in the baby’s affection. There are four jennys. Without the name badges on their identical uniforms, I wouldn’t be able to tell them apart. They have overlapping twelve-hour shifts, and they hand the baby off like a baton in a relay race.
    I seem to have my own retinue, a contingent of four russes: Fred Londenstane, the one who showed up on the day of my little death, and three more. I am not a prisoner here, and their mission is to protect the compound, Governor Starke, and her infant daughter, not to watch over me, but I have noticed that there is always one within striking distance, especially when I go anywhere near the nursery. Which I don’t do very often. Ellen is a beautiful baby, but I have no desire to spend time with her, and the whole house seems to breathe easier when I stay down in my tomb.
    Yesterday evening a jenny came down to announce dinner. I threw on some clothes and joined El in the solarium off the kitchen where lately she prefers to take her meals. Outside the window wall, heavy snowflakes fell silently in the blue-gray dusk. El was watching Ellen explore a new toy on the carpet. When El turned to me, her face was radiant, but I had no radiance to return. Nevertheless, she took my hand and drew me to sit next to her.
    “Here’s Daddy,” she cooed, and Ellen warbled a happy greeting. I knew what was expected of me. I was supposed to adore the baby, gaze upon her plenitude, and thus be filled with grace. I tried. I tried because I truly want everything to work out, because I love Eleanor and wish to be her partner in parenthood. So I watched Ellen and meditated on the marvel and mystery of life. El and I are no longer at the tail end of the long chain of humanity—I told myself—flapping in the cold winds of evolution. Now we are grounded. We have forged a new link. We are no longer grasped only by the past, but we grasp the future. We have created the future in flesh.
    When El turned again to me, I was ready, or thought I was. But she saw right through me to my stubborn core of indifference. Nevertheless, she encouraged me, prompted me with, “Isn’t she beautiful?”
    “Oh, yes,” I replied.
    “And smart.”
    “The smartest.”
    Later that evening, when the brilliant monstrance of her new religion was safely tucked away in the nursery under the sleepless eyes of the night jennys, Eleanor rebuked me. “Are you so selfish that you can’t accept Ellen as your daughter? Does it have to be your seed or nothing? I know what happened to you was shitty and unfair, and I’m sorry. I really am. I wish to hell they got me instead of you. Maybe the next one will be more accurate. Will that make you happy?”
    We both knew she was mistaken. The assault was never aimed at her. If Ellen was the carrot, then I was the stick. The conditions of her coronation