Abel doesn’t even have a hair out of place as he stands up. “You have to admit, it makes tardiness unlikely.”
He made a joke. Is that some program designed to amuse the humans around him? Or is that something deep within Abel himself?
Something else that makes him so close to human?
Noemi can’t let herself think about that, not now or ever again.
Their warehouse work is grueling, but it doesn’t require a lot of intelligence. Even after only one day, Noemi can flick the sensor wand over baggage labels and reroute them almost on autopilot. Every once in a while she still feels that eerie shiver—the wonder and awe of being on another world entirely, surrounded by people from Earth—but nothing undercuts awe faster than working in a warehouse. So that leaves Noemi’s mind free to observe other people.
Specifically, Riko Watanabe.
When Riko had made such a big deal about them remaining quiet, never mentioning what they saw, Noemi had assumed the worst. Probably Riko stole from Kismet’s wealthy patrons, or assisted others who did, she thought. Maybe the people attending the Orchid Festival are so filthy rich they’d never miss a few small luxury items, but that doesn’t make it right to steal from them. Besides, Noemi’s planning to do some stealing herself. For a better cause, sure, but she shouldn’t throw stones.…
But Riko isn’t a thief. Noemi’s been watching, sharp-eyed, not only out of curiosity but also to find out just how tight security is on Wayland Station. So she’s positive that Riko hasn’t taken a single thing from the resort guests’ luggage or allowed anyone else to do so. Every item has been duly packed onto one of the long, skinny shuttles that travels back and forth between Kismet and its moon, and sent on its way.
The thing is—Riko’s putting something else on the shuttles, too.
A medical technician talks to Riko at one point, a quick whispered conference in a corner, before loading a box of his own onto the shuttle. An hour or so later, the same technician shows up with another crate. Noemi gets a good enough glimpse of this one to read its label: MEDICAL SUPPLIES.
Maybe that’s all it is. But if so, why is Riko bothering to whisper? Why are the only people working nearby Noemi, Abel, Harriet, and Zayan… the ones she’s already sworn to silence?
Intoxicants, Noemi finally decides—maybe something that’s not just controlled but banned on Kismet’s surface. Rich, spoiled partygoers will be ready to buy it, so this is probably a minor scheme for profit. Criminal, perhaps, but not wicked.
But it’s hard to keep working hard, hour after hour, for something she knows isn’t right.
That night, the shipments cease. Not because the bags have stopped coming—more seem to pile in by the hour as scions and socialites arrive for the weeklong festival. But apparently the opening-night concert is such an extravaganza that nobody intends to miss it, neither travelers who can wait another few hours for their belongings nor workers who get to watch via holo.
Every screen along the station walkways is showing the celebrity arrivals, and the other temporary workers have started a small party of their own. Apparently they talked some bartender out of a few of his wares, or opened up one of those crates Riko’s been smuggling, because she can hear bottles clinking against each other, and the laughter has grown warmer, freer.
Then she hears Abel’s voice just behind her. “Some of the others plan to celebrate while watching the concert from afar. I feel confident you are welcome to join them.”
She turns to see him standing there, calm and poised, as unruffled as if he’d spent the day napping instead of hauling crates. “I’d rather not.”
“Of course. Far more prudent for you to rest before we must return to work.”
“If I even can. Looks like everyone’s watching—including the guys who let us into the mobile pods.” She nods toward a few of them, who are pointing up excitedly at yet another arriving celebrity as she waves at the crowd.
“That does make napping more difficult.” That seems to be as close as Abel gets to sounding sympathetic. “Are you unwilling to celebrate with intoxicants? Is that forbidden by the God of Genesis?”
Noemi glances over her shoulder at him. “Are you kidding?”
“Many religions have denied their worshippers various forms of pleasure.”
“Sure, there are some faiths that ask you to abstain from certain things—but where did you come up with the idea that all of Genesis prays to only one God?”
He cocks his head in that birdlike way he has, winsome and predatory at once. “All pronouncements during the Liberty War were made on behalf of the ‘Believers of Genesis.’ Reports indicated a mass religious movement had swept across the planet.”
“That doesn’t mean we all converted to one faith.” Noemi doesn’t know why she wants to explain. It hardly matters what a mech thinks, especially one she intends to destroy within the next three weeks. But she feels compelled to go on. “It wasn’t like we all found one God, together. It was more that we… that we all realized we needed to be searching for something more meaningful. Whether we were Buddhist or Catholic, Muslim or Shinto, we all needed to pay more attention to the old teachings. We needed to recapture that sense of responsibility toward the world we’d found. Our faiths gave us the one thing Earth couldn’t give anyone any longer—hope.”
Abel considers this. “So no one is mandated to follow any one faith?”
Noemi shakes her head. “Each person has to find their own way. Most of us do a lot of meditation, a lot of reading and prayer. Although most people wind up joining one of the faiths, probably the same one as their families, we each have to search for our own connection to the divine.”
“What of atheists and agnostics? Are they imprisoned? Made to recant?”
She sighs. “Faith can’t be rushed or faked. Those who doubt or disbelieve have their own meetings, and they look just as hard within themselves. They want to live ethically and morally. They’re just traveling a different path.”
And I probably belong with them, Noemi thinks.
Abel puts his hands behind his back. The gesture’s becoming familiar to her now—it’s a sign that he’s rethinking something. Doubting himself, or at least doubting what he’s been told. She feels a strange surge of glee at the thought of overcoming the programming of Burton Mansfield himself, even for a moment. Finally he says, “What faith do you follow?”
“My parents christened me in the Second Catholic Church.”
“… Second Catholic?”
She shrugs. “Couldn’t really be loyal to the Pope in Rome after seceding from Earth’s colonies. So we elected one of our own.”
“I shall have to review the definition of heresy,” Abel says. “Do you continue to follow this Second Catholic Church? You said the people of Genesis are supposed to choose their own faiths in time. Do you believe as your parents believed?”