Before coming to see their daughter, they'd taken their backups. When
they woke, this event -- everything following the backup -- would never
have happened for them.
God, they were bastards.
"When are you coming back?" I asked, keeping my castmember face on,
carefully hiding away the disgust.
"We'll be sampling monthly, just getting a digest dumped to us. When
things look interesting enough, we'll come on back." He waggled a finger
at me. "I'll be keeping an eye on you and Lillian -- you treat her
right, you hear?"
"We're sure going to miss you two around here," I said.
He pishtoshed and said, "You won't even notice we're gone. This is your
world now -- we're just getting out of the way for a while, letting
you-all take a run at it. We wouldn't be going down if we didn't have
faith in you two."
Lil and her mom kissed one last time. Her mother was more affectionate
than I'd ever seen her, even to the point of tearing up a little. Here
in this moment of vanishing consciousness, she could be whomever she
wanted, knowing that it wouldn't matter the next time she awoke.
"Julius," she said, taking my hands, squeezing them. "You've got some
wonderful times ahead of you -- between Lil and the Park, you're going
to have a tremendous experience, I just know it." She was infinitely
serene and compassionate, and I knew it didn't count.
Still smiling, they got into their runabout and drove away to get the
lethal injections, to become disembodied consciousnesses, to lose their
last moments with their darling daughter.
#
They were not happy to be returned from the dead. Their new bodies were
impossibly young, pubescent and hormonal and doleful and kitted out in
the latest trendy styles. In the company of Kim and her pals, they made
a solid mass of irate adolescence.
"Just what the hell do you think you're doing?" Rita asked, shoving me
hard in the chest. I stumbled back into my carefully scattered dust,
raising a cloud.
Rita came after me, but Tom held her back. "Julius, go away. Your
actions are totally indefensible. Keep your mouth shut and go away."
I held up a hand, tried to wave away his words, opened my mouth to
speak.
"Don't say a word," he said. "Leave. Now."
"_Don't stay here and don't come back. Ever_," Kim said, an evil look on
her face.
"No," I said. "No goddamn it no. You're going to hear me out, and then
I'm going to get Lil and her people and they're going to back me up.
That's not negotiable."
We stared at each other across the dim parlor. Debra made a twiddling
motion and the lights came up full and harsh. The expertly crafted gloom
went away and it was just a dusty room with a fake fireplace.
"Let him speak," Debra said. Rita folded her arms and glared.
"I did some really awful things," I said, keeping my head up, keeping my
eyes on them. "I can't excuse them, and I don't ask you to forgive them.
But that doesn't change the fact that we've put our hearts and souls
into this place, and it's not right to take it from us. Can't we have
one constant corner of the world, one bit frozen in time for the people
who love it that way? Why does your success mean our failure?
"Can't you see that we're carrying on your work? That we're tending a
legacy you left us?"
"Are you through?" Rita asked.