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exhausted. Certainly it was a good thing that in the past hours he'd seen so
many marvels and impossibilities that one more couldn't shock him any worse
than anything he'd already seen.
He did not run gibbering from the room. His reaction was more matter-of-fact
than anything else.
"Hey, you look like me!"
The perfect double made shushing sounds while glancing up and back to make
sure their little brother was still locked fast in sleep.
"Of course I look like you. I'd be worthless if I didn't. I'm the Beta Unit."
"What the hell's a Beta Unit? I know what a Be-tamax is, but not a Beta Unit."
"I recognize the reference, but there is only the most tenuous of relations.
Centauri didn't tell you?"
"No, Centauri didn't tell me. Centauri doesn't tell people things," Alex
murmured angrily. "Why did I think that you had something to do with
Centauri?"
The double hesitated a moment. "You're being sarcastic now, aren't you?
Sarcasm is difficult to recognize."
"It shouldn't be. Not when Centauri's involved. You still haven't explained
what you are, besides me."
"I am a BS-RS."
"I'll buy the first half of that. What about the rest?"
"I don't think you buy any of it, unless you're being sarcastic again. I am a
brain-scan regenerated simulacrum. An exact duplicate of you. Only not as
loud."
The noise made Louis turn lazily in his bed, the dangling arm rolling to flop
against the far wall. Alex fought to keep his voice down. It would not do his
younger brother's development any good at all if he awoke in the middle of the
night to confront two Alexes sitting on the bunk beneath his, staring
anxiously up at him.
"We met before," the alien said. "Don't you recall?"
Alex shook his head slowly, thinking. "Somehow I think I'd remember you."
"I was in the car, Centauri's vehicle. Remember now? In the back. We touched
hands, I took a fast impulse and retina scan, the final impression was
complete, and then I got out fast. After which I became you . . .
unfortunately."
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"Unfortunately for whom?" Alex frowned. "A brain-scan regranulated . . . can't
you put that in plain
English?"
"All English is plain; a scientifically unsophisticated language."
"That's okay. I'm a scientifically unsophisticated guy. Lemme give it a try,
though. You're a robot?"
His double looked offended. "I beg your pardon! I am a state-of-the-art,
top-of-the-line Beta Unit, fully
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programmable on short notice with slipsoidal epidermis and complete
self-adapting internal cultural acclimatization features designed specifically
for work on backward planets."
"Which means?"
"Which means that to you morons I'm a robot."
Alex pondered this a moment, brightened. "I didn't remember promising to help
Otis fix his antenna. So you're the one who made that promise."
"That's what I liked the first time I was told I was going to be working among
you humans. You're so quick on the uptake. Of course it was me. Who else?"
"What else have you been doing while I was stuck chasing Centauri through a
cave on Rylos?"
"Oh, wonderful things. Eminently suitable to a simulacrum of my class.
Patching electric lines and fixtures, plunging toilets, repairing fences,
chasing stray dogs; no wonder you wanna get out of here! What a dump, and a
backward dump to boot. And I thought this was gonna be a cushy assignment; big
metropolitan area, everything nice and clean, the pick of local museums, my
choice of exotic native lubricants and electronic stimuli. . . . You don't
even have cable out here! If I hadn't been able to pick up transmissions from
a couple of your geosynchronous satellites I would've gone bonkers by now."
"Sure, you've had it tough. I'll bet you've spent half that time watching
cartoons."
"As a matter of fact," the Beta Unit replied drily, "your animated
entertainments feature the drollest portrayals of primitive robotic notions
I've ever encountered. From an archeological standpoint it's been fascinating.
The fascination wanes rather rapidly, however. Hey, what are you doing back
here, anyway?
I wasn't notified of any impending return."
"Are you kidding? There's a war going on up there, and if you're on the wrong
side they stick your head in an alien vegematic! How's that for the reactions
of an advanced civilization?"
"Sadly, among organic sapients technological advances always outpace the
social. A truism of advanced societies, I fear. One to which your own racial
history can attest." The Beta Unit's eyes narrowed. "Hold it just one mimite.
You mean after all this moaning and groaning about making something of
yourself, about getting out of this trailer park, you get your big chance, a
chance afforded very few primitives, and you punk out?" He clucked his lips.
"How depressingly typical."
"It's not my fight! And how did you know I wanted out of here?"
"Centauri's programming was very thorough. In addition to qualifying for
Starfighter rating on the test machinery, a potential recruit must also be of
the proper frame of mind. That is a more subjective measurement, however, and
one Centauri apparently misjudged on your part."
Alex looked away. "Whether I want out of here or not has nothing to do with
this. This war still has nothing to do with me or my world."
"Oh, save the whales, not the universe, is that it? And if you think this
conflict between the League and the Ko-Dan has nothing to do with you, wait a
few hundred years until they reach this part of your galactic arm. Of course
your lifespan will have ended long before then, won't it? You won't have to
worry about it, will you?"
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