"It, ah, looks like it packs quite a kick," I said, gesturing at the gun.

"Depends on the force setting," said Quentin. "But, on maximum * which you'd use for granite, and sucha" He adjusted a control on the gun, and fired away from the crater wall. The spike shot across the intervening vacuum and sent up a cloud of moondust where it hit.

I nodded.

"All right?" said Quentin. "Let's go!"

We started climbing the rocky face, climbing ever higher, climbing toward the light.

It was exhilarating. I was outdoors, and the lack of walls made it seem, at least for a time, like I was no longer a prisoner. We made our way to the top of the crater rim and**and fierce sunlight lanced into my eyes, triggering another headache before the helmet darkened. God, I wish my brain would stop hurtinga We walked around for a while on the gray surface, which curved away to a too-near horizon. "Magnificent desolation," Chandragupta had said, quoting somebody or other. It certainly was. I drank in the stark beauty while trying to ignore the pain between my ears.

Eventually, a warning started pinging over the helmet speakers, a counterpoint to the agonizing throbs: our air would soon be running out.

"Come on," said Quentin. "Time to go home." Home, I thought. Yes, he was right.

The bloody moonbus engineer was right. It was time to go home, once and for all.

Deshawn and Malcolm had spent the entire recess researching and conferring, and, as we returned to the courtroom, I heard Deshawn tell Karen he was "as ready as I'll ever be." Once Judge Herrington had arrived, and we were all seated again, Deshawn dove into his cross-examination of the Yale bioethicist, Alyssa Neruda.

"Dr. Neruda," he said, "I'm sure the jury was fascinated by your discussion of the gerrymandering of the line between personhood and nonpersonhood."

"I would hardly accuse the highest court of the land of gerrymandering," she replied coldly.

"Perhaps. But there's a glaring oversight in your commentary on people becoming more than one individual, isn't there?"

Neruda regarded him. "Oh?"

"Well, yes," said Deshawn. "I mean, human cloning has been technically possible since * when? Twenty-twelve or so?"

"I believe the first human clone was born in 2013," said Neruda.

"I stand corrected," said Deshawn. "But isn't cloning taking one individual and making it into two? The original and the copy are genetically identical after all, and yet surely they both have rights and are people?"

"You should take my course, Mr. Draper. That is indeed a fascinating theoretical issue, but it's not relevant to the laws of the United States. First, of course, no sensible person would say that they are the same people. And, second, human cloning has always been banned here * it's even banned up in Canada * and so American law has had no need to incorporate the concept of human clones into its definitions of personhood." She crossed her arms in a so-there gesture.

"Individuation still stands as the law of the land."

If Deshawn was crestfallen, he hid it well. "Thank you. Doctor," he said. "No further questions."

"And we'll call it a day," said Judge Herrington. "Jurors, let me admonish you againa"

It had been some time since I'd connected with another instantiation of me, but it happened that evening, while I was watching the Blue Jays play. They were doing so badly, I guess I was letting my mind wander. Maybe my zombie was willing to watch them get slaughtered, but the conscious me couldn't take it, and*And suddenly there was another version of me inside my head. I told the wall screen to turn off, and strained to listen.

That's strangea "Hello!" I said. "Hello, are you there?"

What? Who?

I sighed, and went through the rigmarole of explaining who I was, ending with, "And I know you think it's 2034, but it's not. It's really 2045."

What are you talking about?

"It's really 2045," I said again.

Of course it is. I know that.

"You do?"

Of course.

So it wasn't the same instantiation with the memory problem I'd encountered earlier.

Christ, I wondered just how many of us there were. "You started by saying something was strange."

What? Oh, yeah. Yeah, it is.

"What is?"

I dropped a pen I was using.

"So?"

So I managed to catch it before it hit the floor.

"Well, there's no slow, chemical component to your reaction time anymore," I said.

"Now, it's all electric * happening at the speed of light"

That's not it. I was able to watch the pen fall, to see it clearly as it moved downward.

"I haven't noticed any heightening of my awareness like that."

I don't think it's heightened awareness a There. I just ptcked it up and dropped it again. It fell in slow motion.

"Fell in slow a how is that possible?"

I don't know, unlessa "Oh, Christ."

Christ indeed.

"You're on the moon. I mean, I suppose you could be anywhere with reduced gravity, including a space station spinning too slowly to simulate a full Earth gee. But since we already know that Immortex has a facility on the moona"

Yes. But if I'm on the moon, shouldn't there be a time delay as I communicate with you? The moon's * what? * four hundred thousand kilometers from Earth.

"Something like that. And light travels at 300,000 kilometers per second, so * let's see * there should be a one-and-a-third second delay, or so."

Maybe there is. Maybe.

"Let's test it. I'll count to five; when you hear me say five, you pick up the count, and carry it through from six to ten, then I'll come in for eleven to fifteen. Okay?"

Okay.

"One. Two. Three. Four. Five."

Six. Seven. Eight. Nine. Ten.

"Eleven. Twelve. Thirteen. Fourteen. Fifteen."

No delays that I could detect.

"Me, neither."

Then howa?

"Andrew Porter said something about using quantum fog to scan the original Jake Sullivan's brain noninvasivelya"

You think that the duplicates are all quantum entangled?

" 'Quantally.' The adjective is 'quantally.' "

I know that.

"I know you do."

Quantally entangled. So we are connected instantaneously.

"Exactly. What Albert Einstein called 'spooky action at distance.' "

I suppose it's possible.

"But why would Immortex create another duplicate of me on the moon?"

I don't know, said the voice in my head. But I don't like it here.

"Well, you can't come down here, to Earth. There can be only one of us here."

I know. Lucky bastard.

I thought about that. "I suppose I am."

Karen was back on the witness stand, this time as called by Maria Lopez, rather than Deshawn. "Earlier," said Lopez, "when cross-examining Professor Alyssa Neruda, your attorney, Mr. Draper, used the term 'gerrymandering' in relation to defining the line between life and death. Do you recall that?"

Karen nodded. "Yes, I do."

"You're a professional writer; I'm sure you have a large vocabulary. Could you enlighten us as to what that odd-sounding word * 'gerrymander' * means?"

Karen tilted her head to one side. "It means to redefine borders for political advantage."

"In fact," said Lopez, "it comes from an act by Elbridge Gerry, does it not, who redefined the political districts in Massachusetts when he was governor of that state, so that his party would be favored in upcoming elections, isn't that so?"

"Gerry" * said Karen, pronouncing it with a hard G, "not Jerry. We've ended up saying gerrymander with a soft G, but the governor * and later, vice-president * pronounced his name with a hard G."

I smiled at Karen's ability to find a polite way to say, "So go fuck yourself, smart ass."

"Ah, well, yes," said Lopez. "In any event, the governor ended up redefining the borders of Essex County until it looked like a salamander. So, again, to gerrymander is to flagrantly move lines or borders for political or personal expediency, no?"

"You could say that."

"And the lawyer for the plaintiff accused the Supreme Court of simply gerrymandering the line between life and death until they found something that was politically palatable, did he not?"

"That was what Mr. Draper was implying, yes."

"But, of course, you want the men and women of this jury to gerrymander another line * the obvious, clear demarcation that is brain death * to another point, for your personal convenience, isn't that so?"

"I would not put it that way," said Karen, stiffly. "And, in fact, you have a personal history of playing this gerrymandering game, don't you?"

"Not that I'm aware of."

"No? Ms. Bessarian, do you have any children?"

"Yes, of course. I have a son, Tyler."

"The defendant in this case, is that correct?"

"Yes."

"Any other children?"

Karen looked * well, I couldn't tell; it was a contorting of her plastic face I'd never seen before, and so I didn't know what emotion to correlate it with.

"Tyler is my only child," said Karen at last.

"Your only living child," said Lopez, "correct?"

Sometimes you read in novels about people's mouths forming perfect "O's" of surprise; flesh-and-blood human faces can't really do that, but Karen's synthetic countenance managed it perfectly while Lopez asked her question. But that expression was soon replaced with one of anger "You're a woman," said Karen.

"How can you be so cruel? What does the fact that I lost a daughter to crib death possibly have to do with the matter at hand? Do you think I don't still cry myself to sleep over it sometimes?"

For once, Maria Lopez looked completely flustered. "Ms. Bessarian, I*"

Karen continued. "For God's sake, Ms. Lopez, to bring that*"

"Honestly, Ms. Bessarian," exclaimed Lopez, "I had no idea! I didn't know."

Karen had her arms crossed in front of her chest. I glanced at the jury, who all looked like they hated Lopez just then.

"Really, Ms. Bessarian. I * I'm terribly sorry for your loss. Honestly, Karen * I * please forgive me."

Karen still said nothing.