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Rigid from head to toe, Nellie lay with her eyes wide open behind the Relaxer’s blinders. Today’s session had come out of the blue. She hadn’t been expecting one while she was in K Block, and had been taken completely by surprise when this morning’s drone escort had told Nell to wait in their room, then taken Nellie to Station Seven. Biting her lower lip, she tried to get a grip. She had to remember Westcott could see and hear every thought that entered her head. Grimly she blanked her mind and let herself float on the sound of gently lapping waves. Today she had no sailboat to focus on, not even a half-submerged wreck. At the start of the session, she’d lobbed a hand grenade instead of her customary rocks, and the boat had exploded into a million pieces. For about three seconds, the scene inside her head had been very satisfactory.

“So, Nellie, how’s it going with your twin?” Westcott asked congenially in her ear.

“Crappy,” Nellie said immediately, without bothering to consider her answer. “I hate her. She’s a bitch.”

“I see,” purred Westcott. “Tell me why.”

“She lies,” Nellie burst out, her entire body convulsing with anger. “She lies about the Goddess and the holy stars and the Great Mother, and just
everything.”

“What does she say about the stars?” asked the psychiatrist.

“She says they’re
wrong
,” shouted Nellie. “The chart has them in the wrong place and doesn’t show all of them. She says there are millions of stars. Billions and zillions.”

Static buzzed Nellie’s ear as Westcott hastily decreased the volume on her microphone. “Actually, Nellie,” he said, clearing his throat. “She’s correct on both those points.”

Aghast, Nellie stared at the inside of her blinders. The stars were
wrong
? How could that be? For years she’d been checking their alignments to keep herself on the path that led toward their will, every day she’d prayed to them and asked their blessing.

“That doesn’t mean, however,” continued the psychiatrist, “that the stars shown on your bedroom chart aren’t in the sky. They are, and they travel in the same basic alignments you see displayed on your chart. But you need to remember that the sky is a very big place, and the chart was designed to show only what is most important to your daily life. This means that when you look at it, you see the major constellations aligned in their basic positions. Not
exactly
as they sit in the sky, but close enough to give you the true meaning of how they align in your life.”

Nellie’s hands ached from gripping the Relaxer’s arms. “So they’re not wrong then?” she asked huskily. “The Twin Moons are actually there, and the Weeping Tree, and the Cat?”

“Yes yes,” the psychiatrist said hastily. “The Moons, the Tree, and the Cat are all real. What you have on your chart has been ... reduced, to clarify things. Make it simpler to understand. So you don’t have to bother with the unnecessary stars.”

“But why didn’t we study the rest of them in Sky Science?” Nellie asked slowly. “You’d think they would’ve told us there were other stars.”

“Well, actually, Nellie,” said Westcott. “No one ever told you there weren’t other stars.”

Startled, Nellie opened her mouth to protest, then closed it again. What the psychiatrist said was true. She couldn’t remember any of her Detta instructors saying, “The stars on your chart are the only stars that exist in the sky.” They’d simply never mentioned any others.

“But how did I forget them?” she blurted nervously. “I must’ve seen them when I was a kid, before I entered Black Core.”

“That was a long time ago,” Westcott said smoothly. “It’s easy to forget what isn’t important to your life here in Detta. Your mind simply releases what is nonessential. There are probably other things you’ve forgotten — all unimportant to your life as an Advanced cadet.”

The Mind Cleanser,
Nellie thought suddenly, then stiffened as the psychiatrist gave a loud cough. Damn, damn, damn. She had to remember she couldn’t
think
in here.

“As I was saying,” Westcott continued, his tone noticeably irritated. “You’ll be learning about the rest of the stars, and their alignments and meaning for your life, before you graduate. It’s part of the upper level program.”

Relief flooded Nellie and she sagged against the Relaxer. So they were actually planning to let her return to Advanced when this was all over. Hopefully that would be soon. “Okay,” she said meekly. “Is that when I’ll learn about the Goddess’s other children?”

“The Goddess had no other children,” Westcott said firmly. “She had only the two sons.”

“But Nell said—,” Nellie began to protest.

“Yes, I know what Nell said,” interrupted the psychiatrist, and Nellie realized he’d probably watched the entire scene take place on the monitoring screen. Or observed a recording of it later. “Your twin is wrong about the five children,” Westcott continued smoothly. “There is a constellation, a very
minor
constellation the
Outbackers have named the Five Children. In fact, they’ve built up an entire mythology about the Goddess giving birth to five mysterious children, but that’s all it is — mythology. Y’see, Nellie,” said the psychiatrist, his voice soothing and warm, “the Outbackers are an inferior race. And that’s not something they like to admit, even though they know it’s true. It’s entirely understandable — who likes to admit they’re inferior? So they’ve created a myth in which the Goddess mated with
human men
from the Outbacks. Can you believe it — the Goddess mating with mere mortals, and from the Outbacks, no less? All that just to make themselves believe they’re our equals.”

Nellie took a deep breath. Her shock was dissipating and things were starting to sort themselves out inside her head, but she had to be sure. “I thought,” she said slowly, “that Outbackers are the same race as us.”

“Tsk tsk,” the psychiatrist said quickly. “Bite your tongue. They might look the same, but there are serious flaws in their genetic make-up. After all, they don’t follow the same careful breeding program the Interior does. I mean, Nellie—,” Westcott chuckled softly in Nellie’s ear. “Have you ever seen an Outbacker admitted to the Black Core program?”

With a nod, Nellie closed her eyes and settled back into the Relaxer. For once Westcott was making sense. All along she’d had a gut feeling Nell was right about the stars, and wrong at the same time. As it turned out, the chart wasn’t
exactly
scientifically correct, but it was right in a way Nell could never be.

“Tell me something, Nellie,” said Westcott, his tone changing slightly. “How do you like living in K Block?”

“Not too good,” Nellie answered absently, her thoughts still focused on her twin.

“Your new room?” asked Westcott.

“Yucky,” said Nellie.

“The food?” asked Westcott.

“It’s the same food,” said Nellie, “but it doesn’t taste as good somehow.”

“And how about—” Westcott paused, as if thinking, “yourself?”

“Myself?” repeated Nellie, unsure of his meaning.

!“Yes, Nellie,” said Westcott. “Tell me how you feel about yourself.”

“I’m a cadet,” Nellie replied matter-of-factly. “An Advanced cadet. I work for Detta and the Emp —”

“Yes yes,” said Westcott. “I didn’t ask what you were, I asked how you felt about yourself.”

“How do I feel about myself?” Unease flickered through Nellie. Never in her four years of weekly sessions with this man had he asked such a ridiculous question. “I don’t ... feel anything about myself,” she mumbled finally.

“Nothing at all?” asked Westcott.

“No,” faltered Nellie.

“Do you like yourself?” Westcott asked.

“I’m a functional cadet,” Nellie said quickly.

“Ah,” said Westcott, “but do you
like
yourself, Nellie?”

Nellie sat silent. The question was incomprehensible, as if it had been spoken in a foreign language. She had no answer for it.

“Well, let me ask you this then, Nellie,” said the psychiatrist. “Do you hate yourself?”

Panic blew itself wide open in Nellie’s gut. “What kind of question is that?” she shouted, jerking upright. Suddenly she had to get out of this place, away from its endless crazy questions. Grabbing at her head, she clawed at the Relaxer helmet, trying to get it off. “I’m a functional cadet,” she screamed. “One of the best. Advanced was stupid to put me in K Block, I should be running mazes and going out for Street Games and—”

“Juba!” Westcott yelled. “Zombie Program, quick!”

Immediately the sound of ocean waves vanished, and a heavy throb permeated Nellie’s brain. As it did, her panic dissolved and
her body went slack, slumping into the Relaxer. Then the Relaxer also seemed to disappear, and Nellie felt as if she was surrounded by a great darkness, a tiny speck floating in the middle of nowhere. From somewhere came the thought,
Where am I?
and all she could think in response was,
Who am I?

“That’s good,” said a soothing voice in her ear. “Just let it all go and float. You are no one, you are nothing, you are nowhere. Repeat after me: I am no one.”

“I am no one,” said Nellie.

“I am nothing,” said the voice.

“I am nothing,” said Nellie.

“I am nowhere,” said the voice.

“I am nowhere,” said Nellie.

“I hate myself,” said the voice soothingly.

“I hate myself,” Nellie repeated dreamily.

“I hate myself,” murmured the voice.

“I hate myself,” murmured Nellie.

“I hate myself,” whispered the voice.

“I hate myself,” whispered Nellie.

“Okay, Dr. Juba,” said the voice. “You can bring her back now.”

Slowly the darkness cleared from Nellie’s brain and the ocean waves returned, washing gently through her thoughts.
What’s going on?
she wondered dreamily.
Where am I? Oh yeah, in the Relaxer, wearing the helmet. Westcott’s talking about ... the stars, and how Nell’s right and wrong at the same time.

“Remember, Nellie,” the psychiatrist said in her ear. “You are a functional cadet. The Empire
depends
on cadets like you to keep the Outbacks in line. And the Goddess needs your unswerving loyalty to spread the truth to the Outbacks and the rest of the world.”

“Yes,
sir
.” Nellie’s eager hand bumped against the Relaxer helmet as she tried to salute. Why had she ever doubted Westcott?
Doctor
Westcott, actually. He wasn’t that bad, if you overlooked the mole
on his chin and his habit of breathing heavily into a microphone. A bit of a drip actually, but ...

“Excellent,” came the psychiatrist’s hearty voice. “Lovely, splendid,
marvelous
. Now how about you find that sailboat and bring it back over the horizon?”

Focusing on the ocean in her mind, Nellie gathered the sailboat’s many pieces and reconstructed it. Then she climbed inside the boat and lay back, enjoying its quiet rocking motion. All things considered, it wasn’t bad in here.

“
Marvelous
,” purred the psychiatrist. “I’m going to leave you there for a bit, Nellie, and then you can have some more of those dengleberry-flavored candies you like so much.”

“Okay,” Nellie murmured carelessly. It was nice out here in the sun, with the sailboat rocking and creaking. So nice it was almost real, she could almost feel the sun on her arms and the wet salt spray against her cheek.
Almost real,
her mind chanted softly.
Almost real.

Gently she drifted off to sleep.

Sixteen

W
HEN
N
ELLIE RETURNED
to the room she shared with her twin, she found it empty. For a moment she stood staring blankly at Nell’s bed, then whirled to face the closing door. “Hey,” she called, but her drone escort didn’t respond, and the door slid quietly into place.

Uneasily Nellie sat down on her bed. For some reason her heart was beating oddly, skipping slightly before each beat, as if unsure of itself. But why would she be feeling unsure? So what if Nell wasn’t here. Her absence was no big deal. After all, if she was dead the experiment would be over, and the drone would have taken Nellie back to Advanced. No, Nell wasn’t dead, she was just ... somewhere, having ... something done to her. Some part of this experiment, probably a session with a deadbeat psychiatrist like Westcott. That was it. Nell was over in Station Seven, putting all her worries and concerns into a sailboat and getting her brain picked.

With a sigh of relief, Nellie rolled onto her back and focused on an action movie that was starting on the monitoring screen. The opening shot showed a woman in Detta uniform hanging from a helicopter, firing a laser beam at a crowd of men on the ground.
Blood was flying, flesh was frying
, as they said in Advanced.
Plumping up her pillow, Nellie settled in for two hours of action-packed gore.

The first wave of pain came fifteen minutes into the plot, a searing flash that seemed to leap straight out of her nose. With a yelp Nellie jerked upright, her hands flying to her face, but there was no blood, no wound she could feel. Obviously no one had shot her, and in this room, where would they shoot from? Swiftly she scanned the walls, but saw no crack or niche. Was it possible the sensation she’d just experienced was connected to the movie, and that she was somehow being made to feel what was going on in the film? But none of the characters had been shot in the face, at least not in the last thirty seconds.

A second flash of pain hit her, again centered in her nose. Bent double, Nellie clutched at it with both hands, trying to ward off further pain, but another flash hit her, then another. The pain flooded her brain, engulfing it in a white heat and blurring her vision. Stumbling across the room, Nellie shoved her face against the mirror over the sink and peered into her nostrils, but could see no blood. What in the Goddess’s name was causing this?

As yet another wave of pain hit, Nellie sank to the floor and curled into a ball, riding it out. Nothing she’d ever felt had been like this — the burning sensation was immense, a surge of pain and heat that began in her nose, then shot through her entire body. The closest thing to it was the sensation caused by a full system of electrodes, but that was surface, attached to the skin. This pain was internal, fed directly into the nervous system. Drenched in sweat, Nellie rode out another searing wave. Her throat ached from screaming, and her hands were sore from jerking against their straps. If only she could get them free and knock the clamp off her left nostril ...