"If it works, it's a goddamned miracle," Lanier said under his breath, "and you say it's simple."

"'Lazarus come forth,' from your perspective, correct?" Olmy asked, hoping to amuse him.

"Don't patronize us," Lanier said. The man's anger was obviously building. Olmy thought he could understand why. Now that Patricia had made her decision, Lanier was cut out of the process. He was simply an appendage. Patricia had obviously ignored his misgivings.

The medical worker—an upright, elongated egg-shaped device about a meter tall, delineated with purple to show where manipulators and other instruments would emerge—approached them, floating a few centimeters above the grass.

Olmy picted modifying instructions and the worker extended a small cup-shape at the end of a thick metallic gray cable. He placed the cup below his ear and closed his eyes. Patricia watched, eyes wide, crossing and uncrossing the fingers of both hands. Her calmness seemed artificial now. Lanier's stomach knotted.

President Oyu and her father joined them just as Olmy removed the cup. They said nothing, standing a few meters away to watch.

The medical worker moved closer to Patricia. A traction field spread out into a kind of cot before it, and Olmy asked her to lie down. She complied. The worker then spread a fan of black cables around her head like a hairnet.

The net adjusted itself, squeezing her hair. Patricia reached up to feel it. "I should never go out in public with this thing on," she joked.

Lanier knelt beside the cot and took her hand. "Just a couple of Hottentots," he said. "Blowing in the wind."

Patricia made a face, then rolled her head to look at Olmy. "I'm ready," she said.

"There's no pain, no sensation whatsoever," Olmy said.

"Well, whatever, I'm ready." She pressed Lanier's hand and released it. He stepped back.

The net tightened, and she winced at the pressure, not painful but strong nevertheless. Lanier winced in sympathy but did not move. Prescient Oyu walked to his side and placed a hand on his shoulder.

"She carries a part of our dream," the senator said. "Do not worry." Lanier squinted at her.

Patricia seemed to be concentrating, her eyes barely closed. Lanier felt a sick kind of fascination. There was no sound, nothing overt whatsoever, simply the transfer of whatever they were borrowing from her, copying.

She opened her eyes and turned her head toward him.

The net withdrew.

"I'm okay," she said, sitting up on the field. "I don't feel any different."

"The combination will take a few hours to mature," Olmy said. "Then Korzenowski should be with us again."

"Will he have a body?" Lanier asked. Patricia stood by him.

"He'll occupy the worker until one can be made," Olmy said. "He can project an image of himself, however. That would be one sign of his complete reconstruction."

Patricia took Lanier's hand in hers again and squeezed it firmly. "Thank you," she said.

"Thanks for what, for Christ's sake?"