“The tailor sent me here,” she said.

Billy Anker got a dawning expression on his thin face.

“You bought the Dr. Haends package,” he said. “I see that now. You’re the one bought it, from Uncle Zip. Shit.”

Seria Mau cut the connection.

“Well, he’s cute,” the clone said.

“That was a private transmission,” Seria Mau told her. “Do you want to get put out into empty space again?”

“Did you see his hand? Wow.”

“Because I can do that if you want,” said Seria Mau. “He’s too quick, this Billy Anker guy,” she told herself, and then out loud added: “Did you really like that hand? I thought it was overdone.”

The clone laughed sarcastically.

“What does someone who lives in a tank know?”

Since her change of mind on Perkins’ Rent, the clone—whose name was Mona or Moehne or something similar—had fallen into a kind of short-swing bipolar disorder. When she was up, she felt her whole life was going to change. Her skirts got pinker and shorter. She sang to herself all day, saltwater dub like “Ion Die” and “Touch-out Hustle”; or the fantastic old outcaste beats which were chic in the Core. When she was down she hung about the human quarters biting her nails or watching hologram pornography and masturbating. The shadow operators, who adored her, took care of her in the exaggerated way Seria Mau had never allowed. She let them dress her in the kind of outfits Uncle Zip’s daughters might wear to a wedding; or fit her quarters out with mirrors to optical-astronomy standard. Also, it was important to them to see she ate properly. She was sharp enough to understand their needs and play to them. When the mood compass pointed north, that was when she had them wrapped round her little finger. She had them make her Elvis food and lurex halter tops that showed off her nipples. She got them to change the width of her pelvis by quick fix cosmetic surgery. “If that’s what you want, dear,” they said. “If you think it will help.” They would do anything to cheer her up. They would do anything to keep her out of the housecoat with the food stains on the front, including encourage her to smoke tobacco, which was even illegal in the FTZs since twenty-seven years ago.

“I wasn’t listening deliberately,” she said.

“Keep off this band from now on,” Seria Mau warned her. “And do something with that hair.” Ten minutes later she sent her fetch back down to Billy Anker.

“We get a lot of interference here,” he said wisely. “Maybe that was why I lost you.”

“Maybe it was.”