'Do I need to tell you what you already know?' Neil continued, watching Nora but obviously speaking to Thomas. 'Everything that happens in the brain of someone who truly loves is happening in her brain right now. Every neurochemical transfer. Every storm of synaptic firings.' He smiled as though she were a prized zoo exhibit as he said this. He turned to Thomas, his eyes bright with arrogance and jubilation, the way they always were when he scored some incontrovertible point.

'True love, Goodbook. She's offering you true love.'

'Neil?' Nora said. 'Where are you? I'm…'

'There's nothing true about this,' Thomas spat. 'Nothing. You're controlling her. Forcing her to love.'

His friend shrugged. 'So? What earthly difference does that make? If it wasn't me who tipped the equilibrium in her brain toward the manifestation of bonding behavior, then what would it be other than an accidental collection of stimuli? A rose brought to the door. A lingering kiss. Heartfelt words. A smile. What does it matter if the world pulls her strings directly, or if it pulls her strings through me?'

'I'm confused,' Nora murmured. 'I… I…'

'It matters,' Thomas said.

'Does it?' Neil sprang from his seat and walked toward Nora, paused just to her right. Nothing about her eyes or expression registered his presence. 'There's a million circumstances that would produce this particular output with this particular brain… love. This'—he held his hands out to the room—'is just one more. Just as natural. Just as meaningless.'

'Neil? You're close. I can hear you! Where are you?'

'Natural?' Thomas asked with savage incredulity. 'What could be natural about this?'

Laughter. 'Our brains are manipulating machines, Goodbook, each the result of millions of years of evolutionary adaptation to its environment, its world. That it should reach out and manipulate itself is as natural as can be. Just think! After grasping and grasping through hundreds of millions of years, it's finally touched the bottom of the bag. Don't blame me if it's empty.'

'I don't…' Nora called, her tone eerily like the one she had used to break into their debates back in the old days. 'I don't know what's going on. But I am feeling these things, Tommy! No one's forcing me. Especially not Neil.'

'Nora…'

'Aw, sweetheart,' Neil said. 'It just seems that—'

'But I feel it! It's the most certain thing I've ever…' Her face was pinned beneath looming circuitry, lines of blood trailing from the bolts that fixed her skull, and yet her expression was one of maudlin yearning, as though she were some teenage diva emoting for the camera. The absurdity of it jarred a wave of nausea from his gut. 'I mean, why did it take me so long to see? I love. I love!'