Playing God(10)

Praeis blinked broadly. “I would have thought you'd be glad to get your own way for a change.”

Lynn shook her head. “Between you and David, I wouldn't know what to do with it anymore.”

Praeis laughed. “You'll think of something, I'm certain.”

Lynn touched Praeis on the shoulder. “Good Luck, Praeis.”

“Thank you.” Praeis lifted her arms from her daughters’ shoulders and took their hands instead. “Come, my daughters, we still have much to do.”

Lynn wished them luck as well, and they waved with their free hands and trooped off with their mother.

Lynn's stomach growled with surprising strength. She headed for the cafeteria's garden.

David might be content with vat-grown, form-molded, flash-cooked food, but Lynn possessed a set of working taste buds and her stomach was not steel-lined. She picked up a wicker basket and threaded her way between the chatting knots of people to the stations she needed. She pulled two eggs out of the drawer under the ceramic “battery hen.” Walking between the troughs of black soil, she plucked a ripe tomato off one vine and a green pepper off a plant from a waist-high grow table. The apples were bright red, but the orange trees were just blossoming, and they filled the air with their light summery scent. The cheese in the processor didn't look ripe enough for her taste, so she skipped it and picked up sealed bulbs of orange juice, coffee, and milk, and a small loaf of fresh, warm bread from its slot in the bakery box.

She was looking forward to having her own place again, where she could set up her own garden and kitchen. As soon as the evacuation, sorry, the relocation was over, they'd have a house on All-Cradle that they could organize as they pleased.

David had left the privacy walls clear on the cube he'd chosen, so Lynn spotted him easily. She threaded her way through the exaggerated mouse-maze of cubicles to him.

He looked at her basketful of raw materials and shook his head. She ignored him. “Room voice, send in a cooking jobber and opaque the walls.”

“Completing request.”

The walls around the table darkened to an aesthetically neutral beige.

The cooking jobber scooted in and parked itself next to the wall. It was a plain machine, little more than a mobile stove with storage for pans, utensils, and spices. Lynn busied herself chopping vegetables, beating eggs, and humming, fully aware that David was grinning behind her back. When she turned around with her fresh omelette steaming on her plate, she had to admit it looked remarkably similar to the half-eaten concoction in front of him, but she would never say so out loud.

“One of these days”—David pointed his fork at her—“I'm going to give you a double-blind taste test, and I'll bet you won't be able to tell the difference between this lovely, ready-prepared meal and what you just spent a half hour picking out and cooking.”

“It was twenty minutes, and I'll take that bet.” Lynn scooped up a fluffy forkful, chewed, and swallowed. “Ahh, real food. Nothing like that delicate tang of mud and blood.”

“Primitives.” David had lived most of his life in space enclaves of one kind and another and still affected a minor horror of unprocessed nature.

“Lynn Nussbaumer,” said the genderless room voice from the tabletop. “Iola Trace and Shane R.J. wish to put through a call.”

Lynn swore and met David's gaze.

He shrugged. “I'm surprised we've had as much peace as we've had.”

“Me, too.” She took a swig of orange juice. “Room voice, I'll accept the call.”

The right-hand wall lit up to show small, dark, tidy Trace in her spartan office with its soothing aqua walls and gleaming work surfaces. She had probably been up and in the station's “working” section for the past two hours. The back wall showed gangly, perpetually bemused R.J., still in his cabin in the dormitory module. He had his walls set to show an African savannah with lions stalking through the tall grass. Lynn still had not quite gotten a handle on how R.J.’s aesthetic sense tied in to his sense of humor, or how stuffy Trace's sense of propriety really was. However, they worked extremely well together and had guided her deftly through Bioverse's corporate maze. Lynn's staff numbered in the dozens, and under them were hundreds of direct-report personnel, but these two were her personal assistants. Lately, their job seemed to consist of keeping her schedule from getting totally overwhelmed by requests for conferences, advice, or talks. Brador had said Lynn had a reputation as a Dedelphi expert. The entire staff of Bioverse seemed bent on proving him right.

“Good morning.” Lynn saluted them both with a forkful of eggs.

“Good morning, Lynn. Good morning, David,” said Trace. David lifted his beaker of coffee to the projections, then turned his attention back to his faux-omelette, politely pretending to ignore the proceedings.