The Course of True Love by Jayel

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The Course of True Love (11/14)
by Jayel

Morgan couldn't remember ever being less annoyed at being awakened at dawn. "I'll get him," he mumbled, kissing his wife's shell-like ear before rolling out of the cot and padding across the tent in his sock feet. "Cool your jets, big guy," he soothed, unlacing the insulated swaddling of his son's papoose bed. "She's right over there waiting for you, I promise."

He lifted the squalling infant in his arms, the angry sobs subsiding into a series of apologetic hiccups as the hot little face nuzzled against his shoulder. "I think you've found your calling, sweetie," Bess said, sitting up. "You're a natural."

"You think so?" Morgan asked, pleased. "I was really worried, you know." He planted a tender kiss on his baby son's downy head before handing him over to his mother. "I mean, back on the stations, I never even had a dog . . " He gave his family a lovingly goofy grin as Bess cradled the baby in one arm and unbuttoned her nightshirt. "I just knew I was going to drop him on his head the first day--"

"Don't be silly," Bess scolded with a smile.

"No, really," Morgan protested. "Babies as a concept are beyond me."

"But he isn't a concept; he's our son," she answered reasonably, stroking a petal-soft cheek with one fingertip.

Morgan's grin broadened. "Yeah," he agreed. "But you know . . . we really should decide what to call him." He touched the baby's tiny, outstretched palm, thrilling as always as the fist closed around his finger with infant determination. "Any ideas?"

"Actually, yes," she said shyly. "I was talking to Yale . . . Did you know that the first baby born in the American colonies was named Virginia Dare?"

"I seem to remember that from somewhere, yes," Morgan answered, his heart glowing like Morganite with love for her. "But I don't think he's much of a Virginia."

"No," she admitted with a smile. "But Dare is nice. Or at least I think so--If you have something else--"

"No," he hastened to assure her. The man he had been on the stations would have insisted on a Morgan Martin, Jr., but now . . . He liked the idea of his son being the first new life in this new world and having a name that was all his own. "Dare is perfect--it suits him." He leaned forward and kissed her mouth, sheltering baby Dare Martin for a moment in the warm connection that had given him life.

***

We're lucky the Grendlers didn't carry off everything we own, Danziger thought, heaving himself upright with a groan. Making love on the snowy ground in a fit of passion was all very well at the time, he supposed, but the morning after was killer. "Tara?" he muttered, rubbing his face, trying to make his skin fit his skull again.

When she didn't answer, he looked up and scanned the camp. The fire was still burning; the coffee was on . . . Getting to his feet with another elaborate groan and a cacophony of crackling joints, he found a wizened apple and a bowl of still-hot semolina porridge steaming on the cooking grate.

But his companion was nowhere in sight.

"Tara!" he yelled, cautioning himself sternly against panic. She's famous for wandering off on her own, he thought as he tugged on his boots. How far could she have gone? Assuming she was moving entirely on her own power and hadn't been kidnapped by convicts or carried off by some lovestruck Grendler . . .

A scream that seemed to come from just south of his left elbow made him jump out of his figurative skin. Swinging around, he found True's new cat regarding him with round green eyes. "Thanks, pal," he muttered, leaning down to scratch behind the creature's velvety ears. "Where'd she go, anyway?" But the cat had no new information to offer.

Scooping up his mag-pro and feeling a little silly, Danziger headed into the trees in the direction of the freshest-looking Tara-sized footprints in the snow with the cat padding along at his heels.

***

Magus was stowing her gear in the center compartment of the 'rail when Devon's resolve to leave well enough alone finally broke. "Hey," the Eden Project's leader said, momentarily incapable of devising a more clever opening remark.

"Hi," Magus answered. "Baines is just getting the smaller gun. We should be out of here in a minute or so--"

"Listen, Magus, I was just thinking," Devon interrupted. "Why don't you let me ride along with Baines? I know you guys are having some personal problems--"

"Thanks, Dev, but we're fine," Magus said.

"Really, it's no trouble," Devon promised. "The kids are with Yale . . . " She let her voice trail off, an embarrassed smile illuminating her face. "To tell you the truth, Marcia, I'd really prefer to go."

Magus smiled back, giving her shoulder an awkward pat. "So I gathered," she admitted. "But Devon . . . are you sure that's such a great idea?"

"Why wouldn't it be?" Devon asked evenly, suddenly engrossed in picking the non-existent lint from the palm of her left glove. "I'm sure Danziger and Tara are very concerned about our not showing up at the rendezvous point."

"I'm sure they are," Magus agreed slowly. "Devon, listen . . . " She glanced around as if to take note of any eavesdroppers. "I don't like her either, all right?"

"Who?" Devon asked innocently, earning herself an exasperated look from her companion. "Okay . . . ," she confessed. "You mean Tara . . . and no, I don't like her. How could I? She's done nothing but antagonize me since the moment we met. But I haven't noticed her being anything but pleasant to you--"

"Except for when she almost killed me," Magus finished with an incredulous laugh. "Okay, so maybe it really was an accident . . . " She frowned, then shook her head. "Yeah, to be completely truthful, I know it was an accident . . . "

"But?" Devon pressed gently.

"But . . . I've had a really hard time thinking of her as . . . "

"One of us?" Devon suggested.

"Human," Magus finished flatly. "I know I shouldn't feel this way, but . . . No one but me has ever seen the inside of her so-called 'matrix', and believe me, you're all really lucky."

"Magus, I think I understand at least partially what you're talking about here," Devon began diplomatically. "But to feel an antipathy towards Tara just because her physiological make-up is different from ours would be--"

"Devon, just for once, would you stop it?" Magus interrupted. "I said I knew my feelings were misguided--you don't need to reiterate the point, all right?"

"Sorry," Devon said sheepishly.

"*My* point is that, for whatever reason, I have a hard time trusting Tara or thinking of her as someone who has the best interests of the group at heart," Magus continued. "And that's why I think it would be better if you let me and Baines go fetch her and Danz back to the fold."

Devon didn't answer for a long moment. "You think she and Danziger may be . . . "

"I think that's a possibility, yes," Magus said bluntly. "I think it's equally possible that nothing like that is going on at all. But either way, I think it's better if you let him tell you anything you know about whatever has happened between them while they were gone."

"I trust John," Devon began, obviously preparing to make a speech.

"Great," Magus cut her off. "So keep trusting him. Devon, he's a guy, all right?"

"What is that supposed to mean?" Devon asked, stung.

"It means that while his heart is probably in the right place and his mind is probably in the right place, the rest of him may be wandering," Magus answered. "I mean, whether we like it or not, Tara is one hot tamale in the looks department, and she is not the kind of girl who likes to sleep alone."

"She's beautiful, yes," Devon admitted.

"Beautiful isn't really the point," Magus said. "Look, all I'm saying is that love and commitment are one side of the great male equation, but sex is the other, and sometimes the scales get tipped. And if John's scales have gone south sometime in the past three days and it means no more than that, you're better off not knowing about it."

"But what if it does mean something?" Devon pointed out, blushing furiously. "What if he . . . what if she . . . "

"Then John will tell you as soon as he gets back," Magus said gently. "If nothing else, he is your friend, Devon. He's not going to do anything to intentionally hurt you."

"I know," Devon admitted, smiling bravely as she blinked back tears.

"So let him make the first move if any moves need to be made, all right?" Magus said, climbing into the 'rail. "We'll be back by lunchtime."

***

Finding Tara proved to be much less of a chore than Danziger had expected--she was sitting on a log not more than a hundred yards away from camp, wearing VR gear. Her head was down, and her face was covered from the eyes down by her upraised hands.

"Hey, you," he called, trying to keep from startling her. But she didn't look up. "Tara, come on," he continued, moving closer, close enough to see the blue light coming from her palms and eyes like the glow of a super-intense lumalamp. "We need to start packing up," he continued, trying to ignore this upsetting little display of cyber-witchery as he touched her shoulder--

Suddenly time seemed to flip-flop backwards--it was last night again, and he was kissing her, and there was a pine cone under his right knee that hurt like a son of a--

"Hey, cut it out!" Tara yelled as he felt himself fall backwards on the snowy ground. She snatched her gear off of her head, the light in her eyes fading in a flash. "Damn it, Val, how many times do I have to tell you---!" Then her words stopped, leaving her mouth still hanging open in dismay.

"You all right?" Danziger asked sardonically, climbing back to his feet. Suddenly, his head felt like he'd just woke up from a three-day bender, and his emotions were beginning to match. Val . . . great. Just great . . .

"I'm fine," she answered, retrieving her fallen gear. "Are you? I pushed you pretty hard--"

"I think I'll recover," he said, catching her hand and hauling her to her feet before stalking off in the direction of the camp.

"John, wait, for pity's sake," she called, running to catch up. "I wasn't--I didn't--Would you please just stop?"

He did as she asked, turning on her with his arms crossed and one eyebrow raise--the patented Danziger look of annoyed impatience. "You weren't and didn't what?" he asked.

"I wasn't thinking about Val, and I didn't use you to fill in the gaps in some VR program," she answered bluntly as she caught her breath. "That's what you think, right?"

"Actually, I hadn't gotten around to drawing that detailed a conclusion," he said. "But now that you mention it--"

"No, don't even start," she cut him off. "Or at least let me explain first." She reached up as if to touch him, then let her hand drop. "Okay . . . I was thinking about last night, recording my memory of it on a VR tube while it was still fresh and all the details were still in short term . . ."

"Have you any idea how completely odd that sounds?" he asked.

"Yeah, I know," she answered. "Anyway . . . I just wanted to have it for later, when you . . . when you decide you'd rather be with Devon."

"You know, Tara, it's really starting to bother me that every time you and I have a disagreement, it somehow works around to being Devon's fault," he pointed out.

"So okay, forget Devon," she said impatiently. "Let's talk about Val--My dead husband, the guy I'm on the rebound from losing. He used to do what you just did all the time--touch me while I was downloading memory. It's a really bad idea--your consciousness gets caught up in the program with mine, and it creates a loop . . . If I hadn't realized the images were doubling up, the same thing could have happened to you that happened to Magus, only worse, because the matrix was more concentrated and you--or your image, anyway--was already a virtual component of the program." She stopped for a moment, then looked up at him again, meeting his eyes. "When I called you Val, the thing that made me think of him wasn't . . . wasn't what was on the program, but the act of pushing you away, the feeling that someone else was inside my head."

"And that's why my head feels like it's going to explode," he said slowly.

"Yeah, probably," she answered, looking away. "Count yourself lucky--if an aneurism had started, you'd have just died, because there'd have been nothing I could have done for you, and Julia's apparently out of earshot." She bent and picked up the cat, brushing the snow from his pointed nose. "So do you believe me?"

He didn't answer for a long moment. "I don't know," he said at last. "I want to--"

"Do you?" she shot back. "I mean, if I'm just using you, it makes any decisions you feel you have to make a lot easier--"

"You're right, it does," he answered, cutting her off. "But I don't want to make the easy decision, Tara. I want to make the right one, whatever that is."

Suddenly at the same moment they heard the unmistakable sound of an approaching dune rail. "Convicts don't drive, right?" she said with a shaky grin, dropping the cat at her feet.

"Not to our knowledge so far," he agreed. "So let's hope this is the cavalry."

End of Part 11

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