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“You,” he repeated Then, to someone on his terminal, he said, “Get down here, now”

“You,” he said a third ti at Bobbie, then paced back and forth in front of her chair

A fewinto the conference room lobby He pulled up short when he saw Bobbie slouched in her chair and Thorsson’s angry face

“What—” he started, but Thorsson cut him off

“This is your fault,” he said to Martens, then spun to face Bobbie “And you, Sergeant, have just proven that it was a ht have been gained fro the only eyewitness has now been squandered by your … your idiotic tirade”

“She—” Martens tried again, but Thorsson poked a finger into his chest and said, “You said you could control her”

Martens gave Thorsson a sad siven enough ti a hand at them “You’re both on the next ship to Mars, where you can explain yourselves to a disciplinary board Now get out of ht”

He spun on his heel and slipped back into the conference rooh for his narrow body to squeeze through

Martens sat down in the chair next to Bobbie and let out a long breath

“So,” he said “What’s up?”

“Did I just destroy my career?” she asked

“Maybe How do you feel?”

“I feel …” she said, realizing how badly she did want to talk with Martens, and becoered by the impulse “I feel like I need some air”

Before Martens could protest, Bobbie stood up and headed for the elevators

The UN co a way out took her the better part of an hour Along the way, she host People hurried past her in the long corridors, talking energetically in clumps or on their hand terminals Bobbie had never been to Oly was located She’d caught a few overn discussed, but compared to the activity here at the UN, it was pretty low-key The people in this building cooverned thirty billion citizens and hundreds of millions of colonists By comparison, Mars’ four billion suddenly seeenerally accepted fact that Earth was a civilization in decay Lazy, coddled citizens who lived on the government dole Fat, corrupt politicians who enriched the infrastructure that spent close to 30 percent of its total output on recycling syste in its own filth On Mars, there was virtually no uneed either directly or indirectly in the greatest engineering feat in huave everyone a sense of purpose, a shared vision of the future Nothing like the Earthers, who lived only for their next governstore or entertainment malls

Or at least, that was the story Suddenly Bobbie wasn’t so sure

Repeated visits to the various inforot her to an exit door A bored guard nodded to her as she passed by, and then she was outside