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<strong>Peter</strong> <strong>Watts</strong> 28 <strong>The</strong> <strong>Island</strong><br />
thing's tit you couldn't even kill your cortical link."<br />
"How I learn. No reason to change."<br />
"How about acting like a damn human once in a while? How<br />
about developing a little rapport with the folks who might have to<br />
save your miserable life next time you go EVA? That enough of a<br />
reason for you? Because I don't mind telling you, right now I don't<br />
trust you as far as I could throw the tac tank. I don't even know for<br />
sure who I'm talking to right now."<br />
"Not my fault." For the first time I see something outside the<br />
usual gamut of fear, confusion, and simpleminded computation<br />
playing across his face. "That's you, that's all of you. You talk –<br />
sideways. Think sideways. You all do, and it hurts." Something<br />
hardens in his face. "Didn't even need you online for this," he<br />
growls. "Didn't want you. Could have managed the whole build<br />
myself, told Chimp I could do it—"<br />
"But the chimp thought you should wake me up anyway, and<br />
you always roll over for the chimp, don't you? Because the chimp<br />
always knows best, the chimp's your boss, the chimp's your<br />
fucking god. Which is why I have to get out of bed to nursemaid<br />
some idiot savant who can't even answer a hail without being led<br />
by the nose." Something clicks in the back of my mind but I'm on<br />
a roll. "You want a real role model? You want something to look<br />
up to? Forget the chimp. Forget the mission. Look out the<br />
forward scope, why don't you? Look at what your precious chimp<br />
wants to run over because it happens to be in the way. That thing<br />
is better than any of us. It's smarter, it's peaceful, it doesn't wish us<br />
any harm at—"<br />
"How can you know that? Can't know that!"<br />
"No, you can't know that, because you're fucking stunted. Any<br />
normal caveman would see it in a second, but you—"<br />
"That's crazy," Dix hisses at me. "You're crazy. You're bad."<br />
"I'm bad!" Some distant part of me hears the giddy squeak in<br />
my voice, the borderline hysteria.<br />
"For the mission." Dix turns his back and stalks away.<br />
My hands are hurting. I look down, surprized: my fists are<br />
clenched so tightly that my nails cut into the flesh of my palms. It<br />
takes a real effort to open them again.
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