Chapter 14

"You're tough," Sergeant¹ said as I eased back into focus.

"You aren't, not without help," I told him in disgust.

"Spunky, aren't you? I meant mental toughness. That's the one thing we can never judge. I think you could have taken the shock right from the start. Of course, you would still have needed the conditioning to integrate properly."

"Conditioning? Conditioning?" It came out of me, vortexing up, outside of my piloting. "What have you done to my mind?"

"We've been trying to get it to grow back up," Sergeant said reasonably. "Think of this. Fountain of Youth. Immortality². Rejuvenation³. This is it. Never mind how it works. Most minds can't stand being young and knowing they will have to go through the same damned thing all over again. We use synapse-shift to switch your upper conscious memories to your id and super-ego, leaving room for new memories. You remember only those things out of the past you have to, to retain your identity."

"Identity," I repeated. "I have no identity. My identity is a dream. I have two identities—one of them years beyond the other."

Sergeant tilted⁴ his head and his eyes at me and slapped me across the face. "Don't go back on me now. We gave you the best we could. The Rejuvenation Service couldn't help it if you were too old for a beta. You shouldn't have waited until you were so old, so very old. We used the very oldest sets and mock-ups we had for betas, but you, you had to keep wandering onto alpha territory, while they were striking sets, even. Beta or not, we gave you good service. Don't slip now."

I heard the voice and I heard another voice, and it said "What could you expect of a beta?" and they were only some of the voices I was hearing, and I wondered what you could expect from a beta, and I didn't know, or think that I would ever know.

The End

1 sergeant   

n.警官，中士

参考例句：

• His elder brother is a sergeant.他哥哥是个警官。
• How many stripes are there on the sleeve of a sergeant?陆军中士的袖子上有多少条纹？

2 immortality   

n.不死，不朽

参考例句：

• belief in the immortality of the soul 灵魂不灭的信念
• It was like having immortality while you were still alive. 仿佛是当你仍然活着的时候就得到了永生。

3 rejuvenation   

n. 复原，再生, 更新, 嫩化, 恢复

参考例句：

• Prolonged starvation and aging might lead to rejuvenation of embryogenic potential. 长期的饥饿和衰老可以导致胚胎发生能力的复壮。
• All this signs rejuvenation of agriculture. 所有这些都预示着农业将复苏。

4 tilted   

v. 倾斜的

参考例句：

• Suddenly the boat tilted to one side. 小船突然倾向一侧。
• She tilted her chin at him defiantly. 她向他翘起下巴表示挑衅。