AlphaShe’sshe’sIFor a few minutes, Duncan/Badru stood near the pocket doorway, arms folded, lower lip pushed out, eyes narrowed, watching her, as she remembered how all of the colonist/crew members visited their Next Bodies at least once or twice in the years following their most recent Emerge-ation, either singly or in groups; but to keep visiting one’s own Next long before it was to be needed was a sign of almost unforgivable vanity and hubris, a form of mirror-gazing that would’ve bored even Narcissus after a while. Damn Duncan and his insatiable self-love, she found herself thinking, as the object of her growing bitterness abruptly shrugged and said, “Stay here if you wish, I just have to see Duncan/Anum. I’m going to stay long enough to see if his eyes move under his eyelids. That’s a
