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forward. It was seated in a clothes-strewn chair, and its expression
was dark.
What are you doing? It hissed. Rosaleen sank beneath her
bedsheets.
“Go. A. Way, “ she ordered the vision.
Had her mother been smarter, she would never have made the
preep—and never tied its continuing presence in Rosaleen's life to the
substantial inheritance her mother had bequeathed her. The preep was
Ellis Kincaid’s personal golem, arising at every occasion to twist her
daughter’s psyche, shame her into wiser choices, ridicule her into
uprightness. If her mother had left her, Rosaleen was sure, to mourn
and to forgive, to see her own mistakes along the way, she might have
actually gotten somewhere with her, albeit long after Ellis had
crumbled into dust. Unfortunately, Ellis trusted no one but herself.
It is wrong … the preep hissed again. Hissing seemed to be the
vocal tone of the dead, if EllisPreep was to be trusted as a model. You
thwart my work by making a mockery of it. You were a good scientist,
Rosaleen—a good person. You know what benefit could be
undertaken with this knowledge, but you squander it. And lead the
world a little further into hell.
And now this. What on earth are you thinking of? Have you no
self-respect, no respect for this man, his culture, for anything? What
are you planning, you slut?!
“It is a fantasy, Mother, “ Rosaleen spat back, sitting up and
glaring at the preep. “A dream, all right? Something that is NONE of
your business!”
A fantasy? Nothing more? You expect me to believe you? Every
sick thought you’ve ever had you’ve followed up. Every nasty little
subterfuge and evil intent—
“Shut up! I’ll tell you what I expect! I expect you to stop barging
into my life when you’re not wanted. You aren’t even my mother!
You’re one of her bad moods, trapped in a hologram. She didn’t want
to die, didn’t want to leave me—she didn’t trust me to live my own
life. But you aren’t her! Don’t you get it, Preep? “ She sat up again.
“If you were my mother you’d have moved on from this by now!
You’re just an endless loop, and you are driving. Me. Insane!
“Now would you please do the right thing and self-destruct? “
Rosaleen fell back in a rage and buried herself in the bedding.
The preep’s dire admonitions were little muffled by the sheets.
Tomorrow, by damn, she really would delete the wretched thing.
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