The Mimicking of Known Successes


 Contents
 
 Title Page
 Copyright Notice
 Dedication
 Prologue
 Chapter 1
 Chapter 2
 Chapter 3
 Chapter 4
 Chapter 5
 Chapter 6
 Chapter 7
 Chapter 8
 Chapter 9
 Chapter 10
 Chapter 11
 Chapter 12
 Chapter 13
 Chapter 14
 Chapter 15
 Chapter 16
 Chapter 17
 Chapter 18
 Chapter 19
 Chapter 20
 Chapter 21
 Chapter 22
 Chapter 23
 Chapter 24
 Chapter 25
 Chapter 26
 Acknowledgments
 Also by Malka Older
 About the Author
 Newsletter Sign-up
 Copyright
 
 
 
 Guide
 
 Cover
 Title Page
 Dedication
 Prologue
 Chapter 1
 Acknowledgments
 Contents
 Copyright
 
 
 
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 Table of Contents
 About the Author
 Copyright Page
 
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 For
 Calyx Paz Azul
 
 
 Demand better than back to normal
 
 
 
 Prologue
 
 The man had disappeared from an isolated platform; the furthest platform eastward, in fact, on the 4°63' line, never a very popular ring. It took Mossa five hours on the railcar to get there, alone because none of her Investigator colleagues were available, or eager, to take such a long trip for what would almost certainly be confirmation of a suicide.
 The platform appeared out of the swirling red fog, and moments later the railcar settled to a halt at what could barely be called a station. Mossa, who had not been looking forward to the long trip herself, had nonetheless passed it in a benevolent daze, looking out at the gaseous horizon that seemed abstractly static as it moved in constant strange patterns. Once disembarked, she found the rhythm of talking to people on the platform only with difficulty.
 “And you say he was standing here?” Mossa asked.
 “That’s right,” the settler confirmed. “Staring out into the eastern fog. People do that sometimes, no harm in it.”
 Mossa grunted, not quite in agreement. She was aware that just because she didn’t understand the appeal—you couldn’t see a meter out into the muck anyway, what did it matter how far the ring had to curve before the next platform?—didn’t mean that others wouldn’t. But if you were emotionally inclined to find significance in that sort of thing, doing so on this platform seemed fairly likely to deepen any gloom you were feeling. The beaten metal was largely bare, the single ring crossing along it lonely, and it might have been a psychological effect of the sparse construction and distance from anywhere else on the planet, but the gasses seemed to flow high here, wraithing around them as if the platform had sunk lower than the standard height.
 Maybe it had. The maintenance team didn’t make it out here very often, judging from the streaks of oxidation on the ledge.
 “And then?” Did he leap? Fall? The parapet edging the platform was the regulation height, enough to rule out any but the most outré of accidents.
 “He turned and went into the pub.” The settler gestured towards the stretch of platform beyond the minimal overhang that stood in for a station, where five buildings huddled into the atmosphere: four residences, with probably two or three separate homes apiece, and a pub with a home above it. The general store would come on a railcar, Mossa figured: a good long stop at the end of the line to allow the residents to select their purchases before sliding back in the other direction.
 “Oh?”
 “Had a lovely big breakfast. Last meal, I suppose,” the settler added, with mournful satisfaction.
 “And then?”
 The person shrugged, most of the motion muffled by their atmoscarfs, enveloping enough to be more properly called wraps. “Didn’t see him after that.”
 “When did you realize he was missing?”
 “It was Ganal, at the pub, noticed first. Like a good pubkeep should. Then when she mentioned, ‘Where’s that stranger? Came in on the morning rail?’ we all started looking.” The settler shrugged. “Nowhere much to hide here, no railcars had been in or out, so. One way or the other, he went over.”
 Mossa and the settler stared down from the platform in silence, observing the constant writhe of the