When Cade said nothing, Mandi asked, "Since you didn't ask about male convertees, I'll..." "I don't give a rat's ass about the men," he interrupted, "I want to know about the women. Got any in Florida?" "No. Georgia. They work with the Center for Disease Control and other agencies. In fact, they've been working with another NIA branch this weekend. As backups, you could say, in case more happened than I could handle at once. One of them was even in the look-alike contest." Sipping his water, Cade said, "Fascinating. Did you convert any of them without asking first?" With a sigh, Mandi said, "NO, and you said 'done is done', as I recall. I'm sorry and that's all I can say. I thought someone your age would be..." That rankled Cade a bit. "'Someone my age?' Would be what? That someone any other age wouldn't be, that is." Gazing hard at him across the table, Mandi said, "I'd very much appreciate it if you wouldn't interrupt me when I'm speaking, Ed. I thought you'd be considerably happier about being chosen for conversion." "That's your word for it. 'Near-total alienation' is what I'm calling it for the moment." The waiter buzzed up to the table and asked Mandi what she'd like. She ordered a coffee and the waiter told Cade that his lunch would arrive shortly, then he buzzed away again. Mandi sat back and said, "You crushed that steel rail in the stairwell. If that's an indication of your progress, you'll be able to stop a tank round with your bare hands in a week. You'll be bulletproof and no Earthly disease will be able to touch you. You'll be stronger and faster than you can possibly imagine and you may develop some of my other powers to a degree." Pausing, Mandi sipped the water the waiter had brought her and added, "And there's one more little thing. Our cells replicate, but they don't degenerate with every copy. Do you understand what that means?" "Sure. It means I may have time enough to write another few thousand books." "You don't seem very impressed with virtual immortality." "Of course I am. I'm just not letting it overshadow the fact that you're forming teams, which means that something more than you can handle alone is headed this way, and if it's bigger than you, it'll be able to squash a convertee in a heartbeat." Chapter Twenty-two