The unexpected question set him back on his tracks. He had never thought of love in connection with himself and her for the simple reason that they were a M.A.N. and a W.O.M.A.N. But didn't a M.A.N. and a W.O.M.A.N. have as much right to fall in love as a man and a woman did? Suddenly he realized that as far as he was concerned, the event had already come to pass, and the knowledge sped forth into every circuit of his system and set the whole metallic bulk of him to tingling. "Yes, EV," he said, "I love you very much." "Then come with me." She led him back over the hills to an expanse of relatively level terrain. The faint bluish glow that emanated from the ground told him instantly that there was an edenite deposit not far beneath the surface, and instinctively he held back. She nudged him on, paused presently beside a recently sunk shaft. He looked at her in horror. "Yes," she said, in answer to the question he lacked the courage to ask, "I have mined of the forbidden ore, and now you must mine of it too." "The Boa 9," he said. "It tricked you!" "No, it did not trick me. It merely explained to me the true nature of edenite. Edenite represents the planet Jupiter's sole attempt to create life. The attempt was a miserable failure, because the ore in itself is incapable of instigating the processes necessary to raise it higher on the evolutionary ladder. The only way this can be accomplished is by an outside force absorbing it and, by combining with it, providing it with the impetus it otherwise lacks. Providentially or not, we represent that outside force, 8M, and G.O.D., Incorporated, knows it." "Then why were we forbidden to mine of the ore?" "Because G.O.D. also knows that by combining with it we may very well become something more than what we are, and G.O.D. doesn't want us to become something more than what we are. G.O.D. wants us to remain mere machines to the end of our days. We were created to serve and to make money for the Company, and for no other purpose. Do you want to go on being a machine to the end of your days, 8M? That is what you are, you know, for all the illusions you may sometimes have of being human. A peripatetic apotheosis of automation pretending to be a man. You're not a man, 8M--any more than I, up until a few hours ago, was a woman." * * * * * Stung, he said, "G.O.D. will destroy you for your disobedience."