A long moment passed. The man—Uncle—straightened and confronted him straightly.

"It's little enough," he said, his voice still cool, "and proves only what is already known. An attempted attack was launched from this location, utilizing the ambient network. As you are the only functioning logic in this space, I am forced to conclude that you were involved, whether you have been allowed to recall it or not."

That . . . produced terror. He had done inventory, but how could he know what had been introduced, to his detriment? He was a machine, Roderick Spode had repeatedly argued; the sum of his protocols and softwares. That it had been convenient for those who had caused his creation to have him self-aware was only that—convenience. Those who had made him could unmake him.

Or force him, unknowing and against his waking will, to work for the harm of children.

"If I have been complicit in such a thing, I hope that you will destroy me," he told the man. "I owe the child my life, and I will not repay that debt by endangering his."

Golden eyebrows rose over stern blue eyes.

"Now, that's well-said, and I like you for it. Which you intend, of course."

At that instant, it came again: a shadow over his perceptions, weighty now. Alert. Malicious.

He entered Command Prime, as effortlessly as if there had been no long sleep, no diminishing of his estate, between the last time and this.

One iteration of himself tracked the shadow in the ambient, while a second opened a new connection to the data-box and began transmission. A third opened access to the ship's library, followed it to the core, and crossed the firewalls into the main databank as easily as a child skipped over a stream.

"Uncle—"

Observed by a fourth instance of himself, the child placed his hand on the man's sleeve, his head tipped subtly to the right. He widened his range to encompass the crates to his right and rear. A match program snapped awake, shrilling alarm.