Elizabeth Moon - Remnant Population

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REMNANT POPULATION

ELIZABETH MOON

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Elizabeth Moon - Remnant Population
Proofed and Formatted by MollyKate 11/25/2002
This is my favorite book to date from an author whose every published 
word I own in multiple editions. If you enjoyed this E-Dition, please 
consider supporting the author by buying it in treeware.
Contents
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
CHAPTER NINETEEN
CHAPTER TWENTY
This is a work of fiction. All the characters and events portrayed in this book are fictional, and any 
resemblance to real people or incidents is purely coincidental.
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Elizabeth Moon - Remnant Population

A Baen Books Original

Baen Publishing Enterprises

P.O. Box 1403

Riverdale, NY 10471

ISBN: 0-671-87718-6

Cover art by Gary Ruddell

First printing, May 1996

Distributed by Simon & Schuster

1230 Avenue of the Americas

New York, NY

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Moon, Elizabeth.

Remnant population / Elizabeth Moon.

p. cm.

ISBN 0-671-87718-6

I. Title

PS3563.0557R46 1996 813'.54--dc20 95-53232

CIP

Typeset by Windhaven Press: Editorial Services, Auburn, NH

Printed in the United States of America

DEDICATION

To Betsy, who provided the spark, and Mary, Ellen, and Carrie who responded with warmth and light.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

This book had a number of godmothers, both old and new. Its literary antecedents include an essay by

LeGuin, The Wall, by Marlen Haushofer, and a book I had not yet read (but heard about) when I began it,

Two Old Women, by Velma Wallis, and those folktales in which wise old women know something worth

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Elizabeth Moon - Remnant Population

learning. But it could not have been written without the living experience of women much like Ofelia,

from whom I learned much less than I should have. They are too many to name, but they should not be

forgotten. Lois Parker helped in revision, especially her willingness to share her own experience of a long

life.

CHAPTER ONE

Contents - Next

Sims Bancorp Colony, File #3245.

Between her toes the damp earth felt cool, but already sweat crept between the roots of her hair. It would

be hotter today than yesterday, and by noon the lovely spice-scented red flowers of the dayvine would

have furled their fragile cups, and drooped on the vine. Ofelia pushed the mulch deeper against the stems

of the tomatoes with her foot. She liked the heat. If her daughter-in-law Rosara weren't within sight, she

would take off her hat and let the sweat evaporate. But Rosara worried about cancer from the sun, and

Rosara was sure it wasn't decent for an old woman to be outside with nothing on her head but thinning

gray hair.

Not that it was so thin. Ofelia touched her temples, as if to tuck an errant strand in place, but really to

confirm the thick strands of the braid she wore. Still thick, and her legs still strong, and her hands, though

knotted with age and work, still capable. She eyed her daughter-in-law, at the far end of the garden.

Scrawny, hair the color of scorched paper, eyes of mud. Thought she was beautiful, with her narrow waist

and her pale hands, but Ofelia knew better. She had always known better, but Barto would not listen to a

mothers wisdom, and now he had Rosara of the narrow body—like a snake, Ofelia had said once

only—and no children.

She minded that less than the others thought. She could have welcomed a daughter-in-law independent

enough to refuse children. No, it was Rosaras determination to enforce on her mother-in-law all the petty

rules intended to preserve the virtue of virgins… that she could not tolerate.

"We should have planted more beans," Rosara called. She had said that at planting, knowing that Ofelia

could not use all the beans she normally grew. She wanted Ofelia to grow beans to sell, as well as beans

to eat.

"We have enough," Ofelia said.

"If the crop does not fail," Rosara said.

"If the crop fails, a bigger crop would be a bigger failure," Ofelia said. Rosara snorted, but did not

contradict. Perhaps she was finally learning that it did no good to argue. Ofelia hoped so. Ofelia went on

working on the tomatoes, pushing the mulch here and there, tying up straggling ends of the vines. Rosara

claimed the tomato vines made her skin itch; she stayed away from them. Ofelia hunkered down to hide a

smile as she thought of this, enjoying the strong green tomato smell.

She dozed off, there among the tomatoes, rousing only when the slanting afternoon light probed between

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Elizabeth Moon - Remnant Population

the rows. Light in her eyes had always waked her; she was still sure she had not slept at all in the cryo

tanks because the lights stayed on all the time. Humberto had said that was ridiculous, that no one was

awake in cryo, that was the point. Ofelia had not argued, but she was sure she remembered the light,

always stabbing through her eyelids.

Now, lying drowsy on the crumbly mulch between the rows of tomatoes, she thought how peaceful it

looked, that little green jungle. Silent, too, for once; Rosara must have gone back inside without noticing

she was asleep. Or perhaps the bitch didn't care. Ofelia rolled the insult on her tongue, silently, savoring

it. Bitch. Slut. She didn't know many such words, which gave the few in her vocabulary extra richness, all

the anger that some people spread over many words on many occasions.

Bartolomeo's voice in the street cut across her reverie, and she sat up as fast as she could, hissing at the

pain in her hip and knees.

"Rosara! Rosara, come out!" He sounded excited or angry or both. He often did. Most of the time it was

nothing, but he would never admit it, even afterwards. Of all her children, Barto was the one Ofelia had

liked least, even in infancy; he had been a greedy nurser, yanking on her nipples as if she could never be

enough for him. He had grown from greedy infancy to demanding childhood, the son whom nothing

satisfied; he had quarreled incessantly with the other children, demanding fairness which always meant

his benefit. In manhood he was the same, the traits she had liked least in Humberto magnified ten times.

But he was her only living child, and she understood him.

"What?" Rosara sounded snappish; either she had been napping (something Barto and Ofelia both

disapproved of) or working on her computer.

"It's the Company—they've lost the franchise."

A shriek from Rosara. It might mean that for once Barto was upset about something worth the trouble, or

it might mean that she had just found a pimple on her chin. With Rosara, it might be either, or anything in

between. Ofelia struggled to her knees, then, with a hand on a tomato stake, to her feet. Her vision grayed

slightly and she waited for it to come back. Age. Everyone said it was age, and it would get worse. She

didn't think it was that bad, except when people wanted her to hurry, and she couldn't."Mama!" Barto,

bursting out the kitchen door into the garden. Ofelia was glad to be upright and obviously working; it

gave her a tiny bit of moral leverage.

"Yes?" She had spotted a fat caterpillar, and when he loomed over her she had it fast in the loop. "See?"

"Yes, mama. That's nice. Listen, its important—"

"A good crop this year," Ofelia said.

"Mama!" He leaned over, pushing his face into hers. He looked more like Humberto than anyone else, yet

Humberto had had gentle eyes.

"I'm listening," she said, putting out her hand to the tomato stake again.

"The Company's lost the franchise," he said, as if that meant something.

"The Company's lost the franchise," Ofelia repeated, to prove she'd been listening. He often accused her

of not listening.

"You know what that means," he said impatiently, but then went on to tell her. "It means we have to

leave. They're yanking the colony." Rosara had come out of the house behind him; Ofelia could see the

patches of red on her cheeks.

"They can't do that! It's our home—!"

"Don't be stupid, Rosara!" Barto spat onto the tomato plants, as if they were her body; Ofelia flinched,

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