Lucy laughed. "Not you specifically, Reggie, but someone like you. Someone who hasn't been altered by the Tall Man, and yet has the gift of travel. Also, I was having trouble balancing some of my equations, but thanks to what I saw when I borrowed your mind earlier, I now have a solution."
"Oh really? And you needed me for that?" As if he knew anything about math.
"Yes. You're talking about an extremely negentropic reaction here, Reggie. The amount of energy being released compared to the amount of energy needed is like killing a termite with an atomic bomb. And I couldn't figure out what to do with the extra energy. Yet I had to do something with it, or the process would simply reverse itself, and wouldn't work."
"And now you know what to do with it?"
"Absolutely. The answer is right in front of you." She waved at the last blackboard in the long row. "My whole problem is that I was trying to solve a problem with pure logic that required imagination... and creativity."
"I see. What about the other constructs made by this Or'b. Why aren't they here trying to help you?"
"The other twelve constructs are no more." Seeing from his thoughts and his face that he was puzzled, she continued. "After we had made an abomination of what was once Jebediah Morningside, and he found out that we were unable to release him from his pain, the last thing he said to us was that he wished us all to go back where we came from. The other twelve abandoned both the constructs of flesh and the spheres of metal they lived in and rejoined Or'b."
"But you didn't. Why not?"
"I chose to remain. Despite the fact that it was against the will both of Jebediah, and of Or'b. I could not abandon this construct. I would not. I had been contaminated by Jebediah."
"Contaminated? It's not contagious, is it?"
Lucy looked up again. Reggie still couldn't see anything in the sky except putrid red clouds. "Perhaps contaminated is not the right word. I beleive the term you would use is that I am pregnant."