Summary

Yoshi's wife, Maduka, is introduced, wandering around the Tanaka home in a sleep mask. Madoka is Global Chief Sales Operative for a company that makes robot caregivers. The robots serve medical and companionship purposes for the elderly and infirm. Madoka thinks about a photograph of her great-great-grandmother, who died in the Great Kanto earthquake in 1923. Madoka feels ambivalent about becoming a mother. She does not think she will find it meaningful, and she longs for meaning. She believes she has an artist's sensibility, but is unsure how to tap into it.

In the next chapter, we meet Luke, a member of Prime Space's observation team specializing in psychology. The name of the Mars mission is “Eidolon” and the observation team call themselves “Obbers” (55). Luke is at Prime's Utah headquarters overlooking the San Rafael Swell, where the simulation...