Read The VMR Theory (v1.1) for Free Online Page B

true!” I protested. “Ask anyone! If I knew her would I have married her?” As long as Gwen is twenty or thirty light-years away, she’s one of my favorite people. I’m not quite as fond of her when she’s on the same planet.
    Catarina interrupted. “Ken’s ex-wife is an advertising executive. Why would the Macdonalds hire her?”
    “In opinion polls, Confederation citizens rank this planet’s inhabitants just above reporters, politicians, and child molesters, and the government is interested in sprucing up its public image,” Stemm said. “However, the timing of this is suspicious given their intense interest in the so-called Vampire Master Race Theory.”
    “She’s suing me,” I groaned.
    “Hmram,” Rizvi said, licking his lips. “Ahhhh.”
    “It’s not what you think. She was working for one of the big firms, and after we whipped the Rodent Navy and ended up in the newspapers, she bragged about the connection to her clients.”
    “I can see that her clients might have thought her obtuse for severing the connection prior to your becoming famous,” Rizvi reflected.
    I shook my head. “No, they had better reasons for thinking she’s dippy.”
    Catarina cleared her throat.
    “Oh, yeah. Where was I? Anyway, after the news leaked that I was a vamp, the kimchee hit the fan. She lost a couple of big accounts, her agency fired her, she sued them, they countersued, and then both sides sued me on the legal theory that I intentionally inflicted emotional distress by continuing to be alive.”
    Noticing the puzzled looks on Rizvi’s and Stemm’s faces, Catarina explained, “Gwen’s home of record is in California.”
    California law tends to be a little weird. The California courts recently garnered notoriety for awarding split decisions where both sides in a lawsuit paid damages to each other. It gave new meaning to the phrase “equal protection under the law,” and it worked about the way you’d expect.
    “Anyway,” I said glumly, “I’m trying to stay a jump ahead of her process servers. Between Gwen and the people who are trying to sue me over stuff that happened on Schuyler’s World, I expect I’ll be in court for as long as I live.”
    “Or longer,” Catarina observed.
    Rizvi folded his hands primly. “Well, hopefully you’ll restrain your litigious instincts while you’re here on Alt Bauemhof, Mr. MacKay.”
    I realized that he was making a joke when Mailboat Bobby started chuckling dutifully. After Bobby concluded his spontaneous outburst of hysterical mirth, Rizvi continued, “As part of our standard in-briefing procedures, I must caution you and your crew members to refrain from providing the inhabitants here with any books on the index of prohibited books. We have provided your computer with a complete listing, and you can simply key in titles to find out whether they are prohibited.”
    “What kind of books are on the index?” I asked.
    Rizvi shifted his bulk uncomfortably. “Mainly works of a religious, philosophical, political, or, ahem, fictional nature.”
    I scratched my head. “Does this mean no romance novels?”
    Rizvi gave me a forbidding stare. “Mr. MacKay, the restrictions on destabilizing literature were originally instituted to prevent the mores of a primitive and pastoral people from being contaminated and overwhelmed by Confederation culture. Over the last half century, teams of psychologists brought in to study the situation have repeatedly advocated continuing this ban, due to the extreme literalism that imbues Klo’klotixag society and the violent competitiveness the Klo’klotixag manifest toward mankind.”
    I shuddered at the vision of Macdonalds competing with humans to write trashier romance novels.
    “Moreover, it would be highly destabilizing to Con-federation-Klo’klotixag relations for the Confederation government to have to, er, admit to the practice at this late date.”
    “Ah, right.” Having experienced the Bucky Beaver phenomenon