"Yes," I told her. "Yes, Dirk." I ran a quick inventory of my feelings, a kind of mental self-test. There was still sadness and black depression in my heart, but overlaying it was a terrible fear. I forced myself to sit up, looked down at the floor. Yes, there were the fragments of the chip. It really was destroyed, she really had crushed it. I found that more reassuring than I'd have believed possible.