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she could put on an environs and walk or drift in silence, surrounded by the dark shapes of equipment
wrapped in plexerv. There was so much about ship operations she didn't understand, hadn't been taught.
Why carry so much excess equipment, weapons far more than they'd need even for replacements? She
could think of possibilities superiors on Mercior wanting their cruisers to have flexible mission
capabilities, for one but her ignorance troubled her less thanwhy she was ignorant. Why was it necessary
to keep fighters in the dark on so many subjects?
She pulled herself through the cold G-less tunnels, feeling slightly awked by the loneness, the quiet. One
tunnel angled outboard, toward the hull of the cruiser. She hesitated, peering into its length with her
environs beacon, when a beep warned her she was near another crew member. She was startled to think
someone else might be as curious as she. The other hawks and crew, for the most part, had long outgrown
their need to wander and regarded it as birdish. Prufrax was used to being different she had always
perceived herself, with some pride, as a bit of a freak. She scooted expertly up the tunnel, spreading her
arms and tucking her legs as she would in a fightsuit.
The tunnel was filled with a faint milky green mist, absorbing her environs beam. It couldn't be much
more than a couple of hundred meters long, however, and it was quite straight. The signal beeped louder.
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The Venging
Ahead she could make out a dismantled weapons blister. That explained the fog: a plexerv aerosol
diffused in the low pressure. Sitting in the blister was a man, his environs glowing a pale violet. He had
deopaqued a section of the blister and was staring out at the stars. He swiveled as she approached and
looked her over dispassionately. He seemed to be a hawk he had fightform, tall, thin with brown hair
above hull-white skin, large eyes with pupils so dark she might have been looking through his head into
space beyond.
"Under," she said as their environs met and merged.
"Over. What are you doing here?"
"I was about to ask you the same."
"You should be getting ready for the fight," he admonished.
"I am. I need to be alone for a while."
"Yes." He turned back to the stars. "I used to do that, too."
"You don't fight now?"
He shook his head. "Retired. I'm a researcher."
She tried not to look impressed. Crossing rates was almost impossible. A bi-talent was unusual in the
service.
"What kind of research?" she asked.
"I'm here to correlate enemy finds."
"Won't find much of anything, after we're done with the zero phase."
It would have been polite for him to say, "Power to that," or offer some other encouragement. He said
nothing.
"Why would you want to research them?"
"To fight an enemy properly, you have to know what they are. Ignorance is defeat."
"You research tactics?"
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"Not exactly."
"What, then?"
"You'll be in a tough hardfought this wake. Make you a proposition. You fight well, observe, come to me
and tell me what you see. Then I'll answer your questions."
"Brief you before my immediate overs?"
"I have the authority," he said. No one had ever lied to her; she didn't even suspect he would. "You're
eager?"
"Very."
"You'll be doing what?"
"Engaging Senexi fighters, then hunting down branch inds and brood minds."
"How many fighters going in?"
"Twelve."
"Big target, eh?"
She nodded.
"While you're there, ask yourself what are they fighting for? Understand?"
"I "
"Ask, what are they fighting for. Just that. Then come back to me."
"What's your name?"
"Not important," he said. "Now go."
She returned to the prep center as the sponge-space warning tones began. Overhawks went among the
fighters in the lineup, checking gear and giveaway body points for mental orientation. Prufrax submitted
to the molded sensor mask being slipped over her face. "Ready!" the overhawk said. "Hardfought!" He
clapped her on the shoulder. "Good luck."
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"Thank you, sir." She bent down and slid into her fightsuit. Along the launch line, eleven other hawks did
the same. The overs and other crew left the chamber, and twelve red beams delineated the launch tube.
The fightsuits automatically lifted and aligned on their individual beams. Fields swirled around them like
silvery tissue in moving water, then settled and hardened into cold scintillating walls, pulsing as the
launch energy built up.
The tactic came to her. The ship's sensors became part of her information net. She saw the Senexi
thornship twelve kilometers in diameter, cuckoos lacing its outer hull like maggots on red fruit, snakes
waiting to take them on.
She was terrified and exultant, so worked up that her body temperature was climbing. The fightsuit
adjusted her balance.
At the count of ten and nine, she switched from biologic to cyber. The implant after absorbing much of
her thought processes for weeks became Prufrax.
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