sympathy. Today, he leaned forward and spoke with a self-conscious cruelty normally foreign to his nature.
"Oh? I suppose you mean that there's still no word of any ship returning from Altair."
Varien visibly flinched, as if from a sudden jag of pain. Nuraeniel had returned from Sirius when expected, reporting that binary star's lack of displacement points. But from Aelanni there had been no word. Ample time had passed for her to locate any displacement points Altair possessed, or to satisfy herself that there were none to be found, and return to Sol. Then still more time had passed. And now, with Moving Day less than three months away, there was no question of sending a rescue mission to Altair. Aelanni and her crew were presumed lost.
"No, there is not," Varien said slowly, "although that isn't what I meant." He drew a deep breath, seeming to gather his strength. "Aelanni understood the risks involved, Colonel. She was not . . . is not a soldier, in your sense—we have had none for a long, long time, as I have explained. But she has always had a comparable sense of duty." He paused. Was there the slightest hint of malice in his eyes? "And, if memory serves, she showed no great hesitation about leaving, Colonel!"
A cold anger flared in DiFalco, banishing everything he had started to feel for an old man who had reason to believe both his children were dead. "Yes, there is something soldierly about her, isn't there? She'll follow orders . . . no matter what she thinks of them! No matter how cynical and unworthy she knows their motivations are!"
For a long moment they glared at each other in dead silence. It was a subject they had both shied away from—this was the closest either had ever come to an open acusation. It was Varien who blinked first, and lowered his eyes with a sigh.
"Whatever I did was done for the good of everyone concerned. You can have no conception of the cultural gulf! And Aelanni has led a life that perhaps leaves her unprepared for some things . . . unable to see beyond the glamor of novelty." He stopped with an annoyed look. "But I have permitted myself to be distracted from my original purpose, Colonel! A ship has, in fact, arrived under continuous-displacement drive . . . but from Alpha Centauri!"
DiFalco at once forgot everything but the implications of Varien's news. It went without saying that the Raehaniv had known about the ship's arrival first; their gravitic technology included grav scanners, capable of realtime detection over interplanetary distances due to gravity's instantaneous propagation. They could detect a ship's emergence from a displacement point—although the scanner, being directional, had to be trained on the displacement point at precisely the right time. And the continuous-displacement drive, with its ongoing series of intense grav pulses, showed up like the proverbial sore thumb. Both were, of course, undetectable by any instrument known to Earth's science. (He recalled, with a flash of amusement, the we-are-alone types in the last century who had made much of the absence of visible Bussard ramjet exhausts in the skies between the stars.)
"Alpha Centauri," he repeated. "So it can only be . . ."
" . . . the remaining picket ship from Tareil," Varien finished for him. "Which was under orders to abandon its station and come here under one and only one set of circumstances. I fear, Colonel, that that ship brings news that transcends our personal concerns—even our concern for Aelanni."
* * *
Naeriy zho'Troilaen was young for a ship captain, but she had aged quickly of late. That was clear as she told her story in the briefing room of Varien's ship. (It still bothered DiFalco that the Raehaniv ships lacked names; the custom had never arisen among them. Wasn't it supposed to be bad luck?)
"The Korvaasha began routine surveying almost as soon as they had settled into their occupation of Raehan. It seems they didn't trust the official records, taking for
"Oh? I suppose you mean that there's still no word of any ship returning from Altair."
Varien visibly flinched, as if from a sudden jag of pain. Nuraeniel had returned from Sirius when expected, reporting that binary star's lack of displacement points. But from Aelanni there had been no word. Ample time had passed for her to locate any displacement points Altair possessed, or to satisfy herself that there were none to be found, and return to Sol. Then still more time had passed. And now, with Moving Day less than three months away, there was no question of sending a rescue mission to Altair. Aelanni and her crew were presumed lost.
"No, there is not," Varien said slowly, "although that isn't what I meant." He drew a deep breath, seeming to gather his strength. "Aelanni understood the risks involved, Colonel. She was not . . . is not a soldier, in your sense—we have had none for a long, long time, as I have explained. But she has always had a comparable sense of duty." He paused. Was there the slightest hint of malice in his eyes? "And, if memory serves, she showed no great hesitation about leaving, Colonel!"
A cold anger flared in DiFalco, banishing everything he had started to feel for an old man who had reason to believe both his children were dead. "Yes, there is something soldierly about her, isn't there? She'll follow orders . . . no matter what she thinks of them! No matter how cynical and unworthy she knows their motivations are!"
For a long moment they glared at each other in dead silence. It was a subject they had both shied away from—this was the closest either had ever come to an open acusation. It was Varien who blinked first, and lowered his eyes with a sigh.
"Whatever I did was done for the good of everyone concerned. You can have no conception of the cultural gulf! And Aelanni has led a life that perhaps leaves her unprepared for some things . . . unable to see beyond the glamor of novelty." He stopped with an annoyed look. "But I have permitted myself to be distracted from my original purpose, Colonel! A ship has, in fact, arrived under continuous-displacement drive . . . but from Alpha Centauri!"
DiFalco at once forgot everything but the implications of Varien's news. It went without saying that the Raehaniv had known about the ship's arrival first; their gravitic technology included grav scanners, capable of realtime detection over interplanetary distances due to gravity's instantaneous propagation. They could detect a ship's emergence from a displacement point—although the scanner, being directional, had to be trained on the displacement point at precisely the right time. And the continuous-displacement drive, with its ongoing series of intense grav pulses, showed up like the proverbial sore thumb. Both were, of course, undetectable by any instrument known to Earth's science. (He recalled, with a flash of amusement, the we-are-alone types in the last century who had made much of the absence of visible Bussard ramjet exhausts in the skies between the stars.)
"Alpha Centauri," he repeated. "So it can only be . . ."
" . . . the remaining picket ship from Tareil," Varien finished for him. "Which was under orders to abandon its station and come here under one and only one set of circumstances. I fear, Colonel, that that ship brings news that transcends our personal concerns—even our concern for Aelanni."
* * *
Naeriy zho'Troilaen was young for a ship captain, but she had aged quickly of late. That was clear as she told her story in the briefing room of Varien's ship. (It still bothered DiFalco that the Raehaniv ships lacked names; the custom had never arisen among them. Wasn't it supposed to be bad luck?)
"The Korvaasha began routine surveying almost as soon as they had settled into their occupation of Raehan. It seems they didn't trust the official records, taking for
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