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parents they weren't gone. He'd grieved hard because he hadn't known that.
He massaged his throbbing head, and abruptly, curiosity about the battle
raging above the sky brought him the entire resource of the local comnode. It
was a weird sensation, without the echo of his private file recording
everything, monitoring, enforcing the Guarantees. Yet he had no trouble
reading the scope recorders to ascertain that dozens of the little lander
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crafts had been destroyed, along with many of the fighters. The sky was full
of the little ships though. And the big ships still fought beyond sight. "The
pirates don't know the Selector is gone."
He spotted a lander headed for the area where they now stood, and another
disgorging its task force beyond the Maze. Nearby, was the hopper Thsee Rith
had come in.
"Come on!" he said, and led the way to the hopper.
Tumbling inside, he ran a quick check, and as Arshel climbed in, he took off,
overriding all the safeties.
Keeping low, he put the hopper down on the shuttlepad outside the village.
Nobody was on the streets now. Even the shuttle-launch control shack was
empty.
But Zref anticipated no trouble, until Arshel balked at the yacht's shuttle.
"Zref, this was hers!"
"I know! Her yacht's the fastest thing within ten days of here!"
He pulled her in and strapped her into the copilot's seat. He took control
through the comnet, launching them through a window between the fighting
ships.
As acceleration hit, she was saying, "But what's the hurry? You can file your
report via comnet, and we can get to Hengrave in our own good time!"
"We're not going to Hengrave," he gasped as g-force pushed the air out of his
lungs.
They fought it silently all the way up, Zref making course corrections until
they mated with the yacht, which he had, primed and ready to receive them.
It was a one-man ship, but could accommodate half a dozen. It was almost fully
stocked. It would take the two of them twice across the HP and back.
They were still in the shuttle when Zref pulled the yacht out of orbit not
waiting for official clearance.
"Zref, what are you doing?" demanded Arshel.
On the way to the control room, Zref said, "We're not going to Hengrave or
Camiat, either. We're leaving. Leaving the HP for good." He Strapped into the
pilot's seat, aware of the residue of Thsee Rith's presence but ignoring it.
He was haunted by whispers of his aklal, too. It often took a long time after
a body was dead for the death processes to complete, especially in death by
violence.
"Arshel, do you remember Final Duty?"
She pulled out of her distracted shock, comprehension dawning. "We can help
them!"
They joined one last time through their aklal symbol. Shui, Iraem, Waysjoff,
Arai and Neini were there, drifting, perplexed. They greeted Zref and Arshel
with joy. "Guide us back!"
"You've nothing to go back to," said Zref, replaying his memory of the
ruination of their bodies and all that came after. "You must go on now," he
added, the hardest thing he'd ever said in his life. "That way!" Hugging them
all within himself, he turned them toward the light and propelled them onward.
They understood at last. Clinging to each other, they turned back to Zref, who
was weeping openly, and Arshel, who was raising venom, straining to go with
them. "Don't grieve," said
Aral. "It was worth it. We'd all dedicated our lives to this and we won free
of the debt."
Shui hugged Arshel, saying, "We invoked. We knew the price. There'll be other
chances, Arshel. You've earned the rest of this life with Zref many times
over. Live!"
As the five drifted toward the light, Zref heard Waysjoff say contentedly,
"I've nothing to complain about."
And then Zref was sucked back down into his body. He hadn't had a chance to
search for Khelin, Ley and Jocelyn. But since they weren't with the others,
Zref could only assume they'd found their own way. Leave it to Khelin to keep
oriented.' His cheeks were slick with tears.
He could barely see his scopes, which showed exactly what Astrogation was
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telling him one pirate left, one HP Escorter left. Epitasis still in orbit.
Smaller ships scattered everywhere amid fragments of their fellows.
As the yacht began to move, Zref threw his trajectory onto Epitasis's scopes,
asking them to move to allow the yacht out, adding, "Captain, I'd appreciate
your cooperation. Zref." He knew he shouldn't have signed it, leaving the HP a
means of tracing him, but he couldn't bring himself to invade her ship and
move it without her assent again.
Meanwhile, Zref followed an exchange between Astrogation and the Escorter. The
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Dobre pomysły nie mają przeszłości, mają tylko przyszłość. Robert Mallet
De minimis - o najmniejszych rzeczach.
Dobroć jest ważniejsza niż mądrość, a uznanie tej prawdy to pierwszy krok do mądrości. Theodore Isaac Rubin
Dobro to tylko to, co szlachetne, zło to tylko to, co haniebne.
Dla człowieka nie tylko świat otaczający jest zagadką; jest on nią sam dla siebie. I z obu tajemnic bardziej dręczącą wydaje się ta druga. Antoni Kępiński (1918-1972)
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