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that had held their image.
She put the ID papers of both transport and crew in a sealed pouch, and stored
it safely away for later examination. Dupaynil came in, with two
Com specialists, to take the homing capsule' away. He asked if she wanted to
watch them extract the message, but she shook her head. At the moment, she'd
take a break from the day's craziness, and discuss the evening's menu with her
favorite cook.
When the call came in from the survivors' geologist, one Dimenon, relayed
through Com, she collected the Iretan heavyworlders and the expedition
co-leaders. Mayerd shepherded Kai, clearly unwilling to let such an
interesting case out of her sight, and Ford brought Varian.
Dimenon had had a good reason for contacting the cruiser - not only a video of
twenty-three small Thek, but an interaction between them and the creature that
had attacked Kai. Sassinak had already viewed the tape once, and now in the
re-run watched Kai's reaction to these odd creatures - fringes, they called
them. The man was positively terror-
struck as the fringes advanced on the Thek, his breathing labored and his skin
color poor. He had not moved well, coming into her office, but she thought if
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a fringe appeared in real life he would somehow manage to run. Pity and
disgust contended in her mind. Had he always been like this, or had events
overcome him? What did Varian think? Sassinak
glanced at her, and realized that she, too, was covertly watching him, her
expression guarded.
Sassinak distracted Varian with a question about the fringes, and
Mayerd, bless her perception, kept the conversation going thereafter . . .
although Kai's answers, when he spoke, tended to cause a sudden rift.
Then the Iretans began to ask their own questions, about the Thek, and their
place in the Federation. Sass's opinion of Aygar's intelligence climbed
another notch. He could think - and, it seemed in the next exchange, he even
had a sense of humor. For when Sassinak asked him what weapon his people used
against the fringes, he said, "We run," in a tone of rich irony.
A slight easing of tension, and the conversation continued: fringes and their
habits, the aquatic fringes the expedition had observed before the mutiny.
Aygar was surprised by that . . . and Sassinak was just wondering how she
could shift the conversation to the reptiloids when
Varian, answering a question, mentioned the word. Dinosaurs. Fordeliton leaped
on it with such eagerness that Sassinak half-expected Varian to recoil
suspiciously. But apparently she thought it was natural for a grown man, a
Fleet cruiser Executive Officer, to leap into an argument about whether
anything resembling a true Old Earth dinosaur could have evolved in such a
different world. Varian reeled off a string of names.
Ford gaped, and then brought Aygar into it.
Sassinak let the excited exchange continue a minute or so, then put a halt to
it with such pointed lack of interest for anything but the political situation
that she knew they'd erupt again when her back was turned. So much the better.
By the time she ushered the Iretans out, Varian and Kai had practically
adopted Ford. She had no trouble persuading them to take all six of the
short-listed specialists . . . Varian, in fact, was openly gleeful. She
wondered if Mayerd had found out anything from Kai, besides the nature of his
injuries and illness, but the medic had spent all her time on physical
symptoms.
"It's no use asking why he's depressed and nervous until he's no longer in
pain, feverish, and numb in places."
"I should think numbness preferable to pain," said Sassinak tartly. "How can
he be both?"
Mayerd gave her a look which reminded her she hadn't eaten on time, and
suggested they take a short break. "Eat a bit of that chocolate you
keep hidden around here," she said, "and I'll have a cup of tea, and we'll all
keep from biting our heads off, shall we?"
"Don't mother me, Mayerd. I'm not old and decrepit."
"No," said Mayerd shrewdly, "but you're about to meet a fourth-
generation ancestor who's years younger than you are, and for all you know a
raving beauty who'll steal Ford's heart away and leave you withering in the
blast of dead passion."
Sassinak whooped, and her tension dissolved in an instant. "You -
That's ridiculous!"
"True, O Captain. So are some other people. Done grieving for Huron yet, or
are you still feeling so guilty you can't enjoy your many admirers?"
"You're making me blush. None of your business, I'd say, except it is, since
you're my physician. Well, yes, I have enjoyed normal - or at least
pleasurable - involvement in the last few weeks."
"Good. About time. That boy Tim's in awe of you, by the way, so I hope you're
going to let him back into your good graces sometime."
"Already done, fairy godmother, so let me be."
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"Back to Kai, then. The toxin destroyed nerve tissue, so he's got sensory
deprivation on some areas of skin - nasty, because he doesn't know when he's
hurt himself. Where the tissue's not destroyed, it's stimulated -
just like pain, but the brain can't register constant stimulus like that, so
he just gets these odd stabs and twinges, and a general feeling of something
very wrong, very deep. His blood count's off, which probably causes the
exhaustion you noticed, and he's not sleeping well, which doesn't help. I
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