`You realize that that Hiver ship, even with its three scouts, hadn’t a chance,’ Rojer said, blithely tucking into a huge meal in their quarters late that next afternoon. `Operation Overkill, that’s what it was.’ `Need I remind you how many `Dinis died in the KLTS?’ Thian said, glaring at his brother.
He had read the riot act to both Rojer and Clancy for `endangering’ their lives which were far too valuable to be risked. He could also point to the minor cuts and contusions which both had suffered when their respective ships had manoeuvred abruptly or suffered concussive buffeting: those could as easily have been mortal wounds.
`I’m not that slow, Thian,’ Rojer replied indignantly, even if I didn’t manage to keep my balance through all the bumps and grinds the Revere did. But you should have seen some of the others. I `ported when I could.’ `I got most of mine, and Clancy fingered the long pro-skin dressing down one side of his face, the splint on his left arm, the sealed wound on the right, and managed a benevolent expression, `buffering someone else’s impact.’ `Besides which, big brother,’ Rojer said, hands on his belt and an intense frown on his face, `if either of us had made use of the escape pods, you’d really have had bad news to send home. It only occurred to me when I was stuck in it, that the damned pod was the most dangerous place to be! I was at Xh-33, remember, and I watched the queens’ pods get blown out of the sky the way we’d pick off avians! Any one of the Hiver scouts could have made a real killing. – – of pods!’ `We also saved both the Revere and the Franklin from being made into sieves,’ Clancy reminded Thian, `or smashed flat. Shielding the ships shielded us and it’s really only a very minor variation of our standing orders from Uncle Jeff.’ He grinned engagingly. `Just a larger escape pod.
`I’ll have to tell him what you did!’ Thian was not about to let them get away without reprimand.
`Go right ahead!’ Clancy said, his grin broader, `but I heard that both Spktm and Ashiant are mentioning our defensive action as the main reason casualties were minimal. although I do now appreciate why the Mrdinis had to consider suicide attacks! There can’t be much room on those scouts with all those heavy missiles they fire off. And that sphere wasn’t going to give up short of total destruction!’ Thian could never stay angry long, not in the presence of Clancy, though he continued to feel an irritable frustration, especially as the two young heroes tossed off their actions as nothing out of the ordinary for Talents of their abilities. That almost annoyed Thian more.
`I think,’ Gravy told him when they met for a quiet meal in the medics’ mess-room, `that you’re a little jealous maybe, Thian, that you weren’t in on the action?’ `Me? Jealous?’ He regarded AlisonAnne, startled.
He’d never thought of himself as a jealous person for any reason.
Her blue eyes twinkled up at him. `Jealous of things or people, no, Thian. But jealous, a little perhaps, of prestige. `Are you sure you’re still T-5?’ I`Probably not,’ she said airily with a delighted sigh, `but I am an empath and very empathic for you.’ She reached across the small table and stroked the back of his hand lightly, a contact that conveyed more than empathy. `I’ve picked up as much from you – Talentwise – as I have about treating `Dinis from Medic Sblipk.
More perhaps,’ and her eyes laughed at him over the rim of her cup.
`You had the hard part – watching, waiting, hoping. Do Talents pray?’ This was said with such an ingenuous expression that Thian felt his aggravation and frustration dissolve. `Besides which,’ she went on, teasing him, `you saw action long before they did, on the Great Sphere.’ Thian made a face at her. “That little fracas was not against live Hivers.’ `The difference is immaterial, Thian. And it was far more dangerous than what your brother and cousin did.’ Thian faith%lly forwarded Captain Ashiant’s detailed report of the encounter and decided, when he could not help but `feel’ Jeff Raven’s furious reaction to the heroism of Rojer and Clancy, that he could safely leave any further discipline to Earth Prime, and Callisto Prime, and possibly both Aurigaean Primes. Righteous anger often ripened with waiting.