`Squadron B’s armed with the new missiles, Kincaid,’ Mallen said, though he did not dismiss Kincaid’s obvious alarm. `And the complement includes one of the fast `Dini destroyers.
`What bothered you so about that planet, Kincaid?’ Laria asked in a conversational tone.
He glanced over at her, took a long breath and expelled it.
Flavia was empathic enough to pick up his rising anxiety, and to know that Laria was deffly calming him and carefully shielding his reaction. A quick touch at Zara and Flavia realized that the highly empathic young therapist had been diverted. Zara would mean no harm, but Kincaid had not completely recovered from whatever had depleted both mental and physical resources.
`The frantic activity, the almost desperate urgency with which the Hive creatures pursued what, for any other culture, would be done with … energy … but not such frenetic turmoil.’ `Was it the spring of the planet’s year?’ Jes asked.
`No. I would have understood that!’ Kincaid shook his head and began twisting his hands together.
`I know what bothered you,’ Zara exclaimed, bouncing on her chair.
`The stinggpzzt!’ `The what?’ Kincaid stared at her and then, almost accusingly, at Laria when she began to laugh.
`No-one would have known to tell you, dear friend, Laria said, briefly laying her hand on his shoulder, `but all Talents get a curious reaction from proximity to Hivers and especially Hive metals and artefacts. We named it “stinggpzzt” because that’s the way it echoes in our heads. It leaves a nasty, an unmistakably metallic taste in the back of the throat and tends to make Talents very irritable!’ To everyone’s surprise, Laria then tousled his hair, laughing with relief `Going through all those Hive buildings and ending up on an active Hive world, you had a massive overdose of it. `Stinggpzzt?’ Apparently oblivious to the hairmussing, Kincaid repeated the term in a witless fashion, obviously trying to relate it to his experiences. `The taste I had ruined anything I ate, which was bad enough to start with …
and I was certainly – irritable – – -` `And a good bit beyond mere “irritable”, I’d say,’ Laria remarked. `What a stupid I’ve been not to have seen what’s been bothering you. You must have thought you were going mad with the reactions.’ `Yes,’ and both Kincaid’s expression and his tone echoed his amazement, `yes, I did think I was going insane.’ He looked at the other Talents. `And you’ve all experienced the same reactions?’ `Not me,’ said Jes and Mallen shook his head, but both Zara and Asia emphatically reassured him.
`We summered on Deneb, you know,’ Zara said, `and even if our parents and aunts and uncles and cousins had already found most of the Hive metals from the original two scout ships that got strewn -over the planet, we’d occasionally smell out a piece or two.
Kincaid turned to Flavia. `But you were at the base going through the Refugee – -` `Not inside it, Kincaid,’ she said, smiling. `We’ve been supplied with some protective clothing that’s supposed to reduce the stinggpzzt effect on Talents. We’ll tell you how well it works.’ `I could just kick myself,’ Laria was saying, wallowing in remorse about such an oversight on her part. `Small wonder you had such a miserable time of it, Kincaid.’ Don’t overdo it, sis, Zara said on a thin line to her older sister. But it’s sure taking the angst out of him. A deep one is your Kincaid.
He’s not my Kincaid, Zara, and never likely to be.
More’s the pity, sis. He’s got a real nice aura. But Vanteer, for all he’s a rover, is more your style.
Vanteer? Zara Raven-Lyon, you stop therapizing me, right this instant! D’you understand me?
Before Zara realized how angry she had made her sister, she found herself out in the dawn heat by the multiple carrier.
I can take a hint, she said apologetically. Laria? I’m sorry.
Really I am. And I’m going to be gone for ages.
&ad, was the unequivocal reply. Oh, all right. Iforgive you but don’t try that sort of stunt around me again.
Understand?
Yes.
You don’t do meekness well. The others are coming.