She went on, “But even with greater numbers, how could his warriors be a worthy addition to yours, who possess wondrous weapons?”
“If they join us as I ask, then they will have such weapons too,” Zeigler promised.
Just then, the compad in Kelm’s tunic pocket beeped. It was set to accept priority interrupts only. He took it out and raised it to his ear, keeping it on audio only. His eyes flickered unconsciously over Zeigler as he listened. “Yes, he’s here with me. I’ll put him on.” He passed the set to Zeigler. “It’s OpCom. The power control room is reporting some kind of problem with the Agni. They’ve put out a call for Dr. Keene.”
“I should get over there,” Zeigler said. “Stay here and make arrangements to get these people back to Joburg. See who we can spare to make an instruction fire-team. I want a dozen at least of Rakki’s fighting men to begin small-arms familiarization right away. Also, find out what you can about these other people over the mountains. They sound like the material we could really use. Maybe that chief of theirs that this guy here is ready to take out is the hook that’ll get them for us.”
* * *
Aboard the Aztec, Vicki sat playing a solitaire game, her eyes following the cards as she turned them but not really seeing them. Tanya, who had ended up as Vicki’s cabin mate, watched from a folding seat on the far side of the cramped space. She and Vicki’s other friends had tried to arrange things such that someone was always with her ever since contact with the Trojan was lost. There had been no further news from Saturn.
“His father was killed in a Navy accident when he was just a boy,” Vicki said, almost to herself. “So I did the single-parent thing for a lot of years. Then Lan appeared and we started the consultancy in Texas, and he was probably the nearest thing to a father that Robin ever really knew. But he was always more of the loner kind of a kid—forever with his head in a book, or immersed in some project that he’d found on his own. Finally, he did start getting something of a life and friends together . . . and promptly lost all of it. Of course, everyone was affected. But Robin never really got over it. He was bitter and withdrawn the whole time we were on Dione. Nothing seemed to get through to him. Lan tried, so did Leo Cavan—he was a friend we’d known since Earth. Joining the Security Arm seemed almost like an act of defiance sometimes—as if he was trying to get some kind of message across. But then maybe it was just a way of escaping. I remember when he said he was going on the Jupiter mission, Lan and I thought it might have been the best thing that could have happened.”
Tanya sat, letting her talk it out. At least she wasn’t insulting Vicki’s intelligence by reciting inane things like “no news is good news,” or any of a dozen other platitudes that the occasion might have prompted.
Vicki contemplated the situation, conceding defeat, and shuffled up the cards to begin dealing out the array again. “Did you ever meet Sariena?”
“The Kronian scientist who was with the delegation that Gallian took to Earth?” Tanya shook her head. “No, but I’ve heard of her. Why?”
“She used to talk about the Kronians’ belief in us and the universe being here for a purpose—the opposite of what they used to teach on Earth. You were on Kronia long enough to know. Is that the way you see things too?”
“You mean about there being some kind of intelligence at work at the back of it all, that it was designed for a reason?”
“That’s part of it, yes. But more than just that. The whole experience of existence serves a purpose. Not so much what you become or who you end up being in worldly terms; but the experience itself. Period.”
“Well, yes, that’s how I was raised to think back home, so it comes pretty naturally to me. So many things make more sense that way. The particular person that you happen to be right now isn’t especially significant—like a vehicle that you use for a while, and then you’re done with. But there’s a more permanent something behind them all.”