That is what I had been looking for. It was not what caught my eye.
The indicated Warrior was approaching our group now. I was pleased to note he had not removed his echo helmet. The force was rapidly approaching the point where they would be as natural maneuvering from the echo helmet data as with their normal vision.
“I am Rahm,” I beamed to him, stepping forward. “May I examine your wedge-sword?”
“Yes, Commander,” responded the Warrior, smoothly snatching the weapon from his harness and extending it to me handle first.
I took the sword and examined it closely. It was identical to my own weapon in size, heft, and balance, except for the pommel weight at the butt of the weapon. It was this that had caught my eye. Rather than being smoothly tooled like my own, it was fashioned as an irregular lump.
“I am puzzled by the design of your pommel, Warrior,” I beamed. “What improvement does this deviation from the normal pattern signify?”
There was a moment’s hesitation before the Warrior replied.
“None, Commander.”
“Then why use this design over the standard?”
“It’s fashioned to resemble the head of an Ant, Commander.”
I examined the pommel again. He was right. Now that I was looking for that specific feature, the pommel did roughly approximate the head of an Ant.
“But why would you want a pommel that looks like the head of an Ant?”
“It…it gives me pleasure to look at it, Commander.”
I was beginning to think there was something significant indicated here. Perhaps a recurrence of the inactive time problem I had experienced on my last mission.