Once more, she was paged: “Ekel! Emergency in Sickbay!”

They skidded around the comer into the passage to the Docking Bay and nearly overturned the gurney. Ferry grabbed for it and prevented Waela from sliding off.

Hali helped to settle Waela as they continued pushing toward Number Eight. They were passing Number Five and she could see the Eight down the passage ahead of them.

Ferry, reaching under Waela’s shoulder as they moved, pulled out something which had caught his eye.

Hali saw him go pale. “What’s that?”

He held it up for her to see.

The thing looked insidious—a small pale tube of silver.

“Tracer,” Ferry gasped.

“Where was it?”

“Murdoch must’ve tried to feed it to her, but he didn’t stick around long enough to be sure she swallowed it. She must’ve spit it out.”

“But . . .”

“They know where we are. The biocomputer can track this through the body, yes, but it can also track it anywhere in Ship.”

Hali grabbed it out of his hand and threw it behind her as far as she could.

“All we need’s a little delay.”

“This is as far as you go, Ekel!”

It was Murdoch’s shrill voice almost paralyzing her as he stepped out of the Number Eight hatch just ahead of Ferry. She glimpsed a laser scalpel in his hand, realizing he could use it as a weapon. That thing under full power could sever a leg at ten meters!

Chapter 57

Chapter 57

As the Jesuits recognized, a key function of logic limits argument and, therefore, confines the thinking process. As far back as the Vedanta, this way of tying down the wild creativity of thought was codified into seven logic-directing categories: Quality, Substance, Action, Generality, Particularity, Intimate Relation and Non-existence (or Negation). These were thought to define the true limits of the symbolic universe. The recognition that all symbol processes are inherently open-ended and infinite came much later.

—Raja Thomas, Shiprecords

THE HYLIGHTER with Thomas cradled in its tentacles vented a brief undulating song and began a slow drop into blue haze. Thomas felt the tentacles enfolding him, heard the song—was even aware that Alki was beginning its long slide into sunset. He saw the dark purple of the meridian sky, saw the side-lighted brilliance of the blue haze and a surrounding rim of steep crags. He saw all of this and still was not sure of what he saw, nor was he entirely sure of his own sanity.

The haze enclosed him then, warm and moist.

His memories were confused, like something seen through swirling water. They moved and shifted, combining in ways that frightened him.

Calm. Be calm.

He could not be sure this was his own thought.

Where was I?

He thought he remembered being thrust into the open outside Oakes’ Redoubt. The land beneath him, then, could still be Black Dragon. He could not, however, remember being picked up by a hylighter.