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Bart looked out the viewport at the swirl and burn of the colors there. Now that he could never speak of the colors, it seemed he had never been so wholly and wistfully aware of them. They symbolized the thing he could never put into words. So that everyone can have this. Not just the Lhari. Rugel watched the Mentorians go, scowling.
Don Quixote no sooner heard a book of chivalry mentioned, than he said: "Had your worship told me at the beginning of your story that the Lady Luscinda was fond of books of chivalry, no other laudation would have been requisite to impress upon me the superiority of her understanding, for it could not have been of the excellence you describe had a taste for such delightful reading been wanting; so, as far as I am concerned, you need waste no more words in describing her beauty, worth, and intelligence; for, on merely hearing what her taste was, I declare her to be the most beautiful and the most intelligent woman in the world; and I wish your worship had, along with Amadis of Gaul, sent her the worthy Don Rugel of Greece, for I know the Lady Luscinda would greatly relish Daraida and Garaya, and the shrewd sayings of the shepherd Darinel, and the admirable verses of his bucolics, sung and delivered by him with such sprightliness, wit, and ease; but a time may come when this omission can be remedied, and to rectify it nothing more is needed than for your worship to be so good as to come with me to my village, for there I can give you more than three hundred books which are the delight of my soul and the entertainment of my life; though it occurs to me that I have not got one of them now, thanks to the spite of wicked and envious enchanters; but pardon me for having broken the promise we made not to interrupt your discourse; for when I hear chivalry or knights-errant mentioned, I can no more help talking about them than the rays of the sun can help giving heat, or those of the moon moisture; pardon me, therefore, and proceed, for that is more to the purpose now."
He said woozily, "How long was I out?" "The usual time," Ringg said briskly, "about three seconds just while we hit peak warp-drive. Feels longer, so they tell me, sometimes time's funny, beyond light-speeds. The medic says it's purely psychological. I'm not so sure. I itch, blast it!" He moved his shoulders in a squirming way, then bent over Rugel, who was moaning, half insensible.
Someday we'll reach true simultaneity enter warp, and come out just where we want to be, at the same time. Just a split-second interval. That will be real transmission." Ringg scoffed, "And suppose you get even better and come out of warp before you go into it? What then, Honorable Bald One?" Rugel chuckled, and did not answer. Bart turned away. It was not easy to keep on hating the Lhari.
Rugel watched him, laughing softly. "Well, you'll have enough time down here. I like to have youngsters who are still in the middle of a love affair with their work. Come along, and I'll show you your cabin."
The lights in the drive chamber began to dim or was he blacking out? The stinging in his flesh was a clawed pain. Briscoe lived through it.... They say. The whirling star-tracks fogged, coiled, turned colorless worms of light, went into a single vast blur. Dimly Bart saw old Rugel slump forward, moaning softly; saw the old Lhari pillow his bald head on his veined arms.
A year ago, frightened, terribly alone, still unsteady on his new Lhari muscles and terrified by the monsters that were his shipmates, he had watched these planets spinning away. Poor old Rugel, poor old Baldy! Behind him, Meta came into the lounge. "Bart " He turned to face her. "It won't be much longer, Meta. Tomorrow I'll find out what the Federation is going to do to me.
"If Rugel isn't sore about it, and if we don't need it for landing, why worry?" He felt like Judas. "Just take a look at my daybook," Ringg insisted, "I checked and marked it service fit! I tell you, somebody was blundering around, opening panels where they had no business, tore it out by accident, then was too much of a filthy sneak to report it and get it fixed!"
After the warp-drive shift, Vorongil came to his cabin, this time crisp and businesslike. "We're back in your galaxy," he said, "among the stars you know. We have no passenger space on the Swiftwing; we had to ship out without replacing Rugel, which means we're short two men. I've no authority to ask this of you, but would you like your old job back for the rest of the voyage?"
He saw Bartol and called, "Are you the new First Class? I'm Rugel, coordinator." Rugel had a huge cleft darkish scar across his lip, and there were two bands on his cloak. He was completely bald, and he puffed when he walked. "Vorongil asked me to show you around. You'll share quarters with Ringg no sense shifting another man.
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