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“She expects! Why doesn’t she trot her … self over there and give him the message. You call her back and tell her to step on it. She can speak to him as soon as he finishes the lecture. These women are too lazy to get off their chairs and stop powdering their noses. You tell her to hand‑deliver that message to Argent.”
Nurse Roditis cleared her throat. “Doctor, should I do something about an operating room downtown?”
“That has to be Redding’s decision … . Where is he? I bet he stopped with one of those university types for coffee. He drinks coffee all day long, it’s a medical miracle he has kidneys left. I drink it by the gallon when I’m around him. If I keep it up, I’ll end up with ulcers like his. Where the bleeding hell is he?”
“If you do want to operate, she had breakfast this morning, but she hasn’t taken anything since.” Nurse Roditis popped a thermometer under Co
Hawk gripped the controls of the floater. Luciente hunched poised at the forward weapon and Co
Hawk was making the floater climb abruptly. They were over the sea, gray waves far below like scales of an enormous fish. The sky was overcast; the puffy bellies of clouds hung over them. They skimmed along just beneath, dodging through fog banks. The floater bobbed corklike in the tides of the air, and she felt a little ill. Hawk looked happy at the controls, singing something Co
“How good to fight beside you
friend of our long table,
mother of my child.”
Hawk warbled in her high thin voice and the floater banked, dipped, leaped while Co
“An army of lovers ca
an army of lovers ca
Hawk warbled in her squeaky soprano, cheerful in the closed cabin, and banked the floater right into a cloud that melted around them, shutting off the world till everything was gray cotton fluff and she could not tell up from down. Co
Luciente gri
“Enjoy? My stomach sticks in my teeth! Do we have to scoot along upside down?”
“We’re like the sea gulls, winging along,” Hawk cried. “How can you not like to fly?”
“You moved this week, Hawk?” Luciente interrupted tactfully.
“I turned over my old place to Poppy. It’s kid‑sized, the bed and chairs are little. Poppy’s been waiting for space for twomonth. Was pla
“Today we carry on Jackrabbit’s fight.” Luciente made herself busy with her weapon. Luciente was operating the jizer and Co
“If we survive,” Luciente said conversationally five minutes later, “have you redded what you’ll do now you’re adult? Bee said you’re dreaming on traveling. Will you apprentice yourself?”
“I’d rather work with floaters than anything. But I want to travel awhile. Never hopped farther than the top of the bay. Thunderbolt and I’ve chewed on taking off for some wandering–after the current phase of the war is over, of course.”
“How do you know it’ll be over?” Co
“Win? It comes in spurts.” Luciente made a face over her shoulder. “Like sun spots.”
“We thought we’d go south. We figure we have a few useful skills to trade and we can always stiff it on any passing work. Bolt is a skilled pollinator. I’m a good begi
“Forty degrees north of east,” Luciente’s voice whipped out. “Two hundred feet lower than present elevation. Dogfight. I count eight objects.”
Hawk canted about, then lurched off through the gray flab in a direction Co
“Almost on them,” she said softly, although of course no one outside could hear them through the cabin walls. “Safeties off. Let’s get them!”
Their floater lurched free of the clouds and straight into the melee. Four of the floaters were decorated like all the machinery at Mattapoisett The other five (nine, not eight, she counted) were khaki‑colored and leaner in construction. Their motors were loud and they left a trail of dark exhaust whenever they climbed.
Hawk carried them right into the midst of the fracas. The noise deafened her, clutching the scammer. When she saw one of the khaki floaters making at them, she shot the weapon and hoped for the best A bolt of light ribboned out. Hawk kept them twisting, climbing, dipping, she turned upside down and flipped over and came about again till Co
Piloted into death by a twelve‑year‑old, she thought. Between the clouds and the vast sea sweeping off into a fog bank, she felt tiny. They were shrunken to the size of insects, of midges and gnats turning in the air. Then she stared at Luciente and her sense of size and proportion returned.
With a red scarf tied around her head to keep her unruly hair from her eyes, Luciente was calm, cheerful at the jizer. She rode out the twists and turns, the plummetings and the shuddering escalations of the floater with apparent pleaure, as if she were riding a spirited horse. Her body moved easily, not freezing in panic as Co
Hawk carried them down through the center of the fight again. Another floater fell past, broken, burning. This time she could see it was a khaki machine. She tried to count the floaters as they bore in. Perhaps there was one less of each.