"Payne says we're going out. Soon as Jariel is evacuated. The sharks will have to take their chances."

"Oh, damn."

"What do the starfish say?" Hans asked, returning with a fruit drink. He was putting on a brave face. He had been in the fleet long enough to learn how to wait for good news or bad. They would let him know about his sister.

BenRabi swung his feet to the deck. "Like I said. I couldn't get through. Too far."

"Maybe somebody else did."

"Somebody with more experience? I don't think so."

Hans was just nineteen, hardly out of creche. He had not yet hardened to all the realities of the harvestfleet.

"Well just have to do it Payne's way. Fight our way through." BenRabi began shuddering as his body reacted to the massive dosage of anti-pain drug. Clara swept a blanket around his shoulders. It did not lessen the chills.

They still did not know for certain that they had won the battle of Stars' End. They knew only that Payne's Fleet had held the battle space, had survived, and had begun making its way home. They had not been attacked again, yet, but it was only a matter of time till the struggle resumed.

"Look at me," benRabi whispered. "I can't stop shaking."

"Go home," Clara told him. "Get some sleep."

"We might break through. They might need me to go on minddrive. Just let me stretch my legs." He picked at his arm where the needle had broken his skin. The strain of the emergency had begun to show on his flesh. He was getting tracks.

He collapsed when he tried to stand.

"Take him home, Hans," Clara told the youth. "Lester. Help Hans load Moyshe onto a scooter, will you?"

"What's going on?" benRabi demanded as Hans halted the flatbed electric truck outside his quarters. For a moment he did not know where he was. "Why did you?... "

"What happened?" a woman demanded. Worry strangled her voice.