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present information," he said. We commence operations in approximately six hundred seconds, after we receive the technical crew's
signal. Any questions?

    "My question," said Rey to Magan over the ConfidentialWhisper
channel, "is whether this whole thing is overkill."
    The skepticism in her voice would have earned a swift reprimand
had it come from anyone else. But Magan had learned long ago that
kowtowing to superiors was simply not part of Rey Gonerev's nature.
She would continue dropping little bombs of snarkiness all morning
until he had answered her. "If you insist on observing," replied Magan
over the 'Whisper channel, "the least you could do is follow standard
procedure and use Council battle language."
    The solicitor made a dismissive shrug. "This isn't a military issue,"
she stated icily. "It's a policy question, and you know it."
    "This policy comes from High Executive Borda."
    "But Magan-nineteen dartguns, six disruptors, and three technical crew, just for one unarmed man? You've taken out whole Pharisee outposts with fewer boots on the ground."
    Lieutenant Lee gritted his teeth, perfectly aware that he had no
cause to gainsay her. You know she's right, he told himself. And there's
nothing you can do about it. He seethed momentarily with ire for the
unsorted, for the unordered, for the chaotic and unplanned.
    Magan turned and gave Rey Gonerev an appraising look. She had
risen once again from her seat and was standing alongside the pilot
watching the formation. Gonerev should have been the type of volatile
element that Magan tried to suppress from the Council hierarchy.
Instead he had worked hard to put Rey Gonerev in the chief solicitor's
office, and it had taken him some time to realize why. It was precisely
because she refused to kiss ass, because she was not Len Borda's toady
and did not aspire to be Magan's either. Gonerev could always be
counted on to cut through bureaucratic and organizational hypocrisy
like a machete slicing through so many thin vines. It was no wonder
the pundits had nicknamed her "the Blade."
    Ridgello had just received final status reports from the other four
hoverbird teams. "Perhaps we need to cover extremities and observe full zoning regulations," he said. Commander Papizon will signal us when
he's overridden the building's security and compression routines, and then it'll
be time to move.

    "This man is not to be underestimated," Magan told the Blade.
"He is as sly as a snake."
    "But-"
    "Enough. The high executive has made his decision. My duty-and
yours-is to carry it out." Magan cut the 'Whisper channel with a curt swipe
of one hand, and even the Blade knew that further argument was useless.
    Ridgello concluded his preoperational briefing with a question for
Magan Kai Lee. "South by southwest makes for a defensive maneuver,"
he said. Anything to add, Lieutenant?
    Magan could feel the randomness algorithm hijack his thoughts and
twist them into unrecognizable shapes designed to sow confusion among
any eavesdropping enemy. "Keep pushing for higher ground, regardless
of any spiking temperatures," he said. "It's a tribute to your preparedness
that we have a robust strategy at all." He could imagine the same process
at work in reverse in each of the soldiers' heads, realigning and reassembling his gibberish into something more comprehensible. Remember that
the subject is expected to be unarmed, and lethal force will not be required. If we
encounter his apprentices, they are to be taken alive.
    Silence ensued. Magan watched the drifting snowflakes and tried
to clear his mind. He could see the officers through the window of the
next hoverbird polishing their dartguns, choosing which canisters of
black code-laden needles to load. Rey Gonerev was making small talk
with the pilot in plain speech, as if deliberately flaunting her defiance
of military convention.
    A little more than a month ago, Magan had never heard of this
man, this fiefcorper who was