The Tower and the Hive Read Online Free Page B

source? Human or ’Dini?
    A laugh echoed between minds. A bit of both.
    All right. I’ll refrain from asking questions you have no intention of answering.
    Your grandmother sends her regards. So do your mother and father. And the presence that was Jeff Raven left Thian’s mind.
    When he took notice again of his immediate surroundings, Gravy was there with a glass of his favorite restorative. Even though that had not been a particularly taxing use of his Talent, Alison Ann in her capacity as Talent nurturer insisted that they all replenish their bodies after every teleportational session. She had half finished her own drink. Clancy, Semirame and Lea Day were dutifully sipping theirs. The “power weasel” didn’t look as tired from this day’s work as she had been from others’. She was shaping up nicely into a good backup kinetic. She raised her glass in a toast to him. As he returned it, his eyes fell on the couch that Rojer had so recently occupied. He blinked.
    Didn’t you think you’d miss him, Thi? Gravy asked, cocking her head at him.
    Actually, no, but I do. And that surprised Thian. And if you say he’s only a thought away, I’ll... I’ll...
    â€œQuickly now, Prime, think of something,” she teased, and ruffled his hair.
    He patiently smoothed it back with his free hand just as the com unit bleated.
    â€œYes sir,” Thian said promptly, for the call originated from the Admiral’s ready room. Ashiant’s rugged face filled the screen.
    â€œWill you and your team please join me for dinner tonight, Prime Lyon?” Ashiant asked.
    â€œWe’d be delighted, sir,” Thian replied. “Did your steward get all he ordered?”
    â€œHe’s still checking, but I understand the manifests included all his requirements and wishes to make full use of the freshest.”
    â€œVery thoughtful of you, sir,” Thian replied.
    â€œMy choice, Prime,” Ashiant said, and disconnected.
    â€œNo more than he should,” said Gravy staunchly. “You should get pick of the crop.”
    â€œHe doesn’t mean me, does he?” asked Lea Day, surprised. CPOs did not normally dine at the captain’s table.
    â€œYou’re part of the team, Lea,” Thian said. “What’s the matter? Don’t you like slumming in officers’ territory?”
    â€œNot really... if it’s only us, the team, I mean. I try not to disappear from my station, you know. Might cause bad feeling.”
    â€œWe’ll avoid that whenever possible,” Thian said, though he doubted the problem was immediate since the whole squadron was still elated by their destruction of the final Hiver sphere. As Lea Day had been part of the Talent team to help effect that destruction, she was a persona very grata. But envy was common among the non-Talented for those who had a measurable quantity of psychic ability. Maybe he should discuss her position with the Admiral and see if Lea could be bumped up to ensign. He suspected she’d rather stay a CPO, top of her own pile, than become an ensign and bottom of another. Not that, in the final analysis, a Talent was ever bottom of anything.
    She was an attractive woman, her dark hair crew-cut like a velvet skullcap in the acceptable fashion that did not, in her case, disguise her essential femininity. In her early forties, she was nearly as tall as he, lean and trim in her shipsuit; a career petty officer, having come up from the ranks: a native of Earth from the old American continental mass who’d joined as soon as she was old enough to enlist. Her electrical skills—especially her uncanny ability to avoid live wires and unnecessary shocks and to dowse exactly the trouble spot in the mass of circuit conduits needed by spaceships—should have alerted someone long ago to her latent Talent. Commander Kloo had spotted it when CPO Day had been assigned to the crews examining the captured sphere