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Too Loving A Touch

Veddin's eyes closed as his warship skipped into normal space. His concentration focussed on his ship's sensors. Images poured through the shiplink embedded in his cerebellum. He had expected to find yet another Squishy ambush, but he floated safe and easy amidst his own robot fleet.

He opened his eyes, to see the beauty of normal space himself. The hard points of starlight and the brilliant sun of the Hydra system blazed with cheer.

Veddin's vision merged again with the images from the DareDrop's sensors. The scene telescoped. The sun brightened, then dimmed as the DareDrop's computer screened its rays. Soon Hydra floated just beyond Veddin's nose. It was a lustrous blue and white jewel, unlike anything in the FreeFed. His own home planet, Kaylanx, was perhaps more colorful with its violent swirls of red, green, and violet, but Kaylanx was not warm, as was Hydra.

He nudged his ship towards the planet. A small contingent of the main fleet followed. Senships scattered into early-warning array around the system.

This was foolish, Veddin realized—using standard military tactics just outside the one invincible planet in the galaxy. He almost ordered the senships back to the main fleet. But with a shrug he let them go. What else could he do with them, after all? For the first time, he understood why the Directorate had let him bring his fleet; now that FreeFed had been found by the larger human civilization, the Directorate had less use for the fleet than Veddin now had for the senships.

Something about Hydra disturbed Veddin. A troubled frown formed, then faded as he realized what was missing: There were neither moons nor battle-stations around the planet. His sensors backed off a bit and caught a single space station glinting in the sun. It was surrounded by gigantic freighters from the rest of human space. They were beautiful, and Veddin felt awed by the builders of these craft that dwarfed the DareDrop.

He also felt an unreasonable surge of joy, being here. It was different from anything he'd ever felt before, a joy that filled parts of his soul that until now had been empty.

Alerted by the sensation, almost alarmed, Veddin searched for an explanation. Meanwhile the joy grew stronger.

"Commander of the unidentified war fleet, this is maneuver control. Please identify yourself." The voice came not through any of the DareDrop's communications channels, but through his mind itself. It reminded him of his first contact with a Hydran Couple, as the savage Battle of Kaylanx Moons climaxed. That had been just before the Hydrans drove the Squishy fleet terror-stricken back into their own territory.

"This is Colonel Veddin Zhukpokrovsk, from the planet of Kaylanx, requesting permission to dock," Veddin thought for the controller.

The sternness of the controller's first thought dissolved. "Veddin Zhukpokrovsk! We've been worried about you!"

Veddin must have transmitted his bafflement, because the controller went on. "The Seekers told us to expect you several days ago. When you didn't show up on schedule, Tarn and Tara Westfall became concerned—and when Tarn gets concerned, everybody gets concerned!"

Veddin was still baffled. He had come here to Touch Autumn Westfall, but . . .

"Tarn is her father, you ninny. Tarn and Tara are the commissioners of Hydra."

"They're what!?"

"Didn't anybody tell you that you have a psi-resonant pair bond to the commissioners' daughter?" The controller chuckled. "Probably not. The Seekers wouldn't consider it a proper thing to mention."

Veddin was still dazed; the controller's thought pattern changed, and changed subjects as well. "Dear Colonel, why'd you bring a fleet with you? You certainly don't need it, and I suspect there's a rule against it somewhere."

Veddin was still trying to understand why the speaker's "voice" had changed. There were two chuckles this time, one in each "voice." "We're a Couple, silly," they said in unison.

Veddin shook his head; of course there were two of them, forming a single psi-resonance.

"Are you going to answer our question, or are you going to try to blast us out of space?" the controllers jested.

He tried to remember their question, and answered just as they were about to repeat it. "I brought my fleet in case I was ambushed."

Loud giggles threaded through his mind. Veddin felt aggravated anger. "Thank the Lords I did, too. I would've been killed if it hadn't been for my robots."

"What?!" The laughter stopped; Veddin thought he could sense a trace of horror mixed with their shock.

He waited till the shock wore off, then told them about the ambush that occurred shortly after he left Kaylanx. Disbelief colored the controllers' thoughts so much that Veddin finally linked them with the DareDrop, so they could see and feel the giant hole gouged in her side by an enemy missile. If the warhead hadn't been a dud . . . well, Veddin never would have known about it.

When he finished, the controllers were grim. "We'll have to tell the commissioners. I've never heard of an attack on humans from a species that knew about us."

The Couple vanished from his mind. The unexplained joy he had felt earlier returned, even stronger now than before.

Another Couple Touched his mind. "Veddin?"

"That's me," Veddin acknowledged, still contemplating the joy.

The new Couple saw his contemplation and shared his joy. "You're getting closer to your touched-one. Autumn feels the same thing." An image of a young woman appeared in his mind, sent by Tarn and Tara Westfall—for the Westfalls were the Couple who now contacted him. Another mind touched his, and he could see through Autumn's eyes a pair of delicate woman's hands, and he could look out the cockpit of a hoverplane at the oceans below. He knew that Autumn could see the DareDrop's control room in much the same manner, through the link her parents provided.

"I am coming," was the message Autumn and Veddin exchanged before the contact dissolved.

"It will be better, of course, when you touch one another," the Westfalls explained to him. "For now, however, you'd better concentrate on docking. Or can your ship enter the atmosphere?"

"I can land anywhere," Veddin replied.

"Excellent. I'll put you in touch with spaceport control."

"Isn't there some kind of Customs inspection?"

"Ah, yes. Customs. Are you carrying anything dangerous—firearms, drugs, or potentially diseased foods, animals, or plants?"

"Nothing except a few gigaton-equivalents in weaponry."

"Are there safety devices to prevent misfiring?"

"Yes."

"Are you planning to use these weapons against us?"

"No."

"That's what the folks at the space station thought. Customs inspection ended."

"What?"

"Customs is much easier when you can just see what's in a person's mind. One thing, though." The thought was wryly amused.

"What's that?"

"Leave your war robots in orbit. There's really no need to land them."

"Sure." Veddin blushed an apology, but the Westfalls were already gone.

The landing was unlike any other. In the FreeFed, all ship-to-shore communication was handled via the ship's communication channels. Here, there were all the normal communication and detection electroptics, but in addition there was a mental link with the ground controller. Veddin found himself acting as a passive relay between the ship and the port.

At least he wasn't alone in being upset by the arrangement; the port controller had never dealt with a pilot who was in direct mental communication with his ship, either. "All in all, I'm glad it's over," the controller admitted to Veddin as the ship touched down. "It takes a bit to adjust to that kind of arrangement." His thoughts turned sympathetic. "I fear that for you, though, the adjusting is just about to begin."

Veddin grimaced. The Seekers, when they first told him that he was half of a Couple, warned him that Hydra was different from Kaylanx. "Less sex, more laughter," was their capsule description. It had been funny, at the time: the Seekers had been so grave, while discussing sex and laughter, of all things! Here, their warning took on new meaning. Veddin had had trouble just finding a traffic controller who didn't giggle incessantly. The Seekers' warning had been true, despite its irony.

And there would be other problems, Veddin realized as he looked outside at the damaged hovacar coming to meet him. Veddin knew it was damaged, because there was just an open cockpit where the sealed capsule should have been. With an effort, Veddin accepted that the hovacar was not damaged at all. Lords of Tarantell! The people on board wore no spacesuits, nor even breathing masks! They were outside, on the surface of a planet, without any protection whatever! It made Veddin very queasy indeed. He tried to think of the phenomenon in a different way: Here was a planet where, instead of sealing small cities, they'd simply sealed the whole planet from outside disturbances.

He still felt queasy. Well, the people were wearing more clothing than people normally wore around Kaylanx; perhaps Veddin could think of the full-length pants, shirts, and boots as a sort of very light spacesuit. A very light spacesuit.

He pulled on the clothes the Seekers had given him on Kaylanx. They were a bit small—even the Seekers had been unprepared for a 230-centimeter-tall ex- wrestler—but Veddin was thankful for them. He would have felt terribly exposed, standing outside on a planet with only a pair of shorts, sandals, and a utility harness.

At last he stepped out of the airlock. As Veddin came down the ship ramp, he recognized one of the three Couples waiting for him: Tarn and Tara Westfall. Each Couple stood hand in hand, fingers lightly interlaced. Meanwhile, the song of joy in Veddin's soul—Autumn's song, he realized—grew stronger.

Veddin stumbled as the world ended.

At least, it seemed like the world ended. Autumn's song just . . . stopped. For a moment Veddin was too stunned by his own loss to notice events around him.

One of the Couples screamed. Another Couple dropped to the ground, and the third Couple grabbed each other desperately.

A supply truck nearing his ship veered, coughed across the white armalloy skirt of the spaceport and crashed into a derrick. Thick smoke billowed around it.

Veddin regained partial awareness. The lost song was still his most immediate reality. When he saw the truck burning he gasped, "Autumn!" She must be in the wreckage.

Now fully aware, he ran for the truck. It was hopeless, he thought; Autumn must have died, or he would still feel something. Nevertheless he ran, and pulled at the crushed door. It came off easily in his hands.

There was another Couple in the truck. They seemed unhurt, yet they clawed at each other and wept, oblivious to the danger around them. "Autumn!" Veddin cried, peering through the smoke. She wasn't there. New fire belched from the truck's belly. He turned back to the hysterical Couple. "Get out!" Veddin screamed. "You'll be killed!"

They didn't respond. There wasn't time to coax. Veddin grabbed the man and hurled him from the wreckage. He took the woman's arm and dragged her away from the flames. The truck exploded. The Couple was still too close to the flames, but they seemed vaguely aware now, and they struggled away from the disaster.

Veddin wiped his brow. Where was Autumn? His eyes bulged as he saw a hoverplane slide over the horizon, canting to one side. Autumn's hoverplane! Still breathing hard, he ran for his ship.

His shiplink hadn't been affected by whatever calamity had struck the Couples; the DareDrop responded calmly to his commands. "Lock onto that plane," his urgent thought rang out. Through his ship's sensors, he watched the craft come down at a crazy angle toward the port. "Tractors on—hold the plane off the ground" —but as he gave the order his ship's computer told him the plane was too far away, and the angle was wrong. Veddin cursed; he'd have to launch to catch her.

But Autumn's parents were right next to his ship; they'd be crisped if the DareDrop took off now. He turned away from the airlock. One half of his mind watched the plane through his ship's eyes, one half sorted out the pathetic humans there by the landing struts. Pair by pair he dragged them onto their hovacar.

He coaxed Tarn Westfall into pressing the accelerator. As the hovacar rocked away, Veddin rushed back to his ship.

Only the fact that the hoverplane started high in the sky had spared it from crashing; its rate of descent had increased dramatically. The plane was slowing down now, but it wasn't slowing down fast enough.

Veddin fell into his chair as the boosters blazed. He still shook with exertion, but he had to get into the air now.

The DareDrop lurched into position. As the tractors locked on, the plane actually fought against their guidance; but despite the plane's most furious counterthrusts Veddin landed it with a feather touch. He landed close by and jumped out.

Autumn leaped lightly from the plane. She looked awfully young in person. But, Lords of Tarantell, she was beautiful! Her deep blue one-piece jumpsuit held flickering threads of silver that outlined her long, supple body; the ocean wind whipped through her strawberry blonde hair, to set it shimmering in the sunlight. Her golden eyes blazed with angry fire.

Veddin paused as he realized she was angry.

"What the hell do you think you're doing?" she yelled at him. She had a thick accent, a more distorted form of Standard than even the language of Kaylanx. She stamped her foot. "I have to get to the space port. I don't have time for idiots."

"I'm sorry," Veddin muttered, blushing. With a start, he realized how unjust her attack on him was. "Wait a minute. Your plane was about to crash. I just saved your life."

She stared at him. "Man, what planet're you from? Haven't you ever ridden a plane before? That's the way they always fly. Computer controlled. Multiple redundancy. Nothing can go wrong." She muttered something under her breath.

This time Veddin turned bright red. "I'm sorry. It's just that, I'm from Kaylanx, and I've never—"

"You're from where?" Autumn had started to turn away, but now she turned back. "Veddin!" Her voice softened; indeed, Veddin wouldn't have guessed it was the same person speaking. "Are you, are you Veddin Zhukpokrovsk?"

Veddin nodded. "Yes, I'm, uh . . ." He was lost in her eyes. She approached him slowly, held out her hand, and his hand was there. When they touched, Veddin could feel a hint of that earlier joy.

Now Autumn blushed. "I'm sorry. When the feeling . . . stopped, I just had to get to the port as soon as possible, to find out what happened."

Veddin nodded. "Yes." He frowned. "I think there's something terribly wrong here. Your parents are, uh . . ."

"What? What about them?"

Veddin's voice caught on the words. "I'll show you." He took her into the ship and they hopped across the last kilometer to the port, with the hoverplane in tow.

As they flew, Veddin considered the mistake he'd made. "I guess I was hasty to assume your plane was falling out of control, but I thought it was manually operated, like the supply truck that crashed on its way out to my ship." He frowned. "Why are the planes automated and not the supply trucks?"

He realized it was a dumb question; how would Autumn know about spaceport supply trucks?

But she looked around the tiny compartment of his control room, and Veddin could almost see her picturing the outside of his vessel; a tight little gray teardrop, battered and scarred from too many encounters with too many enemies. She answered, somehow sad. "I've never seen a ship like this before. Probably the automated trucks wouldn't know what to do with it. They keep a couple of manual loaders just for unusual ships. "

They arrived at the spaceport. Veddin landed a safe distance from the Couples and led Autumn into the open. He had been watching the Couples through his ship's sensors, but when Autumn saw her parents, she gasped and ran to them. "Mom, Dad, what's wrong?"

All three of the Couples had stripped of clothing. They clung to each other in grim caricatures of love's embrace. But there was no love there, only desperation, fear, and horror. Autumn made an effort to cover the three pairs with the discarded clothes, failed, gave up.

She swung toward Veddin. "Don't stand there staring," she said, "we have to cover them up or something."

Veddin knew this wasn't a funny situation, but for just a moment he was taken by the absurdity of it all. He gave an explosive laugh, shook his head. "I'm sorry, my dear, but they pulled their clothes off of their own volition. It hardly seems like my responsibility to clothe them." A new expression spread over Autumn's face; he wasn't sure what it was, but he knew he wouldn't like the results. He continued hastily, "Actually, I think I may have some blankets on board my ship; I know I have some tarps, anyway." He led the way back into the ship. There was a narrow vertical tube just outside the control room, in the thick part of the teardrop. He knelt there and pointed down the ladder rungs. "There are towels and such in the bathroom, on that side."

She peered over his shoulder. "Okay, I'll see what I can find. What else do you have?"

He rose and unlatched a compartment above them, which crashed with a resounding ring against the rear bulkhead. "Sorry," he muttered, "I usually don't do this in gravity."

Autumn hung on to him, rather shaken. "Yeah, I'll bet."

"Anyway, the tarps are up there, if you can find 'em."

"Okay. Can you give me a boost?"

"Sure." He lifted her up into the compartment. "Meanwhile, I have work to do." He retreated into the control room before Autumn's wrath could catch him.

"Where are you going?" she screamed through the walls at him.

"I'm gonna try to raise somebody on the radio," he yelled back.

"Who?"

"Just anyone at all on this peculiar planet of yours."

"Oh." Something clattered over head, but Veddin forced himself to disregard it and work with the ship's various receivers and transmitters. First he tried contacting the port control tower, using the frequencies they'd used to guide him in. All he could get was muffled whimperings in the background. A thump outside announced the return of Autumn from the overhead compartment.

"What does anyone at all say?" she asked.

Veddin shook his head.

"Oh." She disappeared again.

Veddin was lost in his efforts for some time thereafter, growing more grim as each effort produced fewer results. At last he yelled, "I can't find anything!"

There was a gentle tap on his shoulder. "You don't have to yell," was the dry rejoinder.

He looked up; her nose was within inches of his. He was astonished at how beautiful Autumn's eyes were. He swallowed hard. "Did you get your parents all bundled up?"

"Yeah. They're, uh, all right I guess." She shook her head. "Faresh and Hella are almost catatonic, but at least they're still breathing."

"Um." Veddin shook his head, returning to the communication problem. "I get lots of inter-robot traffic, but there don't seem to be any people out there, sending or receiving anything."

"I'm not surprised—even if this is just a local problem, you're not likely to find people talking by radio."

Veddin stared at her. "Why not?"

She pursed her lips. "They're all psychic, you numbskull. What do they need radios for? Some of the more powerful transmitting couples run a sort of broadcasting system for news of general interest. There are some Couples that can t find a resonant psiband in common with some other Couples, but it's easy enough to get an intermediary if you've really got something to say."

"I see." Veddin bit his lip; he wished she'd told him that earlier. Well, she was concerned with her parents.

"Can we bring them on board?"

"Who?"

"My parents and the others. Can we bring them on board?"

Veddin opened his mouth, shut it. "Sure, we can stuff em in the empty supply holds."

Autumn's voice took on a dangerous edge. "It's either that or carry them to the control tower. The ship's closer."

Veddin felt his neck muscles tense. "Don't you think we should find out what else is happening around here? At least your parents are safe. Others may not be."

She gritted her teeth, then the defiance disappeared. "You're right, of course."

Veddin nodded solemnly. "We all have our moments."

Autumn harrumphed. "Only a moment, now and then."

Veddin rose from his chair, ducked out of the control room. "Where's the nearest town?"

As they stepped out of the airlock, Autumn pointed south. "I remember seeing a cluster of buildings that way as I was coming in."

"Okay. The next question is, how should we get there: Your plane or my ship? If you don't mind, I think we should take your plane. I doubt they'd appreciate me obliterating a couple of buildings with backwash,"

Autumn put her hands on her hips. "Of course we're taking my plane. You think I'd trust your driving?"

They were standing next to the plane's door before Veddin realized that, for a long time, the two of them had been holding hands.

As the plane took off, Veddin turned to Autumn. She was turned away from him, and her shoulders were shaking. He touched her. "It'll be all right. All we have to do is find out what's causing this, and we'll fix it."

She turned forward. "I just don't understand why it's destroyed everybody. As nearly as I can tell, they're all all right except that they've lost their Touch."

Veddin nodded. "What penalties are involved in becoming a Couple?"

"What do you mean?"

"Do you lose anything in exchange for the wholeness of finding your touched-one?"

She shook her head violently. "Of course not."

Veddin decided not to pursue it, but Autumn continued. "They've just lost their loved ones, that's all, in a way we can't even understand."

"Not even the loss of your loved ones should destroy your ability to act."

"Well, maybe it shouldn't, but it does. It would probably happen to you too if you lost your family."

Veddin looked away. "No, it wouldn't."

"How do you know?"

"Because my younger sister was on Moon Leiea when the Squishies destroyed it." He tried to swallow but could not. "Leiea was in my defense sector. When Laurain died, I knew." His voice took a note of determination. "But I couldn't stop fighting because of that. There were other moons, and Kaylanx itself. They would have destroyed the whole system, just the way they destroyed Colander, if we stopped fighting."

Autumn seemed slightly chastised. "I'm sorry."

"So am I." His hands roamed over the deep rips in the arms of his chair, the internal scars that matched the scars on the DareDrop's hull. "I'm just glad the Hydrans felt the disturbance in the psifields and found us. Without you, we would have lost everything."

Her shoulders sagged, and for a moment she did not look adolescent. "Why do they all hate us so much? I can see why normal species think we're deformed mutants, with our occasional super-resonant Couple, and our billions of people with no psi resonance at all, but why can't they just leave us be? Isn't the terrible isolation we suffer punishment enough?"

Veddin watched the planet slip underneath. A cluster of unnatural shapes approached. "Look," he said.

She peered over his shoulder. "It's the city."

Veddin never would have recognized it as a city. On Kaylanx, a city was a tight crush of warrens. Here the buildings were only one or two stories, and they were scattered across a grassy plain, completely exposed to the elements. To the northwest there were three stadium-sized buildings, and when Veddin scrutinized them he could make out the shapes of robots scurrying about.

Autumn saw the direction of his gaze. "Those are factories," she explained. "Mostly run by robots, though they're supervised by us. These factories make spaceship parts; the tallest roof encloses a final assembly area for small ships." As she described Hydra's shipbuilding industry, Veddin was again amazed by Autumn's technical expertise.

He made no comments.

She pointed back at the city proper. "Normally, you'd see Couples here and there sunning themselves." She bit her lip. "And there would be hovacars coming and going, and laughter—" She stopped on a sob. "It's happened here, too."

Veddin reached over to hold her by the shoulders, then gasped. "Look!" He pointed at a Couple near the edge of town, directing a motley collection of robots to cart another Couple indoors. Even as Veddin watched, the Couple stopped supervising the robots. They reached out to hold each other tightly for a moment, then returned to their work.

Autumn redirected the ship's computer to steer them toward the Couple. "Thank the Lords there's someone left!"

The Couple on the ground was equally glad to see Veddin and Autumn step out of the hoverplane under their own power. The dark-skinned, dark-haired man clasped each of them by the hand. "Shea and Fanth Ostrit," he introduced his wife and himself. "I thought we were the only survivors," he said. "We need all the help we can get."

Veddin nodded. "What are you doing?"

"Getting people inside before they blister in the sun, trying to get them to eat." He shook his head. "Not much success with the second. We fixed up the first Couples with intravenous feeders and robot attendants, but we ran out of equipment." Even as he spoke he reached for his touched-one, who reached for him as well. The conversation ended while the two revitalized each other.

A baby cried on the second floor of the building to their right. Shea and Fanth broke out of their trance at the sound. "I'll go see if there's anything wrong," Shea said. She trotted into the house.

Veddin asked Fanth, "What is it that's happened to everybody?"

Fanth shrugged. "Somebody's jamming all our resonances."

"Fanth!" Shea came to the balcony of the house, cradling a child in her arms. "Hurry up here. The mother is turning blue. I don't know what's wrong with her."

"Right." Fanth dashed toward the house. He turned before entering and waved at one of the robots. "Peter! Follow me."

Veddin came up behind Peter, and Autumn followed him. "Why aren't you and Shea affected?" Veddin asked as they climbed the steps.

"We are. But I guess we're getting along better than most because we're sort of new here. The Seekers just brought us together about a year ago, and we haven't developed as close a bond as the others." He looked puzzled. "Don't you feel the jamming? Are you multiply resonant psimates, who're strong enough to overcome it? You don't seem to be affected at all."

They reached the second-floor landing; the door to one bedroom hung open. "No, we're not multiply resonant," Veddin said. He felt a warning tug on his arm from Autumn, but he disregarded it. "We're isolates."

Fanth took a reflexive step away. "Oh."

Autumn stepped around Peter. "That's not quite true. We are a Couple, but the Seekers just found Veddin recently. I was going to meet him at the spaceport when, when," she started to lose control, and Veddin held her tight.

Veddin finished explaining. "Her parents were at the port. They weren't in very good shape."

Shea poked her head out from the bedroom. "Fanth?"

Fanth went in, took one look at the woman on the bed, and swore. "Ciquestan's deficiency. Peter! Tell Chipper to bring my medkit!" Fanth smiled wryly at Veddin and Autumn as they walked in. "I was a doctor on Eridani III, before the Seekers found me. I never thought I'd use my training again."

Autumn knelt by the bed. The woman was young, hardly older than Autumn herself, and almost as beautiful. Autumn spoke. "What can can we do to help?"

Fanth looked grim. "Not much here, I'm afraid. You could start down the street where we left off, to see if there are others like this."

Veddin looked out over the balcony at the horizon. "What about the other towns? Are you sure the jamming is just here, on the spaceport island?"

Chipper whirred into the room. Fanth grabbed the bag and started to work.

Shea turned to Veddin. "How would we know how widespread the problem is?"

Fanth looked up from inserting a tube in the woman's arm. "It's probably the whole planet, Shea." His voice held little hope. "A psi-resonant field keeps its strength no matter how far away you go. The jamming has surely spread all over Hydra."

For a long moment the four of them pondered the scope of the disaster. At length, Fanth stood up. "Well, we won't do any of them any good standing here. Let's go"

Veddin shook his head. "What are you going to do?"

Shea look tired. "We'll go on down the street. What else can we do?"

Autumn stomped her foot. "You can't help the whole planet like that!"

Fanth started shaking with stress. "We can't do anything about the whole planet. We have to do what we can. Maybe there are other Couples like us and—" he paused, "couples like you, who can help the people on the other islands."

Autumn leaned forward to say something cutting, but Veddin spoke first. "What happened to this woman, anyway? Is this a reaction to the jamming?"

"In a sense. She has Ciquestan's deficiency, which has nothing to do with the jamming, but she and her touched one probably kept the chemical imbalance under control using their psi powers." Fanth paused.

In the midst of the stillness, the sound of someone's breathing stopped.

Fanth turned back to the bed. "No!" He ripped at the sleeve of the woman's gown, and pushed another needle in. A mottle of darker blue spread across her features. "Damn!" Fanth clenched and unclenched his hands, not knowing what to do.

Shea took him by the arm. "Come on," she whispered. "We'll save the next one." She looked at Autumn. "We'll be down the street if you need us. " They shuffled out of the room.

Veddin turned away from the dead woman. "We have to find the jammer." He didn't know what to do in this house. He hurried to leave. "Isn't there some way to track down the source of a psi field?"

Autumn didn't answer till they were out of the house again. "Some of the most sensitive receptor Couples, and the telekinetics, can home in on a sender's location in space. But . . ."

"But all the receptor Couples and telekinetics are probably in bad shape, and even if they aren't, if they tried to find the jammer they'd probably get broken up and then they'd really be in rough shape," Veddin completed her sentence.

She looked down. "Probably."

"Isn't there some mechanical way to locate them? On Kaylanx, we developed the ability to at least detect resonant psi fields, after we met the Squishies. We were even able to shield ourselves somewhat by the time they attacked Kaylanx. Surely Hydra has a far better psi technology than the FreeFed."

"Not really. There's never been a need to understand psi here; all they've ever had to do is use it." Autumn looked up at him. "There have been some experiments, at a couple of the universities. In fact, I seem to remember hearing about Couple Berrens, on Pyrta, making some breakthroughs recently." Her voice perked up. "The Berrenses have an especially powerful resonance, too; they might've been strong enough to survive the jammer, especially since Pyrta is on the other side of the planet." Autumn's features tensed with hatred. "When we find out who's responsible, we'll kill them."

"First we have to find them. How can we contact the Berrens Couple?"

Until that moment, Veddin hadn't noticed that the sun was sinking. The city lights had been slowly brightening, taking up the slack. Now Veddin noticed the lights, because they went out.

Earlier, the city had been too quiet. Now the stillness was deathly.

Autumn's hand came to her mouth. "Oh no."

"What happened now?" Veddin tried to force himself to grasp the kaleidoscope of disasters the last few hours had brought. He didn't succeed.

"The fusion reactor for this island chain must've failed. The reactors are monitored by psikinetics, who tune the reactors by controlling the cold catalyston flux. The flux density must ve dropped below the critical region. There's no power, probably anywhere in this whole ocean."

Veddin rolled his eyes. "Joy. Don't you people do anything without using psi powers?"

Autumn's eyes were flashing again. Veddin decided that that was their natural state. "Of course we do things without psi! Why do you think we have fusion reactors in the first place? For the most part the machines do the work. Couples only do the important work, like keeping the machines from going berserk." She paused. "People only do a handful of the most important jobs. It's just that the important jobs are, uh . . ."

"Important," Veddin said dryly. "So now it's only the important jobs that aren't getting done." Looking around, he saw a robot frozen in the middle of the grassy land; undoubtedly it was externally powered, by transmission lines from the reactor. "It looks like none of the unimportant work is going to get done around here anymore, either." He pointed at the robot.

"It could be worse, you know. If the flux had gone up instead of down, the reactor could have exploded. "

It was Veddin who exploded. "Surely you've got failsafe systems!"

"Well, we do, but . . ."

"Lords of Tarantell! Even your hoverplane had multiple redundancy!"

"Yes, you're right, of course. But hoverplanes are usually flown by people who'd be helpless if the plane failed. The reactors are run by psikinetics who specialize in probability manipulation." She paused. "We import our reactors, and the reactors come equipped to be operated by isolates. But since there's always at least one psicouple, probably two, watching a reactor, I'm afraid we don't maintain the systems the way we ought to. I've mentioned it to my father a couple of times, but I don't think he ever did anything about it."

Veddin wanted to scream. "We've got to fly back to my ship right away. I'll pull in some of my senships from system orbit, put them around the planet. At least then we'll have warning if one of Hydra s reactors blows up." He headed for the hoverplane.

Autumn pulled on his arm. "Wait, Veddin. We can't fly back." There was a hysterical note in her voice.

He turned toward her, jerking quickly; his nerves were also frayed. "Why not?"

"The plane—it's beam-powered. It won't fly."

Veddin was stupefied for only a moment. "Then we walk." He turned back to the grassy lane, turned left, turned right, threw his hands up. "Which way do we go?"

Autumn bit her lip. "I don't know."

"Wonderful. Do you have any maps on your hoverplane?"

She shook her head. "We don't use maps here."

Veddin just stared at her, the question on his face.

She answered. "When a Couple wants to know how to get someplace, they just think with another Couple in the right area, someone who knows their way around that island."

"I see." Veddin felt weak. "And you, milady, how do you navigate?"

"Sometimes I have friends put me in contact with the right Couple." She shrugged. "Actually, I usually ask the robots how to get where I'm going."

Veddin stared at the frozen robot in front of him. It stared back. Finally Veddin burst out laughing; it seemed a more reasonable reaction than crying. "Do they shoot looters here? I'd guess not. Come on, lady." He held out his hand. "We'd better eat something before we leave. It could be a long journey."

Together, they headed into the nearest house.

While Autumn rattled through the kitchen, Veddin stepped outside and looked for a convenient roof to climb. Seeing none, he loped to the tree behind the house, and sped to the top: it was a lot different to climb a live tree than a jungle gym, he discovered, but not enough to stop him. Peering around in the fading light, he spotted what looked like a starship's needle prow. It was more or less back in the direction he thought they'd come from. Satisfied, he returned to Autumn.

Through the door into the living room Veddin could see two pairs of eyes staring at him. The room was gloomy, but Veddin thought the eyes belonged to two children. He felt certain that they were holding hands. "Hi," he waved at the kids, and stepped toward them.

They vanished before he could reach the doorway.

"There's no need to be frightened," Veddin shouted out. "Are you hungry? We're fixing things to eat." He became aware of scuffling behind him and turned to Autumn.

"It's no use," she said, "they don't speak Standard yet."

"They don't? They look like they're nine or ten. Surely they've learned the language by now."

Autumn shook her head as she searched the cabinets. "It's the last thing they teach in the schools." She smiled at him. "You keep forgetting that this is Hydra. Those children are touched-ones, with the same telepathic powers everybody else has."

"Don't they learn a little before they come here?"

"Those two you just saw were born on Hydra."

"Really? That's some coincidence, isn't it, for both members of a Couple to be born on the same planet?"

"Not on Hydra." Autumn snapped down a knife on a wedge of cheese. "Couples don't necessarily fall in love, get married, and have children, you know. Sometimes they even hate each other. Many of them have other lovers. When someone wants to have a child, the Seekers try to find matings that will produce children with resonant bonds."

"I didn't know they knew enough about Coupling to do that."

Autumn snicked some sort of taff roll in half with a loud bang. "They don't. They make a lot of mistakes."

Veddin came up behind her and wrapped his arms around her waist. "I'm very thankful for one of those mistakes."

He glimpsed a smile playing across Autumn's lips.

Veddin stepped away. "What's for dinner?"

Autumn turned to the table. "I'm sorry I couldn't do better," she said, waving her hand at a collection of pale vegetables. "But most of the food here requires cooking, and of course we don't have any power."

"Quite all right," Veddin replied, taking a healthy bite out of a lime-colored, but otherwise carrot-like thing. He made a face. "On second thought . . ."

Autumn looked away, and Veddin was mad at himself. "Wait, I didn't mean it. Here, eat something with me. We have to hurry. I think I know where we're going, but I'd rather get started while there's still some daylight." He went back to munching on the green carrot, and Autumn joined him. "In fact," he started stuffing his pockets with food, "I think we can probably carry this stuff with us."

"Stop!" Autumn ordered as he grabbed a plump blob. "You'll crush the ograns. I thought I saw a knapsack in the living room; we can find a better way to carry stuff than in your pockets."

"Fine." Veddin watched with both humor and joy as she gathered up the food; she was beautiful, and durable, and spoiled, and he feared he was quite in love.

Disregarding Veddin's offer of help, Autumn whipped the pack to her back. They headed off past the hoverplane, in the general direction of the starship prow Veddin had seen. "How old are you, Autumn?" Veddin asked.

"Almost nineteen. Why?"

"Just curious." Veddin was almost thirty, himself.

"Were you hoping for a respectable old dowager? If so, that's tough. I like me as I am."

"I see. I guess I can live with that."

"Yeah?" She flashed him a smile with the same energy her eyes held when she was angry.

"Yeah." He considered her for a moment. "You know, all through this trip I've been surprised at how much you know about the machines here: the spaceport, the factories, and the fusion reactors."

She shrugged. "I talk to the robots a lot. And I've spent a lot of time working with equipment all over Hydra. Most of the Couples don't like machines. They'd probably get rid of them if they could. But not everybody is a multiply-resonant telekinetic/psikinetic/receptor/broadcaster. Most of them need the machines as much as people from Earth or Kaylanx." She hesitated. "Sometimes I think I have more in common with machines than with people. The robots don't have any touched-ones either." She smiled shyly at him. "At least, I used to think I was like the machines. Until you came."

They trudged silently along for a time. The neatly cut lawn of the city turned wild and ragged as the buildings disappeared in the distance. It started to get cooler, and darker; far darker than Veddin had ever seen it get on a planet. He moaned when he realized why. "Lords of Tarantell! You don't have any moons here!"

It took Autumn a moment to understand his meaning. "No, of course not. Hydra doesn't have any moons. Why?"

"Because we're trapped out here, that's why. In a few minutes it'll be too dark to see." He glanced back the way they'd come. "There's not a building close enough to get to, either."

Autumn laughed. "Don't worry, the wild animals won't hurt you. We don't have any wild animals."

"No, but we'll get damn cold, at this latitude." He considered it for a moment. "Though I was sort of surprised at how warm it was during the day."

Autumn laughed again. "Of course it's warm, silly. The psikinetics control the weather, taking the edge off the . . ." She stopped laughing. "Lords of Tarantell. No."

"Well, let's hope the loss of weather control doesn't catch up with us for a couple of days. I think we'll make it through tonight, and tomorrow we'll be back on the ship."

"Yes, but—" she shook her head. "The main purpose of the weather control is to stop the tornadoes and hurricanes that're constantly starting up around the equator. If we don't stop them, they'll destroy most of the islands. And all the people who live there." She paused. "Including Couple Berrens and the university."

Veddin picked up the pace.

And stopped when Autumn stumbled in the dark and cried out in pain.

"You all right?" he asked, kneeling next to her.

"Yes. I stepped into a rut, I guess." She reached down to touch her left ankle.

Veddin gently squeezed both her ankles; she seemed to be all right. "We're stopping here for the night."

"We can't."

"We are." They did. Veddin lay down beside Autumn, reached out to hold her.

She squirmed away. "I don't think we should, uh . . ."

Veddin rolled his eyes in disbelief. What had the Seekers told her about him? Did they think he was a sex maniac? "Child, I've had more than my share of women. I don't need to add you to the collection. But it's getting cold out here, and I'm damn well going to hold you warm until morning. Now, if you want to kick and thrash with a man who just plans to conserve your energy, that's fine by me, because it'll surely keep you warm enough. But you don't have to."

She snuggled up next to him. "Okay."

She was a warm glow in his arms. Veddin chuckled. "On the other hand, if you want to be added to the collection, that'll keep you warm, too, and—" Veddin swallowed hard as Autumn jabbed him in the stomach.

They eventually dozed into fitful slumber.

As he rolled away from the sunshine, he choked on a dew-laden clump of grass. With a moan, Veddin extricated himself from Autumn's death grip. He stretched.

It was a mistake. He was cold, damp, and very very stiff. His stomach was hungry. And his brain was dead tired.

He turned to his companion, shook her gently. "Hm?" she mumbled. Veddin pulled her to her feet, ran his hand through her hair in a futile attempt to remove the worst tangles. Still she was beautiful in the morning light.

"Leave me alone," she yawned.

Chuckling, Veddin shook her.

"Cretin. I've committed mass murder on a dozen planets for lesser offences," Autumn mumbled, her eyes closed. "It's unhealthy to get up when you're asleep."

"Arise, arise," Veddin told her as he slung her right arm over his shoulders and half guided, half carried her down the road. "Kill me later. At the moment, we have a planet to save."

Her mumblings subsided. The sun rose, the people warmed, and soon Veddin could again see the spires of spacecraft in the distance. "Hail the miracle! We've been going in the right direction!"

"Great. When do we eat?"

"As soon as we arrive. As soon as we get within shiplink range of the DareDrop, I'll tell her to start cooking breakfast. I suppose there'll be enough food for two. Of course, the ship's awfully small, so you'll have to eat outside." Veddin wisely told her this from an adequate distance; when Autumn lunged at him, he dodged easily.

"You're an evil man," she told him, though it was her joy that flashed, not her anger.

As they came within broadcast range of Veddin's shiplink, Veddin told Autumn what news the ship had to offer. "Nothing's changed, Autumn. Your parents are still half way to the control tower, out of control."

"Have they eaten yet?"

"No."

"Let's get them aboard your ship and take them with us."

Veddin pursed his lips. "There isn't room."

"Well, it would be kinda crowded, but—"

"No! If we have to fight, they'd die without acceleration couches."

"What fighting?! Who could you possibly wind up fighting?"

He looked at her quizzically. "Don't you remember? You were going to kill the jammer."

"I was joking."

"You may think so now, but you were serious then. Think, lady. How did this happen? It's sure not a natural phenomenon. You said yourself that plenty of species hate us."

"Nobody'd dare attack us!"

"The Squishies dared to attack me, even though I was on my way here."

"What?!"

Veddin told her about the ambush. "This jamming would be a brilliant coup de grace for them. I'd swear this was their doing, if I knew how they could have done it." He shrugged. "I don't know how anybody else could have done it, either. I still bet it's the Squishies."

Autumn was silent.

The DareDrop was clearly visible now. "I'll race you to the ship," Veddin offered as he began trotting. Autumn passed him in a flurry of blonde hair, and he was surprised to find himself gasping for breath when he caught up with her. "Men are so weak," she sniffed as they climbed aboard.

As Veddin plunked down into his chair, he glanced up at Autumn. "I'll bet we don't know how to get to your research island, do we?"

Autumn groaned. "No, you're right."

"Um. Fortunately I have given this matter some thought. You say the machines here know how to get around?"

"Yes, but they all use transmitted power. They're all shut down."

Veddin laughed. "Not all. Just the ones in this island cluster, that are powered by the deactivated reactor. Which reminds me." He closed his eyes for a few seconds. "There. I've called some of my senships into planet orbit, to watch for exploding reactors. And I've sent a message shuttle back to Kaylanx, to tell them that the Couples of Hydra are out of commission, and they'd better get the warfleet back in shape before the Squishies show up." He closed his eyes again, to concentrate on the DareDrop. "Back to current events. What's the name of the island we're looking for?"

"Pyrta."

Veddin relaxed in his chair, working with his ship to communicate with Hydras network of automatons. "Strap yourself in. We're gonna make this a short ride."

The blastoff was less than gentle. Veddin had pangs of sympathy for Autumn, listening to her gasp for breath, but he could no longer suppress the sense of urgency he'd felt since they were stranded in the city. Pyrta was near the equator; he could just see the two of them arriving in time to watch a hurricane smash whatever useful equipment there might be to bits.

Once in free fall, Veddin asked more questions about Hydrans. "Autumn, why are humans so different from other species? What makes human psis so much more powerful—and so much more rare?"

Autumn looked a bit wan from the acceleration and now the weightlessness, but she answered nevertheless. "There are a lot of arguments about that; it may be the hottest question the biologists have." She untangled her arms from the webbing, tried to get comfortable. "One part of the answer is pretty straightforward. As the . . . complexity, I guess, of an organism increases, the probability of resonant psibond formation decreases: There are so many more links required to form the resonance. The flip side of that, though, is once those linkages form, the resonance is much more powerful." Her expression turned perplexed. "What we don't really understand yet is how we could have evolved so far before developing psychic powers. Everywhere else, psi develops before intelligence does. Psychic ability usually serves as the bridge from muscle-oriented evolution to intelligence-oriented evolution. 'Course, the evolution of intelligence doesn't go too far. It always plateaus before the beings get too complex for near-one-hundred-percent pair formation. An average alien Couple isn't quite as smart as an average human in isolation."

Veddin nodded. "How related are complexity and intelligence? Are more intelligent Couples more powerful as well?"

"Not necessarily. Psi power and intelligence are related statistically, but not directly. My parents, for example, have a normal, single-resonance bond. But they're very intelligent, or they wouldn't be the Commissioners." She shook her head. "On the other hand, there are some really dumb Couples out there that are awfully powerful."

Veddin chuckled. "I see." He thought for a moment. "But you still haven't told me why man developed so much intelligence without developing any psychic powers along the way."

"Nobody knows. We think early man must have had psychic abilities; marginal pre-men wouldn't stand a chance without it." She shrugged. "But then the psychic abilities disappeared, somehow. The pre-men had developed just enough so that continued evolution of intelligence worked better than reverting to animals."

Veddin closed his eyes as the DareDrop interrupted. "Get ready. Were going back down." Just before the acceleration hit, he wondered, "You know, maybe the same thing happened to those pre-men that's happening here."

"What?"

"Wouldn't that explain it? Suppose somebody started jamming the psifields on Earth, way back when?"

Before Autumn could reply, the breath was squeezed from their bodies.

They stepped out of the DareDrop into a large circle of scorched earth. The stench from the crisped wildlife caused them both to gag.

"You practically destroyed the place we were coming to visit," Autumn complained. "Even our biggest ships don't wreck the landscape this way."

They hurried from the area. "The DareDrop is a warship, woman. It is not a sightseeing bus. You need power in a warship, not pretty baffling." They were out of the ring of destruction, and the air was laden with the smell of flowers of all kinds. Veddin sneezed, powerfully, and stifled a second attempt by his nose to protect itself.

"Are you all right?"

He straightened up, gritted his teeth. "Sure." He was allergic to flowers, but he'd survive. "I just hope the buildings are air conditioned."

The heart of the university was six six-story buildings hexagonally arranged. Veddin remained in contact with the DareDrop via a portable shiplink amplifier. And the DareDrop, in turn, stayed in contact with Hydra s automaton network. The ship told him which building contained the Berrens office; he led Autumn at a brisk pace through the doors.

There were two people in the outer hall, one clinging to the left wall, one to the right, dying. Autumn hugged herself closer to Veddin. "What can we do?" she whispered.

"Stop the jammer," Veddin replied, walking past them.

They stopped as they reached the center well of the building. "Great," Veddin muttered, "now what?" They looked around together. "Don't they have a directory or something on the wall, to tell you how to get to different offices?"

Autumn pointed at a booth with two chairs. "Usually, there's a receptionist who—"

"Who puts you in Touch with the people you're looking for. I should have guessed." Veddin snorted. "Why is nothing ever easy here?"

Just then, a Couple came to the rail on the second floor. "Who are you?" the man croaked. He had obviously not used language for years.

"We're looking for Couple Berrens," Veddin called out. He saw a staircase and, grabbing Autumn's hand, hurried for the second floor. "Don't go away, we'll be up in a second."

"Where is there worth going?" the woman said with cold amusement. "There is, of course, our office, which is at least comfortable. Follow us."

Cursing under his breath, Veddin reached the second floor just in time to watch the Couple disappear down a corridor. He and Autumn caught up as they turned right through a glasscene door with the inscription Couple Shayloh above it.

Still holding hands, the Couple wrenched the curtains apart to let in some light. "Who are you? What did you come here for?" the man asked.

"I'm Autumn Westfall, and this is Veddin Zhukpokrovsk."

Veddin gave them a Kaylanxian salute.

"We're here to see Drs. Berrens, to see if they have any machines we can use to track down the jammer."

"Really," the woman said, with the same cold amusement she'd shown earlier. The Couple took a couch in one corner of the room; Autumn led Veddin to a couch across from them.

The woman continued. "I'm intrigued. Imagine using a machine to locate a source of psi power."

The man chuckled; at least, that's what Veddin took his gagging sound to mean. "Yes, my dear, a machine." He looked at Autumn. "Unfortunately, Drs. Berrens are dead. The shock of separation was too much for them."

Veddin had seen too much death to be shocked; he was more intrigued by the Shaylohs. "What about you two? Why haven't you died?"

"Because we are class 9 resonants," the woman began haughtily.

"Not even the most powerful jamming could possibly break our bond," the man ended.

"Can you locate the jammer for us?" Veddin demanded.

"No." The man wheezed. "We can't even transmit to you across the room." His wheeze turned into a sigh. "It hardly seems worth living."

The woman spoke again. "You're isolates, aren't you? That's why you're not affected."

Autumn blushed. "No, we're a Couple, but we had just met each other when the jamming started, so we really didn't get a chance to, well . . ."

"We haven't lost our souls, like everybody else on this planet," Veddin said in disgust.

The Couple stared at Veddin long and hard. "Don't mock us, isolate," the man said.

"You have no idea how great the gift of psi resonance is," the woman said.

Veddin started to lose control of his temper. "But I do know how great the price is, half-creature. Are you even now too blind to see how much you've lost?" Veddin shook his head. "No matter. Tell us, how do we find the Berrens laboratory?"

"I don't know how to explain in words," the man said in anger.

"Then lead us," Veddin demanded.

The man just glared at him. Suddenly Veddin was aware of the time ticking by, while people all over the planet drew closer to death in many hideous ways, and his patience disappeared. With two swift strides he was between the paired ones, and he wrenched them apart. "Tell us," he spat.

The man shrieked; the woman whimpered. "Please," they begged as one.

Autumn started to speak, but Veddin broke her off. "Tell me," he repeated.

"Hemten!" the man choked out. A wide slab of metal rolled around the corner. "Our research robot will show you," he explained.

Still Veddin held the Couple apart while the robot whirred into the room, until they had explained to the robot what was wanted.

"Release them," Autumn begged.

"Of course," Veddin replied, doing so.

Huddled in each other's arms, the Shaylohs glared at Veddin. "On another day, we would have destroyed a barbaric creature who dared to keep us apart," the woman said.

Veddin turned to them with a hot reply, but he took a deep breath and willed himself to remember the warm welcome he'd received in approaching Hydra, and the gentle power of those who had come to Kaylanx to stop the war. "On another day, you would be a noble and generous Couple, and we would be friends."

As they followed the robot down the hall, Veddin noticed Autumn pondering him reflectively. "You were barbaric in there," she said, "but you were right. And, at the end . . . You're not a barbarian." She held out her hand, and they moved together into the room through which the robot disappeared.

The walls were studded with readouts and mechanical arms; the central workbench was littered with parts and patching. Veddin saw movement out of the corner of his eye. He turned and gasped. "Squishies!" With a vicious tug he pulled Autumn behind him, and from the bench he grabbed the longest tool he could reach. "Get down!" he ordered Autumn, then leaped at the two purplish, jelly-soft humanoids who stared at him with unreadable expressions.

"Wait!" Autumn screamed in his ear, then grabbed at his drawn-back arm. Veddin, surprised and off balance, tumbled to the floor. "They're not Diorecians!" Autumn cried. "They're our friends!"

Veddin rolled catlike to his feet. He paused just long enough to see that indeed these were not quite like the Squishies he'd fought at Kaylanx. The noses were flatter, the arms longer, and the faces held flecks of green.

Autumn blocked his path. "It's all right. This is a Couple from Tarca. The Tarcans are on our side: though they think we're deformed mutants, they're more amazed than horrified. Hydra is crawling with Tarcan scientists who're studying us like crazy. We're the most interesting puzzle to come along in millennia."

As Autumn spoke, the aliens moved very slowly, their outside hands raised in weaponless greeting, their inner hands clasped together. When they were close, one hand reached out to Veddin. His muscles writhed in horror, but he let the alien touch him.

He came into direct mental contact with the Couple. Since they had also touched Autumn, he had indirect contact with her as well.

"Aha," the aliens thought. "Another powerful resonance broken asunder." The mind held a moment of puzzlement, then expressed understanding. "No—two isolates who would be Coupled, but not yet. Am I right?"

Autumn and Veddin agreed, as two separate voices. The two alien personalities were for all practical purposes just one being, but Veddin could tell Autumn's thoughts very distinctly.

Veddin's foremost thought was astonishment that this alien Couple was still able to transmit.

"Yes, though human pairings come apart, our bond is unharmed," the Couple continued, amused. "Obviously."

Again, Veddin and Autumn thought the same thought, though again they were distinct thoughts. "How can that be? Only the most multiply resonant of the human bonds have even a scrap of Coupling left."

Again the Tarcans were amused. "Yes, this seems quite a puzzle. Human Couples are so powerful, yet so . . . fragile. We believe the difference must be evolutionary. In our species, the bonds were tested for millions of years under harsh conditions: other species on our planet also had psi, and any Couplings that could be broken were, during that time."

Veddin saw an image of Autumn s parents, and Autumn thought at the aliens, "Can you find the source of the interference?"

"No," was the sad response. "But we see you came seeking machines to do such seeking. We have no direction-finding mechanisms, but we do have several units that can detect psifields and measure their local strength."

"What good will that do? If psifields don't lose strength with distance, how could we even tell if we were getting close?"

The aliens projected no thoughts for a moment. "It is true that psifields attenuate very slowly, but they do attenuate."

"We'll use my ship," Veddin realized. "Would interplanetary distances be enough to detect changes?"

The aliens assented.

"Then we should at least be able to tell whether the source is on Hydra or not."

"Yes." The Tarcans looked at an instrument on the bench; as Veddin saw it through their eyes they explained its operation to him. "It's strictly experimental, so treat it gently," they warned.

"Like a kitten," Veddin promised as he reached to pick up the gadget. He pointed at another piece of equipment. "That looks like another model of the same thing."

The Tarcans agreed. "But don't try to move it; that was the first one, and it s tuning is not adjustable. Even a tiny jar could break it."

"That's all right." Veddin turned his thoughts to Autumn. "I want you to stay here and use the old one. We need a detector permanently stationed to watch in case the jammer moves. Somehow, I suspect that when he sees my warship dropping on him, he may try to get away, or something silly like that."

Autumn raised her eyebrows. "No way. I'm going with you. These people can watch the detector."

Veddin snorted. "Great. How will I talk to them? I can talk to you via Hemten"—he nodded at the robot, now sitting quietly in the corner—"but not with the Tarcans. They don't even have vocal cords, do they?"

"They know how to read and write. They can communicate with the robot just fine—better than most of the native Hydrans," Autumn retorted.

Veddin shook his head. "Besides, things may get nasty after I find the jammer. I still think it's the Squishies. And whoever it is, he's bound to be armed to the teeth."

Even under normal circumstances Autumn's anger was hard to bear; but now, through the Tarcan linkage, Veddin could feel her anger in his mind. It was a palpable, relentless force. Veddin started to succumb when an alarm went off in his brain.

It took him a second to realize that the alarm was from the DareDrop, rather than from one of the people in mental linkage. "My Lords," was his last oath before breaking contact with the Tarcans.

With a bound he was at the door. "A Squishy fleet just skipped in," he explained rapidly, though Autumn had seen the images in his mind as well as he had. "They'll destroy the whole system if we don't stop them." He took a deep breath. "It's a big fleet." Numbers and descriptions were already pouring into his brain, and every second the prospects turned bleaker; the Squishies must have stripped their worlds raw to bring these fleets here. Lords, how Veddin hated fanatics! "I can't hold them for long. We have to find the jammer and destroy him, so your people can deal with the Squishies. I'll still take readings on the jammer's strength; I'll just do it while I'm shooting missiles and commanding a fleet." With that, he was running down the hall as fast as he could go. "Tell the robot to link to the DareDrop!" he shouted over his shoulder.

He was being crushed to death by the fury of his own acceleration when he got the first message from Autumn. "Veddin, my detector reads 7.9."

Veddin scowled at his own detector, sitting on his copilot couch. He remembered the Tarcans warning to treat it gently. "Gently," he muttered. He eased up on the acceleration enough to reach over and switch the thing on. "Mine reads 8.8," he radioed back to Autumn. "Obviously, our detectors aren't calibrated with each other. I guess it was silly to hope this would be easy." If his own detector was even still working correctly.

Once out of the atmosphere he started warming up his shields and beamers. The ships in his robot fleet did the same even as they sailed into position to met the titanic swarm of enemy. For a moment he considered telling Autumn to peek out a window, to see the most incredible light show in the universe, then shrugged the idea aside. She probably wouldn't be impressed; or worse, she would be scared for his own safety in the hell that would soon evolve.

Veddin pulled a tight orbit around Hydra and headed for the fleets.

Autumn's voice came through again. "I'm sorry, Veddin. More news. Veddin, my reading has changed. It's dropped to 7.7. The jammer's moving."

Veddin didn't have the time to be upset; the battle had already been joined. The Squishies were blasting into the system at an acceleration much too great for them to stand for long. Fanaticism was at work again. Veddin's fleet was only partly gathered, and they were retreating as fast as they could, waiting for reinforcements.

Fortunately the robot ships eould maneuver rings around the Squishies; but if they couldn't slow the Squishies down soon, there wouldn't be room to fight before Hydra was overwhelmed. Veddin inched his acceleration up another notch, and started skipping in and out of normal space like a drunk star racer; he was too far away, the lag time for his communications was crippling his fleet.

And then he decelerated as viciously as he had accelerated: the Squishies had already launched a salvo of planetbreakers! Veddin's own ships were strewn too thinly to catch them all; he would have to get them himself. The Squishies must have had planetbreakers to waste, to start shooting them already. Well, they'd keep Veddin tied down by Hydra, anyway.

"My detector is still reading 8.8," he told Autumn. "I'm gonna veer off now and get a third reading from another direction." He didn't tell her that he was heading that way primarily to stop the Squishy missiles.

There was something funny about the missiles; some of them didn't generate the radiation trace of planetbreakers. One of the senships he'd left in orbit around Hydra scanned them quickly; they were full of electroptics, but there was no warhead. Damn! "Autumn, the Squishies are shooting some strange missiles. I'll bet they're full of psi-jamming equipment." If he were right, the whole nightmare on Hydra was a Squishy plot. The ramifications were endless, but he didn't have time to think about them now. With several brief sweeps of his weapons this first flock of missiles disappeared, far in front of his own ship, very very far from their target. Veddin headed back out toward the battle.

And another volley of planetbreakers screamed toward Hydra.

Even as he turned his ship to intercept them, he received an image from one of the senships he'd put around Hydra. The image was of hellfire rising from the ocean. One of the fusion reactors had just blown sky high. Even as he watched, the senship's computers analyzed the tidal wave and calculated its future path; Pyrta, the island where Autumn waited, would be destroyed within minutes.

Veddin screamed in primeval rage, as he had when his sister died. "Autumn! Is there a plane around? There's a tidal wave coming toward you. You have to get off the island!"

"My detector reading has dropped to 7.6," she said. Obviously, she wasn't going to budge until they found the jammer.

Hardly coherent as a thinking entity, Veddin directed his ship to destroy the second wave of missiles. As he calmed, he looked back at the glowing readout on the psi detector. "It's still 8.8," he almost howled.

They now had six readings from two machines at three locations, at roughly three times. He shifted the numbers to the DareDrop's computer, but without much hope of a fix on the jammer. There were too many imponderables; and the jammer was moving! They might never get enough readings! Where could the jammer be?

Even as he realized where the jammer had to be, Autumn came to the same realization. "Veddin! The jammer is you!"

Of course! How else would the Squishies get something close enough to Hydra? Somehow they'd planted one aboard his own ship in that last battle.

Wait, there was another explanation. "Unless my detector's broken," he countered in misery. "I wouldn't be surprised if it's just junk now, after all that acceleration." To check, he'd have to go back to the island, to see if Autumn's readings went back up. Or scan the DareDrop in minute detail.

There was no time. Before he could get back to Pyrta he'd have lost them all: The island, the detector, and Autumn would all be gone.

A third salvo of planetbreakers came flashing toward Hydra.

A swarm of Squishy ships blasted their way through the screen of Veddin's fleet at last, and plunged toward the planet only seconds slower than the missiles.

Veddin cut power and unsnapped his webbing. "Autumn, listen carefully." He stepped free from his couch, and ducked out of the control room. "Go get the Shaylohs; you know, the Couple down the hall. Tell them that if we're lucky they're gonna get their powers back suddenly—but tell them that they don't have a moment to waste celebrating. First, they have to stop that tidal wave before it kills them and you."

"Okay."

"I'm not through yet." Veddin pulled down his space- suit. "Next, there's a bunch of missiles loaded with jammers, and if the jammers get close enough, you're dead. You have to stop those." He struggled the last inches into his spacesuit. He wondered how great the range of those jammers was; if it was as great as the jammer on board the DareDrop, Hydra was sunk. Fortunately, there wasn't enough room on each missile for a big power plant. Probably the one on the DareDrop had tapped into the DareDrop's engines.

"Okay."

"Wait. There's a bunch of planetbreakers coming with the jammers. If any of those get to your planet, there'll be nothing left but a dozen small moons." He plunged through the narrow passage to the airlock.

"Okay."

"Shush. There's a fleet right behind them, loaded to the gills with more of the same. And the rest of the fleets are breaking through now." The outer port opened up, and Veddin poised at the opening. "And Autumn, I love you," he sobbed.

"Veddin!" He heard her cry before he leaped from the ship.

He pointed his retrojet at the ship and pushed himself away as fast as he could accelerate; minutes before, when he first knew what he had to do, he'd had his fleet fire a dozen missiles at the DareDrop. Even one hit would obliterate the ship and any jammers that she might carry.

He didn't really have a chance of getting far enough away; the missiles were just seconds from contact when he jumped through the portal. One after another, twelve explosions sent blinding pulses of light that his helmet filters could only partially block off.

It had been stupid to try to escape, Veddin now realized. His radiation meters leaped to frenzied peaks. At least on board the ship his death would have been quick and painless. He sighed.

With faint curiosity, he turned toward the planet. There was no way he could see from here whether the tidal wave had struck.

He turned back toward the fleets and the volleys of missiles, glowing brightly as they needled toward Hydra. They were beautiful needles, quite hypnotic in their movements as they slowly bunched together.

The widespread points of light came together, and dissolved in a titanic explosion of brightness that excelled even the brilliance of the DareDrop s demise.

The planetbreakers had blown the jammers to smithereens, Veddin realized. Then he noticed Autumn s song in his heart, so soft now, yet so unforgettable. He felt like rejoicing, until he felt the guts of his radiation-torn body coming up his throat, looking for someplace else to go. He remembered he was dying.

Then he was gone from there, no longer a part of his dying body. Now he was trapped in a multiple mind.

He was dimly aware that the Shaylohs were a part of that mind. "We are sorry," the mind said, "we would request your assistance, but there is no time, and we know you would volunteer, if time permitted," With that the mind swept, not merely around him, but through him. Everything he knew of space, of war, and of alien beings, was theirs. There followed a contemplation too brief and too intense for Veddin to understand. The mind opened a window on a brightly lit scene filled with warships. On board the ships were points of light; points that were somehow more like the mind himself than they were like the flares of the engines, and as he watched, those points of light dimmed and disappeared by the thousands. Other forces, yet again different in their appearance, grasped the ships and twisted them into the distance. The battle was over.

But the mind was growing; more and more Hydrans were finding themselves and joining the attack, With them they brought power, and hate. Soon the hate grew stronger than any of the other forces there, a lust for revenge that exploded as the members of that mind remembered and thought and searched, to see that other minds, the minds of friends and lovers, were missing, were gone forever. Wild with pain and hate, the mind shifted, passing thousands of stars to a planet covered with bright points like those once carried by the ships in the alien fleet. In a single shuddering pass through that planet, the mind snuffed out every last point of light.

The mind shifted again, to another system. Here there floated several planets covered with light. For a moment the mind paused. It considered which to destroy next.

Till now everything had moved too fast for Veddin to comprehend. But he understood the half-planned genocide that that mind would commit and, though Veddin too had reason to hate the Squishies, he was appalled at the totality of the coming annihilation. "Wait!" he cried into the agonized consciousness. "You can't just kill them all!"

The mind was well shielded. It fully expected some type of attack from the Squishies; it relished the thought of destroying the attackers. But the mind was not prepared for an attack from within. "You must stop!" Veddin cried with all his resolve and determination.

The mind stopped. And the people who composed that mind stopped, and thought, and saw what they had done, and were horrified.

The separate minds (for they were one no longer) turned to Veddin. "Thank you."

Veddin relaxed. The minds shifted away again, back to Hydra.

And Veddin found himself in a spacesuit filled with vomit and blood. His stomach still heaved to drive more forth. He had forgotten that he was dying.

Pain, blinding pain, fire screaming through every cubic centimeter of his soul. He tried to twist and turn, but couldn't even tell if he succeeded; he could feel nothing beyond the pain. He wondered if this was what it felt like to die of radiation. No, that couldn't be; he should already be dead. Could it be that the ancient religions had told the truth after all: Could this be Hell?

Somewhere amidst the pain there came a chuckle; certainly it was the Devil. "No," the voice said, regretting its earlier amusement. "Fear not. This is not Hell, and I am not the Devil, though I can surely understand why you might think that. Hold on to your sanity for just a few moments, and you'll be fine."

The pain subsided. A gentle rolling motion replaced the agony; he must be in a flotation tank. Ungluing his eyelids, Veddin looked up through the transparent case. A couple stood there holding hands, smiling at him. He rolled in the tank, reveling in his release from pain.

"We're sorry about the pain," the Couple told him, "but we haven't found a method to prevent it. It's a pretty wracking experience, for a human brain to have psikinetic Couples and receptor Couples stomp around, rebuilding each individual cell." The man shook his head. "It was pretty horrible for us, too."

"Sounds like it." Veddin marveled again at the powers these people had. He forced himself to remember their weaknesses as well.

He tensed as he felt the song in his heart growing stronger. "Autumn," he cried. "I have to get out!" As he beat against the tank lid, the Couple unlatched it. Veddin jumped out of the tank into the cool air, and became acutely aware of his nakedness.

The woman handed him a towel. The man turned to a closet and pulled out some clothes. "Autumn will be here in a few minutes," they thought soothingly, completely misunderstanding his panic. "We've found it unwise to let touched-ones be present during cell-rebuilding operations; often the pain damages them even more than it damages the person being worked on."

Veddin's thoughts were incoherent. Finally he considered his ship, and was horrified. "The DareDrop," he thought in anguish, "she's gone." He looked wildly at the Couple, his mind filled with need.

"We think they've rebuilt one of the alien vessels for you, a replacement for the DareDrop." They were puzzled by his interest. "It's not the same, but it should serve most of the functions. Frankly, it'll be more comfortable, if the images of the DareDrop in your mind are any indication." The Couple smiled. Veddin received from them an image of the hall outside. He saw himself walking down the hall to a door, through which the landing field could be seen. "It's just outside."

With a final tug at the sleeve of the ill-fitting shirt they'd given him, Veddin dashed from the room. "Thanks," he thought over his shoulder.

As he broke from the building, he could feel the gentle pressure from his embedded shiplink. He turned left as the DareDrop II told him which way to go. He ran with increasing terror. A different kind of shudder formed inside of him; Autumn knew something was wrong.

Suddenly he was fighting his way through molasses. He worked harder with each step he took. At last he could go no farther.

"Stop," a mind projected at him. He was trapped.

"Let me go," Veddin begged. Autumn's song was pure with love now, and it grew closer. He turned to see Autumn approach, concern on her face. She jogged toward him as she saw his agony. "No!" Veddin screamed in voice and thought.

Now Autumn slowed to a stop. Her muscles strained as Veddin's had. "What's wrong?" she asked. Her parents were coming up behind her; they too looked concerned.

"Don't touch me!" Veddin said.

Autumn choked. "Why?" her voice wavered.

"Surely you know why! Do you want to wind up like the rest of the creatures here?"

"Calm yourself," the Westfalls commanded, "Your thoughts are chaotic."

They were right. Veddin forced himself to breathe deeply, slowly. He had panicked back in the flotation tank, and the panic was irrational. Touching Autumn would not turn him into a vegetable. He remembered that Couple they had met near the spaceport, helping people get indoors. They had been together almost a year, and they had still been able to act in the crisis.

Perhaps he could Touch Autumn, to try to explain . . .

No, he couldn't. Emotionally, he wanted to Touch her, to become a Couple with her. She could fulfill needs that he'd never admitted needed fulfilling. If he Touched her, he would never let go. Better not to even try.

Why did he have to love the woman whose touch would leave him crippled?

"What a foolish thought," Tarn and Tara Westfall interjected. "Our reliance on psi is no more crippling than your reliance on electroptics, Kaylanxian. What if Kaylanx's central power generators disintegrated? We, the psis, would have to save you, as you saved us. The difference is minimal."

"No!" It wasn't the same, but it took Veddin a moment to put it into an organized thought. "There is a difference. If Kaylanx lost her generators, I'll grant that she would probably die. But I would have tried to save her." They had freed his arms; he swept them over all Hydra. "You didnt even try!"

The Westfalls withdrew in embarrassment for a moment; another Couple, the pair who controlled Veddin's bonds, came in. "That is not an indictment against us either, Veddin Zhukpokrovsk. That is a tribute to you as an individual. Do you really believe all Kaylanxians share your will to succeed? How many of them would work with you if the lights went out on Kaylanx? How many would stare in horror and amazement, waiting for salvation, as we did?"

Veddin had no answer.

The Westfalls returned. "We're all a bit overwrought from the past two days' nightmare. It's difficult to discuss this unemotionally. Wouldn't it be better to postpone decisions for a few days, to let the light of objectivity begin to return?"

If he stayed long enough, Veddin knew he would lose. Touching Autumn would be so easy.

Pity flowed from the Westfalls. "How deep your conflict runs, Veddin Zhukpokrovsk. One part of you feels you must stay, and another part thinks you must leave." They paused. "Stay, Veddin. The emptiness that holds you is ancient, born in Man's beginning, before Nature stole from us the right to Touch. Few men ever get the chance to share the joy once meant for us. You would search forever for the answers you can find here with ease. Without Autumn you will never be free."

"And with her, I will never be free." Veddin turned away, not even noticing that the molasses that bound him was gone.

"Don't go!" Autumn begged. "Come with me. Please. See Hydra through my eyes. It's beautiful here." She stretched her arms toward him. "I love you."

"And I love you." He shook his head. "But there must be another answer, a better answer. Don't you see—it's us, the isolates, that makes Couples strong! To forego our isolation is to make us just like the Squishies. Is that a worthy goal? The children who grow up here, Coupled from birth, are they lucky never to know what it's like to be men? The answers that Hydra offers are no better than the isolation most humans suffer."

There was the mental equivalent of a polite cough in Veddin's mind, and the Couple that had bound him spoke. With a start, Veddin recognized them: they were the Shaylohs. "We don't pretend to have any answers," they began, "but we do have an alternative for you to consider."

Everyone was alert to the new thought. "Yes?"

"We have studied the psi-resonance jamming technology in depth since the battle. We could give Veddin a small implant that would locally jam psi-resonances. That way, he could touch Autumn, without Touching."

"Ingenious!" the Westfalls thought.

"Marvelous!" Veddin replied.

"Not on your life!" Autumn shrieked.

The Shaylohs focussed their attention on Autumn. "Would you rather lose him completely? We will design the device so that, if you ever succeed in convincing your touched-one that it is unnecessary, he may deactivate it."

A long moment passed while Autumn considered the compromise. "All right," she muttered.

A twinge of pressure formed under Veddin's left temple, then disappeared. Autumn broke free of the restraining psiforces and ran into his arms. Again Veddin felt the dim echo of a true Touch. It would be so easy to complete the sensation . . . yet, he believed, it would be so wrong. There must be more to mankind's destiny than just being like the others. He was convinced of that, though he couldn't say why.

He heard Tarn Westfall's hoarse voice—apparently the jammer blocked mental transmissions as well. "Good luck to both of you. Veddin, may your compromise bear new and interesting fruit." Tarn looked at Autumn and almost laughed out loud. "And you, my daughter, may you be successful in ending the compromise to your advantage." Now he did laugh. "I don't know which one of you to bet on. "

Veddin hugged Autumn. She responded in kind. He whispered, "Do you have anything you want to take with you? We're leaving for Kaylanx, you know, at least for a short time. I can't stay here, not now. The next destination after Kaylanx, I leave to you."

She shook her head. "I suspect the Shaylohs have already put my things on your ship. That's just the sort of thing they'd do."

"Very well. We'll go see."

They turned toward the waiting starship. Hand in hand they went, still alone, but now at least together.

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Framed