Well, it isn't the realization of his own mortality that has gotten to him. This isn't the odds- closing-in blues that plagues Climber Commanders. If I look closely, I can catch glimpses of the it can't happen to me of our age group.

Is it the realization of his own fallibility? Suppose last patrol he made a grotesque error and got away with it through dumb luck? The kind of man he is, that would bother him bad because forty- seven men might have gone out with him.

Maybe. But that's more the kind of thing that would break a Piniaz. The Old Man never claimed to

be perfect. Just close to it.

"She'll be gone when I get home." His eyes are long ago and far away. He had had these thoughts before. "She won't leave a note, either."

"You really think so?" I nearly missed the cues telling me to ask.

Marie isn't his problem. A problem, and a symptom, but not the problem.

"Just a feeling, say. You saw how we got along. Cats and dogs. Only reason we stayed together was we didn't have anywhere to go. Not that it didn't look worse."

"In a way."

"What?"

"Hell probably offers a sense of security to the damned."

"Yes. I suppose." He draws his pipe from his pocket, examines its bowl. "You know Climber Fleet One hasn't ever had a deserter? Could be."

For a moment I envision the man as an old-time sea captain, master on a windjammer, standing a lonely, nighted weather-deck, staring at moon-frosted wavetops while a cold breeze fingers his strawlike hair and beard. The sea is obsidian. The wake churns and boils. It glimmers with bio- luminescence.

"For what distant, heathen port be we bound, o'er what enchanted sea?"

He glances up, startled. "What was that?"

"An image that came to me. Remember the poem game?" We played it in Academy, round robin. It was

popular during the middle class years, when we were discovering new dimensions faster than we

could assimilate them. The themes, then, were mostly prurient.

"My turn to come up with a line, you mean. All right." He ponders. While he does so, Kriegshauser delivers the coffee.

"Zanzibar? Hadramaut? The Ivory Coast? Or far Trincom-alee?"

"That stinks. It's not a line, it's a laundry list."

"Seemed to fit yours. I never was much good at that, was I?" He puts his pipe away and sips

coffee. Under ship's gravity we can drink from cups if we like. A small touchstone with another reality. "I'm a warrior, not a poet."

"Ah?"

"'Ah?' You sound like a Psych Officer."

Whatever its nature, his bugbear won't reveal itself this ! time. Not without inspired coaxing from me. And I have no j idea how to bait my hook.

I think I know how a detective hunting a psychopathic killer ! must feel. He knows the man is out there, killing because he wants to be caught, yet the very irrationality of the killer makes him impossible to track-----

Can his problem be this role he lives? This total warrior performance? Is there a poet screaming to get out of the Commander? A conflict between the role's demands and the nature of the actor who has to meet them?

I don't think so. He's the quintessential warrior, as far as I can see.

He chose me because I'm not part of the gang. And maybe now he's hiding from me for the same reason.

"You slated for Command College?" I ask, shifting my ground. If he hasn't made the list, that

might take him by the balls. Passing an officer over amounts to declaring he's reached his level

of incompetence. No one gets pushed out, especially now, but the promotions do end.

"Yes. Probably won't get there before this fuss is over. I'm slated for the squadron next two missions, then Staff at Climber Command. Won't get off Canaan for at least two years. Then back to

the Fleet, probably. Either a destroyer squadron or number two in a flotilla. No time for war college these days. All on-the-job training."

A weak possibility lurks here. Upward mobility threatened by war's master spirit: Sudden Death.

"Why did you volunteer?"

"For Climbers? I didn't."

"Eh? You said..."

"Only on paper. I asked for Canaan. Talk to the officers our age. A lot of them are here on 'strong recommendation' from above. What amounted to verbal orders. They're making it simple. The Climbers are the only thing we have that works. They need officers to operate them. So, no Climber time, no promotion. You have an unprofessional attitude if you don't respond to the needs of the Service." A bilious glow of bitterness seeping through here.

He drains half his cup, asks, "Why the hell would I ask for this? The chances of me getting my ass blown to ions are running five to one against me. Do I look fucking stupid?"

He recalls his role. His gaze darts to Kriegshauser, who may have overheard.

"What about rapid advancement? Glory? Because Canaan is your home?"

"That's shit for the troops and officers coming up. Navy is my home."

My stare must be a little too sharp. He changes the subject. "Strange patrol. Too quiet. I don't like it."

"Think they're up to something?"

He shrugs. "They're always up to something. But there are quiet periods. Statistical anomalies, I guess. They're out there somewhere, slipping through. Maybe they've found a pattern to our patrols. We don't really run random. Human weakness. We have to have order of some kind. If they

analyze contacts, sometimes they figure a safe route. We change things. The hunting is good for a while. Then, too, Command wastes a lot of time taking second and third looks at things."

There's bitterness whenever he mentions Command. Have I uncovered a theme? Disenchantment? He

wouldn't be the first. Not by thousands.

There's no describing the shock, even despair, that clamps down on you after you've spent a childhood in Academy, preparing for a career, when the Service doesn't remotely resemble classroom expectations. It's worse when you find nothing to believe in, or live, or love. And to be a good

soldier you have to live it, to believe your work has worth and purpose, and you have to like doing it.

There's more going on in the Climber than I thought. It's happening beneath the surface. In the

hearts and minds of men, as the cliche goes.

I'm sipping coffee with the Commander when the alarm screams.

"Another rucking drill?" The things have worn my temper to frayed ends. Three, four times a day.

And the only time that bitching horn howls is when I have something better to do.

The Commander's pallor, as he plunges toward the hatch, is answer enough. This time is for real.

For real. I make Ops before the hatch closes, barely a limp behind the Old Man.

It is easier in operational mode.

Yanevich and Nicastro crowd Fisherman. I wriggle into the viewscreen seat. The Commander elbows up

to the tachyon detector.

"Ready to Climb, First Watch Officer?"

"Ready, Commander. Engineering is ready for annihilation shift."

I hunch down, lean till I can peek between arms and elbows. The tachyon detector's screen is alive for the first time since we lost touch with the mother. It shows a tiny, intense, sideways V at three o'clock, which trails an almost flat ventral progression wave. The dorsal is boomerang- shaped. A dozen cloudy feathers of varying length lie between the two.

"One of ours," I remark. "Battle Class cruiser. Probably Mediterranean subclass. Salamis or Lepanto. Maybe Alexandria, if she's finished refitting."