What good could Pham's godshatter be against a thousand enemy ships and the Blight behind them? She floated for a timeless while, the sobs fading into despairing silence. And again she wondered if what she'd done could possibly be right. She had threatened Pham's life to protect Blueshell and Greenstalk and their kind. In doing so,
复件 (66) air max, she had kept secret what might be the greatest treachery in the history of the Known Net. Can one person make such a decision? Pham had asked her that, and she had answered yes but.... The question toyed with her every day. And every day she tried to see some way out. She wiped her face silently. She didn't doubt what Pham had discovered. There were some smug posters on the Net who argued that something as vast as the Blight was simply a tragic disaster,
复件 (53) air max2, and not an evil. Evil, they argued, could only have meaning on smaller scales, in the hurt that one sophont does to another. Before RIP, the argument had seemed a frivolous playing with words. Now she saw that it was meaningful -- and dead wrong. The Blight had created the Riders, a marvelous and peaceful race. Their presence on a billion worlds had been a good. And behind it all was the potential for converting the sovereign minds of friends into monsters. When she thought of Blueshell and Greenstalk,
复件 (69) air max2, and the fear welled up and she knew the poison that was there -- even though they were good people -- then she knew she'd glimpsed evil on the Transcendent scale. She had gotten Blueshell and Greenstalk into this mission; they had not asked for it. They were friends and allies, and she would not harm them because of what they could become. Maybe it was the latest news items. Maybe it was confronting the same impossibilities for the n'th time: Ravna gradually straightened,
复件 (4) air max2, looking at those last messages. So. She believed Pham about the Skroderider threat. She also believed these two were only enemies in potential. She had thrown away everything to save them and their kind. Maybe it was a mistake, but take what advantage there is in it. If they are to be saved because you think they are allies, then treat them as allies. Treat them as the friends they are. We are all pawns together. Ravna pushed gently toward her cabin's doorway. The Skroderiders' cabin was just behind the command deck. Since the debacle at RIP,
mbt white sport, the two had not left it. As she drifted down the passage toward their door, Ravna half-expected to see Pham's handiwork lurking in the shadows. She knew he was doing his best to "protect himself". Yet there was nothing unusual. What will he think of my visiting them? She announced herself. After a moment Blueshell appeared. His skrode was wiped clean of cosmetic stripes,
复件 (82) air max1, and the room behind him was a jumble. He waved her in with quick jerks of his fronds. "My lady." "Blueshell," she nodded at him. Half the time she cursed herself for trusting the Riders; the other half, she was mortally embarrassed for having left them alone. "H-how is Greenstalk?" Surprisingly, Blueshell's fronds snapped together in a smile. "You guessed? This is the first day with her new skrode.... I will show you, if you'd like." He threaded around equipment that was scattered in a lattice across the room. It was similar to the shop equipment Pham had used to build his powered armor. And if Pham had seen it, he might have lost all self-control. "I've worked on it every minute since ... Pham locked us in here." Greenstalk was in the other room. Her stalk and fronds rose from a silver pot. There were no wheels.