Free Tides of Light by Gregory Benford Page A

suit, drifting with the still-dancing
     radiance that had almost reached the main party.
    Killeen watched as the view approached the coasting body. He recognized the backpatch of Waugh, a womanoriginally of the Family Knight, now a Bishop. The form did not move.
    It spun in stately revolution, as solemn and uncaring as a planet in its gyre. Toby approached carefully. Within the helmet
     was shadow.
    Then Killeen noticed a small dark patch on Waugh’s boot, a flaw perhaps struck by a near miss during the attack. It was a
     small hole, hardly deep enough to break the suit’s vacuum seal. But it had allowed a voltage in and was rimmed by a burnished
     halo. Killeen saw that Waugh’s helmet was slightly swollen and distended. He understood then why they could not see into it.
     Carbon black masked the faceplate. He was grateful for this small fact, because then he could not see inside, where Waugh’s
     head had exploded.

TEN
    The memory came back to him as he ate the celebratory dinner. Waugh, a good crewwoman he had not known well. She had paid
     the price for his decisions, and he would never know if somehow the cost could have been less.
    Fortunately, her genetic material and eggs were preserved by
Argo’
s surgery. We must take measures to ensure that all Family can contribute to future generations’ genetic diversity. I advise—
    “Shut up!” Killeen muttered. His Arthur Aspect had no sense of time and place and decency and Killeen was not in a mood for
     his coolly analytical views. He glanced up fromhis serving of baked savory eggplant and saw that no one had noticed his exclamation, or else were too polite to show it.
     Ignoring outer manifestations of Aspect conversations was now considered good manners.
Argo’
s soft life was at least making the Family more refined.
    He could not help reliving the battle, a habit he had picked up through the years on the run on Snowglade. The Family always
     held a Witnessing if a member was wounded or killed in an attack, and this time there had been Waugh and Leveerbrok, both
     brought down by electric weapons. So the Witnessing summoned up the mourning, and then the Family broke into smaller families
     and guests for a meal which put the dead behind them and made muted merriment over the victory. Killeen had seen many such,
     most celebrating nothing more than escaping another mech ambush or pursuit. It was pleasant to greet this meal as a Cap’n
     fresh from his first engagement, an intense action swiftly won.
    “I sure hope next time you saddle somebody else with the scanner,” Toby said, passing an aromatic zucchini casserole.
    Killeen allowed himself a slight smile. “Cermo makes minor staffing decisions,” he said curtly.
    “Oh, come
on
, Dad,” Toby said. “You’re frappin’ over.”
    “I’m what?”
    “Frapping over,” Besen explained, pronouncing the words carefully. “It means dodging.”
    “New lingo for young Turks?” Shibo asked.
    Toby and Besen looked blank, but the second young guest, Midshipman Loren, said brightly, “Well, guess we sorta have our own
     way, y’know, talkin’ things out.”
    “Turks?” Toby persisted.
    “Old expression,” Shibo said. “The Turks were an old Family who lived vibrantly.”
    This was news to Killeen, who had never heard the termeither, but he did not show this. He was fairly sure that if the Turks had been a Family, it must have been long before humankind
     came to Snowglade. Perhaps they had inhabited the Chandeliers, or even had come from ancient Earth. Shibo had made good use
     of the years of voyaging, communing often with her Aspects, learning much. Along with tech help, Aspects and even the lesser
     Faces prattled about their own lost times and traditions.
    “Yeasay,” Killeen said, “the Turks fought hard, ran swift.” He saw Shibo give him a skeptical glance but kept on. “They never
     had a better day than the one you brought off, though.”
    “Yeasay, we blasted ’em,” Loren said, eyes