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it She was repressed, I think's the best way o' puttin' it.
What Sawbill sold her made her unrepressed. Any-ways, she overdosed herself.
She " his expression twisted horribly, "became somethin' less than human but
more than dead. Voluntarily turned herself into a commodity. Not a lynx or
somethin' decent like that, but something lower, beneath vileness, who " He
stopped, unable to continue.
Ethan wondered if he dared say anything. Finally he spoke as softly, gently as
he could. "Maybe if you could find her now. She might've changed, tossed what
she was engulfed by, and you could "
"Lad, I said she overdosed herself. She didn't fol-low instructions. Happens
all the time to those who make use of an emoman's merchandise." There was a
mountainous sadness in his voice.
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Alan Dean Foster - Mission to Moulokin
"When Sawbill finally stopped supplyin' her, she hunted up others who would. I
can't find her because she's dead, lad. To me and most o' the worlds, any-way.
She just sort of got eaten away from the inside.
Not physically. That I might've been able to cope with. The body did just
fine, 'til it got used up too. By the time that started, her mind was long
gone." He turned his attention back to the ice.
"I hope she's dead, Ethan. Should've done her a great kindness and killed her
myself. I couldn't, but as
I told you, I was very young then. Everything Sawbill did was perfectly legal.
He was always very careful about that. Probably still is, whatever he's
doing."
"But couldn't you have stopped him, legal or not? The man was your brother.
Couldn't he see what he was doing to the girl?"
"Feller-me-lad, emomen have their own code, their own set o' morals. 'Cording
to his way of thinkin', he wasn't doing a thing to her. She was doin' it to
herself. Commonwealth law sides with him. Emomen's drugs have never proven
addictive, not like something such as bloodhype, say. They're big on legality.
Not morality."
"How can you act legally and not morally?" Ethan wanted to know.
September laughed, looking with pity at his young friend. "Feller-me-lad, you
don't know much about government, do you? Or law."
"Government that reminds me." Ethan hastened to change the subject. He'd
tunneled too deeply into another's soul and had entered hollows he now wished
he'd stayed out of. "How are we going to make our discoveries known to proper
Commonwealth author-ities without letting anyone cover them up?"
"So you're finally as suspicious of Trell as I am, feller-me-lad?"
"Almost."
"Good enough. Never trust an official who smiles that much."
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"He knows everything that happens in Brass Mon-key. We need someone who can
command a closed beam for off-world transmission."
"Isn't anyone," September grunted. He seemed hard at work on the problem,
having already forgotten the moody discourse of moments ago. "Wait now." He
rose, towered over Ethan. "Ought to be one office that can send closed
messages."
"Don't keep me guessing, Skua. Trell's Commis-sioner, and he can "
"Think a second, feller-me-lad. Brass Monkey's large enough to rate a padre."
Being only an occasional church-goer, and less religious than most, Ethan
hadn't thought of the local representative of the United Church. No one, least
of all a comparatively minor functionary like Trell, would dare tamper with a
sealed Church communica-tion.
"Now that that little gully's crossed, let's go back and see if we can't help
put our ship back together, eh, young feller-me-lad?"
They left the shore and headed toward the ice-rigger. The fifth and final
duralloy runner, the steer-ing skate, was being hoisted into place at her
stern. Ethan snatched a surreptitious glance at his companion.
The patina of indestructible confidence had returned to his expression, only
slightly tarnished.
Skua September had turned out to be as vulnerable as any human. His huge frame
simply gave him greater depths in which to hide his passions.
With typical lack of formality, the Moulokinese prepared no noisy
demonstration to greet the return of the
Slanderscree
. The townsfolk went about their everyday business and the shipwrights who'd
helped
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Alan Dean Foster - Mission to Moulokin replace wheels with runners returned to
their yards. Officially, the sole ceremony consisted of minister
Mirmib and two aides meeting them at dockside.
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