"I'll buy that. But what was that parting shot—7 can open this door'?" Lester mimicked the Commissioner's deep voice.

"I'm too old to leam new tricks, too, Les. I teleported through the roof door of that parking facility. He saw me do it. And she saw the memory of it in my mind. If she'd lived, she'd've picked my mind clean. And I didn't want her to die."

Op Owen turned abruptly to the window, trying to let the tranquility of the scene restore his equilibrium. It did—until he saw Harold Orley plodding along the path with his guide. Instantly a white, wide-eyed, hairstreaked face was superimposed over the view.

The intercom beeped and he depressed the key for his sanity's sake.

"We've got a live one, boss," and Sally Iselin's gay voice restored him. "A strong pre-cog with kinetic possibilities. And guess what?" Sally's excitement made her voice breathless. "He said the cop on his beat told him to come in. He doesn't want any more trouble with the cops so he…"

"Would his name be Bill Jones?"

"However did you know?"

"And that's no pre-cog, Sally," op Owen said with a ghost of a laugh, aware he was beginning to look forward again. "A sure thing's no pre-cog, is it, Les?"

For those of you who have consistently asked for more Helva stories, here is "Honeymoon." Only it's an un'story. I call it that because it cannot stand without a lot of explanation which really makes the minor incident that is the meat of the story much too top' heavy. You really ought to have read at least "The Ship Who Sang," the story, if not the full novel, to understand what is left out.

I have often called Helva my alter ego. "The Ship Who Sang" is my favorite story; I still cannot reread it without weeping, for I wrote it in an unconscious attempt to ease my grief over the death of my father, the Colonel. The other yams in the novel were therapy for other personal problems, none of which actually figure in the plots. So, although this tale should have been the starting point of a new volume about Niall Parollan and Helva, I don't really yet know if Helva will sing again. "Honeymoon" does tie up the one loose end which the majority of my readers have complained to me about.

"May i come aboard, Helva?"

Helva said yes without thinking because the traffic in technicians and Base officials attending to her refitting was constant. Then, she checked identity because while the voice was familiar, no technician would have couched such a formal request.

Rocco, Regulus representative for Mutant Minorities, was her unexpected caller. With the easy manner of one used to the protocol of brain-brawn ships, the Double M man saluted her behind the central column and sauntered into the lounge, looking about him with interest at the choice artifacts Niall had introduced, the circuit prints and cables draped about the control console, the pattern of dust and grit leading toward her engineering and cargo compartments.

"I've stopped apologizing for the mess," Helva said, "but the galley's intact if you don't mind serving yourself while Niall's not here…"

"I'm here because he isn't, Helva," Rocco said, refusing her hospitality with a courteous gesture and seating himself facing her panel.

"In which capacity? Double M, or Rocco?"

"Unofficially, but Rocco is always willing." Then he hesitated, biting the comer of his lip while Helva waited, amused that the suave, fashionably attired troubleshooter for Double M was at a loss for words. He'd had no block a scant seven days ago when he'd been needling Chief Railly before she'd extended her Central Worlds contract. "Let's just say that I had an interesting conversation yesterday which leads me to beg the indulgence of a chat—an unofficial chatwith you."

"On what subject?"

"Coercion?"

"Whose?" Helva was amused.

"Yours, primarily. Parollan's . . man can take care of himself."

Helva chuckled. "Now, Mr. Rocco, you were in Chief Railly's office that day."

Rocco impatiently brushed that side. "Yes, I heard the official line. They got you to extend your original contract with them… which was almost legal."

"Very legal, Rocco. I did some surreptitious checking myself. And I got them…"

Rocco held up his hand, peremptorily cutting her off. "Did or did not Railly deploy a detachment around you, effectively preventing you from lifting off if you'd so desired? And did or did not Parollan have to short out a perimeter fence to get to you?" "There was a little misunderstanding…" "Little?" Rocco's swarthy face darkened to emphasize that single explosion. "My dear Helva, I have my sources, too. Railly had the entire planetary security force, civilian and service, looking for Parollan."

"I had Broley on my side." Helva chuckled for the city shell person's cooperation had been involuntary. Broley still wasn't speaking to her because she hadn't opted for independent status and taken on one of the clients he bad lined up for her. "So you did. Do you now?" "Oh, he'll sulk a while longer, I expect." Rocco hitched himself to the edge of the couch. "Now, look, Helva, I know what it says on paper but I also know that Parollan's resignation from the Service is still in effect. Oh, he's brawning you to Beta Corvi, but there isn't anything contractual after that." "So?"

"Helva, I don't mean for you to be left high and dry. Especially with an incredible extension of debt which you must work off. And with Chief Railly overtly your enemy because of Parollan. Now that guy may have been a brawn-brain ship supervisor for the last twelve years, and bloody good at it from what I hear, but that doesn't mean he's going to be a good brawn. By anything left holy, Helva, it's a long way from telling to doing."

"Do you remember my last brawn, Teron of Acthion, that well-trained, physically stalwart twithead?"

Rocco gave a long sigh that ended with a grudging grin. "Okay, so he was a dud that BB School turned out by mistake. You can go too far in the opposite direction." Obviously Rocco felt she had with Parollan. "Seriously, Helva, that contract extension makes my skin crawl. You're committed to repaying almost

"You do have good sources, Rocco."

He grinned again, maliciously. "In Double M, I've got to. Look, there's a lot more to this whole affair than the fact that in a scant ten years you paid off your original indebtedness to Central Worlds for your early childhood care, the initial shell, education, the surgery needed to fit you into this ship, maintenance, and so forth."

"I paid off partly due to Niall Parollan, remember?"

"Granted, granted."

"And when this cycle-variant drive we're taking back to Beta Corvi gets approved, we'll be out of debt in next to no time."

"Not when, Helva. If. If wishes were horses, beggars would ride. I saw the reports on that cycle-variant drive, Helva. I heard what happened to the manned test ship."

Helva snorted with contempt. "Ham-handed fools."

Rocco would not be diverted. "I don't mean the fact that they inadvertently cycled the power source too high, Helva, I mean that curious discharge that is worrying the nuclear boys juiceless."

"Why do you think we're taking it back to Beta Corvi?"

"And thank the gods that you are." Rocco recrossed his neatly booted legs in a nervous fashion. "Whatever that particular force is, it's bloody dangerous. And no one seems to know why or how."

"They'll tell me." At least, she amended privately, she thought they would. If only because the use to which humans put their minor form of stabilized energy amused them. (And what did you do on Beta Corvi for an encore, Helva?) She was far from happy about having to go back to Beta Corvi, but the ends justified the means… she hoped.