His back still turned, Clovis tried to sound confident. "I have to go up there, Karla. I have to find out what's going on so we can help figure out what we're going to do."

Karla reached out and grabbed Clovis by the shoulder, spinning him around to face her. "You can't leave us! What sort of man would desert thirty children ..." Her voice trailed off as she read the anguish twisting over Clovis's features. "Oh, God, Clovis. I'm sorry ... I didn't mean ..."

Clovis clenched his jaw and waved away her concern. "You're right, no manwould abandon thirty children. No manwould have found himself in this predicament. A real man would have led everyone to safety far away from here. Being only half a man, I ushered everyone into this rathole, and now the cat sits up there, waiting for us to come to it."

He looked into her azure eyes. "You don't know how, before all of this, I wished for some way to show you what sort of person I really am. I used to fantasize rescuing you from a dangerous situation ... Yes, even trapped in this body, I can dream of being a knight in shining armor." Clovis snorted derisively at the image. "Then this happens and the opportunity I wished for let us both see what I truly am. The word pitifulseems so appropriate."

Karla stared at Clovis silently. "Clovis, I don't see you as pitiful..."

"Save it!" he snarled angrily, jerking a thumb back toward his own chest. "I know what I am, and I know how everyone sees me. I'm an oddity. I'm a court jester, I'm a freak of nature that people befriend just to prove how open-minded they are, but they never want to get close. They don't care because I'm not a real person. I'm a resource, but in this situation, I'm not very useful. Face it. You'd never have spoken to me if you hadn't wanted me for your class."

Karla slapped Clovis hard across the face. "Clovis Holstein, I will not be spoken to in that tone or with those words! You insult me, and you insult all those who are your friends."

She pressed her right hand against Clovis's livid cheek to stroke away the sting. "You think people only see you as small, but that's not true. Maybe they're more aware of your physical proportions at first, but that changes after a while. I've got dark hair and light eyes and I always think people find me strange because of that unusual combination. You've got no monopoly on such feelings."

She frowned heavily. "How can you say no one cares about you or wants to be a true friend? I remember seeing you at the community dance a month ago. I envied how you got along so easily with everyone. You, Dan Allard, and Cat Wilson laughed and carried on like three close friends, and it certainly didn't look as though your friends were just politely tolerating you."

Clovis looked down at his feet. "Perhaps I do have some friends, but that's beside the point. You wouldn't have gone to the dance with me."

Karla narrowed her eyes. "You didn't ask me, did you?"

Clovis's look challenged her. "Would it have made any difference if I did?"

She sighed. "I won't lie to you, Clovis. You don't fit the image of my dream man."

The dwarf shook his head. "And Thor does?"

Karla Bremen moistened her lips. "Clovis, I'm not a teenage girl looking for a date for the big dance. Yes, at one time, Thor closely matched what I wanted, but I've changed since creating that image. There are some things more important to me than looks." She glanced back over her shoulder to the room where the children lay huddled together. "The care and feeling you've shown over the past couple of days have touched me. You have strength, you have heart, and as much courage as anyone who ever strapped himself into a 'Mech."

Clovis studied her face. "Are you saying there's a chance for me in your life?"

Karla nodded. "It's not a contest with me as the prize. It's working together to see if we have what it takes to form a lasting partnership. I make no promises, other than to be honest with you, and you'll have to accept that. If we're to have a relationship, it will have to grow of its own accord."

Clovis smiled as the tension between them eased. "Hope for the best, but prepare for the worst, as they say at the fights on Solaris."

Karla laughed sincerely. "A wise idea. You've no idea how awful is my cooking nor how voracious is my appetite for truly bad holovids."

"I'll take my chances." Clovis looked back toward the room containing the children. "You'd best get back to them. I still have to go up there and see what is going on."

She hesitated, then said softly, "Be careful, Clovis."

Slinging a satchel full of electronics repair tools over his shoulder, Clovis laughed lightly and headed toward the shaft leading upward. "Take heart, fair damsel. Beset by the Dragon we may be, but no knight in shining armor would ever leave a lady in peril."

During the long climb up toward the surface, Clovis forced himself to concentrate on the mission at hand. Can't be dreaming about what might or might not be, Clovis.Rung by rusty rung, he ascended to a sub-basement level of the 'Mech bay. Crawling through shadowy access passages, Clovis headed deep into the facility the Kell Hounds had used as their temporary base.

Finally, in a water pipe tunnel just north of the east-west sewer line, he found what he had been seeking. A meter beyond the wall that separated Morgan Kell's private office from the room he used for staff meetings, Clovis felt a slender fiber-optic cable running along a waterpipe.

Bingo! Though I griped about spending five hours down in these stinking tunnels, now I'm glad Morgan wanted an independent visiphone line running out of his office.Groping around in his tool kit, Clovis located the small headset and cable tapper he'd used to check the connections when putting in the line.

He clipped the optical collar to the line and tightened it down until he heard a dial tone in his earpiece. On the alpha-numeric keypad dangling from the optical collar, he carefully typed in "COMSTAR," then adjusted the microphone before his mouth. He turned up its volume fairly high.

A gentle voice of indeterminant sex filled his ear. "ComStar, Lyons south. The Peace of Blake be with you."

Clovis kept his voice to a low whisper. "I have a message for Morgan Kell."

The ComStar technician's reply was firm but friendly. "Colonel Kell, in compliance with an order from Duke Aldo Lestrade, has left the world. I can put you in touch with his contact person here, a Clovis Holstein?"

"I am Clovis Holstein. I need to get a message to the Kell Hounds. New Freedom has been occupied by a company from the Third Dieron Regulars. I need to tell Morgan."

Clovis heard the gentle tapping of fingers on a keyboard. A computer beeped and the tech's voice again came on the line. "I do not have a current location for Morgan Kell."

Clovis thought for half a second. "They should be at Alphecca, at one of the jump points."

"That's not what my computer shows, Mr. Holstein."

Clovis frowned. The heat from the hot water pipe filled the narrow tunnel with a stifling warmth. Sweat poured from his forehead and stung his eyes. "All right, then they should be at Ryde."

The tech clucked lightly. "I show that they have not reported in to collect their messages. Do you want to send this message to Ryde?"

"Yes."

"Splendid." The click of computer keys again played through the line. "With our next transmission, the message should get there by the first of next week."