Digby and Honored Pedure watched open-mawed as Daddy built the theory up in more and more elaboration. Digby had always liked the science part of the show, and this had him all but hypnotized. Pedure on the other hand...her shock faded quickly. Either she had heard this before, or it was tending away from the path she wanted to follow.

The clock on the control-room wall was ticking down toward the orgy of commercial messages that always ended the show. It looked like Daddy was going to get the last word...except that Viki was sure Honored Pedure was watching that clock more intensely than anything in the studio, waiting for some precisely chosen strategic instant.

And then the cleric grabbed her mike close, and spoke loudly enough to break into Sherkaner's flow of thought. "So interesting, but colonizing the space between the stars is surely beyond the time of this current generation."

Daddy waved dismissively. "Perhaps yes, but—"

Honored Pedure continued, her voice academic and interested, "So the great change during our time is simply the conquest of the next coming Dark, that which ends this cycle of the sun?"

"Correct. We—all who hear this radio broadcast—will have no need of deepnesses. That is the promise of nuclear power. All the great cities will have sufficient power to stay warm for more than two centuries—all the way through the upcoming Dark. So—"

"I see, and so very large building projects must happen to enclose the cities?"

"Yes, and farms. And we'll need to provide—"

"And this then is also the reason you want an added generation of adults. This is why you push oophase births."

"Oh, not directly. It is simply a feature of the new situ—"

"So the Goknan Accord will enter the coming Dark in fact with hundreds of millions of Darkstriders. What of the rest of the world?"

Daddy seemed to realize that he was headed for trouble. "Um, but other technologically advanced countries may do the same. The poorer countries will have their conventional deepnesses, and their awakening will come later."

Now Pedure's voice had steel in it, a trap that was finally sprung: " ‘Their awakening will come later.' During the Great War, four Darkstriders brought down the most powerful nation of the world. In the next Dark, you will be Darkstriders by the millions. This seems not different from a preparation for the greatest deepness massacres in history."

"No, it's not like that at all. We wouldn't—"

"I'm sorry, lady and sir, our time has run out."

"But—"

Digby rumbled on over Daddy's objections. "I'd like to thank you both for being with us today and—" blah blah blah.

On the soundstage, Pedure stood up the moment Digby finished his spiel. The microphones were off now and Viki couldn't hear the words. The cleric was evidently exchanging pleasantries with the announcer. On the other side of the stage, Daddy looked very nonplussed. As Honored Pedure swept past him, Daddy stood and followed her offstage, talking animatedly. Pedure's only expression was a haughty little smile.

Behind Viki, Didi Ultmot was pushing levers, tuning the most important part of the broadcast, the commercials. Finally, she turned away from the controls. There was something a little dazed about her aspect. "...You know, your dad has some really...weird...ideas."

There was a sequence of chords that might have been music, and the words, "Sharpened hands are happy hands. Brim the tinfall with mirthly bands—"

Spider commercials were sometimes the high point of Princeton Radio programs. Molt refresh, eye polish, leggings—many of the products made some sense, even if the selling points did not. Other products were just nonsense words, especially if it was a previously unknown product, and second-string translators.

Today, it was the second-stringers. Reung, Broute, and Trixia sat fidgeting, cut off from the signal stream. Their handlers were already moving in to clear them from the stage. Today the crowd in Benny's parlor pretty much ignored the commercials, too:

"Not as much fun as when the kids are on, but—"

"Did you get the angle on spaceflight? I wonder what this does to the Schedule? If—"

Ezr wasn't paying attention. His gaze stayed on the wall, and all the chitchat was just distant buzzing. Trixia looked worse than usual. The flicker of her gaze seemed desperate to Ezr. He often thought that, and a dozen times Anne Reynolt had claimed the behavior was nothing but eagerness to get back to work.

"Ezr?" A hand brushed gently against his sleeve. It was Qiwi. Sometime during the program she had slipped into the parlor. She had done this before, sitting silently, watching the show. Now she had the gall to act like a friend. "Ezr, I—"

"Save it." Ezr turned away from her.

And so he was looking directly at Trixia when it happened: The handlers had moved Broute out of the room. As they led Xopi Reung past her, Trixia shrieked and lunged from her chair, her fist smashing into the younger woman's face. Xopi twisted away, jerking out of her handler's grip. She stared dazedly at the blood streaming from her nose, then wiped her face with her hand. The other tech grabbed the screaming Trixia before she could do more damage. Somehow Trixia's words made it onto the general audio channel: "Pedure bad! Die! Die!"

"Oh, boy." Next to Ezr, Trud Silipan bounced off his seat and pushed his way toward the entrance to Benny's parlor. "Reynolt is going to have a fit about this. I gotta get back to Hammerfest."

"I'm coming, too." Ezr brushed past Qiwi and dived for the door. Benny's parlor was silent for a shocked moment, then everyone was talking—

—but by that time, Ezr was nearly out of earshot, and chasing Silipan. They moved quickly to the main corridor, heading for the taxi tubes. At the locks, Silipan tapped something on the scheduler, then turned. "What do you two want?"

Ezr looked over his shoulder, saw that Pham Trinli had followed them out of Benny's. Ezr said, "I have to come, Trud. I have to see Trixia."

Trinli sounded worried too. "Is this going to screw our deal, Silipan? We need to make sure that—"

"Oh, pus. Yeah, we gotta think how this may affect things. Okay. Come along." He glanced at Ezr. "But you. There's nothing you can do to help."

"I'm coming, Trud." Ezr found himself less than ten centimeters from the other, with his fists raised.

"Okay, okay! Just stay out of the way." A moment later, the taxi lock blinked green and they were aboard and accelerating out from the temp. The rockpile was a sunlit jumble just to one side of Arachna's blue disk. "Pest, this would happen when we were on the far side. Taxi!"

"Sir?"

"Best time to Hammerfest." Normally, they had to baby the taxi hardware—but apparently the automation recognized Trud's voice and tone.

"Yessir." The taxi pushed off at nearly a tenth of a gee. Silipan and the others grabbed for restraints, and tied down. Ahead of them the rockpile grew and grew. "This really sucks, you know that? Reynolt is going to say I was absent from my post."

"Well, weren't you?" Trinli had settled down right beside Silipan.

"Of course, but it shouldn't matter. Hell, one handler should have been enough for the whole pus-be-damned translator crew. But now,I'm going to be the one who looks bad."

"But is Trixia all right?"

"Why did Bonsol blow up like that?" said Trinli.

"It beats me. You know they bicker and fight, especially some of the ones in the same specialty. But this came from nowhere." Silipan abruptly stopped talking. For a long moment he stared into his huds. Then, "It'll be okay. It'll be okay. I bet there was still some audio feed from the ground. You know, a live mike, a failure of their show management. Maybe Underhill took a swipe at the other Spider. That might make Bonsol's action ‘valid translation.'...Damn!"