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hyperdrive.”
    “Two centuries,” Louis echoed.
    If Nessus had done his edits properly, Louis would no longer remember Earth’s orbital period. That memory should be gone, along with every other memory that could conceivably point his way home without Nessus’ help.
    Nessus said, “We recently discovered that the Gw’oth have established a colony in the Fleet’s path.”
    Prevent a war.
    Louis ran laps around the passenger deck, his rejuvenated body demanding
action.
Compared to his father’s (!) autodoc, boosterspice was scarcely a step beyond exorcisms and leeches. Louis seethed with wonderment and unwonted energy.
    And more than a trace of worry. Had he not just gotten
out
of a war?
    The worry could wait. Nessus said they had a long flight ahead of them.
    Louis picked up the pace, his boots pounding the deck. He was young again! He had so much energy to burn off.
    And less wholesome urges to fight off. Some dark recess of his mind demanded pills, something to take off the edge. The body could be cured. Had been cured. Bad habits? Those, he would have to break.
    He began running flat out. The jumpsuit wicked away sweat as fast as he produced it. Nanofabric? The cloth was yet another wonder of Puppeteer tech.
    If the energy of youth and the challenges before him could not distract him, free him, nothing ever would. Voyage far beyond Known Space. Prevent a war between the frighteningly advanced Puppeteers and a whole new alien race. He had embarked, surely, on an adventure to rival anything even the infamous Beowulf Shaeffer had ever endured.
    (“Too bad you won’t remember it,” taunted that part of Louis still craving a pill. Too bad you’ll never be able to tell your father what you’ve done.)
    Louis ran and ran, till sweat rolled down his face and his chest heaved—
    To the second star to the right and straight on till morning.
    From the comparative safety of his locked cabin, Nessus listened to unending thuds. The footfalls came faster and faster as Louis burned off his excess energy, or sublimated his innate aggression, or worked up his nerve. Would Louis succeed?
Could
Louis succeed? Nessus had his doubts. Not even Beowulf Shaeffer had been Nessus’ first choice.
    If only Carlos Wu’s autodoc healed minds half as well as it healed bodies.
    At his best, Sigmund Ausfaller was exceptional. His innate paranoia found connections no rational mind could. His brilliance found opportunities amid the direst of circumstances. In the years Nessus had known the man, Sigmund had had adventures to rival anything even Beowulf Shaeffer had accomplished. And so Nessus had abducted Sigmund, his memory, like Louis’s, stripped of all knowledge of the location of Human Space.
    But Sigmund was broken. His last adventure had left him adrift in deep space in the crippled stub of a ship. Sigmund was half mad when help finally arrived. He was too scarred, mentally and emotionally, ever again to set foot aboard a spaceship.
    Louis would have to serve.

6

    Louis sat in the copilot’s crash couch, a drink bulb of Kona coffee in hand and a plate of scones at the ready. Whatever complaints he might have, the repertoire of
Aegis
’ synthesizer was not among them.
    The couch where Louis sat could have been purchased on any human world. Almost certainly it had. Everything else on the bridge—the control consoles, the pilot’s couch, even the padded rim of the hatchway—looked half melted. Corners and edges must be unnecessary risks. A person could bang his knee.
    He savored a bit of scone. (“Substituting one appetite for another,” an inner voice mocked.) Ignoring the scorn, he took his time chewing. When the subtle flavors had faded, he called out, “Voice. Show me one of the Gw’oth ensembles.”
    The holo that popped up was disgusting: a Gordian knot of flesh, writhing and pulsating. The Gw’oth came in every color of the rainbow, and in infrared Louis could not see. Hues and patterns changed in real time for reasons he