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reminded himself again that space travel on a grav-enhanced drone was not like being on an actual moving, swaying, shifting oldstyle sea vessel.

    "What are you doing?"

    Polyon released the chair controls and spun slowly round to face Darnell, long limbs relaxed as if to emphasize his comfort in this environment. "Just. ..
    playing games," he said with a queer smile. 'Just a few little games to pass the time."

    "What'd you do, crash the SPACED OUT gameset so badly you lost the screens?"

    "Something like that," Polyon agreed. "You can help me start it up again, if you like."

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    Anne McCaffrey 6f Margaret Ball

    PARTNERSHIP

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    It was the closest thing to a friendly overture Darnel!
    had heard from Polyon since they met the previous night. Maybe, he thought forgivingly, maybe the poor guy didn't know how to make friends. Coming from a stiff-backed upper-crust lot like the de Gras-Waldheims, spending his life at military boarding schools, you couldn't expect him to have the savoir vivne and easy social manners that Darnell prided himself on displaying. Well, he'd help old Polyon out, be his friend on this litde jaunt.

    "Sure thing," he said, walking on into the room with a careful soft step that didn't jar his aching head. He sank into one of the cushioned passenger chairs,
    "Nothing to it, I used to play this stuff all the time in prep school. Tell you what — if I help you get into the computer, maybe you'll help me get into something else?" He winked laboriously at Polyon.

    "What exactly did you have in mind?" The man didn't have a due how to make light conversation.

    "Two of us," Darnell explained cheerfully, tapping away at the console keys. "Two of them. The black one is more your size. But I need a strategy to get into the del Parma skirt's pants. Tactics, maneuvers, advance and retreat — Got any suggestions?" Not, Darnell thought, that he really needed any help, but there was nothing like a round of good, bawdy male-to-male bonding talk to cement a friendship. And since Polyon evidently wanted to be friends, Darnell was more than ready to meet him halfway.

    " I'm afraid you're on your own there," Polyon said distantly. "I've... never had occasion to study the problem."
    He nicked an invisible speck of dust off his pressed sleeve and affected to study the SPACED OUT screens as Darnell brought them back to fill the walls of the cabin.

    The implication was clear; he'd never needed to work out tactics with the ladies. Well, of course not. With the de Gras-Waldheim name and fortune behind him —

    and that muscle-bound, oversized physique — still, he had no call to sneer at somebody who was just trying to he friendly. Darnell glowered at the console and tapped the commands that would set the game at —
    hmm, not Level 10, his reflexes weren't quite up to the interactive holowaniors just yet. Level 6. That should be high enough to scramble Polyon's moves and let him see what it was like dealing with an expert

    "It's a new version," Polyon said in surprise. "I don't remember that asteroid belt.''

    Til bet five credits there's a due to the Hidden Horrors of Holmdale somewhere in the new asteroids,"
    Darnell offered.

    "No bet on that. But I'll lay you five credits that I/it's there, I'll find it first. Choose your icon!"

    Darnell chose one of the play icons displayed along the bottom of the central screen. He always liked to be Bonecrush, the cyborg monster who stalked the lower tunnels of the labyrinth but occasionally blasted out into space with his secretly installed jetpacks and personal force shield. Polyon, he noticed with pleasure, was taking the icon for Thingberry the Martian Mage, a wimp of a character if there ever was one. This game should be over in no time.

    "So what brings you out to the Nyota system?"
    Polyon asked after a few minutes of seemingly idle maneuvering and pointless commands.

    Darnell scowled at the screen. How had Thingberry managed to surround two-thirds of the asteroid