"Your mind full of cobwebby memories, Moyshe man-friend. One time you play revolutionary on hard matter place called Dustball."
"Yeah. I did. About two weeks. Then it was duck bullets all the way back to the Embassy."
"You live much in few years, Moyshe man-friend. Ten times anyone else linked by starfish Chub. Many adventures. Think Chub would make good spy?"
"Who would you spy on?"
"Yes. Problem. Very difficult to disguise as shark."
"That's another joke, isn't it?"
"Yes. You still spying, Moyshe man-friend?"
"Not anymore. I'm not Thomas McClennon anymore. I'm Moyshe benRabi. I've found me a home, Chub. These are my people now. You can't spy on your own people."
"Oh. Saw shadows in your mind. Thought maybe secret spy-stuff lurked. So. Hey! Maybe someday you go spy on hard matter place people? Be double spy."
"Double agent?"
"Oh. Yes. That right words."
"No more spying, Chub. I'm going to be a mindtech."
"Dangerous."
"So is spying. In more ways than you'll ever understand."
"Hurts-of-the-heart dangers, you mean?"
"I don't know why they tell you you're stupid. You're a lot smarter in a lot of ways than most people I know. You see things without having to have them explained."
"Helps, being starfish. People can't look inside, Moyshe man-friend. You have to tell. You have to show. You not the kind of man to do that."
"Yeah. Let's talk about something else, huh?"
"Running out of talk time, Moyshe man-friend. Scavenger creatures getting dancey. You not paying attention?"
"I still haven't got the hang of seeing everything at once."
That was one of the beauties of the mindtech's linked universe. He was not subject to the limitations of binocular vision. But he did have to unlearn its habits.
Blind people made better techs faster. They had no habits to unlearn, no preoccupations to overcome. But blind people who suffered from classical migraine were scarce.
Scarlet torpedoes edged toward the fleet. They were not yet wholly committed. Hunger still had not banished good sense.
Sharks were slow of wit, but they knew they had to get past the harvestships to reach their prey.
That was the whole point of the starfish-Starfisher alliance.
"Can't visit anymore, Chub. We're not going on mind-drive, so I'll have to help fight."
"Oh, yes, Moyshe man-friend. Shoot straight. I help, putting right vectors in your brain."
"All right." Aloud, into his helmet, benRabi said, "Gun Control."
A second later his earphones crackled. "Gun Control, aye."
"Mindtech. In link and free to assume control of a sector battery. Sharks will attack. Repeat, will attack."
"Shit. All right, buddy. But never mind the sector battery. Master Gunner says he wants you to feed the main battle tank. Think you and your link can give us good realtime input?"
"Yes," Chub murmured deep in benRabi's hindbrain.
"Yes," Moyshe said. And wondered why. It was not something he had ever tried.
"Monitor?"
"All go, Gun Control," Clara's voice interjected. "Green boards all across, I've just keyed the translator. You can bring the computer on-line whenever you're ready."
"Stand by for draw, Linker."
"Moyshe," said Clara, "don't take any chances. Key out if it gets rough."
"Drawing, Linker."
For an instant benRabi felt as though some intangible vacuum were sucking his mind away. A smatter of panic quickly yielded to Chub's soothing.
Moyshe relaxed, became a conduit. He became an almost disinterested observer.
The scavengers suddenly grew dancey with a vengeance.
"Attack imminent," benRabi muttered.
Those pilot fish were excited because they would feast no matter what the outcome of battle. They would be perfectly content nibbling dead shark or dead starfish.
A dozen crimson torpedoes suddenly misted, stretched into long, fuzzy lines, and solidified again near the starfish herd.
A hundred swords of light started carving them into scavenger food. Sharks were easy meat for particle beams.
"Teach them to try end run through hyper," Chub whispered.
The starfish herd had not bothered to dodge. They would not begin maneuvering till the protection of the human ships began breaking down.
It might not hold, benRabi reflected. Five vessels could not establish a sound fire pattern. There would be blind spots. Big holes. To fill them would mean risking hitting your own people.
The shark packs milled. They had not yet found workable tactics for assailing a fleet of harvestships.
Their intellectual slowness was the only hope for starfish and starfishers alike. Something had happened to the sharks. Their numbers were expanding almost exponentially. They were becoming ever more desperate in their quest for something to eat.
Their prey, historically, had been the stragglers of the great starfish herds. The feeble and injured and careless. But now they assaulted the strong and healthy as well, and had even begun turning on their own injured. Even the firepower of a harvestship could not hold the massed packs at bay when hunger heterodyned into a berserk killing rage.
"Not look so promising as you thought, Moyshe man-friend. All going to come at once, from everywhere, crazy. Just killing and dying."
There was dread in Chub's thought. Moyshe was dismayed. Even in the hell that had been the battle at Stars' End the starfish had not lost his good cheer.
The starfish's prediction proved correct. The red torpedoes suddenly exploded in every direction. Moyshe had seen the same reaction among humans. The first had been by a band of fair-weather revolutionaries who had heard the police were coming. Another time, a terrorist had lobbed a hand grenade into a crowded theatre.
But the sharks were not fleeing. The instant-insanity had seized them. They were spreading out to attack.
They arrowed in on the harvestfleet. Laser and particle beam swords stabbed.
Danion's fire was deadly. The realtime simulation from the minds of a man and a starfish linked gave the weapons people a fractional second's advantage over their brethren in ships relying on normal detection systems.
The shark wave rolled round Danion like a breaker around a granite promontory.
They could have worn her down in time, had they had the patience of the sea, and the sea's resources for endlessly sending in another wave. They had hurt her bad at Stars' End. It only took one shark getting through, with its multi-dimensional fires, to ravage a whole section of ship. But this horde was more limited in its numbers and more driven by hunger.
"Oh, Christ," benRabi swore as an explosion ripped a huge chunk from a sister ship. A shark had gotten through there. The service ships, still evacuating Jariel and trying to plug the holes in the fire pattern, swarmed toward the fragment. Clouds of frozen water vapor boiled round it as atmosphere poured out.
A shark flung itself into the starfish herd.
The great night beasts were not defenseless. One burped a ball of the. nuclear fire that burned in its "gut," flung it with Robin Hood accuracy. The shark perished in the fading flash of a hydrogen bomb.
One predator was gone. And one starfish was disarmed for hours. It took the creatures a long time to revitalize their internal fires.
BenRabi had seen the peaceable starfish use the same weapon against Sangaree raidships at Stars' End.
"Fur is flying now, Moyshe man-friend." Chub was straining for humor. "We doing all right, you and me. Maybe your Old Ones decide you not stupid after all." Left unthought was Chub's hope for the same reaction from his own Old Ones.
By way of support benRabi replied, "This is a new era, Chub. It's going to take hastiness and danciness to survive."