He paused, trying to get it all together. The ambush, "The ambush, it wasn't stupid -- but it was completely ad hoc. The enemy had no back up. Their weapons were dumb,
mbt sale, simple things --" insight "-- why,
mbt changa women, I'll bet if you look at the wreckage of Greenstalk's skrode you'll find her beam gun was some sort of cutter tool. And the only sensor on the claymore mine was a motion detector: it had some civil use. All the gadgets were pulled together on very short notice by people who had not been expecting a fight. No, our enemy was very surprised by our appearance." "You think the Aprahanti could --" "Not the Aprahanti. From what you said, they didn't break moorage till after the gunfight,
MBT Tenga High Boot, when the Rider moon started screaming about us. Whoever's behind this is independent of the Butterflies, and must be spread in very small numbers across many star systems -- a vast set of tripwires, listening for things of interest. They noticed us, and weak as their outpost was they tried to grab our ship. Only when we were getting away did they advertise us. One way or another, they didn't want us to get away." He jerked a hand at the ultratrace window. "If I read that right, we've got more than five hundred ships on our tail." Ravna's eyes flicked to the display and back. Her voice was abstracted, "Yes. That's part of the main Aprahanti fleet and ... " "There will be lots more, only they won't all be Butterflies." "... what are you saying then? Why would Skroderiders wish us ill? A conspiracy is senseless. They've never had a nation state, much less an interstellar empire." Pham nodded. "Just peaceful settlements -- like that shepherd moon -- in polyspecific civilizations all across the Beyond." His voice softened. "No, Rav,
DRE BEATS TURBINE, the Skroderiders are not the real enemy here ... it's the thing behind them. The Straumli Perversion." Incredulous silence, but he noticed how tightly Blueshell held his fronds now. That one knew. "It's the only explanation, Ravna. Greenstalk really was our friend, and loyal. My guess is that only a small minority of the Riders are under the Perversion's control. When Greenstalk fell in with them she was converted too." "T-that's impossible! This is the Middle of the Beyond, Pham. Greenstalk had courage, stubbornness. No brainwashing could have changed her so quickly." A frightened desperation had come into her eyes. One explanation or another, some terrible thing must be true. And I'm still here,
DRE BEATS BY LADY GAGA, alive and talking. A datum for godshatter; maybe there was yet a chance! He spoke almost as the understanding hit him. "Greenstalk was loyal, yet she was totally converted in seconds. It wasn't just a perversion of her skrode, or some drug. It was as if both Rider and skrode had been designed from the beginning to respond." He looked across at Blueshell, trying to gauge his reaction to what he would say next. "The Riders have awaited their creator a long time. Their race is very old,
复件 (63) air max, far older than anyone except the senescent. They're everywhere, but in small numbers, always practical and peaceful. And somewhere in the beginning -- a few billion years ago -- their precursors were trapped in an evolutionary cul-de-sac. Their creator built the first skrodes, and made the first Riders. Now I think we know the who and the why. "Yes, yes. I know there have been other upliftings. What's marvelous about this one is how stable it turned out to be. The greater skrodes are 'tradition' Blueshell says, but that's a word I apply to cultures and to much shorter time scales. The greater skrodes of today are identical to ones a billion years ago.