Peace shook her head. 'That'll mostly be carbon dioxide. Even without the impact and combustion of hydrogen for oceans, there's millennia of red heat latent in carbonate formation.'
Removing his suit, Buckminster was nodding. 'I had an idea from Earth news. Transfer booths are getting cheap enough for something besides emergencies, so I thought: refrigeration.' He looked at her quizzically. 'I don't think I've ever mentioned this, but are you aware that you hop up and down when you hear a new idea you really like?'
'Yes. Were you thinking convection, or Maxwell's Demon?'
'Both in one step. Transmitter in the atmosphere, receiver in orbit. Only the fast molecules get transmitted, the rest are pushed out and fresh let in. Dry ice comes out near true zero, slower than orbital speed, and falls in eccentric orbit to make a shiny ring. Less heat arriving, and the gas returns to the atmosphere very gradually for slow heat release. You're doing it again.'
'I know. Suggestion: send all the molecules in the transmitter, and draw the momentum shortage from the adjacent atmosphere. Faster turnover, massive downdraft, more hot air comes in from the sides.'
Buckminster thought about it. Then he carefully hung up his suit, turned back to her-and hopped up and down.
Buckminster had the cleaner on monitor when Peace came up and said, 'He's ready to come out. Want to be there?'
'No.'
'Okay,' she said, and went off to the autodoc.
She'd naturally set it so Corky didn't wake up until it was opened, so the first thing he saw was a Protector. He stared, appalled-she was something of a warning notice for 'Don't Eat Spicy Foods At Bedtime'-and then, astoundingly, said, 'You're Jan Corben's little girl?'
Widening her eyes was just about her only option in facial expressions. 'Now how did you arrive at that?' she exclaimed.
'You have her eyes,' he said.
'It didn't actually work out that way,' she said.
'Excuse me?'
'Not unless you can come up with a really good reason for breaking into my home.'
She watched him catch up. 'Protector,' he said to himself, just grasping it. Then he said, 'Where were you during the War?'
She scooped him out of the autodoc, shut it, and plunked his bare behind down on the lid, stingingly hard. 'You are an invader in my home,' she said, looking up at him. 'You may now explain yourself to my full satisfaction.'
'You can't kill a human breeder,' he said skeptically.
'You're not a relative. Even if you were, invasive brain readout wouldn't damage your testicles.'
For the first time he looked worried. 'I thought it was a kzinti base. I wanted to steal a ship.'
Peace blinked, then said, 'Buying a ship would be recorded. You wanted to attack their home planet.'
'To land. And kill the Patriarch.'
Peace blinked again, then touched her caller and said, 'Buckminster, come to the kitchen. You have to hear this.'
'Four minutes,' came the reply.
She hauled Corky off the 'doc by his elbow, and walked to the kitchen still holding his arm. He stumbled a few times, then got his feet under him. She was exasperated enough to contemplate changing step just to louse him up, but refrained, as it would be waste work to haul him the rest of the way. She had the floor produce a seat, stuck him in it, and dispensed a few small dishes. 'Eat,' she said.
'What is this stuff?' he said suspiciously.
'Stewed rat heads, giant insect larvae, and assorted poisonous plants.'
He scowled, but got the message-don't be ridiculous-and began eating. Presently he said, 'This is wonderful.'
'Good, that'll be the neurotoxins kicking in.'
He scowled again, shut up, and ate.
Buckminster came in soon, got something hot with alcohol in it, took a good gulp, and said, 'What is it I have to hear?'
'This fellow came to this kzinti base, that we're in, here, to steal a ship, to take to Kzin. Guess what he wanted to do there?'
Buckminster shrugged. 'Assassinate the Patriarch?'
'Right.'
Buckminster took another gulp and said, 'No, really.'
'Really.'
Kzinti rarely laugh, and it is even rarer for a human to be present when it happens; but the sound was similar enough to human laughter for Corky to stop eating and scowl. 'What's so funny about it?'
Buckminster had an analytical mind, for an evolved creature, so he sat down and made a serious attempt to answer. 'Many years ago,' he said, 'when I was first allowed out, still almost a kitten, I used to hunt… birds, sort of… out on the grounds. I was very good at it. Some were bigger than I was, and all of them wanted their meat even more than I did, but I devised snares and weapons and brought them down. All but one. It was big, and kept going by higher than I could shoot an arrow, and I was never able to find the right bait to lure it down. However, it had very regular habits, so I built a sort of giant crossbow thing-'
'Ballista,' said Peace.
'Thanks. A ballista, to shoot at it. Just to get the range, at first. As it turned out, I only got to fire it once. The shot landed in a neighbor's grounds, stampeding some game. I was too little to know yet that there was a world outside my sire's estate, which included things like other estates. And orbital landing shuttles.'
It took Corky a few moments to realize: 'You were trying to shoot down a spaceship.'
'With a crossbow. Yes.'
'And my plan reminds you of that.'
'Vividly. Almost perfectly.' Buckminster was chuckling again.
Corky had been getting himself carefully poised for the last couple of minutes. Now he launched himself over the edge of the table at Buckminster.
Buckminster threw the rest of his drink on the table.
Corky's right foot came down in the liquid, and he spun sideways and tumbled the rest of the way. Buckminster swung his mug into Corky's hip, knocking him aside, and Corky slid past him off the edge of the table. He hit the ground about four feet away-then six feet away-then seven-then he rolled a few more feet. After that he tried to get up a few times, but kept slipping.
Buckminster got up and dispensed himself a towel, refilled his mug, and said, 'You want a drink? It'll reduce bruising.' The reply he got wasn't articulate enough to be obscene. The kzin flapped one ear, and went to mop up his first drink.
When Corky had finally managed to get as far as sitting upright on the floor, Peace-who'd seen it coming and known she didn't need to move-said, 'Buckminster and I have been working together, and working out together, for years. He's a strategic minimalist, and he's got enough cyborg enhancements that I hardly have to hold back. If he'd been holding your previous rude remarks against you, he might have been mean enough to let you actually use that Hellflare nonsense on him, and shatter your bones in the process.'
Buckminster tossed the towel at the trash and told Corky, 'What's on you is your problem. Likely to remain so, judging from your past habits. Do you use a name, or just mark things?'
Corky scowled again, evidently his default expression, but said, 'Doctor Harvey Mossbauer.'
'Doctor?' Buckminster exclaimed in disbelief. 'What kind of a doctor are you supposed to be?'
'I'm a psychist.'
Buckminster was speechless for the fifth time in the twenty-eight years Peace had known him, and that was
