Dark: How many Phoenix are at each of your places?
Cheng: Twelve at Ophir.
Mantar: I would have to count. About twice that many at Hesperidum.
Pietro: About seventy-five here, as well as the wives of most of the Phoenix who are married.
Dark: Seventy-five! That's more than we had in school!
Pietro: Don't forget that the school was there for a long time before you came, and it had many graduates. The government captured between a third and a half of us who were in the school at that time, but there are still probably three to four hundred Phoenix scattered about Mars.
Dark: Where are the other three instructors, whom I was unable to contact with this telepathic call?
Pietro: They are at Charax, Nuba and Ismenius. Their telepathic powers are not as well developed as ours, and they would not hear you unless they were expecting the call.
Dark: Cheng, I thought your group was to go to Regina.
Cheng: It was, but the Regina airlocks were more effectively blockaded to us than at the other cities. Those who went to the other cities, except those who were caught, had identification establishing them as legitimate residents of those cities. Regina has a peculiar social structure which makes this virtually impossible, except for the Phoenix who are already there and have been for a long time. We thought of stopping at Zur, but there were no arrangements to care for us there. We went to a dome farm operated by a friend of the Phoenix in Pandorae Fretum, and stayed there until we could trickle gradually into Ophir.