“And is it finished?” she asked. “Is anything ever finished?” Nea drooped upon the hassock. Resting her chin upon her hands she looked up at the screen.
“That is where we are going?” she asked.
“Ato is certain that Grim Hagen is headed for Aldebaran,” Odin answered.
“One star out of millions. What difference does it make?”
“You have been working too hard—”
“Oh, damn!” she said angrily. “There is more to the work than you and the others guessed. Now, we are going to rescue a cousin of mine and to punish another cousin. The old rat-race. Tell me why don’t people just go sit in a corner and enjoy themselves. So far, we have done nothing but increase our scurrying a thousand-fold.”
He tried to make a joke of the matter. “You sound like a beatnik.”
“Perhaps,” she answered slowly, still looking up at the screen. “They considered my father beat—dead-beat. But I know more of this science than you do, Jack Odin. What if I told you there was little chance of finding Maya. Or, if you found her, she might be an old, old lady.”