"Welcome home, Cobber!" he said. "We were beginning to worry about you."
Cobber tapped his feet experimentally on the floor of the ship. "It feels good to stretch out again after fourteen days in the tank. Air would have run low soon."
As was the ship's rule, Jina replaced the empty food drawers, stored up the fuel tanks, replenished the air supply and turned to the stacks of dinatro bombs in the back of the car.
"Shall I clear these out?" Jina asked.
"No. Let them stay," Cobber said. Before he could leave the dressing room the other officers and members of the crew came into the room.
"What did you hear?" they asked. Anxiety was written over their faces. Evidently they had already seen the effects of war. They waited, intent upon him.
"The peace is ended among the Kamae," he told them.
"Is it nation against nation?"
"No. They have not developed as far as that. Isolated tribes have attacked others, wiping them out. One by one the advanced cities that have schools and teachers are being laid low by wandering bands. I saw some of the ruins—"
He broke off and, as if seeing them again in his mind, said, "Old and young. Burnt out bodies buried in snow drifts. No prisoners. Savage war."