Memory Read Free Page B

was, now. His Barrayaran identity was simply an extra dimension. An appendix?

    There's no place like home.

    I didn't say there was nothing better. I just said there was nothing like it.

    This brought him to Appendix C , which was the Dendarii combat armor recordings of the actual penetration and hostage retrieval sequences, Sergeant Taura's Green Squad and its rescue of the freighter's crew, and his own Blue Squad and that whole . . . chain of events. In full sound and color, with all their suits' medical and communications telemetry. Morbidly, Miles ran through all the real-time records of his seizure and its unfortunate consequences. Suit #060's vid recording had some really great close-ups of Lieutenant Vorberg, shocked from his doped stupor, screaming in agony and toppling unconscious in one direction while his severed legs fell in the other. Miles found himself bent over, clutching his chest in sympathy.

    This was not going to be a good time to pester Illyan for a promotion.

    The convalescent Vorberg had been handed over yesterday to the Barrayaran Counsel's office on Zoave Twilight, for shipment home through normal channels. Miles was secretly grateful that his covert status had let him off the hook for going into sick bay and personally apologizing to the man. Before the plasma arc accident Vorberg had not seen Miles's face, concealed as it had been by the combat armor's helmet, and afterwards, of course . . . The Dendarii surgeon reported Vorberg had only the haziest and most confused memory of his rescue.

    Miles wished he could delete the entire Blue Squad record from his report. Impractical, alas. Having the most interesting sequence missing would draw Illyan's attention as surely as a signal fire on a mountaintop.

    Of course, if he deleted the entire appendix, all the squad records, it would be camouflaged in the general absence. . . .

    Miles considered what could replace Appendix C . He had written plenty of brief or vague mission synopses in the past, in the press of events or exhaustion. Due to a malfunction, the right-arm plasma arc in Suit #032 locked into the "on" position. In the several minutes of confusion surrounding correcting the malfunction, the subject was unfortunately hit by the plasma beam. . . . Not his fault, if the reader construed this as a malfunction in the suit and not its wearer.

    No. He could not lie to Illyan. Not even in the passive voice.

    I wouldn't be lying. I'd just be editing my report for length.

    It couldn't be done. He'd be sure to miss some tiny corroborative detail in one of the other files, and Illyan's analysts would pick it up, and then he'd be in ten times the trouble.

    Not that there was that much in the other sections pertinent to this brief incident. It wouldn't be that hard to run over the whole report.

    This is a bad idea.

    Still . . . it would be interesting practice. He might have the job of reading field reports someday, God forbid. It would be educational to test how much fudging was possible. For his curiosity's sake, he recorded the full report, made a copy, and began playing around with the copy. What minimum alterations and deletions were required to erase a field agent's embarrassment?

    It only took about twenty minutes.

    He stared at the finished product. It was downright artistic. He felt a little sick to his stomach. This could get me cashiered.

    Only if I got caught. His whole life felt as if it had been based on that principle; he'd outrun assassins, medics, the regulations of the Service, the constraints of his Vor rank . . . he'd outrun death itself, demonstrably. I can even move faster than you, Illyan.

    He considered the present disposition of Illyan's independent observers in the Dendarii fleet. One was detached back with the fleet's main body; the second posed as a comm officer on the Ariel . Neither had been aboard the Peregrine or out with the squads; neither could contradict him.

    I think I'd better think