Pegasus in Flight Read Online Free PDF Page A

workers could make up in seconds. I will not fall behind the schedule. We will make our completion deadline. We must have the suitable personnel. You told me that you have them, and I have here the proof.” Triumphantly Ludmilla extracted a pencil disk from her tunic and brandished it at Rhyssa.
    “In that reply I said that I would certainly approach all Centers with your specific requirements. I most certainly did not promise to fill the vacancies.”
    Barchenka narrowed her pale eyes into a basilisk stare. “You recruit constantly. It is public knowledge that you find new Talents—”
    “It does not follow,” Rhyssa inserted smoothly, “that those we recruit are the kinetics that you specifically request. Certainly I could not ask untrained Talents to go into the hazards of space.”
    “Why not?” Ludmilla dismissed that consideration with a broad wave of her hand, inserting the pencil file back into its pocket at the end of the gesture. “We will train them on the job—to be useful, to be careful, to be specialists. They will love space. They will make many credits and be wealthy.”
    “The Talented do not accumulate wealth, Manager,” Per Duoml stated in his flat, nearly toneless voice, his patient eyes never moving from Rhyssa’s face.
    “Nonsense! Everyone acquires wealth.” Ludmilla had more than the usual contempt for altruists. “In the beginning we had many Talents working for us.”
    “We wished to assist the world project,” Rhyssa said. “But you would not accept their stipulations when their contracts came up for renewal.”
    “Stupid clauses, untenable for us. Shifts of no more than six hours when we work twenty-four on the platform. Special shielding for noise. There is
no
noise in space.” Her scornful gaze rested hotly on Rhyssa.
    “No noise which is audible to you, Madame Engineer, but which is extremely unpleasant to sensitives.”
    “Bah! Sensitive!” Once again Barchenka summarily dismissed that consideration. “Spoiled, pampered, catered to.”
    “No, Madame Barchenka, not pampered or spoiled, but yes, catered to,” Rhyssa flashed back. “The Talented are skilled personnel and require some minor considerations to enable them to perform at their best in the hostile environment of space.”
    Barchenka plowed on as if she had not heard. “It is incredible that such a minority can exert so much influence on the economic life of our world. In the airport, in the spaceport, in industry where, while I order matériel, I see the very Talents I must have to complete the most important project of the world, a project which has universal approval, which means mankind may reach beyond the limits of this solar system and explore the very stars themselves. Yet you and the other Center managers do not permit me to hire the specialists I need.”
    “It is not the permission of the Center directors that is required, but the consent of the employed,” Rhyssa reminded the engineer. “Center directors negotiate the individual contracts with the necessary safeguards.”
    “I can buy the contracts.” Barchenka’s challenge was also a threat.
    “Such contracts cannot be sold, Engineer Barchenka, and if you would accept the necessary safeguards, you might be more successful in attracting Talent!” Rhyssa replied sternly, beginning to lose patience with the woman’s dogmatic pursuit. She could ignore Per Duoml’s mournful expression and even keep her gaze averted from Prince Phanibal’s hot eyes, slightly wet lips, and nostrils that flared slightly from his rapid breathing; but all three glaring at her were an unnerving combination. She kept a smile on her lips, deliberately increasing the flow of her limbic system.
    “You can insist,” Ludmilla repeated. “It is in all your contracts that ‘it can be voided at the discretion of the Center in emergencies.’ ”
    Rhyssa suppressed a rush of anger that Barchenka had been given access to a Parapsychic Contract and had to remind herself