Out on the blue event horizon edge of the Black Hole called Infernos, the ship Arugula hovered somewhere between now and eternity. Inside, on the command deck surrounded by his crew of mechanicle men, Captain Numo gaged dials and measurments, an endless stream of information feeding into his massive brain banks. For years he had lived by himslef and his mechmen creeping slowly towards some type of understanding with Infernos. Everyday as he ate his hydroponec meal of lettuce and tomatoes and tofu material, he felt himself getting slowly closer and closer to a breakthrough that would allow him an understanding with the phenonemom, and through it, through the rent in the universe itself, peer inside his own brain, follow his own black hole and come out on the otherside, his side, the side, basically, of reality, and sanity. He'd been on the event horizon for such a long time that all recollection and information regarding his whereabouts had long been dropped from textbooks, and even official documents. The last computer which had contained a listing of his position had not passed the Creetor upgrade in compuGanics, its files untranslatable now except possibly for some young hacker type with an intrest in some arcane knowledge. However, no hacker had managed to take the outdated computer out of the trash, and the material had been crushed and reconstituted into plasatic playground play forms, and placed into a young Ganic cluster of type-12a's for their amusement.

Thus it was only random chance, or Profesor AKOTTs theory of optimal path which brought the first starcraft in uncounted years into contact with Professor Numo and the arugula.

As it was, Michigan 12, a music type from the ganic Cluster of Aptimum, had not expected to find a scientific starcraft of the old style hovering about the Black Hole she had chosen as her relay transmiter for her pirate Ganic Station. In even older days, what Michigan 12 sought to build would have been termed a Pirate Radio staion. While the term Pirate waas still in use, radio had long since been replaced by the perfect information technology, the Ganic. Implanted preconcieving into the near non existene preborn, The Ganic device granted near instantaneous creation and transmission, and recievement of all types of sendings, absolute regardless of distance, in Terra measurments or light years. Ranging from Mathematicla to emotive, and all stratas in between and exceeding. However, in the interving period during which the Great Egg Creetor ships had been launched to the outskirts of the universe, and their subsequent return, more Evolution back to mother Terra, a subgroup of TyGannical Zealots had succeded in gaining control of the Network Government and imposed a somewhat Fundementalist Viewpoint on the parameters of Ganic use. Michigan 12, having been shaped by cluster of her and her Creetors, had a bent towards more libertine views, and, with many others, had flown ships to hidden locales to transmit their own viewpoints to counter the official Networks creeds and mottos. Later, these outposts would prove valuable in wresting control from the Fundamentalist Clusters to theRepublican Confederation and Commune Grouping system which, while brief, proved adapt at the transition that would be engendered with the retun of the egg Creetor ships. But all that would be in the near future, and now Michigan 12 was wingin her way towards a suprised encounter with capt Numo and his pre-Terra Net stlye cruiser, the Arugula.

MIchigan had had to make a series of random moves until she felt herself safe from being followed. Surely the fact of her crafts removal from the Grouping would be noticed. However, the jumps she had made gave her confidence that it would be sometime befroe they were able to track her down. Now she had to slow down enough to scan for a suitable BlackHole to wrap her transmissions about before sending them back to Terra, the tight beam guareentedd to break up the Gannic Network and replace it with her coded program of anti-ism. She knew others out there were dong the same thing. Some of the them were even close friends of hers, such as Dodge44. It had been hardest for her to leave him, but the Feeds they were being Networked had such an overpowering stench about them that action had overwhelmed even their own intedesires, and so they had parted to join in the Resistance.

Her Pregressive contacted her with a message, indicating a Black Hole presence. She aimed her way towards the marker, and when she was a few Kliks from the event horizon, that was when she picked up the blip that was the Arugula

"Pregressive, identify that will you?" Michigan instructed her central Biocom. No reply cme forward, and curiousity piqued Michigans inherant resistors. The tygnnics would have registered on her Biocom, so this could not be one of theirs. She programmed a closer look. Her screens showed an odd structure, with a form vaguly familiar to the constructs she had grown up with. her sensors didn't pick up anything of a dangermode, so she decided to see if she could contact it.

In the meantime, on the bridge of the Arugula, it was some time before Numo realized that the blinking lights and lowlevel gonging reverberating over his ship was not another creation of his own mind, but was in fact the Comlink registering an incoming call. It had been near forever since an incoming call had registered, that he had forgotten the machinery which existed to warn him about just such an event. His mechmen stood silently about him, waiting his orders to this break in routine, endless eventhorizon routine.

" It's a communiction.." captain Numo mused, stroking his current beard. His mind was momentarily blank. A communication was not something he thought about much. The last signal he'd recieved had been a junkstyle relay advertising for Nostalgia Rocket Fuel. After that his longdistance transmitter had simply stopped recieving. His mind had been too occupied to send on of his mechman to fix it. Now he mused he should have that done, but than the blinking light came back into focus and he recalled he had a message, and that someone was hailing him, and he ought to acknowledge. He pushed a button.

"Um, Numo here. Hello?...Hello..this is Numo..er, may I help you?"

Back aboard her craft, Michigan 12 puzzled over the reflection on her monitor. She'd never seen such a face, except in the old VirtRoom IconoBanks she'd pawed through with her friends. A gaunt face, deep set eyes, and a scrawny beard. Not only that, but she wasn't having luck Gannically connecting with him. Only the silence echoed in her recievers.

"Numo, Michigan 12 here. what is your Cluster Code? Please reply."

Cluster Code? wondered Numo. whatever was the girl talking about. In some region of his mind he recalled the IRU Council had awarded him some code, or had that been a medal for his research on Nutrinotechnology? Again, his memory only gave up a succesion of vague, bearded men white haired and old clapping him on his back. THere had been many of those. If he had chanced to remember to look in a mirror, he would have noticed that he too had become one of these men..

"Er, Michigan 12. This is Numo. No code, just Numo, of the Arugula, on, um, research. compling some wave front densities, all the way up into the Netherdimensions Sparhauser postulated regarding contraction of the Core. Rather interesting. really, this last raytrack test put the lid on Nedens theory about the gestalt timing. "

It suddenly occured to Numo he ought to be a polite host and invite the newomer over for some sort of beverage, or food. Was that not the usual protocol? He'd had a jolly time the last time, how many terran years ago, when his old friend Spencercast, the Logitechno Philosopher had stopped by on an outbound voyage to test his hypotheseis on Autocatalytic Technological Conversions and their relationship to distance from the Universal Core. Numo's Mechmen had done a fine job preparing old style PaxAmericana dinner fare, and the distilled alchohol they'd drunk had led to llively conversations and the detachment of Spencercast's biomorphed leg, the one he'd lost on the climbing trip on Sherpahn.

"Michigan 12, please to be invited over here to the Arugula for fine dining. I, um, look forward to your company. Docking port 2 is available. My Mechmen will met you and direct you acordingly. Shall we say 1100 hrs?" Numo blinked, and gave a smile.

Perplexed, Michigan lleaned back in her hammock. Should she accept? Could she trust this odd fellow on the outskirts of nowhere? Was his old vessel even stable enough? Why couldn't she connect with h im ganecally? She could only postulate that he'd launched Pre-ShiftPhase, and had missed out on the whole First revoution...It wasn't to far a reach to suppose that. there had been lots of Pre-ShiftPhasers who'd jettisoned out to distant stars only to be found later, maintaining their isolated expeditions and missions. OldTimers they called them. Usually they had been searched out and brought back to Terra and updated. The NewsNetworks always did a piece on them, the gruff old and aged astrounauts of yesteryear, grizzled travelers whop always registered suprise at the changes wrought on old Terra in their long absences...Scientists mostly, and Michigan decided she would accept the Oldtimers offer. As she prepared to dock and packed her bag, concealing in it the tiny stungun Dodge44 had given her for protection as they'd kissed goodbye, she figured she would probably be able to set up her relay station anyhow. Old Numo might even be able to give her some help on the matter. The years of his Blackhole studies might have brought forth unreported information, allowing her better transmission capabilites. Michigan smiled at the thought of her superbeam smashing the Networks Control to pieces, leaving an untraceable missilemessage imbedded solid to broadcast her, and the others, appeals to the entire TerraCluster, unable to be stoppped by the Fundamentalists. Muffled thuds announced her docking, and as the air settled and her lock opened, Numo's Mechmen gave her a silent welcome to the solid girders of the ancient ship Argyle....

Thru thte long corriders of the silent ship the Mechmen of Numo lead Michigan. The servants of Numo were interesting to look at. Humanoid in shape and clad in odd, homespun garments they shuffled about with, to Michigan, a confused and puzzled look upon their face. this was probably due to the placemnt of photoreceptor and datlinks in their head, an effect Numo was of course aiming for in an attempt to provide a semblance of companionship in his long, scientific isolation. to Michigan they reembled the momatrons in the kinderclusters, tall, gentle murmuring robits that fed, warmed, and swathed each newborn as the ganic relays were activated, that startling brillant moment of enfolding warmth and welcome into a giagantic, human emotive network. simply walking next to these odd creations made Michigan smile as memory lapped at her consciousness.

The long corridors of the ship stretched on. Built at time when the style was steellike and girded. Catwalks and pipes, bioluminescent walls and glass elevators where oddly empty. By its design, the ship made Michigan exepcet to see a crowded, moving mass of people, all moving about, all excited and caight up in the mutual purpose and excitment of scientific discovery. Instead there were only the silent Mechmen, machines within a machine. Her odd escort lead her on and on, deeper into the bowels of the ship.

Watching his mechmen set the table, Numo fussed a little. He reaaranged the red rose at the center of the table, and smoothed down the ruffles on his tuxeoded cumberbund. He wondered if the style might be appropriate, but this thought soon passed from his mind as he wondered if the core linage he'd used on the probe relay he'd launcehd yesterday was appropriate for the QuaserLight test. His fingers absently fingerd the rose petals as his mind went blank, as it oftyen did, relaxing in some far corner from the heavy weight of his thpughts, his years and knowledge. When he snapped out of it he found himself holdin a fried cutred section of sesame toasted tofu. He set it hurriedly down on a plate, wiping his hands on his pants, and decided he's sit with his back to the starwindow, so his guest could look out on the swirling darkness of INferno.

When she entered, Numo was for a moment stunned, more shocked and jolted than he'd been by any of the recent scientfic breakthroughs which had occured on his long watch. Michigan 12 was exquiste, sharply carved features and eyes which held a color green that was only found on old Terra. Yet her beauty went beyond that, out from her youthful stance and energy, out from her and deep into Numo. It struck at memories untouched since, since there was no way to measure. Yet a resonance struck, and Numos face must have reflected this, as it registered wide open, uncluttered emotion, for Michigan 12 looked exactly like Numo's daughter, and when NUmo reaslized this, rushing up at him like a toprpedo from the depths to sink his floating ship, his memory told him again, breaking its silence of many years and layers and shelvings, the important fact that NUmo did indeed have a daughter.

"Ilsa!" he gasped, passing out into his bowl of udon style noodles, the memories a floodgate to a tidal wave of emotions.

Puzzled by the Old Tiimers behavior, even more disturbed by not being able to intercept the broad range of emotives she was used to translating, Michigan 12 could only lift the mans head dripping miso soup base from his whiskers out of the bowl and deftly dabbing at the withered face. He'd obviously undrgone a type of reponse in the recordant parameters, faint but powerful fluctions hinted at and picked up only by her most sensitive ganic translatoers. With a sigh she resigned herself to fullload vocalizing.

"Numo, Captain? you allright there?" she asked, shakling him, as the mechmen buzzed worriedly about, setting, and resetting dishs and plates of food.

Breaking from his dream of his daughter floating amongst chives and miso, Numo sputtered back to the world.

"Forgive an old man his memories.." he told Michigan as he halfheartedly wiped dry his beard, "But you remind me of my daughter, long ago.."

"Really?" Michigan asked, settling herself into a chair, giving the steaming food a sniff befor ehelping herself. "What was her Ident? Maybe she was one of my mothers..." She began shovelling the food into her mouth. The rice noodles and soy tasted deliciouse. It had been a few years since she'd tasted such fare. The TyGannics had fostered a diet heavily reliant upon meat and cheeses. Often as not, she and Dodge44 and others from her Cluster had engaged in Gardening, a clandestine operation involving stealthsuites and the raiding of the Party officials Gardens, utilizing the latest in Enter and Hack technologies that youth was constantly engendering. Once, a very close call with Minister Pickerdillys electrohounds had yielded them nonetheless with a pair of juicy, organic tomatoes.

"I guess in my day there was usually only one Mother. The Event Horizon, time slows here, I keep forgetting. What year might it be on old Terra?"

Noodles lifted to her face, Michigan paused. She tried to guess what year Numo had left from, and on which calendar. The Official Calendar calibrations had changed twice, and Michigan could never recall the Conversion formulas.

" I was born when they launched the great Creetor ships.." she offered, recalling the biggest event which had reverberated throughout her childhood, apart from the current governemntal takeover. Numo simply shook his head. These events had no meaning, only his work, only the physical existence of Inferno was important, and, of course, what lie inside, if it was 'inside' He was still waiting for the return of Drone 2525, whose callibrated instruments would hopefully yield the proof of taiko's Interteller theory, or once again prove Lord Tennebrae's formulas correct.

Watching Michigan eat, noticing the added on techogadgets( the infared contacts, the fingerllinks and various sense enhancers) of a world which had passed him by, Numo recalled his last conversation with the Arugulas Main Computer, the last one befor she switched off the voice program forever. They, (the computer had been called WillyGibb, spoke with a cold, Canuk like accent.)

"Oh sure, Numo, why not just hang ut over thar in the Event Horizon, no contact with Terra. Information gonna past you by, eh?"

Now Willy Gib, I'm working on a set project. The Groundwork is already complete. what more information do I need but what comes out of Inferno? Information from others will simply corrupt. With a standard set of technologies, with the parameters already in place, technology has plateaued, you know the autocatalytic limit is approaching, your own make up is part of that."

After that, the silence became slowly eternal.