The Fenris Device by Brian Stableford Page B

of Gallacellans is....
    â€œ...I’ll blow this ship to wherever the Saberwing went.”
    ...limited. They did have weapons.
    I was confused. First things first.
    â€œOK,” I said, “I’ll head for Mormyr. While I’m headed there, I’ll think it over. Just don’t panic.”
    I put the hood back on, and I began to move the ship into an arc that would take us somewhere near Mormyr. I accelerated a bit, but I didn’t want to transfer. So far as I was concerned, it could take weeks to get there. I was in no hurry.
    What was that you said? I asked the wind.
    Gallacellans used to fight. They gave up, but it was a deliberate policy. They certainly had armed ships at one time.
    How the hell do you know? I asked.
    How do you think? he replied. I was one once.

CHAPTER FIVE
    A not inconsiderable amount of water had flowed under the proverbial bridge since the wind had first invaded (infected?) my mind. At first, I had been implacably hostile to the idea of housing a second mind in a skull which I seemed to be filling adequately all by myself. Eventually I had become reconciled to the idea, had endeavored to set up an amicable working relationship, and had even gone so far as to make free use of the wind’s talents when my own seemed inadequate to the situation in hand. By this time I trusted the wind, and I even liked the wind. He was discreet, and occupied himself peacefully for most of the time, and rarely intruded himself when he wasn’t wanted. We had both approached the problem of two minds sharing one brain like mature individuals, and we had it under control.
    But all this should not conceal the fact that I was still—to some extent—scared of the wind. I knew by now that he wasn’t going to take over my body and consign my persona to outer darkness, but I was still anxious that my own individuality should not be threatened by a mingling of our minds. For this reason, I allowed the wind to make use of my motor nerves and my bodily capabilities to the full extent of his talents, but I had never allowed him to interfere with the workings of my mind. One has to have a certain amount of privacy.
    I knew that the wind had access to all my memories and all my knowledge, so far as he cared to make use of it, and he had volunteered to give me access to all his. I had refused. I had refused even to evince any curiosity about the nature of his being, his past history, or his future plans. Perhaps this attitude was slightly unreasonable—the wind, at least, felt that the fear from which the attitude derived was unreasonable—but one has to consider that the wind was a creature whose whole existence was dependent on the sharing of another creature’s mind. While between hosts he was completely dormant. He was therefore perfectly adapted to the degree of commingling which he wanted. I was not so adapted. My mind was designed for individual existence. Thus, the blending which—from his point of view—was the true essence of mentality, might well—from my point of view—be the destruction of my identity. It is all a matter of perspective. These are not matters in which one is inclined to take a cavalier attitude and needless risks. I valued my ignorance of the wind, because that ignorance was my guarantee of identity. Perhaps I was missing a great opportunity.
    Well, perhaps.
    There are certain situations, however, in which ignorance is an expensive luxury. I knew perfectly well that the wind had held up this little snippet of information about his having been a Gallacellan in times past for strategic reasons—he wanted me to appreciate to the full what a fool I was to hold myself aloof from his mental resources. I also knew that he would volunteer nothing more. I would have to ask him what he knew, and I would have to say “please” if I wanted to use any of it. I didn’t hold it against him that he should play the game in this