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Thorby watched with awed distress, then went to his bunkie and thought. He tried to figure out why he felt so badly. He had not loved Grandmother -- he hadn't even liked her.
Then why did he feel so lost?
It was almost like when Pop died. He loved Pop -- but not her.
He found that he was not alone; the entire ship was in shock. There was not one who could remember, or imagine, Sisu without her. She was Sisu. Like the undying fire that moved the ship, Grandmother had been an unfailing force, dynamic, indispensable, basic. Now suddenly she was gone.
She had taken her nap as usual, grumbling because Woolamurra's day fitted their schedule so poorly -- typical fraki inefficiency. But she had gone to sleep with iron discipline that had adapted itself to a hundred time schedules.
When her daughter-in-law went to wake her, she could not be waked.
Her bedside scratch pad held many notes: Speak to Son about this. Tell Tora to do that. Jack up the C.E. about temperature control. Go over banquet menus with Athena. Rhoda Krausa tore out the page, put it away for reference, straightened her, then ordered the Deck Master to notify her husband.
The Captain was not at dinner. Grandmother's couch had been removed; the Chief Officer sat where it had been. In the Captain's absence the Chief Officer signaled the Chief Engineer; he offered the prayer for the dead, she gave the responses
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