Beta shook her head. "The big worm," she corrected. (Or that's what I thought she said, at least. It could just as well have been "the bookworm" or "the big word," or even "the bakeware," really ...) Whatever it was Beta had said, it was enough to break Kat away from her datawork and send her hurrying over to the hushphone. That piece of hardware did its usual fine job of work, and I couldn't make out a single syllable of the conversation, which lasted more than five minutes.