The Vorkosigan Companion - Lillian Stewart Carl [145]
Firka:
No first name given. One of Russo Gupta's smuggler friends, he was the bookkeeper of the group, handling false passports, easing them around regulations, and taking care of nosy officials. He was killed by Ker Dubauer after transporting his cargo of stolen haut-fetuses. Gupta used his identity while on Graf Station to try to kill Dubauer. (DI)
Five, Garnet:
A quaddie on Graf Station, she is slim and long-limbed, with white-blond hair, leaf-green eyes, and high cheekbones. She is the quaddie Ensign Corbeau was with when he didn't respond to the crew summons from the Barrayaran escort. In the scuffle to retrieve him, her arm was broken, inflaming tensions between the quaddies, the Barrayarans, and the Komarrans. She is a premier dancer in the Minchenko Memorial Troupe that performs zero-gee ballet. She was with Bel Thorne when both of them were gassed unconscious by Russo Gupta, and awoke to find herself in a recycling bin. After the mystery is solved, Ekaterin calls her to help convince Ensign Corbeau to accept the diplomatic officer position on Graf Station. (DI)
Five-space math:
The complex higher math field that governs the science of wormhole jumps and technology. Miles has a difficult time with his five-space navigation classes at the Imperial Academy, but he passes them. On Komarr, Barto Radovas was a five-space math engineer, as is Doctor Riva. (K, MM)
Flimsy:
The standard means of conveying a hard copy of written or printed documents, the flimsy is a paper-thin sheet of plastic on which text is printed. Most standard comconsoles have built-in printers to create hard copies of documents. (All)
Flipsider:
A derogatory term for a hermaphrodite. (VG)
Float chair:
A device quaddies use to move about more easily in gravity, it is a small, one-person anti-gravity pod. It doesn't have a place for feet, but handles on the floor where the quaddie rests its lower set of hands, with the controls mounted on a central column. (L, DI)
Force screen:
A generated field of pure energy, impenetrable to all physical attacks, and many energy-based ones. The technology behind it is not explained. They are used for defense of ships, buildings, and persons. A force screen can be conformed to the shape of a building or ship or be spherical. A home version may be powerful enough to kill even large insects, and when a larger life-form comes into contact with it, it envelops it in a golden glow. Vehicle-mounted versions provide shielding from debris and radiation for spaceships moving at high velocity. Chalmys DuBauer traps Carlos Diaz outside of the screen surrounding his property to interrogate him about the feelie-dream he hired Anias Ruey to create. A kilometers-wide force screen over the Cetagandan Emperor's Celestial Gardens requires an entire power plant for its maintenance and provides both military and environmental protection. A spherical force screen over the Marilacan prisoner-of-war camp on Dagoola IV shows above ground as an opalescent dome. Personal defense screens are created by a wire mesh suit that protects against nerve disruptor and stunner attacks, and later a personal plasma mirror shield is created that protects against plasma arc blasts. (All except FF)
Fors, Bern:
A sergeant for GalacTech security. Sent out to recover a stolen shuttle on Rodeo, he and his partner are thwarted by Silver and Ivy Minchenko, who use the shuttle's engines to destroy their ground vehicle. (FF)
Foscol, Lena:
An accountant for the Waste Heat Department of the Komarr terraforming project at Serifosa, she is a middle-aged woman with frizzy, gray-blond hair. Involved in Soudha's scheme to destroy the wormhole to Barrayar, she embezzles the money from the terraforming budget to finance the jump-point plot. She is the one who informs Miles that help will be on the way after Etienne and he are chained outside,