His satisfaction was short-lived, though. Flint broke comm silence a moment later. 'We've got trouble, boys,' she said. 'Heading our way.'
Two more Darket appeared from beyond the bulk of the asteroid, moving slowly but gathering speed as they came. Blair's comm monitor picked up a transmission from one of them. They were summoning help.
'Lancelot Flight, break off action,' he ordered sharply. 'Recloak and head for the backup rendezvous.'
It galled him to run, but they didn't have much choice. Though the Excaliburs could deal with these two fighters easily enough, they couldn't count on being able to refuel and rearm at this depot before a swarm of additional Kilrathi ships turned up. A thorough search of the asteroid would turn up the depot, and if they were caught inside the result would be disastrous.
He hit his afterburners and punched in the new course. Paladin's warning ran through his mind. With this depot compromised and the secondary one depleted, the Terrans were on a one-way trip to Kilrah.
If they made it that far.
* *
Audience Hall, KIS Hvar'kann.
Kilrah System
The Audience Hall was empty except for the Crown Prince, brooding on his throne. Melek hastened to the foot of the dais, bowing low. Thrakhath raised his head at the retainer's approach.
'I left orders that I was not to be disturbed,' the Prince rumbled.
'An urgent message, Lord Prince,' Melek told him. 'One of our patrols reported engaging Terran fighters. Here in our own system . . . and they escaped using cloak technology.'
'Ape ships . . . here?' Thrakhath straightened, eyes flashing with anger. 'Cloaked . . . spies, seeking word of our fleet, then.'
'We cannot say, Lord Prince,' Melek said. 'But . . . we intercepted one exchange of messages between them. And our computers have identified the voice of the apparent leader.' He paused. 'It was . . . the one named Blair. The Heart of the Tiger.'
'Him . . .' Thrakhath stood slowly, drawing himself to his full height. 'That one would not come on a mere spy mission. Could it be . . . could the Terrans be planning a strike? Perhaps they plan to attack our fleet while it is still taking on armaments . . . to break up our attack before we can leave orbit.'
'It is possible, Lord Prince. But we cannot be sure.' Melek hesitated. 'The cruiser Kheerakh discovered a hidden supply cache in an asteroid near where the encounter took place . . . but I fear the fools destroyed it by bombardment rather than investigating.'
'I trust Kheerakh has a new captain now?'
'Yes, Lord Prince. One who is . . . less impulsive
'We must look to our defenses, Melek. I do not believe the Terrans can mount a serious threat, but even a few shipkiller missiles released into the fleet while it is bunched up would be an . . . annoying setback. Order fighter patrols around the orbital yards doubled.' Thrakhath paused. And have my personal ship and squadron readied to launch on short notice. If the Heart of the Tiger has come, I mean to take him myself.'
Melek bowed again. 'As you order, Lord Prince. He backed away, leaving Thrakhath alone in the empty hall.
It seemed the apes were far more resilient than the Emperor's grandson had ever realized. Melek wondered what other surprises the Terrans might have in store.
They had come farther than Blair ever dared to hope they would. The three Excaliburs located the backup depot and set down long enough to refuel and replace the missiles Maniac used to destroy the Darket that took out Vagabond. From there, they pushed into the Kilrah System, all the way to the outer moon of the Kilrathi homeworld itself, and the last Terran depot.
Like the first station, this depot was a crude chamber carved out of solid rock with mining lasers. A force field curtain allowed the interior to be pressurized, so Blair and his two pilots worked unencumbered by bulky pressure gear. But the facilities were primitive, and the work was difficult enough even so. The near-weightless conditions didn t help matters much, either. Though the equipment had virtually no weight, it retained its full mass, and none of the three were accustomed to working under such conditions. Care and caution were required at a time when every instinct cried out for them to hurry, to finish the job and get back into space as quickly as possible. It made for frayed nerves.
Nonetheless, they did the work, exchanging the missiles slung under Blair's Excalibur for one of the two massive Temblor Bombs stowed in the depot. He decided against loading the second one onto a different fighter. Originally, he hoped to have two fighters fitted with bombs, each with a fully-armed escort, but Vagabond's death changed his plans. A fighter without missiles wasn't worth much in a dogfight, and one escort couldn't hope to cover two bombers at once. If this run failed — and anyone survived to return to the depot — they could try again later, perhaps. But for now Blair figured two fighters flying cover gave him that much more of a chance to make the bombing run successful.
With the bomb loaded, they topped off their fuel tanks and ran a final test of their on-board systems.
'Do you really think this is going to work?' Flint asked as they were finishing. 'Or are we just going through the motions?'
'It'll work,' Blair said. 'We have to make it work.' He was still thinking about Vagabond's last transmission. So many people died to get them here, starting with Angel. Blair was determined to make their sacrifices count.
'I'd be a damned sight happier if Vagabond was still with us,' Marshall said. 'He wasn't very flashy in the cockpit, but he was steady. And we'll be missing him soon enough, I bet.'
'I already miss him,' Blair growled. 'And not just because he was a good wingman.' He caught sight of the sheepish look on Maniac's face. 'Look . . . we'll all miss him, the way we miss every single one of the others who bought it. I read somewhere that the darkest times are supposed to bring out the best in people.' Blair looked away. 'I don't know about that. All I do know is this: we've got to finish the job. Because if we don't, there's nobody else to pick up and carry on after us. So . . . give me everything you've got. That's all I can ask.'
He turned away and shoved a chip cartridge into the portable computer they used for their tests. The oversized monitor screen came on, and Paladin looked down at the three with a serious expression.
'This is the final briefing, laddie,' Taggart's recorded image told them. 'By now you've finished loading the T-Bomb, and you're ready for the final phase of the mission. I pray to God you can carry it out. If you canna do it, I dinna ken who can.'
Paladin was replaced by a satellite photo showing part of the surface of Kilrah, a long, jagged canyon in the middle of rocky desert land. 'You are looking at your target, a deep natural canyon that goes down nearly a mile. It was formed by one of the most active fault lines on the planet.' A computer-generated map replaced the photo image. 'If our calculations are correct, this point, here, near the northern end of the canyon, is critical. Three faults come together at this one point, and if the Temblor Bomb is detonated there it should set up a chain reaction of quakes that will devastate Kilrah.'
Taggart appeared again. 'Lay it in there sweet and easy laddie. The exact coordinates are already preprogrammed in your flight computers. To make the run, though, you'll have to descend into the atmosphere, into the canyon itself, and drop the bomb on the target. Because you'll need your shields to handle a high-speed atmospheric insertion, you'll have tae go in the last stretch without your cloaks. It'll be dangerous . . . but if you move fast and hit hard, you'll have a chance.'
The general paused, and Blair had the feeling his old eyes were looking right out of the screen at him. 'It's almost over, laddie. You and your people are the best for the job, and I know you'll do Terra proud. You'll be in my prayers, all of you. Good luck.'
The screen went blank, and Blair turned back to the others. 'All right, time to saddle up. We've got a
