'There's a bright side?'
'Sure. The bad guys don't like flying through all this space junk any more than we do.'
'Maybe not,' Maniac said. 'But they can take more risks out there than we can. After all, they've got nine lives.'
'NOW, GENERAL QUARTERS, GENERAL QUARTERS ALL HANDS TO BATTLE STATIONS! REPEAT, ALL HANDS TO BATTLE STATIONS!'
Blair turned in his chair to face a monitor and punched up an intercom link to the bridge. 'This is Blair. What's going down?'
The screen showed Rollins in the foreground, with the running figures of bridge crewmen hurrying to their posts visible behind him. From somewhere out of the picture the sensor officer was talking. 'I'm reading multiple contacts, Captain. Eight . . . no, ten capital ships. Four of them are carriers. Configuration. . . they're Kilrathi, sir. No doubt about it.'
Rollins turned to look into the camera. 'We've got a mountain of trouble out there, Colonel,' he said 'A whole damned cat task force just popped onto our scopes.'
The image in the monitor broke up, replaced by Eisen's heavy, scowling features. 'I'll take it, Lieutenant,' he said crisply. 'Colonel Blair, we have four carriers plus escorts incoming. No fighters yet, but you can bet they'll launch a flock of them when they've closed the range.'
'That's pretty long odds,' Blair said slowly. 'Delius Station doesn't have much firepower.'
'Not enough to make a difference,' Eisen agreed. 'We're breaking orbit and heading for the nearest jump point. There's no sense in buying it here.'
'And our orders? The flight wing?'
'Get ready for a magnum launch, Colonel. Get your birds ready. We may need them to buy the ship enough time to reach the jump point.' Eisen's look was grim. 'Another bug-out, Colonel. I'm sorry, but it looks like you'll be covering our tails one more time.'
'Understood, sir,' Blair said.
Eisen had already turned away from the intercom, issuing orders to his bridge crew. 'Navigation! Plot course to the nearest jump point. Helm, break orbit. Proceed at full thrust. Gunnery. . . be ready to clear a path if the debris field gets too thick . . .' The intercom went dead.
Blair slapped the red switch that issued the magnum launch alert. A new alarm shrilled, followed by the computer's public address announcement. 'LAUNCH STATIONS! LAUNCH STATIONS! ALL FLIGHT WING PERSONNEL TO LAUNCH STATIONS MAGNUM LAUNCH!'
Blair checked his instruments for what seemed like the hundredth time, knowing that nothing had changed yet feeling compelled to do something. Every one of Victory's fighters was crewed and ready, even a pair that the technical staff had down checked as unreliable. Now they were waiting, and that was an agony worse than any combat situation.
The carrier had opened up a fair lead over the Kilrathi ships, bulling her way through the asteroid field with weapons blazing to clear away any chunk of rock big enough to pose a threat to the ship. The Imperial vessels were more cautious, keeping to a tight formation and lumbering slowly after Victory as if reluctant to commit themselves to an attack. Perhaps they had learned to respect the Terrans in earlier clashes . . . or perhaps they simply regarded it as triumph enough to drive the ship away from Delius Station, leaving the Terrans there — including a small contingent of the carrier's crew still on liberty — completely at the mercy of the Kilrathi task force.
Blair was starting to hope they might not have to beat off any genuine attack, but the threat remained. They wouldn't be able to relax their guard until they made the jump to Tamayo, if then.
'Colonel, sensors are reporting a launch in progress from the lead Kilrathi carrier.' Rollins gave him a welcome distraction, however grim his news might be. 'It's the flagship . . . Hvar'kann. Looks like you'll be having a party after all. ''
'Acknowledged,' Blair said. 'Flight wing, from Blair. Begin launch sequence on my mark.'
At that moment his comm panel went crazy. The visual display broke up in a kaleidoscope of patterns and colors, and the speakers in his helmet squealed and whined. It took several seconds for the noise to fade and the screen to come back on-line. Blair stared at the monitor, as if it might give him some clue to what had just happened.
A glowering Kilrathi face filled the screen, a face Blair had seen many times before.
Thrakhath.
The image jumped and jittered again, then returned. Blair studied it thoughtfully, wondering what was causing the distortion. Ship to ship video transmissions used computers to encode and decode messages, and to provide automatic translations of foreign languages. For the computer to have this much trouble reconstructing whatever message Thrakhath was broadcasting meant the signal content must be massive. Evidently, the Kilrathi were trying to overload Victory's whole comm system and Jam every frequency the Terrans might be using.
Thrakhath's image began to speak as the computers processed their translation of the Kilrathi language. I have heard of your Terran Bible with its predictions that there will be a weeping and gnashing of teeth. These the Imperial Race will soon fulfill. We will tear out your tongues, we will scoop out your brains. You will learn to beg for the release of death.'
Blair tried to switch to a different comm channel, but Thrakhath's hissing, taunting image remained on the screen. 'You will be prime examples to the other races in the galaxy, you clownish baboons. Your race will suffer a thousand torments and more. And do not think that the presence of the Heart of the Tiger among you can make a difference. Colonel Blair will be reduced to a pile of entrails, his bones will be gnawed by our young.'
Hearing himself referred to directly made Blair stiffen. It wasn't often that the Kilrathi chose to grant a name to one of their human adversaries . . . and it inevitably meant that the individual they chose to 'honor' had become the prime target of a Kilrathi challenge.
'Heart of the Tiger, you shall pay for the blood of every Kilrathi noble you have dispatched in baffle. They shall make songs of your death, of the failure and disgrace you shall know even before your death. Already you have failed, Heart of the Tiger, failed at Locanda Four, failed at Ariel . . . failed your lair-mate, the one known as Devereaux, the Angel.'
Blair gasped as the image of Thrakhath on his monitor blacked out, only to be replaced by a new scene. . . .
A scene from hell.
It was a large room, red-lit, dark, with ornate fittings and decorations more suggested than seen among the shadows. A throng of Kilrathi in garb Blair recognized as that of the high nobility were gathered in the middle of the open chamber, bowing low as Thrakhath and an aged Kilrathi, the Emperor himself, entered. As the Emperor sat on the imposing throne, Blair became aware of movement in the shadows on either side of the two figures. It was difficult to judge exactly what was happening, but when he finally realized what he was witnessing, he wished he had not.
There were Terrans along the wall behind the throne men and women hanging in chains, their Confed-issue flight suits in rags. Bulky Kilrathi guards carrying nerve-prods moved among them, striking out almost at random, eliciting cries and moans from their victims.
