Martinez sighed. “Just tell us what the pilot is doing.”
Racer Two’s craft—the display did not offer the name of the pilot, and Martinez didn’t recognize the flashy scarlet paint job on the craft—had just rotated to a new attitude and fired the main engine.
“She’s decelerating, my lord,” Chatterji said.
“And why is she doing that, Chatterji?”
“She’s d—dumping delta-vee in order to—to—” She licked her lips. “—to maneuver better,” she finished lamely.
“And what maneuver is this deceleration in aid of?”
Chatterji’s eyes searched the display in desperation. “Delta-vee increases options, my lord,” she said, a truism she had learned in tactics class, and clearly the first thing to leap to her mind.
“Very true, Chatterji,” Martinez said. “I’m sure your tactics instructor would be proud to know you have retained a modicum of the knowledge he tried to cram between your ears. But,” he said cheerfully, “our pilot isdecreasing delta-vee, and therefore decreasing his options. So tell mewhy, Cadet Chatterji. Why?”
Chatterji focused very hard on the display but was unable to answer.
“I suggest you review your basic tactics, Cadet Chatterji,” Martinez said. “Persistence may eventually pay off, though in your case I doubt it.You —worm there—” Addressing the cadet whose name he didn’t know.
“Parker, lord.”
“Parker. Perhapsyou can enlighten Chatterji concerning our pilot’s tactics.”
“She’s dumping delta-vee in order to be captured by V9’s gravity.” He referred to Vandrith’s ninth moon, the innermost counting as number one. The Shaa didn’t go in much for naming astronomical objects in interesting or poetic ways.
“And why is she entering V9’s gravity well, Parker?”
“She’s planning to slingshot toward the satellite near V11, lord.”
“And number four—that would be Captain Chee—” He recognized the blue and silver paint job. “Why is shenot dumping delta-vee? Why is she accelerating instead?”
“I—” Parker swallowed. “I suppose she’s trying another tactic.”
Martinez sighed deliberately. “Butwhy , worm, why? The display should tell you. It’sobvious. ”
Parker searched the display in vain, then Cadet Foote’s languid tones interrupted the desperate silence.
“Captain Chee is accelerating, lord, because she’s intending to bypass V9 entirely, and to pass between V11 and the satellite to score her point. Since V11 possesses an atmosphere, she’ll probably try to use atmospheric braking in order to dump velocity and make her maneuver to tag the satellite at the last minute.”
Martinez rounded on Foote and snapped, “I don’t recall asking your opinion, Cadet Foote!”
“I beg the lord’s pardon,” Foote drawled.
Martinez realized to his dismay that Foote had just succeeded in making himself the star of this encounter. Martinez had intended to throw a little justified terror into some wastrels caught drunk on duty, but somehow Foote had changed the rules. How had hedone that?
In children’s school fiction, there was always the evil bully, tormenting the youngsters, and then there was the hero, who tried to stand between the bully and his victims. Foote had made a gesture to help Silva, and now had just rescued Parker.
And I’m the bully,Martinez thought.I’m the wicked superior officer who torments his helpless underlings just to assuage his own pathetic feelings of inadequacy.
Foote, Martinez realized, had him pegged just about right.
Still, he thought, if he were going to be the villain in this little drama, he might as well do it well.
“Parker should learn that you won’t always be there to rescue him from his own stupidity,” he said to Foote. “But since you’ve chosen to express an opinion, suppose you tell me whether Chee’s maneuver will succeed.”
“She shan’t succeed, lord,” Foote said promptly.
“Shan’tshe?” Martinez said, mocking. “Andwhyever shan she not? ”
Foote’s tone didn’t change. “V11’s satellite has altered course, but Chee didn’t see it because it was on the far side of the moon at the time. She’ll be too late to correct when she finally sees her error.” Foote’s tone had grown almost intimate. “Of course, Captain Blitsharts seems to have allowed for that possibility. His acceleration isn’t as great, but he’s allowing himself more options.”
Martinez looked at the number one boat and saw the famous Blitsharts glossy black paintwork with its ochre- yellow stripes. Blitsharts was a celebrated and successful racer, a glit of the first order, famous not only for his victories, but for the fact that he always raced with his dog, a black retriever named Orange, who had his own acceleration bed inMidnight Runner ‘s cockpit next to his master’s. Blitsharts claimed the dog enjoyed pulling hard gees, and certainly Orange seemed none the worse for his adventures.
Blitsharts also had a reputation for drollery. He was once asked by a yachting enthusiast why he called the dog Orange. Blitsharts looked at the man and lifted surprised eyebrows above his mild brown eyes. “Because it’s hisname, of course,” he said.
Oh yes, Martinez thought, there was rare wit in the yacht clubs all right.
“You think Blitsharts will win?” Martinez asked.
“At this stage, it’s very likely.”
“I don’t suppose Blitsharts is a relative of yours, is he?” Martinez asked.
For the first time, Foote hesitated. “No, my lord,” he said.
“How generous of you,” Martinez said, “to mention his name in conversation,” and was rewarded by seeing the cadet’s neck and ears turn red.
Chee crashed into V11’s atmosphere, her craft trailing a stream of ions as it cut through the moon’s hydrocarbon murk. She saw her target’s change of course too late, altered her heading and burned antimatter to try to make her mark. Her bones must have groaned with the ferocious gees she laid on, but she was a few seconds too late.
Blitsharts, on the other hand, hit the atmosphere with his usual impeccable timing, burned for the satellite, and passed it without breaking a sweat. And then kept accelerating, his torch pushing him onward past his mark.
“Perhaps, Cadet Foote, you will favor us with an analysis of Blitsharts’s tacticsnow ,” Martinez said.
“Of course, lord. He’s…” Foote’s voice trailed away.
Blitsharts’s boat stood on a colossal tail of matter-antimatter fire and burned straight out of the plane of the ecliptic. Foote stared at the screen in confusion. Blitsharts seemed to be heading away from his next target, away fromall his targets.
“Blitsharts is…he’s…” Foote was still struggling for words. “He’s…”
“Shit,” Martinez said, and bolted for the door.
TWO
Operations Command wasn’t in the Terran wing of the Commandery, but Terrans were on duty at this hour, none aware of any emergency until Martinez burst through the door. The duty officer, Lieutenant Ari Abacha, lounged with his feet on his console, a perfect corkscrew apple peel falling from his paring knife onto the napkin spread over his lap, while the three duty techs dozed over the screens that helped them supervise the automated systems that routed routine traffic.
Martinez batted Abacha’s legs out of the way as he rushed for an unoccupied console. The screw of apple peel spilled to the floor, and Abacha bent to pick it up. Footballers careened over a brightly lit field in one of his displays—he was a big Andiron supporter, Martinez recalled.
“What’s the problem, Gare?” Abacha said from somewhere near the floor.
“Vandrith Challenge race. Yacht’s out of control.” Martinez dropped onto a seat that had been designed for a Laiown and called up displays.
“Yeah?” Abacha said. “Whose?”
“Blitsharts.”
Abacha’s eyes widened. “Shit,” he said, and leaped from his seat to look over Martinez’s shoulder.
Telemetry fromMidnight Runner had been lost, so Martinez had to locate the yacht by using the passive detectors on Zanshaa’s accelerator ring. Blitsharts’s yacht had cut its main engine and started tumbling. From the erratic way the boat lurched, it appeared that maneuvering thrusters were still being fired. It was possible that
