The Reaches

second blast rang out, thruster exhaust blanketed the RF spectrum.

Gregg's radio roared with static. He prodded at it with a finger, trying to find the power switch. The static pulsed as he switched bands uselessly instead. He smashed the unit with the edge of his hand, using his torso armor as the anvil to his rage. Fragments of thermoplastic and electronic components prickled his skin.

The Dalriada rose on a huge billow of plasma, shaking the world. A moment later, the Peaches followed, dancing like lint above an air vent because of the larger vessel's exhaust.

Gregg screamed in fury, backed a step, and kicked the twisted gun mount with his bootheel. Metal creaked. He pushed again at the barrel, planting his hands as close to the muzzle as he could to maximize his leverage. The massive weapon slid a millimeter, then jounced across the decking for half a meter before it locked up again. The edge of the muzzle scored a bright line in the concrete.

Gregg jumped into the stairway to the ready room and hunched there. 'Go ahead, Stampfer!' he shouted. He didn't have time to close the armored door above him. He'd seen figures scuttling toward the fort out of the corner of his eye. 'Shoot! Shoo-'

The plasma cannon fired. The bolt, the residue of a directed thermonuclear explosion, struck the deck at a flat angle and sprayed out over a 120° arc. The portion of windscreen in the blast's path vaporized; the shockwave blew the rest of it off the fort's roof, along with everything else smaller than the other cannon. The rifle and bandolier Dole left according to orders were gone forever.

Scattered backflare seared Gregg's hands even though he huddled below roof level and clasped them against his chest. The cannon recoiled hard, shearing the remaining mount and dumping the weapon itself over the lip of the building.

Stampfer stumbled out of the control citadel. He mouthed words, but Gregg couldn't hear them. Gregg waved the gunner ahead and climbed after him to the blast-scarred roof.

The line of thirty houses facing the fort was on fire, every one of them. Some were built of concrete, but the surge of ions had ignited their interiors as surely as those of houses built of less refractory materials.

For a moment Gregg thought he was still being shot at. No bullets sparked or whined around him. Rifle ammunition was cooking off in the blaze.

There were still three mounted plasma cannon. Gregg stared at them transfixed. He could hold the fort himself while the Halys lifted the rest of his party to safety.

Stampfer seized Gregg by the hand and rotated him so that they were face-to-face. The Dalriadan patted the nearest plasma cannon with his free hand.

'C'mon!' he said, speaking with exaggerated lip movements to make himself more comprehensible to his half-deafened commander. 'These're fucked good by the backblast. The training gear's welded. Let's get out while we can!'

Stampfer jumped off the south side of the deck, keeping the fort's bulk between him and the burning city.

Gregg followed. When he threw his arms out to balance him, pain lancing across his pectoral muscles stopped the motion. He fell on his face and had to shuffle his knees forward to rise.

He began running, ten paces behind Stampfer. The vessel's side hatch was open, and the glow of her idling thrusters was a beacon to safety.

39

Sunrise

Dole waited poised at the controls while a gust of unusual violence even for Sunrise channeled between the hulls of the Dalriada and that of the metal-built ship lying parallel to her. The wind settled to 15 or 20 kph.

'There!' the Halys' bosun said as he shut the thrusters down with a flourish. 'That's greasing her in!'

'I'll go see what I can learn about why we were abandoned on Umber that way,' said Stephen Gregg in an expressionless voice. He reached for the hatch control.

'Sir?' Dole said, sharply enough to draw Gregg's attention back from its bleak reverie. 'Ah-d'ye think you're going to need the flashgun you're carrying?'

Gregg stared at him. 'That depends on what I learn,' he said evenly.

'Right, right,' said Dole as he rose from the console. 'So wait for a minute while I get my gear on too, okay?'

Stampfer got up from the attitude controls. He laced his fingers together over his head and stretched them against the normal direction of the joints. 'I guess we'll all go, sir,' he said toward the bulkhead. 'It was all our asses they left to swing in the breeze, wasn't it?'

'Too right,' murmured Gallois, already half into his hard suit.

'Say,' said another of the Dalriadans plaintively as he donned his armor, 'does anybody know what that other ship's doing here with our two?'

'I don't know what it's doing,' Gregg said as he waited for his men to equip themselves, 'but I'm pretty sure what it is, is the Adler. They're Germans from United Europe.'

He paused while he remembered Virginia. 'The captain's a man named Schremp,' he added. 'I could have lived a good deal longer without seeing him again.'

Dole had brought the Halys in between two ships lying within a hundred meters of one another. It was a form of bragging, proving how much better he could do than the Halys' AI.

It had also been dangerous, but Gregg felt too bloody-minded to care if misjudgment sent them crashing through the side of the Dalriada. Anyway, it was a short walk hatch-to-hatch in the brutal wind.

The ramp to the Dalriada's forward hold dropped as soon as Gregg opened the Halys. He and his crew started toward the larger vessel. A single man waited for them in the hold. He raised his visor as they entered.

It was Piet Ricimer.

'Good Christ!' Gregg blurted. 'Piet, I-Dulcie told me you were dead.'

'Thanks to the goodness of Christ,' Ricimer said, a reproof so gentle you had to know him well to recognize it, 'nothing happened to me that rest and a great deal of blood plasma couldn't cure.'

He glanced toward the ramp. 'I'm going to close the hatch now,' he said, reaching for the control. 'You'd better step forward, Gallois.'

Gregg embraced him. Their suits clashed together loudly.

'I thought you were, were lost too, Stephen,' Ricimer murmured. 'When I came to, I asked where you were. They said they were sure you'd lifted off of Umber, but you hadn't joined them on the run to Sunrise.'

'Them bastards took off like scalded cats!' Dole snarled. 'And us in a Federation pig that thinks it's a miracle to come within four zeros of her setting on a transit. Of course we were going to be a couple days behind, if the bastards didn't wait up on us!'

'I've got something to discuss with Captain Dulcie,' Gregg said in a voice as pale as winter dawn. He clapped his friend on the back and moved toward the companionway to the bridge.

Ricimer stepped in front of him. 'No, Stephen,' he said. 'I made the plans, I gave the orders. The fault was mine.'

'You were unconscious!' Gregg shouted.

'I was responsible!' Ricimer shouted. They were chest-to-chest. 'I am responsible, under God, for the future success of this voyage. Me!'

Both men eased back by half-steps. They were breathing hard. 'Stephen,' Ricimer said softly. 'What's done is done. It's the future that counts. Those mistakes won't happen again.'

Gregg smiled savagely. 'So, it's forgive and forget, is that it, Piet?' he said.