"Yes, sir." Crane worked his board, lightening and sharpening the view.

Takara whistled. "That's not getting the drop on them, Crane. That's a full-fledged thud."

"A thud and a half," Holloway agreed. A group of Zhirrzh—the whole contingent, it looked like—were lying unmoving in the front of the entryway. Stunned or dead.

He clicked his comm onto Duggen's channel. "Duggen, this is Holloway," he said. "Looks like you've got a clear path."

"Already on it, Colonel," Duggen's voice came back. "Squad One: pincer in. Outriders, stay sharp—we don't know how fast they can recover."

And as if on cue, the alien farthest back in the entryway cautiously lifted his head. For a moment he peered toward the doorway, apparently assessing the situation. Then, keeping low, he began slinking toward the door. "Duggen, you've got movement," Holloway said.

"I see it," Duggen said. "Outriders, stand ready; Squad One, hustle it to backup. You got a choice here, Colonel: you want a prisoner or a cadaver?"

"Prisoner, if possible," Holloway said. "But don't lose anyone in the process."

"No problem," Duggen said. "I doubt they've got much fight left in them."

The alien was still moving, and now Holloway could see involuntary-looking twitches in some of the others. "Looks like they're all starting to come to," Holloway warned.

"Squad Two's just about here," Duggen replied. "Soon as they're in backup, we'll move in."

Holloway bit at the inside of his cheek. They'd saved the tectonic station—at least for the moment—and in another minute they'd have some prisoners. Bargaining chips, if the Zhirrzh understood such things. Maybe even a way to corroborate this ghost/Elder thing of Melinda's.

And then the alien reached down and picked up one of the laser weapons.

At the edges of the monitor screen the muzzle ends of two Oberon assault guns appeared as the Peacekeeper outriders within camera range drew a bead on the enemy soldier. "So much for their not having any fight left," Takara said.

Holloway didn't answer. A word from him—a couple of bursts from those Oberons—and that would end it. The Peacekeepers could take the time to well and properly seal the tectonic station, and this potential threat to a possible CIRCE component would be finished. Certainly enough humans had died already in this war; and if Melinda was right, the aliens probably wouldn't take another six or seven Zhirrzh deaths all that seriously.

But if Melinda was also right about this war's being a mistake...

The alien had gotten the weapon to his shoulder, its muzzle angled downward toward the ground, and was moving with a strange awkwardness toward the entryway door. "Target him," Duggen ordered. "If that muzzle starts up, take him down."

The alien reached the entryway door and stopped. For a heartbeat he just stood there, weapon ready but still not aimed.

And Holloway came to a decision. "This is Holloway. All Peacekeepers, hold your fire."

"Sir?" Duggen said.

"You heard me," Holloway said. "Hold your fire unless and until fired on."

"Colonel, we're damn exposed out here," Duggen said, his voice tight. "If we wait until he fires, we could lose half the team."

"That's an order, Sergeant," Holloway said, clicking his comm to the aircars' channel. "Aircars, this is Holloway. Do either of you have a working external loudspeaker?"

"Aircar One, sir," the answer came back promptly. "I have one."

"I want you to fly over toward the Zhirrzh village, Erikson," Holloway said. "Not fast, like an attack. Just sort of drift over toward there, the way Sergeant Janovetz flew in four days ago. Be sure to stay well away from the white pyramid."

"Yes, sir."

"Crane, give me a split screen," Holloway ordered, ignoring the look on Takara's face. "Strike-team monitor and spotter view of the aircar."

"I hope you're not planning to send him all the way in," Takara murmured. "We still don't know what's happened to Janovetz."

"This is a different kind of experiment," Holloway assured him, watching the monitor. Aircar One had left its position and was moving gingerly toward the waiting line of attack copters. So far they were just hovering there watching him. "I want to see how willing their commander is to make deals."

Takara snorted under his breath. "Cass, these are the Conquerors," he reminded Holloway darkly. "You don't get a name like Conquerors by making deals."

"Maybe," Holloway said. "On the other hand, they did let Duggen's team get away unharmed the last time we tried to get to the tectonic station. That kind of lenience wouldn't seem to fit the Conquerors tag, either."

Takara grunted. "If they even spotted them. I'm still not convinced they did."

The copters had broken formation now, one of them moving to flank Aircar One. Holloway held his breath; but the alien aircraft didn't open fire. Instead, it merely dropped into a parallel course, its weapons trained warningly on the Peacekeeper craft. "Hold it steady, Erikson," Takara reminded the pilot. "No sudden moves."

Holloway glanced at the ranging data from the spotters displayed at the bottom of the monitor. "Close enough," he told Erikson. "Do some lazy circles around that spot and put me on loudspeaker."

"Yes, sir. On loudspeaker."

Mentally, Holloway crossed his fingers. "Zhirrzh commander, this is Commander Holloway of the Peacekeeper forces. We have seven of your soldiers trapped. I want to offer you a deal for their return."

Takara threw him a frown. "I thought you wanted them as prisoners."

"I've changed my mind," Holloway said. "Crane, I need a contrast or gain change on the strike-force picture. Something that'll pick up faint objects, focused on the area around that entryway. Can you do that?"

"I'll try, sir," Crane said, fiddling with his board and splitting the strike-force picture into two duplicates. One of the images zoomed forward to frame the dark entryway, then faded into a strange pattern of black-and-white blurs. "How's that?"

"We'll know in a minute," Holloway said, leaning forward to gaze at the blurs. If Melinda's ghost had been telling anything even approaching the truth...

And, suddenly, there it was: a ghostly figure, barely visible even on the enhanced picture but clearly recognizable as a Zhirrzh, floating just outside the dark blob of the entryway. One of the blurs in the entryway moved, and on the unaltered strike-force picture the Zhirrzh holding the laser weapon lowered its muzzle the rest of the way to the ground. Then, as abruptly as it had appeared, the ghost vanished.

Takara whistled softly. "I'll be damned. She was right."

"Looks that way," Holloway agreed, feeling a shiver run up his back. Real, living ghosts...

"Sir, report from Aircar Two," Crane spoke up. "The Zhirrzh reinforcements moving up from the south have stopped."

"Confirm that."

"Copperheads confirm, Colonel," Crane said. "Enemy reinforcements holding position one hundred forty-three meters south of the target zone."

"Maybe they're setting up another of those ground laser stations," Takara said.

"There's no indication of that, sir," Crane said. "They just seem to be waiting."

"Colonel, I'm getting something," Erikson's voice came from the speaker. "Boosting gain on the external mikes..." The speaker crackled for a second with background noise. Then, as the enhancers cleaned up the sound, a distant and oddly mechanical voice came through. The same voice, as near as Holloway could tell, that had been in the recording Sergeant Janovetz had sent back before his pulse transmitter had gone silent. "—of the Zhirrzh. Speak your offer."

Holloway clicked on his comm. "Your soldiers may return to you unharmed," he said. "But they must first leave behind all equipment and weapons that they are carrying."