Five crewmen were drifting around the closest one to Lawrence as his helmet rose through the hatchway into the axial corridor. Two of them were trying to get it to open, while one was pressed against the viewport in the center trying to see into the next section. Lawrence lifted his wrist: he could feel the tiny wriggling of the dispenser mechanism's muscles as the darts spat out.

Denise crawled her way along to the emergency door and pressed a ring of energy focus ribbon against it. Lawrence was pushing the unconscious crewmen away.

"Get clear," Denise told him. She sent a code to the ribbon. The pulse of raw energy it emitted sliced clean through the door. Thick black smoke jetted out as the edges of the composite sizzled and flamed. Fire alarms went off.

Lawrence gripped the door's handle and kicked down on the burning circle. It flew out, turning over and over like a flipped coin, with the noxious vapor swirling behind it. Several crewmen who were clustered round the other side of the door took flight.

For a second Lawrence could see down the length of the Koribu toward the forward compression drive section. Then all the other emergency pressure doors were closing. Amber strobes came to life and fire sirens wailed along the entire corridor. Crewmen were diving away down radial corridors. He managed to dart three of them before they all vanished. Secondary pressure doors began closing off the radial corridors as he and Denise glided over them.

There was a network node ten meters from the emergency pressure door. Denise used a power blade to slice through the casing and carefully positioned a dragon-extruded communications link on top of the databus unit Microfilaments slid through the electronics inside to merge with the fiberoptic cables. Prime loaded into another section's network.

The audio alarm brought Captain Marquis Krojen instantly awake. The volume was like the scream of explosive decompression. He sat up fast, the strap around his waist preventing him from soaring completely off the bunk in the low gravity. For a moment he looked around in confusion as his cabin lights came on. Starships had different alarm sounds for every conceivable type of emergency. After so many decades flying them, Marquis could have sworn he knew every one by heart. But this time he actually had to wait for his DNI to scroll the information.

"Intruder alert?" He simply couldn't believe the neat indigo symbols.

The alarm fell silent.

"Yes, sir," the ship's AS confirmed.

"Jesus Christ, this has got to be a drill." Something dreamed up by that bastard Roderick after all the trouble at the Durrell Spaceport. It couldn't be real.

"No, sir," the AS insisted. "I have been erased from the maintenance bay hangar section network. Firewalls are in place and holding against the subversion software."

Marquis tore at the Velcro on his waist strap. He went through his main cabin into the bridge, moving fast in the one-eighth gravity. Colin Jeffries, the executive officer, was in the command chair, looking thoroughly shocked. Only three other bridge consoles were manned.

"What the hell happened?" Marquis Krojen made an effort to calm down. "Give me a situation review."

"A Xianti reported a hydraulics failure," Colin Jeffries said. "We docked it in the maintenance bay, and the next thing we know the whole surrounding network had been subverted."

"What's our response?" Marquis sat in one of the unused console seats. The ship's AS activated the panes, showing a range of schematics and camera images.

"Standard response is to withdraw power and environmental support from the contaminated section," the AS said. "That has been done."

"Can you get me a real-time visual image of the space-plane?"

"No."

"Divert an engineering shuttle to the maintenance bay, now," Marquis told Colin Jeffries. "I want to see what's happening."

"Aye, sir."

"Durrell Spaceport security is online," the AS reported. "They are warning us about the spaceplane. They believe it has been taken over by a Thallspring resistance movement."

Marquis Krojen refused to let the shocking information panic him into hasty action. The AS had brought up a physical threat procedure on one of the panes. If there was a valid bomb threat against the Koribu, the captain was to order all hands to abandon ship. Security determined that any resistance group that had gotten within striking range would have a bomb capable of destroying the entire starship.

But it hadn't gone off yet. And if they were going to nuke the Koribu, why were they busy trying to subvert it?

"Could our engineering shuttles just rip the Xianti out of there?" Marquis Krojen asked.

Colin Jeffries shook his head doubtfully. "I don't think so. Those shuttles don't have much thrust, and the hold-down latches are designed with a lot more inertia than a loaded Xianti in mind. You'd have to get underneath it and cut through them."

"Work on it. I need options."

"Aye, sir."

"Do we have any contact with any crewmen in the affected section?" Marquis asked the AS. He just couldn't bring himself to say "contaminated."

"No, sir," the AS said. "There are no internal communication links open."

"Very well, I want someone physically looking through the viewport in the emergency pressure door. Give them an open link to the bridge."

"Yes, sir."

"Overflight coming up," Colin Jeffries called.

The AS routed the engineering shuttle's sensor imagery to the panes on Marquis Krojen's console. He looked down on the big pearl-white delta shape, not quite knowing what to expect. It appeared ridiculously impassive. Then his mind ran through docking procedures.

"Did we activate the airlock tunnel?" he asked.

"No, sir," the AS replied. "It was connected after the subversion occurred."

Marquis Krojen looked directly at Colin Jeffries. "They're inside, then. Jesus! Does Durrell Spaceport security actually know what's in there?"

An excited voice burst out of a console speaker. "Sir, I can see somebody moving into the axial corridor."

"Who is this?" Marquis Krojen asked.

"Irwin Watson, sir, fusion engineer."

"Okay, who can you see, Watson?"

"Sir, it's a Skin."

A Skin? Marquis mouthed at Colin Jeffries. The executive officer shrugged.