I'm lost. There's nothing I can do except, maybe, buy Streaker a few minutes.

Some time ago the two fleets had stopped tearing at each other as they chased him. Takkata-Jim realized they were coming to an agreement.

Suddenly his receiver buzzed with a basic contact code in Galactic One. The message was simple… stop and surrender to the combined Tandu-Soro fleet.

Takkata-Jim, clapped his jaws together. He hadn't a transmitter, so he couldn't respond. But if he stopped dead in space they would probably take that as a surrender.

He delayed until the message had been repeated three times. Then he began decreasing speed… but slowly. Very slowly, drawing out the time.

When the Galactics had drawn close, and their threats began to sound final, Takkata-Jim sighed and turned the longboat's fire-control computers back on.

The boat bucked as small missiles leaped away. He applied full thrust again.

When both flotillas simultaneously fired volleys of missiles at him, he tried to evade, of course. It would be unsporting to give up.

But he didn't have the heart for a major effort. Instead, while he waited, he worked on a poem.

* The saddest of things

To a dolphin — even me—

Is to die alone… *

118 ::: Streaker

The ambush at the gas giant was unexpected. The enemy came in close, using the great planet's gravity to swing about in a tight hyperbolic turn. They were unprepared for an attack on their flanks.

Compared with their breakneck dive, Streaker was almost motionless. She fell upon the pair of cruisers as they passed, lacing a web-like tracery of antimatter in their paths.

One of the battleships blossomed into a fireball before Streaker's computers could even identify it. Its screens were probably already damaged after weeks of battle.

The other cruiser was in better shape. Its screens flashed an ominous violet, and thin lines of exploding metal brightened its hull. But it passed through the trap and began decelerating furiously.

"It'll misss our mines, worse luck," Tsh't announced. "There wasn't time to lay a perfect pattern."

"We can't have everything," Gillian replied. "You handled that brilliantly. He'll be some time getting back to us." Tsh't peered at the screen and listened to her neural link. "He may be very tardy, if his engines keep missssing. He's on a collision spiral with the planet!"

"Goody. Let's leave him and see about the others."

Streaker's motion was taking her away from the giant planet, toward another group of five onrushing cruisers. Having witnessed part of the ambush, these were all adjusting course furiously.

"Now we see how well the Trojan Seahorse works," Gillian said. "The first bunch was close enough to read our engines and know we're Earth-made. But these guys were too far back. Has Suessi altered our power output along Thennanin lines, as planned?"

Wattaceti whistled confirmation. "It's done. Suesssi says it'll cut efficiency, though. He reminds you that our engines aren't Thennanin."

"Thank him for me. Now, for all our lives, what happens next depends on whether they're an unimaginative lot, as Tom guessed they'd be.

"Full power to the psi shields!"

"Aye, sssir!"

Energy detectors lit up as the oncoming ships swept them with probe-beams. The motley assortment of approaching ET vessels seemed to hesitate, then diverged.

"Numbers one, four, and five are accelerating to pass us by!" Tsh't announced. The bridge was filled with chattering dolphin applause.

"What about the others?"

Tsh't's manipulator arm pointed to two dots in the holotank. "Decelerating and preparing for battle! We're picking up a beam-cast in Galactic Ten! It's a ritual challenge!"

Tsh't shook her head. "They do think we're Thennanin! But they want to stop and finish us off!"

"Who are they?"

"Brothers of the Night!"

The magnification screens showed the two approaching battlewagons, dark and deadly and growing nearer.

What to do? Gillian kept her face impassive. She knew the fen were watching her.

We can't outrun them, especially not while we're faking Thennanin engines or wearing this heavy Thennanin shell.

But only a fool would try to take them in a straight battle. A fighting fool like Tom, she thought ironically. Or Creideiki. If either of them were in command I'd be preparing condolence wreaths for the Brothers of the Night right now.

" Gillian?" Tsh't asked nervously.

Gillian shook herself. Now. Decide now!

She looked at the approaching death machines.

"Down their throats,' she said. "Head toward Kithrup."

119 ::: Galactics

"We shall leave half of our joint fleet above the planet. None of the others will dare return, now that we have consolidated. We shall also send squadrons to clean the moons of hiding enemies, and to investigate the happenings out beyond the gas giant."

The Tandu Stalker had only four legs now, instead of the former six. The Soro Krat, wondered what accident had befallen the leader of her unpleasant allies.

Not that it really mattered. Krat dreamt of the day when she could personally detach the Stalker's remaining limbs, and then all its head buds.

"Is it possible that that out-planet chaos may be caused by the quarry?" she asked.

The Tandu's expression was unreadable on the display screen. "All things are possible, even the impossible." It sounded like a Tandu truism. "But the quarry could not escape even the stragglers' small might. If they are captured by them, the remnants will fight over the spoils. When our task force arrives, we will take over. It is simple."

Krat nodded. It did sound elegant.

Soon, she told herself. Soon we will wring the information out of the Earthlings, or sift it out of their wreckage. And soon thereafter we will be before our ancestors themselves.

I must try to make certain some few of the humans and dolphins are left alive, after they tell us where the Progenitor Fleet is located. My clients do not appreciate it when I use them for entertainment. It would save trouble if I found amusements outside the family.

Wistfully, she longed for a scrappy male of her own species as a joint Tandu-Soro detachment of thirteen ships blasted at full thrust toward the gas-giant planet.

"Damage to the stasis flanges on the port ssside!" Wattaceti announced. "All missile slots in that sector are out!"

"Any harm to the inner hull?" Gillian asked anxiously.

The fin looked blank as he sounded out the damage control computer. "Nope. The Thennanin shell's taken it all, ssso far. But Suessi says the bracings are weakening!"

"They'll try to concentrate fire on the port side now that it'ss damaged," Tsh't said. "And they'll expect us to turn away. Starboard missile batteries! Fire mines at forty degrees azimuth by one hundred south! Slow thrust and lurk fuses!"

"But-t no one's there!"

"They will be! Fire! Helm, roll ship left two radians per minute, pitch up one per minute!"

Streaker shuddered and groaned as she turned slowly in space. Her screens flickered dangerously under powerful battle beams she could never hope to match. Not a blow had been struck on her opponents. They kept up easily with her lumbering attempts at evasion.

From Streaker's shadowed quarter six small missiles puffed lazily outward, then cut thrust. Streaker turned to try to protect her weakened side, a little more slowly than she was really capable of turning.

Sensing a fatal weakness, the enemy battleships followed the turn. Beams stabbed out to blast at Streaker's damaged side, at what the Brothers of the Night thought was their supine enemy's real hull.