She started to speak again, then stopped, staring into his face, and tears welled in her eyes. All around her, nonessential personnel filed silently, somberly-almost ashamedly-into the flotilla's small craft as Concorde stripped down to the minimum crew needed to fight her weapons and run her systems effectively, and a crushing sense of guilt afflicted her. She was a doctor, not a warrior, yet her place was here, on the flotilla flagship with the staff officers and crewmen who had become her friends.

"At least me stay, then," she said very softly, almost pleadingly. "Please, Andy. I . . . belong here."

"No, you don't," he said gently. "You belong with Snyder, looking after my people for me. And after the war ends, you belong in that cottage you're always teasing me about." Her mouth trembled, and she drew a deep breath, but he shook his head. "No, Melly." He drew her close and gave her a brief, unprofessional hug, then stepped back.

"Take care, Melly," he said, and turned away without another word.

George Snyder sat on his bridge once more, watching Sarmatian's plot, and his belly was a lump of lead as the flotilla's formation shifted. He looked up briefly as the hatch opened, and nodded with curt courtesy to Dr. Soo. The surgeon had no business on the command deck at a time like this, but he never even considered ordering her off it.

The formation shift completed itself, and the face of Andrew Prescott appeared on his com screen. The admiral looked calm, almost relaxed, and Snyder bit his lip as the other man nodded to him.

"You have your orders, George. Captain Shaarnaathy's remaining fighters should be able to give you some cover, but it's going to be up to you to evade the enemy."

"Understood, Sir." Snyder made it come out almost naturally.

"Just get the data home, George," Prescott said quietly. "I'm counting on you. Get the data and my people home."

"I will, Sir. You have my word."

"I never doubted it." Prescott drew a deep breath and nodded again, crisply, with an air of finality. "Very well, George. Stand by to execute."

"Aye, aye, Sir. And, Sir?" Prescott raised an eyebrow and Snyder cleared his throat. "It's been an honor, Sir," he said then. "God bless."

"And you, George. And you. Prescott out."

The com screen went blank, and the "gunslingers" of Survey Flotilla 62 began to alter course.

The Enemy was up to something.

Seven of his starships altered course suddenly, swinging around to head directly for the Fleet's missile ships, and a tentacle cluster of gunboats came with them. It was . . . unexpected. The sort of thing the Fleet might have done, but not the sort of thing the Enemy did. Yet his purpose became quickly evident as the rest of his formation altered to a course headed directly away from the missile ships.

But expected or not, the Fleet wasn't unduly concerned. There was no option but to meet the attack head-on; to do anything else would allow the fleeing ships to open the range sufficiently to drop back into cloak and disappear once more. But the sensor readings were clear. The Enemy possessed no more than five capital missile ships of his own, no match for the firepower awaiting him. He would be smashed to wreckage as he attempted to close, and while he would undoubtedly succeed in crippling or destroying some of the Fleet's units, he couldn't possibly cripple enough of them.

Had the crews of the Fleet's ships been capable of such a thing, they might have smiled in anticipation, for the attack craft and the gunboats and the kamikazes on both sides had been expended or rendered impotent. This would be a battle in the old style, from the days before the Enemy had introduced his infernal attack craft. One that came down to tonnages and missile launchers and determination, with no subtle maneuvers or technological tricks, and the Enemy was too weak to win that sort of fight.

I wonder if I should have recorded some final message for Ray? Prescott wondered as he watched his plot. Then he shook his head. There simply hadn't been time to record messages from everyone aboard Concorde and her consorts, and it would have been a gross abuse of his rank to have sent one when the rest of his personnel could not. Besides, he'll understand. If anyone in the galaxy will, Ray will understand.

"Entering SBM range in twenty seconds, Sir," Chau Ba Hai said, and the admiral nodded.

"Engage as previously instructed, Commander," he said formally.

George Snyder's eyes burned as he watched the plot.

Seven battlecruisers and nine gunboats charged straight down the throats of their pursuers, and as he watched, Concorde and the surviving Dunkerques launched their first strategic bombardment missiles. Matching Bug missiles sped outward in answer to the Allied SBMs, and there were three times as many of them. ECM and point defense defeated the first few salvos, but there were more behind them. And more. And still more.

Delaware took the first hit. The Dunkerque-class ship staggered as an antimatter warhead scored a direct hit on her shields, but she shook the blow off and continued to charge, and her short-ranged consorts-the Cormorants and their command ship, Vestal-followed on her heels, still far out of the range of their own weapons as they surged straight into the Bugs' fire. Eleanor Ivashkin's frailer gunboats rode the battlecruisers' flanks, sheltering behind them, hiding in their sensor shadow, but the Bugs were ignoring them . . . just as Andrew Prescott had planned. Battlecruisers were a far greater threat than gunboats, and Bug missiles sleeted in upon them as the range spun downwards.

He heard someone breathing harshly beside him and looked up to see Soo's face streaked with tears as she watched the same icons. He wanted to reach out to her, to say something, but there was nothing he could say, and he returned his eyes to the plot.

The Enemy missile ships began to take hits. Shields flared and died, armor vaporized, atmosphere trailed behind them like tangled skeins of blood, but they charged onward, ignoring their damage, and the Fleet lunged to meet them.

Australia was the first to die.

Snyder knew no one would ever know how many hits she'd taken, but she was still driving forward, still riding the thunder of her remaining launchers, when her magazines let go and she vanished in the horrific glare of matter meeting antimatter.

A Bug Antelope blew up a moment later, but then it was Vestal's turn, and Corby and Condor were suddenly without a datanet. But only for a moment. There were openings in Concorde's now, and they slotted into them, swelling the flagship's defensive fire once more, as they and their sisters charged to their dooms.

"Gunslingers," the Survey Command crews called them, and so had Snyder, with the tolerant contempt of specialists for men and women whose only duty was to fight and die. And die they did. Shields blazed and flared like forest fires, and the plot seemed to waver before Snyder's burning eyes, but they never slowed, never hesitated. Never turned aside.

Delaware blew up, then Condor. Code Omega transmissions sang their death songs, but they were all in range now, and more Bug ships died or staggered out of formation, drives faltering. A handful of hoarded Bug kamikazes streaked in, launched at the last moment to hurl themselves upon the bleeding gunslingers. Point defense and Ivashkin's gunboats killed most of them, but TFNS Corby and Musashi were blasted apart, and then there was only Concorde.