It isn't a ploy which Command approves. Climbers aren't engineered for it. Our air is rich with human effluvia. It'll contaminate the water as it melts.

Operational people don't care. Heat is the bigger problem. They willingly strain the filters with contaminants.

It takes only five hours for that water to match interior temperature. The ship is generating too much heat.

The Commander lets temperature approach the red line. We're sweltering. The superconductors flash warnings, but they do so long before any actual danger.

The air feels thick enough to slice.

The Commander orders heat converters and atmosphere scrubbers activated at hour nine in Climb.

From then on, in my humble opinion, it's all downhill.

The machines which hold temperatures down and keep the air breathable are efficient and effective, but are powerful heat generators themselves.

This heat isn't the sudden, shocking heat we experienced when the Main Battle died. This is a creeping heat. It comes on as inexorably as old age. Weariness doesn't help when one is battling its debilitating effect.

The Climb endurance record is fourteen hours thirty-one minutes and some-odd seconds, established by Talmidge's Climber. Talmidge commanded one of the early craft. It carried less equipment, fewer personnel, and entered Climb under ideal pre-Climb conditions.

Sitting here in stinking wet clothing, sucking a squeezie, unable to leave my station, I wonder if the Old Man is shooting for the record.

By hour eleven I'm toying with the notion of a one-man mutiny. The Commander's voice breaks through the mist clouding my mind. What's this? Hey! He's counting down to an emergency heat drop—

We'll plunge into norm, vent heat briefly, then get back up and see what our detection systems have to say about the habitability of this neck of the night.

"Isn't he a little too cautious?" I croak at Fisherman. The TD operator is barely sweating. "They can't have stayed with us this long."

"We'll see."

From the corner of my eye, while I'm watching the lances of the energy weapons discharging the accumulators, I see the weak V on Fisherman's screen.

"Contact, Commander. Fading."

"Very well. He'll be back. Mr. Westhause, we're making for Beacon One Nine One. Get out of here before he fixes our course. Drop us again as soon as we're beyond detection."

The emergency venting procedure lasted forty seconds. Each second bought about one more minute of Climb time.

Two hours roll past sluggishly. The Commander takes us down again. He's kept the ship up on pure guts. Throdahl, Berberian, and Laramie have gone slack in their harnesses. Salt tabs and juice only help so much.

This can't be doing our health much good.

It seems the more experienced men should handle the hardships easier. Not necessarily true.

Nicastro is the next to go. Is it the cumulative effect of ten missions? Tension? The physical wear of hustling round seeing to everyone else?

Nicastro isn't quiet about going, either. He screams as sudden cramps tear at his legs and stomach. My nerves won't stand much of this.

I suspect the Commander wanted to stay up longer. Losing both his quartermasters changes his mind.

"Mr. Yanevich, work on Laramie and the Chief. Use stimulants if you have to. Junghaus, keep a wary eye."

"Aye, Commander." This time five minutes pass before he announces a contact.

"We're gaining on them," Yanevich tells me as he massages Nicastro's calves. There's barely room to lay the Chief out on the deck grating. The First Watch Officer grins like a fool. "Better get some salt into him." He shouts into the inner circle, "We have any calcium pills in the medkit?"

"Sorry, sir."

"Shit."

Westhause whips the Climber off at a wild angle. He asks, "Commander, you want to change beacons?

They could get a baseline—"

"No. Keep heading for One Nine One."

Despite a temperature fit for making raisins, I'm shivering. Internal is down twenty degrees and falling. Humidity is a sudden ten percent.

"What are you fucking smirking about?" I snarl at Yanevich. And, "Shit! I'm getting as foulmouthed as the rest of you. Anyway, seems to me that if the bastards can hang on this good, they'll run us down. How the hell do they do it, anyhow?"

Nicastro groans, tries to throw Yanevich off. The Commander helps hold him down.

"They've got a giant think-box at Rathgeber. Instel linked to all their hunters. Human brains cyborged in for subjectives. And nothing else for it to do. By now they know what ship this is, who's commanding, and how long we've been out. They've made an art of it. The head honcho at Rathgeber is sharp. And he gets better all the time."

"So why didn't we stay put and let them chase their computer projections?"

"Because that's the oldest trick of all. We would've come down in somebody's lap. See, our main problem is, we're outnumbered. They can follow up a lot of projections. They're probably working the top forty from that last contact."

"And we're not going to do anything about it?" Why is he so cheerful? That irritates me more than the other firm's stubbornness.

"Of course not. We don't get paid to slug it out with destroyers. We beat up on transports."

Next tune down we vent heat completely, dispose of accumulated wastes, and take hyper before the opposition shows. We've shaken them. The Old Man says it was an easy routine. I find the assertion dubious.

I race for my hammock the instant he lets us off battle stations. The men who had difficulty getting through Climb are supposed to have first shot, but this time I'm taking advantage of my supernumerary status and my commission. I've had it. I can be a candy ass once in a while.

More than one man curses me for having my ass in the sink. I tell them what they can do with their personal hygiene.

No one has gone out of his way for me.

The last I see of the Commander, he's standing at a stitt parade rest, staring into the empty display tank.

Our destination proves to be an instel-equipped beacon. The Recorder busies itself reporting the Leviathan affair. It's a time of relaxation, a time of realization.

We still have our missiles.

7 Orders

The patrol is getting to me. I've been rude to or belligerent with almost everybody today. I have a lot of fear and nervous energy pressure-bottled inside me.

I'm not the only Sam Sullen. I see fewer smiles, hear fewer jokes. The tone of the crew is quieter. There's an unmentioned but obvious increase in tension between individuals. There'll be a fight before long. Something has to act as a valve to relieve pressure.

I'll hang around Ops till it happens. I don't want to be part of the process. The Old Man's inhibiting effect makes Ops the safest place to be.

Piniaz has the watch when I arrive. The Commander is on hand. Command has responded to our report.

Finally.

"The sons of bitches," Piniaz growls.

The Commander hands me a message flimsy. It's a congratulatory message. Over Tannian's chop.

"Not one goddamned word about Johnson," Piniaz mutters. "The brass-bottomed bastards. Be the same fucking thing when we get ours. Some sad sack of shit will move us to the inactive file, wait a goddamned year, then send the regret-to-informs."

Nicastro gives Piniaz a poisonous look. His hands are shaking and white.

"Goddamned printout form letter, that's what they send. Full of Tannian's bullshit about valiant warriors making the supreme sacrifice. Jesus. Talk about insensitive."

I get in the way as the Chief lets fly. Startled, he pulls the punch. I tap him back and ask, "How are they hanging, Chief?" He settles into an embarrassed calm.

Piniaz missed the swing, but catches enough of the postmortem to understand. He cans the bitching.