"Smells Eke a trap to me," I say. "With bait Tannian couldn't resist."

The fighting hasn't yet begun. Our brethren are still maneuvering into attack positions.

At first I think the Commander is upset because he's been ordered into the cauldron, too. Wrong.

The sense of that is too clear. Instead, our orders are bizarre.

The Old Man explains over coffee, in the wardroom, with all officers present.

"Gentlemen, we've been chosen—because of our superb record!—to initiate a new era of Climber warfare." There's an ironic cast to his smile. He taps a flimsy. "Don't look at me. I didn't make it up. I'm just telling you what it says here. We're supposed to take advantage of the brawl back yonder." He jerks his head as if in a specific direction.

He doesn't pass the message around. He holds to the eyes-only rule. "A hint or two here that they had this planned all along. It's why we were off chasing that Leviathan. Johnson was supposed to go in with us."

"For Christ's sake," I mutter. "What the hell is it?"

He smiles that grim shipboard smile. "We're going to scrub the Rathgeber installations. Right when the other team needs diem most."

Puzzled silence. Makes a strange strategic sense. With Rath-geber's backing the hunter-killers will have a field day, finding thirty-four Climbers hi one small sector.

"Didn't we just get out of there?" I ask, more to break the silence than because I want to know.

"Sure. We were a couple of days away. Still are, on another leg of a triangle." He muses,

"Rathgeber. Named for Eustaces Rathgeber, fourteenth President of Commonweal Presidium. Brought Old Earth into Confederation. Only moon of Lambda Vesta One, a super-Jovian, sole planet of Lambda Vesta." He smiles weakly.

"Been doing my homework. For what it's worth, the base started out as a research station. Navy took over when the research outfit lost its grant. The other firm picked it up during their first sweep."

The wardroom echoes, "But..." like a single-stroke engine having trouble getting started. The Commander ignores us.

"We'll hyper in to just outside detection limits. That and the other intelligence data we'll need will be assembled aboard the beacon. They have a printer. Then we Climb and move in. We go down, tear the place apart, and run like hell."

"What the fuck kind of idiot scheme is that?" Piniaz demands. "Rathgeber? We use our missiles up, we won't have anything to shoot back with while we're getting away. Hell, they've got fifty hunters ported there."

"Sixty-four."

"So how the hell do we get out?"

No one questions our ability to get in, or to smash the base. It's not a plum ripe for picking.

I've been there. It's tough.

"Maybe Command doesn't care about that," Yanevich says.

"Nobody will be home but base personnel," the Commander counters. "This convoy operation will draw them off. Tannian isn't stupid. He figures it's a trap. So we give them what they want, then scrub Rathgeber so they can't take advantage. Hell, everybody's always saying it'd be a rabbit shoot out here if it weren't for Rathgeber."

It makes sense. The strategic sort of sense, where a chess player sacrifices a pawn to take a bishop. Rathgeber's loss would hurt the other team bad, just as we'd be bad hurt if Canaan went.

The Old Man continues, "I think the Admiral is counting on us to pull the escort off the convoy."

"Hitting them with rabbit punches," Bradley mumbles. He and I lean against a bulkhead, staring down at the in-group. Threaten here, threaten there, make them drop their game plan."

"Right out of the book."

He shrugs.

The Old Man says, "Our problem will be ground and orbital defenses. Intelligence is supposed to give us what we need, but how good will the data be? Those clowns can't figure what side of their ass goes in back. Anybody ever been to Rathgeber?"

I wave a reluctant finger. "Yeah. A two-day stopover six years ago. I can't tell you much."

"What about defenses? You were gunnery."

"They'll have beefed them up."

"You look them over? How's their reaction time? They won't have messed with detection and fire control."

"What do I know?"

"What size launch window can we expect? Can we do it in one pass? Will we have to keep bouncing up and down?'

"I spent my time getting snookered. What I saw looked standard. Human decision factor. You'll get seven seconds for your first pass. After that you only get the time it takes them to aim."

"Very unprofessional. You should've anticipated. Isn't that what they taught us? Never mind. I forgive you."

I stare at the Commander. Why has he accepted a mission he doesn't like? He has the right to refuse.

No one suggests that.

They bitch about Command's insane strategies but always go along.

"Mr. Westhause, program the fly. We'll take hyper as soon as all the data comes dirough." He steeples his fingers before his face. "Till tomorrow, gentlemen. Bring some thoughts. I want to be in and out before this convoy thing blows up. Our friends are counting on us."

I smile grimly. He really hopes we get an extended leave out of this.

Is Marie in his thoughts? He hasn't mentioned her for a long time.

Wonder what she did after we left. By now she must think we're done. Our squadron is overdue.

Command knows we're alive, but they don't keep civilians posted.

Varese keeps fidgeting. He decides to tell us what's on his mind. "We've been out a long time, Commander. We're way down on hydrogen and CT."

"Mr. Westhause, see if there's a water beacon on our way."

We haven't spent much time under pursuit, but daily Climb routine draws steadily on our CT. Normal hydrogen is less of a problem. Some beacons maintain water tanks for in-patrol refueling.

That's the Engineer mentality surfacing. It compels them to start having seizures when fuel stores reach a certain level of depletion. The disease is peculiar to the breed. They've got to have that fat margin. In die bombards they got antsy when down by 10 percent. At 20 percent they kept everyone awake dragging their fingernails over the commander's door.

They want that margin "in case of emergency."

Varese is less excitable than most Engineers.

"We won't need much CT after we shake loose," the Commander muses. "We'll burn what's left going home anyway. We can pick up more water anytime."

Once a Climber concludes active patrol, she remains on annihilation till she has just enough left to sneak in to Canaan. Venting excess is too dangerous, especially near TerVeen.

A Climber is most vulnerable before CT fueling and after final CT consumption. Those are the times when she needs big brothers and sisters to look out for her. She's just another warship then. A

puny, fragile, lightly armed, slow, and easily destroyed warship. Vulnerability is why she has a mother take her out to Fuel Point.

CUmbers aren't sluggers. They're guerrillas. In the open they're easy meat.

Lieutenant Varese takes no reassurance from the Commander's confidence. Engineers never do. A wide streak of pessimism is a must in the profession.

"Any more questions?"

There are. No one cares to broach them.

The Commander allows us to board the beacon. I go through the hatch just to see how those people live.

Holy shit! Fresh faces! Clean faces. Well-fed, smiling faces, with welcomes for the heroes of the universe. Gleaming, apple-cheeked babies. But no women, damn it.

We look like prisoners lately released from a medieval dungeon. Sallow, gaunt, filthy, wild of hair and eye, a little tentative and timid.

Damn! There really are other people...

Right now, the first few minutes, while we're staring at the beacon crew, I feel a fresh wind blowing on our morale. It's a cool gale driving away a poisonous smog. Some of the men grin, shake hands, clap backs.