All eyes turned to the rear.

MacAllister was getting to his feet, getting his cutter out. "Good," he said. "Welcome to Deepsix, where the gnats knock you down first and then bite."

"They do seem to be interested in us," Hutch said.

There might be another problem: They were well toward the middle of the river, and the current was carrying them faster than anyone had anticipated. It was obvious they were going to miss their selected landing place.

The river had become too deep for the poles. Chiang and MacAllister took over the paddles and worked furiously, but they made little headway and could only watch helplessly as they floated past their beach.

The dragonflies stayed with them.

They were operating in sync, riding the wind, their wings only occasionally giving vent to a flurry of movement. "You think they could be meat-eaters?" Hutch asked Nightingale.

"Sure," he said. "But it's more likely they're bloodsuckers."

"Ugly critters," said MacAllister.

Hutch agreed. "If they get within range, we're going to take some of them out."

"Maybe it's not such a bad thing," said Chiang, "that this world is going down the tube."

MacAllister laughed. It was a booming sound, and it echoed off the river. "That's not a very scientific attitude," he said. "But I'm with you, lad."

"Oh, shut up, Mac," said Nightingale. "It's the efficiency of these creatures that makes them interesting. This is the only really old world we know of, the only one that can show us the results of six billion years of evolution. I'd kill to have some serious time here."

"Or be killed." MacAllister shook his head, and his eyes gleamed with good humor. "Your basic mad scientist," he added.

Chiang drew his paddle out of the water and laid it on the deck. "They're getting ready."

Nightingale saw it, too. They'd been flying in that loose V, spread out across maybe forty meters. Now they closed up, almost wingtip to wingtip.

MacAllister watched Nightingale draw his cutter. "I'm not sure," he said, "that's the best weapon at the moment." He put his own back into his pocket and hefted the paddle. "Yeah." He tried a practice swing. "This should do fine."

The dragonflies advanced steadily, approaching to within a few meters. Then they did a remarkable thing: They divided into three separate squadrons, like miniature fighter planes. One stayed aft, the others broke left and right and moved toward the beams.

Hutch held up her hand. Wait

They began to close.

The boat was completely adrift now, headed downriver.

"Wait."

The ones in the rear moved within range. Kellie and Chiang were in back, facing them.

"Not yet," said Hutch. "If they come at us, be careful where you fire. We don't want to take any of our own people out."

Hutch was on the port side, MacAllister to starboard. Nightingale dropped to one knee beside Hutch.

The flanking squadrons moved within range.

"On three," she said. "One…"

"You know," said Nightingale, "this isn't necessarily aggressive behavior."

"Two…"

"As long as they don't actually attack, there's no way to know. They seem to be intelligent. They might be trying to make contact."

MacAllister shifted his position to face the threat. "Say hello, Randy," he said.

Three,"she said. "Hit 'em."

The ruby beams licked out.

Several of the creatures immediately spasmed and spiraled into the water, wings smoking. One landed in what appeared to be a pair of waiting jaws and was snatched beneath the surface.

The others swept in to attack. The air was filled with the beat of wings and a cacophony of clicks and squeals. One of the creatures buried its proboscis in the meaty part of Hutch's arm. MacAllister threw himself at it, knocked her down and almost into the water, but he grabbed the thing, pulled it out, and rammed it against the side of the boat. Laser beams cut the creatures out of the air. Nightingale took a position at MacAllister's back and killed two of them in a single swipe.

Mac meantime stood over the fallen Hutchins like a Praetorian, swinging his paddle, and bashing the brains out of any and all attackers. Amid all the blood, shouts, screams, and fury, and the electric hiss of the weapons, Nightingale grudgingly realized that the big dummy was emerging as the hero of the hour.

And quite suddenly it was over. The dragonflies drew off. Nightin-gale could count only five survivors. They lined up again, and for a moment he thought there would be a second assault. But they lifted away on the wind, wings barely moving, and turned inshore.

He looked around, assured himself that no one had been seri-ously injured, and listened to Hutch reassure Marcel. She was sitting on the deck of the raft, holding her injured shoulder.

"Hurts," she said.

Marcel listened to it all and never said a word. When it was over he took a seat near one of the wallscreens where he could look down on Maleiva III's surface.

He had never felt so utterly helpless.

XVI

If there is one characteristic that marks all sentient creatures, it is their conviction of their own individual significance. One sees this in their insistence on leaving whatever marks they can of their passing. Thus the only race of starfaring extraterrestrials we know about distributes monuments dedicated to themselves in all sorts of unlikely places. The Noks, with their late-nineteenth-century technology, put their likeness in every park they have. Earth has its pyramids. And we pay schools and churches to name wings, awards and parking areas after us. Every nitwit who gets promoted to supervisor thinks the rest of creation will eventually happen by and want breathlesssfy to know everything about him that can possibly be gathered.

— Gregory MacAllister, "The Moron in the Saddle," Editor at Large

Hours to breakup: 180

There was no single space on board Wendy that was large enough to accommodate everyone. So Beekman compromised by inviting a half dozen of his senior people to the project director's meeting room. Once they were assembled a technician put them on-line to the rest of the ship.

Beekman started by thanking them for coming. "Ladies and gentlemen," he continued. "You're all aware of the situation on the surface. If we're fortunate, there'll be no need for an alternative course of action. But if we don't have one, and we need it, five people will die.

"We were invited to make this flight because somebody thinks we're creative. This is an opportunity to demonstrate the validity of that proposition. I've been telling the captain all along that, if the plan to retrieve and install the capacitors doesn't work, there is no alternative to saving the lives of our people I'd like you to prove me wrong.

"I don't need to tell you that we're running out of time. And I also don't need to tell you that I personally see no way to do it. That's why we need you. Stretch what's possible. Devise a course of action. Find a solution.

"I won't waste any more of your time here. But I'll be standing by. Let me know when you have something."

They beached the raft, limped ashore, and collapsed. Kellie got the medkit out and Nightingale set to work repairing the wounded. No toxin or biological agent could penetrate the field, so the only problem was loss of blood.

Despite the optimistic report that had gone up to Wendy, Nightingale alone had come away uninjured.

Fortunately, the wounds were superficial, but Kellie and MacAllis-ter had both lost too much blood to continue.

The attackers had gotten Kellie twice in the right leg. Hutch in the shoulder, MacAllister in the neck. That one looked painful, but Mac just grimaced and did the kind of thing he usually did, commenting on the ancestry of the dragonflies. Chiang had taken bite wounds to the stomach and an arm.