“She,” a reporter pounced on the question, but another shouted:
“Was it a successful test, when the duration was half an hour less than the Wilhelmsen run, at a slower speed?”
“The rider eliminated the threat. It had nothing left to shoot at. There’s no point in continuing beyond mission accomplished.”
“But could they have kept going?”
“No doubt whatsoever. And let me point out, they were slower, but their target was moving at system entry speeds. Wilhelmsen’s targets were only randoms, from known fire points, nothing this real-time. But he gave us data that helped us. It wasn’t a pointless sacrifice—never a pointless sacrifice.’’ Tanzer had just shown up in mission control, Tanzer accepting handshakes of his staff, beyond the sound-damping spex, and the whole press corps was suddenly trying to figure out how to get where they weren’t going to be admitted. Villy clapped him on the shoulder in passing and escaped the intercepts, while another Optex pickup arrived in his face with,
“Ms. Salazar has denounced the choice of Paul Dekker as the source of tape for the program and called for the disfranchisement of the Beet. How do you feel about that?” “My answer? If that incoming had been Union, that ship and that young pilot and crew would have prevented global catastrophe. A single barrage of inert matter falling on Earth at half light would create ecological disaster.” Stock answer, stock material, the science people had calc’ed it years ago: he knew not a damned thing about climates, truth be told. A reporter followed up: “Earth was not in actual danger.” “Earth was in deadly danger if that had been a Union ship. But Hellburner demonstrated its ability to deflect any such attack. Their course was right on intercept with that incoming militia ship, you can see it on the display up there. This was a live ordnance test, but nothing at any time was aimed at Earth or Luna.” “What if it went off-track?”
“That’s why there are range safety officers.” He didn’t want to say what he suspected, that if the destruct sequences for the rider’s missiles hadn’t been dumped to Eagle’s computers by the Sol system buoy on entry, the range safety officer on the ECS4 had to have had a few extremely anxious moments once the shots went around the limb of the moon. That volley had come very close to sending the missiles out of communication with the carrier. But the crew hadn’t pulled any punches. No crew could afford to think in those terms. Ever. “Lieutenant, lieutenant, do you think—“ “Excuse me….” He was getting a burst of new information off FleetCom on the screens and over the PA, and another line of comflow in his ear from Saito, saying …
Panic over much of Europe, assumption the test was real, public reactions yet uncertain… But Mazian was in front of the cameras in Bonn, with pronouncements of what a Union strike would have meant for Earth,… calling Paul Dekker and his crew phenomenally skilled, heroes of Earth’s own defense forces, a combined FIeet-and-crew…
“Good run. Stilt room for improvement.”
Porey’s voice; and Dekker wanted to tell him go to hell for the trick they’d pulled. Destruct the ordnance, damned right they’d had to, he’d been scared as hell they might hit a friendly ship; but a Belter didn’t have ordinary nerves, and he’d not been a hundred percent convinced until they’d gotten the congratulatory communication from FleetCom that it had been the scheduled test.
Didn’t know what to do with the nerves now, things were still dragging along, interminable time stretch: not so hard a job, this run, but that was the problem, wasn’t it? You didn’t get the hellish repositions and redirects when you were working with Ben and Sal, when your co-pilot was thinking ahead of the pilot’s problems so he didn’t get called on for those moves—only one of those shifts he’d had to rip, they’d hyped the v sideways hard after Sal’s best shot and Ben was still muttering about realspace feeling real, and soreness setting in.
Meg said, “We’re in the pocket, right in the pocket, now, Dek, you don’t have to do a thing til the bow-shock. —Incidentally, compliments from Capt. Kreshov, on Eagle, he says it was a damn pretty job, his words. —Thank you, sir. The team appreciates the compliment. —We got a drink offer from his armscomper.