Abruptly his extra force went into hyper-drive—risky, that close to a stellar mass, but their engines were especially well tuned, so losses were light—and entered the fray. They did so from all directions, admittedly sparse but nonetheless pouring fire inward while Magnusson’s main body drove straight through the opposed formation, loosing every demonic energy in its weapons.
Zeta Sagitarii has been part of this thrust. She takes a hit astern. It is, actually, a near miss, which does not vaporize her; but it wrecks the engine section and sends radiation and red-hot chunks of metal sleeting everywhere else. Or so we postulate. What we know is simply that she was lost.
Blenkiron panicked. He did not fall into gibbering idiocy, but he saw his fleet shattered and knew not what to do. The captain of the flagship, one Tetsuo Ogawa, became a hero by calmly “advising” him. By fits and starts, the Terrans broke off the engagement. For the most part they withdrew in good order. The majority escaped.
They were, however, in no condition to continue the fight. Magnusson had become free to lay his hand on all of Sector Aldebaran.
Zeta Sagitarii drifts off, sublight, a cold and twisted lump. In some intact compartments, capacitors maintain temperature and air renewal. It is not enough. Rescue craft, searching through the flotsam of battle, will not come within detection range of this hulk—as enormous as the least of reaches is between the stars—before their squadrons must proceed onward. Surviving crew will die of thirst, those who do not go in blood and vomit, of acute radiation poisoning.
We would like to imagine Ensign Kittredge is spared that. Suppose her turret split open under the blast. Exposed to the vacuum of space, she would lose consciousness within thirty seconds. A piece of metal shearing through her heart or her skull would be quicker still.
Admiral Sir Olaf Magnusson’s victory became classic in the annals of warfare.
Chapter 9
Diana’s visitor surprised her. She had met Cynthians before, as ubiquitous as their species was, but not often, and never this person. For a moment she and he exchanged appraising looks. It was a male, she saw. If he had been wearing much more than a pouch and his silky white fur, she could not have been sure; the secondary sexual characteristics were few. Bipedal, though with arms nearly as long as his legs, he stood about ninety centimeters tall. Toes and the six fingers on either hand were almost equally prehensile. A bushy tail lifted up behind the round head and its pointed ears. Blunt-muzzled and long-whiskered, the face sported a natural blue-gray mask around luminous emerald-hued eyes. His voice was high-pitched, its Anglic clear though apt to come trilling and hissing through the pointed teeth.
“You are milady Crowfeather?” he said. “Permit self-introduction. I hight Shan U of Lulach. Is your Wodenite companion present?”
“No,” she replied. “I don’t know when he’ll be back. What can I do for you?”
“Perhaps it is I who can do you a favor, milady. I have heard your partnership is in search of Ancient relics.”
Diana decided this was understandable. She was merely one more human, but Axor inevitably generated gossip. “Well, yes. So far we’ve drawn blank. The public database screened no thin’ for us that looked the least bit promisin’. He went off today to talk with the local priest of his church, in case the padre had heard of anything. I gather the parish takes in a big territory.” She smiled wryly. “No doubt the two of them’ll go on to every sort of theological shop talk.”
“You cannot expect to find much information recorded about a planet when most of its land is wilderness that does not sustain colonists,” declared Shan U. “Prospectors, timber cruisers, and other nonscientific explorers have scant incentive to go to the trouble of preparing scientific reports. The geographical separation of communities hinders the dissemination of locally available information.” He arched his tail. “Ah, but it may be that I can put you in the way of some clues.”
The heart sprang in Diana’s breast. “You can? What? How?”
“Peace, I pray you. I am not, myself, qualified to be your guide. I am the captain of a riverboat. It will shortly be departing for Lulach. Now plying the great stream, year after year, one is bound to hear many a tale, and I recollect mentions, now and then, of impressive ruins glimpsed. Rumors about you and, especially, your companion having trickled as far as the waterfront, I thought I should come urge you to seek farther for informants.”