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—II—

1

Warrant Officer Willum Sanghurst DeVries was scared.

His mouth was dry as bone and his palms were so slick he kept losing his grip on the harness. He didn't like being strapped into place like a sack of spare parts. I'm a ship's engineer, not a . . . What was he, exactly, besides a green-around-the-gills coward and several kinds of fool? Not a battle technician, that was for sure. More like a stop-gap replacement for a mission already in trouble.

Just our luck that damned Deng sentry ship caught us dropping out of FTL. It had fired two shots before Bonaventure's guns had destroyed it. But those two shots had counted. He didn't know what their casualties had been—high, he was guessing, given the damage Bonny had sustained. Willum wondered if the other LRH unit's crew had sustained losses, too. Captain Matsuro hadn't told him, if it had. He wanted to ask, but didn't want to sound any greener or scareder than he already did.

Why'd I ever agree to serve on a drop ship? Every man who served on one was required to train as replacement crew for whatever was being dropped. And since Bonaventure Royale's job was dropping LRH intel-teams onto occupied worlds, his training had led him to this: replacing a dead engineer on a Mark XXI Special Unit headed into potentially the worst battle of the whole damned war. Common sense and a healthy dollop of terror told him to stick to the Bonaventure Royale like a tick to a dog's back.

You're no Marine, Willum told himself for the millionth time. Yeah, well, you weren't hired to be one for this drop, either, so quit wetting yourself. Engineering you know. And you'll be staying inside the Mark XXI. . . . 

Trouble was, that scared him too. Willum was a ship's engineer, accustomed to interacting with and maintaining FTL ships and their psychotronic systems. He'd studied Bolo configurations, enough to be familiar with their general systems; but he wasn't a specialist and he'd never really believed it would come down to this. Confident in his ship's ability to avoid trouble coming out of FTL, Willum DeVries had sloughed off. It didn't matter that Bonny'd destroyed that Deng sentry; the damage was done, the Bolo crew had lost two men, and here he was, harnessed for drop after a scant three-minute warning to get his terrified backside aboard.

Willum was afraid the whole crew might pay the price for his carelessness. He didn't think he could handle that. Nor was he psychologically prepared to get as close to dirtside battle as a Mark XXI's crew inevitably went. Willum had never run from a fair fight, but the Deng had never heard of fighting fair. And nobody was nice to an enemy spy. Maybe that was another reason his skin was crawling.

Or maybe it was just that Mark XXI Special Units had generated intense debates in both military and political circles almost from their development. Screwball programming, it was whispered, odd behavior patterns, almost incestuous relationships with their crews—relationships a Mark XXI crewman would cheerfully hospitalize a man over if he were stupid enough to speculate about them in a crewman's presence. Just what, exactly, a Mark XXI's programming might be, to inspire such loyalty and widespread controversy, Willum didn't know. Secrecy surrounded just about everything connected with the Mark XXI Special Units. Whatever it was, Willum figured he'd find out soon enough.

If the Deng let him live so long.

Which reminded him to be scared all over again.

A glance at the other officers brought no reassurance. The MC, a grim-faced guy named Hart, didn't look frightened, exactly; but the pallor around the edges of his lips wasn't natural, either. If a combat veteran like Hart who'd participated in multiple successful missions was spooked . . .

The man everyone called "Banjo" was the only member of the original crew Willum felt might tolerate him. Assistant Mission Commander Aduwa Banjul, with only a year in this crew himself, had given Willum a whirlwind orientation after he'd climbed through the open personnel hatch—

They dropped away from Bonaventure with a lurch. Freefall . . . Willum swallowed bile. He'd never been space sick, but battle sick . . . That was a possibility he hadn't yet tested. Don't be sick, DeVries, don't be sick. . . . 

He knew what was going on around him—theoretically. An infiltration force of two ships would be blowing Deng satellite systems, stripping away the enemy's orbital monitoring capability as part of a decoy operation with longer-term benefits. Meanwhile, two LRH Bolos and several hundred similarly cocooned decoys dropped from orbit toward BFS-3793-C's pitted, canyon-scored surface. . . .

Willum tried unsuccessfully to loosen his grip on the drop harness. He glanced at the vid screen which gave the Command Compartment a view into the Crew Compartment. Willum wanted to see how the other crewmen were holding up. Dismount Team One was in harness on the left. "Gunny" Hokum, the crew's gunnery sergeant, was whistling under his breath. Eagle Talon Gunn's dark eyes met Willum's in the vid pickup. The AmerInd grinned briefly, teeth gleaming white against bronzed skin. "Great ride, huh, tekkie?"

Despite the veiled insult, Willum tried to smile back. At least someone had talked to him, making an effort to include him in this mission. "Yeah."

"Icicle" Goryn eyed the vid lens with open hostility. His silent glare seemed to say, "You're not Honshuko Kai, damn you. Who gave you the right to talk to us as an equal?"

He held Icicle's gaze long enough for the veteran to shrug and glance away. It wasn't Willum's fault their friends had been killed; but that wouldn't help a damn bit when they hit the ground running and had to work together.

DT-2 had harnessed in to the right. He'd never met the man whom Danny Hopper, a Bonaventure shipboard Marine, had replaced. The Bolo's crew had called him Specter. They'd spoken the nickname with reverence even before his death. Hopper looked more nervous than Willum, swallowing so often he reminded Willum of a bullfrog in full song. Sergeant "Milwaukee" Petra, harnessed to Danny's left, was DT-2's team leader.

Crazy Fritz, a lean, hollow-eyed man hanging in harness on Hopper's other side, glanced at the ship's Marine as though to say, "We needed Specter. Not a goddamned fancy-pants Marine." But he didn't quite voice it aloud. Hopper, a courageous twenty-year-old who'd spent most of his duty tour as a ceremonial guard, returned the older man's look levelly—but he lost a few shades of color and did a good bit more swallowing.

Great. We're screaming toward Enemy lines and the whole damn crew is rattled before we even leave orbit. 

Willum had a desperately bad feeling in his gut, and it wasn't called space sickness.

We fall. Encased as I am in a sphere of foam-form heat-repellent tiles, I am blind during the initial stage of drop. Inertial sensors transmit a phenomenon I have never shared with my Commander: I am dizzy. Drop always does this to me. I wonder if humans experience the same sensation. Speculation along such lines is not productive. I devote my attention to the mission at hand. 

Ablative foam tiles begin to shed mass. We have reached atmosphere. I am aware when the ribbon drag deploys, slowing our speed. My crew is unharmed by the change in velocity, although I detect higher-than-normal levels of stress chemicals in the bloodstreams of my two replacement crew members. Danny Hopper, in particular, suffers during this drop. I will suggest corrective medication once we achieve landing. The ribbon drag functions perfectly. More heat-resistant tile boils away. A series of seven small parachutes deploy, slowing our velocity further. An outer sensor array tip clears. I am able to see. Dizziness disappears instantly; inertial sensors match visual input perfectly. 

We are still high in the atmosphere. I am able to track one hundred forty-three of the decoys as well as my sister LRH-1327. She is encased as I am in a glowing sphere that shrinks with each passing picosecond. Her drag chutes have also deployed. Deng weapons discharge from the planet's surface. Missiles arc upwards. One decoy explodes. A second decoy is destroyed. We drop lower. LRH-1327's main chute deploys. Her descent slows sharply. Decoys deploy main chutes and some begin sensor scans. These broadcast their findings back to Bonaventure Royale, reporting terrain features and Enemy activity in order to provide good data for the landing force as well as make themselves higher priority targets. Two seconds before I drop below the horizon line, LRH-1327 explodes. 

I mourn. 

"Doug," I say in my softest voice, "mission parameters have changed. LRH-1327 has been destroyed. I am sorry."

My Commander does not respond for 0.89 seconds. An eternity of grieving. "Understood, Red. Delay deployment of main chute."

I execute the command, overriding automatic settings. "A wise decision, Doug."

I wait to deploy the main chute which will slow us to speeds at which our para-wing can be deployed. A slower drop provides too great a risk of destruction. We are humanity's last hope for reconnaissance of Hobson's Mines before the main invasion fleet arrives. Thousands of human lives will be spared or destroyed depending on the success of this intelligence-gathering mission. We cannot risk being shot down. 

I wait until sensors tell me we have reached the critical edge of our margin for error. I deploy the main chute. The shock of drag slows us. My crew members jerk in their harnesses. I check their vital signs for injury, but detect only expected mission-level stress. We drop. Deng weapons destroy five more decoys still visible to my sensor array. I search the terrain below for potential landing sites and coordinate visual data with on-board maps. 

My maps of BFS-3793-C, nicknamed Hobson's Mines, are excellent. This was a human mining colony until the Deng invasion two months and four days ago. We cannot allow the Deng to hold this world. It provides critical war materiel that would give the Enemy a strategic advantage over humanity. We must retake the mines. I note that we drop toward a large river. Preliminary scans reveal that it lies at the bottom of a canyon 0.82 kilometers wide. Water depth varies. The deepest spots are more than adequate for a camouflaged landing site, particularly if Bonaventure Royale's efforts to neutralize the Enemy's satellite reconnaissance abilities have been successful. 

I blow all remaining heat-ablative tiles with a small charge. They continue on the original trajectory and smash into the ground. They will look like a crashed decoy when found. I deploy our para-wing on schedule. I am unencumbered and vulnerable. I want to get down. Using controls on the para-wing, I spill air to change course toward the river as best I can. I cut the starboard lines to my trailing chutes and reel them in with the ribbon drag, leaving only the para-wing outside my hull to slow our descent. 

We head for the river. We sway and drop. The course I hold takes us directly toward the target I have chosen, a spot that sensor scans indicate is the deepest available. At twenty-seven meters in depth, this is a good landing site, although I am constructed to withstand a drop onto bare rock if that is required. 

At extreme sensor range I detect Deng airborne scoutships. My intelligence data on such scoutships indicates we are not yet in their sensor range. I have 3.88 seconds in which to disappear from their sensor sweeps. I activate Chameleon screens, taking on the outward visual, radar, and infrared signatures of an airborne Deng scout. It is the best I can do. We drop into the canyon. The walls are 321 meters high on the near rim. 

I warn my crew: "Brace for landing!"

At the last possible moment, I attempt to climb in an effort to stall my para-wing, as I need to kill as much forward movement as possible and reduce speed to minimize any splash. When we enter the water the sharp slap recreates dizziness in my motion sensors. We slow. I reel in the trailing para-wing while still descending. My crew has suffered another jolt but appears to be in good health. I am relieved. Drop is a dangerous time. Even during a perfect drop, a crewman can suffer sprained neck muscles or dislocated shoulders. My crew is safe. 

We touch bottom. My treads rest on clean-scoured stone. Water temperature is 2.7 degrees centigrade. Current flow is 0.6 meters per second. A swift current. The chilly water disperses our heat signature in a short-lived downstream plume. We are hidden from Enemy eyes. 

"Doug, we have achieved a safe landing. I would recommend that we remain in this position for another twenty-four hours."

"Agreed. Okay, you heard the lady. Time to break out the playing cards. We're here for the duration."

I am pleased. My Commander is satisfied with my performance. He calls me "the lady" when I have done particularly well. My crew and I are safe. That is all that matters for the moment. 

"Brace for landing!"

Willum jumped at the sound of an astonishingly human female voice—then shut his eyes and hung onto the harness. To his shame, he yelled. . . .

The remaining fall wasn't a long one. The shock of landing jarred everything, despite the harness that held him suspended. Webbing dug into flesh. He'd bruise in crisscross stripes—if he lived long enough to bruise. After that first, terrible jolt, they slowed to a gentle, eddying descent.

Water, Willum realized with a blink. We've landed in water. 

They bumped a hard surface.

"Doug, we have achieved a safe landing," that same female voice said out of the air. It's the Bolo. . . . "I would recommend that we remain in this position for another twenty-four hours."

Up in the Mission Commander's chair, Doug Hart nodded. "Agreed. Okay, you heard the lady. Time to break out the playing cards. We're here for the duration."

Willum sagged in his harness. Thank God . . .

"All right, everybody unstrap," Hart said, unsnapping his own harness. His boots thumped against the deckplates. "Good job, Red. Anybody hurt?"

"No, Doug," the Bolo responded.

It gave Willum an odd feeling to know that his vitals were being monitored by his transport system. FTL ships weren't equipped with that invasive feature. Dammit, I should've done more careful reading on those specs like we were told. He was certain the Bolo could provide him with whatever data he needed; but his incomplete information was dangerous. He'd fix that, pronto.

"That's great, Red. You did a fabulous job getting us down in one piece. Run a complete systems check on yourself and report."

Hart didn't look nearly so grim, now that they were down. In fact, he had a nice, friendly smile. "You all right, DeVries?"

Willum poked a tongue at his teeth. "Yeah. I think they're all intact."

Hart laughed. "Unstrap. You have work to do. I want Red checked stem to stern."

"Yessir," he said, struggling with the harness release. Either he was fumble-fingered or it was stuck. He flushed, caught his breath, and tried again.

Hart glanced at a sensor eye. "Status, Red?"

"Systems check in progress. Chameleon screens reconfigured to match color and texture of surrounding sedimentary bedrock and water. Probability of detection by Enemy 0.093 percent unless tight-beam search sensors touch the Chameleon screens. My systems are functioning normally except for an alarm in my food-processor unit. I would like DeVries to look at it when there is time. Hopper—do you prefer Danny?—may I suggest breathing slowly and evenly through a fine-mesh cloth? Report to Medi-Unit, please, and I will assist you. Yes, Danny, that's the console in the forward starboard corner next to the head.

"Doug, Target Prime lies 91.3 kilometers northwest of our current position. That would place it upriver of our landing site. A good map in my data banks suggests a direct route is available once we leave the confines of this canyon. According to my on-board colony maps, the canyon walls open onto a broad river valley 61.7 kilometers upstream. A boat landing for rented pleasure craft should provide excellent egress from this river. From there we can take a dirt access road to the main highway. I would suggest travelling during the day with Chameleon screens modified to approximate the heavy farm and mining equipment in widespread use on this world."

"Very good, Red. We'll let the furor die down before we try getting closer to Target Prime. A few days underwater will help convince the Deng they got all their incoming targets."

Willum was all for that.

"Para-wing stowed. I'll drain the water out of my tummy after we've come up for air."

Out in crew quarters, several crew members chuckled. Willum paused in his battle with the stubborn harness buckle and stared at the nearest speaker grill. The Bolo's voice was remarkable. She sounded like his grandmother. He could almost imagine a living surveillance tech reporting from a sensor-array display room in another compartment somewhere. Except there weren't any other compartments: just the cramped Command Compartment and the jam-packed Crew Compartment. The reaction the Bolo's voice set up in him was eerie, disturbing. He knew the Mark XXI was nothing more than a machine. Self-aware and fitting most definitions of sentience, perhaps; but a machine, nonetheless. Yet already he found himself wanting to think of it as her.

And why not? You think of your ship the same way. 

Bonny's programming wasn't nearly as complex as a Mark XXI's, yet Willum was deeply attached to Bonaventure Royale. He began to understand a little better why Mark XXI crews reacted as they did.

Hart had opened the bulkhead door between Compartments. The Mission Commander glanced his way. "DeVries, quit hanging around in harness and get busy on that food-processor alarm. Then break out your gear and double-check Red's operational status. It'll help familiarize you with her systems. Banjo, let's perform a complete weapons check. Hopper, you especially, listen up. DeVries, move it!"

The Marine officers left him alone in the Command Compartment, still struggling with the unfamiliar drop harness, and closed the bulkhead door with a hiss of pneumatics. He finally unlatched his harness release. Willum sprawled ungracefully onto the floor. At least none of the crew had seen that embarrassing display. He made it back to his feet and willed rubbery legs to hold him.

"Wonder where this food processor is I'm supposed to look at?" he muttered aloud, mentally reviewing what he'd studied nearly a year previously.

"Move aft," the Bolo responded. "It's in the port corner of my Crew Compartment, aft of the seats."

He jumped at least eight centimeters off the deckplates.

"I'm sorry, dear. I didn't mean to startle you."

"Uh—" He glanced around and found the camera lens that marked the Bolo's video pickup. "Hi. Didn't realize you were . . ." He trailed off and felt his neck grow hot. He sounded stupid and green.

A remarkably human chuckle issued from the speaker. "Don't feel embarrassed, Willum. You've never been assigned to a Bolo before. Welcome aboard, by the way."

"Uh, thanks. You're, uh, not what I expected."

"My programming provides for a closer simulation of human dialogue and verbal interplay than an FTL ship's programming. My duty is the welfare of this crew. I do my best to perform that duty."

"What happens when you lose a crewman?" Willum asked, thinking of the two men killed aboard Bonaventure.

The long pause surprised Willum. He'd never had a psychotronic unit delay an answer. "I grieve for them," the Bolo finally said. "Giurgiu Galati—although he hated that name; I always called him Specter, too—and Honshuko Kai were my boys. Specter and I had been together for seven years, three months, twenty-one days, six hours, five point seven minutes. Honey Pie and I were together from the day I was commissioned. The Enemy has robbed me of their company. May we discuss my damaged food processor instead, please?"

In that moment, Willum DeVries stopped thinking of her as the Mark XXI or even as just the Bolo. She became real to him, someone who'd lost friends same as Willum—same as anyone in the military since the coming of the Deng invasion fleet.

In that moment, she became "Red"—and, possibly, the only friend he would find on this mission.

"Sure. We can talk about something else. And . . . I'm sorry. I've lost friends to spodders, too." Willum cleared his throat. "Now, let's see about this processor."

"Thank you, Willum."

He gathered up his equipment packs and headed aft to the so-called galley, a tiny corner of the Crew Compartment where an automated food processor battled for space with a refrigeration unit and a waste disposal unit. Either the crew ate off their laps or some kind of table could be raised between the seats. The crew's seats were bolted to the deck. Behind him, the men and their commanding officers were going through a very thorough weapons check. Nobody paid him the slightest attention, except to grunt when he had to step over them to reach the "galley."

Willum dug out equipment and began to investigate circuitry he understood. "Ahh . . . Yeah, I think I see the problem. . . ."

It felt good to finally be useful again.

2

Harry "Gunny" Hokum closed the access panel which shut off the Command Compartment from the rest of Red's interior. Banjo glanced up, nodded, then went back to his screens, monitoring everything which came in via Red's sensors, packaging it for easier analysis, noticing any tiny anomaly that might mean danger to Red or her crew. Doug Hart, busy working with Red replanning their mission parameters now that they were the only surveillance unit left, swivelled around in his command chair.

"What's up, Gunny?"

He leaned his back comfortably against the closed door. "Got the men settled in. Everything looks fine; nothing damaged in drop."

"Good. What else? You look like a man with a problem."

Gunny scratched his elbow. "Yeah. Well, maybe. What can you tell me about the Frog?"

"Hopper?" Hart frowned. "Problems?"

"Maybe. Maybe not. He's green, scared pretty bad. The boys are shook up, losing Specter the way we did, and Honey Pie, too, and even though they're smart enough not to say it, well . . . It's pretty clear they don't have much faith in Hopper. That boy's rattled. I've got him working solo right now, doing maintenance on his weapons. Figured he needed something familiar to settle him down. But I gotta know what he's made of before we Dismount."

Hart nodded. "I glanced at the file Ish gave us before drop, but I haven't had much time to do more than glance. He's been a shipboard Marine since joining the service. He's never seen combat—but how many of 'em have? Goddamn fuzzy spiders . . ." Gunny and Banjo muttered agreement. Hart pulled at his lower lip. "I remember reading he graduated well in his class, so they haven't stuck us with a stupid replacement. Red? What can you tell us we haven't already covered?"

"Danny qualified expert with all weapons for which he is rated. He is seventh-generation career Marine. His grandfather was decorated for valor in the Halloran Campaign. He studied xenobiology, so is passingly familiar with the physical and psychological profile of the Enemy; as familiar as a Marine private with no field experience can be. I suspect this is one of the reasons Ish selected him, Doug. He has scored well on all field-combat tests and has hearing two points above the norm for human males his age.

"He has been nervous since boarding, potentially because his first combat mission is a dangerous assignment with strangers rather than his shipboard comrades; but blood chemistry and pulse rate suggest he is calming down nicely. That was a good idea, Gunny, putting him to work cleaning his rifle. I would suggest making an effort to include him in group activities very soon. He needs to become part of this crew."

Hart nodded. "Yes, the sooner the better. We'll have a couple of days underwater for you to work on that, Gunny. Get him involved. Work on the others. How's Fritz?"

Gunny grimaced. "Crazy's spooked. Hell, you know how he and Specter were. Damn finest team I ever saw work together. He's got a bad feeling about this mission."

Hart didn't speak. From the tightening of his jaw muscles, Gunny knew his commander shared Crazy Fritz's feeling—maybe because of Crazy's gut reaction. It didn't make sense; but some men just seemed to know when trouble was coming, like a weathervane pointing the path of a storm front.

"Do what you can to loosen him up," Hart said at length. "We need him on edge, but not paranoid. How about you, Gunny? We had a bad start." Hart met his gaze squarely and held it.

Gunny didn't hesitate. "I got confidence in you, sir. We'll complete the mission."

Doug Hart grunted. "Good. I know I can count on you."

Banjo looked up from his screen. "And you, Doug? While we're baring our souls? Personally, I'm scared spitless."

Hart grinned suddenly. "You would be. You always did hate spiders."

Banjo snorted rudely.

Hart sobered. "This is no easy mission. Especially with LRH-1327 gone. We were damn lucky to get down in one piece. They had us dead to rights from the moment we dropped out of FTL. But . . ." He swivelled absently in his command chair, burning up nervous energy. "We have a good chance to complete the mission. Red and Banjo and I are working up details now for overlapping recon plans, since we'll have to cover LRH-1327's mission parameters as well. It won't be a cakewalk, but we'll manage."

"Just do me a favor," Banjo smiled. "Dance at my wedding when this is over."

Gunny grinned. "You meet somebody?"

Hart laughed and thumped Banjo's shoulder. "Should'a known you'd go and pull an Ish Matsuro on me."

Banjo chuckled. "Wonder what Ish thought when we dropped off that ship without him."

"He missed it like hell," Gunny muttered. "Should'a seen his face." Gunny—perhaps alone of the human crew—knew what it had cost Ish Matsuro to give up command of LRH-1313. Red knew, but she wasn't talking either. Not even Doug Hart, who had been seconded to command with his departure, probably guessed the depth of Ish's pain. Gunny remembered like yesterday the conversation he'd inadvertently overheard late in the night, with Ish pouring his heart out and Red listening, commenting quietly, trying to guide their commander toward the right decision.

No one but Gunny and Red herself knew that level-headed, no-nonsense Ish Matsuro had fallen in love with two women: the future Mrs. Matsuro . . .

And Red.

Gunny glanced into Red's video pickup and wondered if she could guess what he was thinking. He wondered if he could guess what she was remembering. Had it cost Red as much as it had cost Ish to file the recommendation that her commander be promoted into a slot suitable for a career officer to marry and raise a family? He would probably never know. But it was good they had Red to watch over them on the eve of their deadliest mission to date. Gunny knew that would be the deciding factor in whether or not he slept at all over the coming days.

Gunny suspected Doug Hart had no real inkling what a fine command he carried into war. If there'd been a way to tell him without betraying Ish and Red, he'd have made damned sure his commander knew it. So he cleared his throat and scuffed one boot toe on the deckplates and said, "Red'll take care of us, anyway, Banjo. Hell, who knows? Maybe she'll dance at your wedding."

A sweet chuckle issued from the speakers. "A Mark XXI Special Unit can't dance. But I could serve cake with my exterior manipulator arms. And I take a mean wedding photo."

Banjo grinned. "Deal."

Doug Hart smiled. "That's a rendezvous, then. Now, about this processing plant . . ."

Gunny retreated, leaving the officers and Red to plan out the next few days of his life.

To Willum DeVries' surprise, they stayed in the river for three days. The first day they spent checking everything and sitting in place. The officers went on thirty-three percent alert status, which meant at least one officer was awake at all times. Taking his first solo turn in Red's Command Compartment was unnerving; but Red was so good at her job, she left him with almost nothing to do but watch the vid screens. The second two days they spent crawling upstream to locate the boat landing marked on Red's map. During transit, they amused themselves playing cards with one another and with Red.

"Two, please," Red said. Delicate manipulator arms ran along a rail the length of the cramped box which comprised living quarters for six men and bunking quarters for eight. There were a few spots in the compartment Red couldn't reach, but not many. A folding table which could be lowered into the deckplates served the crew for meals and recreation. At the moment, Red's manipulator "fingers" held five ordinary playing cards. Red slid her discards to one side. Gunny dealt two replacements.

"Thank you, Gunny," Red said politely.

Willum wondered if anyone else had considered the practical side of betting against a machine with video monitors capable of seeing everyone's hand, not to mention medical monitors capable of detecting the slightest changes in biological responses. It seemed to him a little like asking the mouse to step onto the cat's tongue; then he decided it would be unforgivable to accuse a lady of cheating. He asked for three and received them.

They began to play.

Gunny bet four. Hopper folded. Crazy Fritz grinned and met the bet, then raised two. Eagle Talon grunted and dropped six into the pot. Red and Willum stayed in, too.

"Call," Milwaukee said.

Red had two queens and a pair of threes.

Fritz had a straight.

Willum kissed his money goodbye.

Milwaukee grinned and took the pot with a straight flush.

"Damn your lucky hide," Fritz groused. "Best hand I've had in a year and you go and beat it."

"Refreshments, boys?" Red asked as she delicately gathered and shuffled the cards. The process fascinated Willum. If he got through this mission, he was going to ask for a transfer. He wanted to find out how they put these babies together. Red continued the shuffle with the skill of a riverboat gambler. "I could do brownies in ten or an apple pie in twenty?"

"Brownies," Gunny voted.

"Pie," Crazy Fritz countered.

"Pie," Milwaukee agreed.

Eagle Talon grinned. "Brownies," he said, as though tying the vote were the most sinfully delightful task in the universe.

Hopper exchanged glances with Willum. "Uh . . . Brownies?"

Willum's turn. "Pie."

Red actually chuckled. "Oh, goody, I get to break the tie. How about both? Brownies going in now. Pie'll take a little longer, boys, but it ought to be good. And there's cold milk in my fridge. My deal and the game is seven-card no-peek . . ."

And so the hours passed.

"Okay, men, listen up." Hart stepped into crew quarters and banged on the bulkhead wall. Willum blinked sleepily and pulled himself out from under. "Move it," Hart rasped. "We're about to leave the river. Before we go, we review mission priorities one more time."

A general groan met that order; but Red's crew rolled out of their hammocks and folded them away, taking their seats to await the briefing. Willum, blinking sleepily, had to stand, since his place was up in the Command Compartment when he wasn't asleep. Hart motioned for him to remain where he was. At the front of the Crew Compartment, a vid screen lit up with a map that could only have come from the mining colony's own archives. Hart took a lecturer's stance beside it. Banjo, on duty as officer of the watch, remained sealed off in the Command Compartment.

"This is our original Target Prime," Hart said crisply. Red thoughtfully highlighted a spot on the map for him. "It's a fully-automated mining facility. We believe a heavy Deng concentration lies here" —another spot lit up about three kilometers away—"where the terrain will accommodate a larger number of Deng transports. But we're not sure. Our job is to confirm and estimate enemy strength and emplacements, extrapolate attack plans, and report back to FleetCom with our findings the instant they drop out of FTL."

The map changed. "LRH-1327 was charged with scouting this position. Ordinarily two LRH units would not be dropped this close together; a mission like this would be entrusted to one team. Fortunately, two teams were dropped for just the kind of emergency we've encountered: destruction of one team during combat drop. LRH-1327's target becomes our new Primary. This is a processing plant, semi-automated. Terrain here will accommodate a very large Deng force. It's reasonable to assume the Enemy would concentrate its assets on this site, since it's capable of producing a finished product ready for export.

"We scout this location first, from extreme range. Terrain will allow for long-range monitoring. Once we've reconnoitered the processing plant, we fall back to our original Target Prime and complete our mission. Red, how far is the processing plant from us now?"

"Twenty-nine point six kilometers upstream. The colony situated this facility on the closest area of flat ground suitable to accommodate a space port. There is a good road." The map changed to a broader-scale view. A thin red line flashed to indicate the road. "The mines are 63.5 kilometers upstream from the processing plant." Two dots appeared, marking the targets.

"Okay. Questions?"

Gunny spoke first. "Do we have any photos of these facilities? Or pics of the terrain around them?"

A collage of photographs flashed onto the screen.

"Thanks," Gunny said, moving closer to study the images. "Looks like we won't need to dismount for the processing plant. That's open ground. Visibility's as good there as anywhere on this ball of rock, I expect. What'll you use for cover, Red?"

"I will engage Chameleon screens to simulate the appearance of an ore carrier." Another photo appeared, this one of a large, unwieldy tracked vehicle that Willum recognized as one of the completely automated types developed for remote worlds just like this one, where the labor force was small but the planetary coffers were rich. "The map indicates a parking compound for ore cars in need of maintenance here." The processor-plant map reappeared. A circle of light marked the maintenance depot.

"If Commander Hart agrees, I intend to park in this compound and gather data over the course of twenty-four hours, provided there are enough vehicles in it to act as camouflage and provided no Enemy or human personnel approach closely enough to recognize the Chameleon screens for what they are. If I cannot use this site, I will move along this road, circle this position eight thousand meters from the processor plant, then retrace my route and initiate the second phase of our mission."

"What about that damned mine?" Crazy Fritz asked uneasily. "That place looked treacherous."

"That's our job," Gunny grinned. "If it's treacherous, we'll tackle it."

Danny Hopper looked scared again.

Hart said, "Okay, Red. Your plan for the processor plant looks good. What about the mine?"

Red switched maps. "We will need Dismount Teams, Doug. The mine is situated at the base of a cliff and runs 12.5 kilometers beneath the surface. A narrow draw curves away from the surface-level facilities plant through here. An access road capable of supporting ore cars runs through it, between these two ridgelines. The suspected concentration of Deng forces is here, north of this larger ridge."

"All right," Hart said, studying the map. "Gunny, put DT-1 here, where the contour lines form a point south of this V-shaped cut at the tip of the ridge. You should be able to scope out the Deng in this wider valley from there. Milwaukee, I want you here on the second fork of this double ridge, line-of-sight to Gunny, overlooking the access road in this draw. Red, you I want here, behind the tip of this third ridge, hidden but line-of-sight to Milwaukee. That'll put us close to the mine; but colony records indicate it's completely automated, so we shouldn't encounter anyone. We take readings, transmit data to Red for transmission to FleetCom, and get the hell out of there. We'll be operating on a very tight schedule. Given the distances we have to cover and the speeds we'll be restricted to, I estimate we'll have less than half a day at the mine before FleetCom drops out of FTL and requests our data."

Gunny asked, "Red, how far is the mine from pickup point?"

"Forty point six kilometers." A new map flashed onto the screen. "Pickup point sits atop this mesa. I should have no trouble gaining the top via this route." A series of dots marked the route she intended to take, along the edge of a precipitous canyon.

"Good," Gunny nodded. "Time frame on these missions?"

"An ore car's top speed is 48.3 kilometers per hour. From our current position, I estimate 36.7 minutes to reach a position from which we can conduct our recon of the processing plant. I will do a thorough survey, to include Deng departure and arrival schedules. This is, after all, the larger of the two assigned targets which must be scouted."

Hart just nodded.

"It will take approximately one hour eighteen minutes to reach the mine from the processing plant. Due to the proximity of the mine facility to extrapolated Enemy positions and the need for Dismount Teams, I do not advise a prolonged recon effort here."

"No," Doug Hart agreed, looking grim. "We get in, do our business, and leave. Like I said, half a day tops, from Dismount to Recall. Less, if we can manage it. I'd rather not be anywhere near that Deng concentration when we have to transmit to FleetCom. Hopper . . ."

Hopper cleared his throat. "Sir?"

"What equipment do you take?"

The Marine answered immediately. "We go suited, sir. Our stealth suits won't match Red's Chameleon screens, but they'll mask our heat signatures. We take energy conversion screens to cover our positions. If we're blown, they'll protect us from Enemy fire for a little while, sir, and transfer energy they absorb to operate the automated infinite repeaters tied into the system."

Hart nodded. "I don't expect you'll be blown, but we're always thorough."

"Yessir. My mission is to provide security for Sergeant Petra. He operates comm and does any additional recon he can from our position. My job is to guard him while he does it and make damn sure he gets to our recon position in one piece so he can transmit Gunny's data."

Hart nodded once again. Clearly, Danny Hopper knew his business, even if this was his first combat mission. "Very good, Hopper. Fritz, you take point. Nursemaid him if he needs it. I don't think he will. Questions?"

Nobody had any.

Willum DeVries knew he wouldn't sleep till this mission was over.

"All right, then, Full Alert Status as of now. Red, take us up."

Hart gestured curtly to Willum; he followed his commander into the Command Compartment and strapped into his seat. Banjo scarcely paid heed to their arrival; he was intent on Red's data screens. The Bolo moved smoothly. The decking tipped as she climbed the steep grade up out of the river. The main screen flashed to a real-time video picture. They halted again while still underwater.

"Extending whip array, Doug."

The picture shifted, periscopelike as the Bolo lifted a sensor array into the air. The lens cleared and revealed an abandoned boat landing. Pleasure craft sat in the starlight, motionless hulks that registered clearly under Red's light-enhancing sensors. The first faint hint of dawn was visible in the dark sky. Nobody left alive to rent any boats. . . . Willum wondered if the Deng had spared anyone to run the machinery. He didn't know much about Deng military operational strategy.

The thought of becoming a slave to a hairy, multilegged "spodder" with a body the size of a small dog was almost as bad as the thought of dying.

"Proceed, Red," Hart said quietly. "Engage Chameleon."

"Chameleon engaged."

They rumbled quietly up out of the water and headed into Enemy territory.

The boat ramp I have accessed is made of concrete which is approximately five centimeters thick, varying in depth in the manner of poured concrete. Ordinarily a vehicle of my weight would crack such a thin concrete slab; but my designers have considered the need for leaving no trace of my passage. My treads are each 0.9 meters across. They and my independent-drive wheels protrude beyond either side of my hull, skirted with chameleon screen nearly to ground level. Thus my treads and wheels distribute my weight across a broad cross-sectional space, which gives me a ground-pressure per square centimeter less than that of an adult male human. 

I pull onto the concrete pad and halt, surveying the access road beyond. It is made of dirt, with old track imprints from wheeled vehicles. I lower my rear track-camouflaging unit and engage its drive. I move forward, scanning the imprints and sending their configuration to the roller I now trail behind my rear fender. Its thousands of small studs extend and retract in synchronized patterns to duplicate the tracks I encounter. When I pass over the tracks, obliterating them and making my own minute signature in the dirt, my track-camo unit recreates the old tracks in my wake, leaving no trace of my passage. 

I follow the dirt road for 5.8 kilometers and encounter the paved road my on-board charts have indicated. There is no traffic. This concerns me; but following the paved road is the better choice of those I currently perceive. It is a faster, more direct route and I am less likely to encounter very soft ground in which my track-camo unit would have more difficulty in covering signs of my passage. It is also better than very rough, broken terrain which would slow down my progress and place us behind schedule for this mission. I have already discussed this decision with my Commander, who agrees that it is the best choice; but the lack of traffic disturbs me. I voice this concern. 

"Any sign of aerial observation?" Doug asks. "Or ground crews that might be watching?"

I do a passive scan for Enemy energy signatures. The only traces I discover are to the north, over the visible horizon. I see no sign of aerial capabilities in this region. Should I be spotted from orbit, my Chameleon screens will mimic the reflective surfaces, angles, and part-to-part ratios of a mining ore car. We should be safe. 

"No, Doug. I am uneasy; but we should be fine."

"Let's do it, then. Move out as planned."

I turn onto the highway and drive slowly north, at the top speed of an ore car. The slow pace is worrisome, but necessary. I scan the surrounding countryside on passive systems and register the presence of small farms. I pick up no trace of human heat signatures. Farm animals have been left to fend for themselves. Cattle are visible in fenced pastures. They are thin, but appear to be surviving. I cannot determine whether the same can be said of their human owners. We do not know the Deng policy on captured humans. I file my discoveries for later transmission to FleetCom. It is useful to know what the Enemy will leave intact as well as what it will destroy. 

We join a convoy of ore cars from a side road while still an estimated 16.1 kilometers from the processing plant. These ore cars are southbound from a small mine which shows on my maps but is not considered a target. The terrain surrounding it is too rough for Enemy forces to concentrate there. My scan shows no human or Enemy personnel inside any of these cars. This matches records from the mining colony, which state that these vehicles are fully automated. I am pleased the Enemy has not stationed its own personnel on the ore cars, as this would complicate my mission. I scan the signals which these ore cars use to communicate with one another and mimic their own transmissions, asking permission to join the convoy. Space is made for me. I pull into the space and join the line of slow-moving ore carriers. 

We are still an estimated 10.8 kilometers from the processing plant when I encounter our first direct evidence of human survival on a Deng-held world. At a distance of 3062 meters we pass a fenced enclave in which my passive data-gathering sensors detect both human and Enemy personnel. From visual data, I determine that the humans present in this enclave are largely female and/or immature children. No males over the approximate human age of twelve are present. My Commander watches them on video screen and remains silent. Banjo speaks. 

"Bloody bastards are using 'em as hostages. Must be forcing the men and most of the women to work the processing plant."

My Commander nods silently. I note that the Enemy's need for war materiel is sufficiently urgent to use slave labor rather than import their own labor force. I fear these people will die during the reoccupation of BFS-3793-C, but I see no way to safeguard them. My mission profile does not include protection of civilian populations. I add my observations to my growing report file and turn my attention to mission parameters. The first of our two targets is within sensor range. 

The maintenance depot for ore carriers holds six such vehicles. I am pleased. I tell the ore carriers ahead of me and behind me that I must break ranks for depot maintenance. I receive messages acknowledging my status update. I turn into the depot lot and take up a position which commands a view of the processing plant below. It is a good position, as extrapolated from my on-board charts. From this place, I can perform a thorough reconnaissance of this facility without risking my Dismount Teams. 

I go to work. 

The processing-plant reconnoiter went smoothly.

So smoothly, Willum started to worry.

He'd always heard the old military axiom, "No plan survives contact with the Enemy." So when they completed their recon from the maintenance lot without a single hitch, he started to fret. Things have already gone wrong, he tried telling himself. We're due a break or two after what happened to Bonny and LRH-1327. But the pep talk didn't help much. He was still worried.

Red set out for the mine in a convoy of automated ore cars returning for a new load. They crawled along at a fraction of Red's top speed while Hobson's double moons rose above the fractured horizon. They were still on full fifty-percent alert, which meant half the Dismount teams were awake in the Crew Compartment, ready for combat if an emergency arose. Doug Hart and the other half of the Dismount Teams' members had bunked in hours ago, resting up for the arduous mission facing everyone, leaving Banjo with the night watch.

Willum DeVries hung in his hammock, unable to sleep. Unlike the others, he had nothing to do. Nothing to plan for. Hart and Banjo both had a million details to sort out, plans to review, alter, substitute. The Dismount Teams had equipment to check, stealth penetration plans to finalize, their own set of a million details to fuss over. Naturally, they were content in their frenzy. Even Hopper, for God's sake, had calmed down once given something to do.

All Willum had to do was wait.

During the long hours of waiting, he'd read everything on Red he could access; he knew her systems as well as he was going to. All that remained was to sit through the coming mission and hope like hell the Deng didn't give him anything to do. He turned over, restive and too keyed up to relax, even when he tried deep breathing and relaxation techniques. Finally he gave up and slipped out of his bunk. He tiptoed into the head and closed the door. The head was quite literally the only place inside Red where a man could find any privacy at all.

"Willum?" Red asked softly after he'd been in there for twenty solid minutes, trying to cope with night terrors and the sense that he would somehow fail his fellow crewmen by forgetting or not knowing something critical. "I am not registering any signs of illness. Nor do you appear to need to use the head's standard facilities."

"Uh, no . . . I'm not sick." Not physically . . . He took the plunge. "I, uh, just wanted to get away from the others. I can't sleep," he admitted.

"Your service record indicates that you have never been in combat. You are not a Marine. Combat is not your function. Nervous stress is normal in your situation, Willum. Would you like a mild sedative?"

"No . . . No, I don't want to be muzzy tomorrow."

"I can prescribe a medication which will not leave you groggy after you reawaken. You need to rest. Tomorrow will be a busy day."

"Yeah," Willum muttered. "For everyone else." He crossed his arms over his bare chest. "Dammit, I feel about as useful around here as an opposable thumb on a coconut."

"Willum. We need to chat."

He sighed. "Shoot."

"You have expressed the same frustration I heard often from Honey Pie. Honshuko Kai," she added. Willum could all but see her amused smile. "Honey Pie often felt himself to be a useless team member, even though he was my longest-serving crewman and essential to my continued mission readiness." The door to the head hissed open silently. Red's manipulator arms entered on the overhead track. The door closed again. "Here" —she extended a manipulator arm— "let me give you that sedative. Hold still, it'll sting only a second."

He allowed Red to give him the injection.

"Honey Pie once said he felt like cook, butler, and chief bottle washer in an expensive travel-trailer."

Willum chuckled. "Know the feeling, Red. I know the feeling. How'd he deal with it?"

"We played a lot of cards. Would you like to learn canasta?"

"Canasta?" Willum blinked, momentarily startled; then smiled. "My grandmother used to play canasta. Okay, Red, show me."

She produced two card decks from a small console in the head itself; then a tiny tabletop slid out from the wall. Willum just stared. Red told him, "Honey Pie installed these fixtures just for the two of us to share on nights like this. This is the only place, you know, where I can hold a private conversation with one of my boys. I think you need that almost as much as you needed that sedative and something else to think about."

She shuffled cards with extraordinary skill. "Now . . . before we begin, I have one last piece of advice. I always told Honey Pie this, so I will tell you, also. We are each selected to serve in exactly the right capacity for our talents and skills. Beware asking for something more. The gods may be listening."

Willum shivered. "Thanks. You have a point, there." He grimaced and rubbed the back of his neck. "I guess I wouldn't be much use on a Dismount Team. I couldn't sneak my way out of a paper bag." Then, because curiosity got the better of him, he asked, "How come you're so . . . not smart, wise?"

Red's chuckle issued from the speaker grill. "I was programmed with an extensive library on psychology, philosophy, and comparative religions in order to interact more effectively with my crew. And I have learned during the past eight years what my crewmen think about on the eve of a mission.

"Now . . . I deal each of us fifteen cards. The object is to collect sets of seven like cards. Such a set is called a canasta. You may use up to three wild cards per canasta, although such a `mixed' canasta has a lower point value. At least one canasta is required before you can go out. . . ."

Willum fell asleep in the third hand, a thousand and fifty points behind but content with the score.

Gunny Hokum woke at 03:40 and eased out of his bunk to use the head. Someone else had closed the door to use it ahead of him. Gunny waited. And waited. Twenty minutes later, he knocked on the panel to assure himself that no one was ill—although surely Red would've said something—and heard Red's voice whisper, "Yes, Gunny, you should come in, please."

He eased open the panel and found Willum DeVries slumped over a hand of canasta, fast asleep. One of Red's internal manipulator "hands" rested on his shoulder, gently. Gunny discovered a sudden thickening of the throat that made swallowing difficult. No wonder Ish fell for you, little lady . . . 

He felt sorry for DeVries, sorrier in some ways than he felt for Hopper, who at least had something to do. Gunny had lost track of the number of times Honey Pie had sat at that same tiny table, playing canasta in privacy with Red while Gunny and his men prepared for a mission. He missed Honshuko and Specter. Losing men out of a crew like this left gaping holes in a man's life. Unfinished conversations, plans that would never come to fruition . . .

Successful Mark XXI teams remained together, often for years at a time, growing closer and ever more effective, because once a crew was assembled which worked well together, breaking it up for anything more than seriously important reasons was just plain stupid. Specter and Honey Pie had been like family to Gunny. He appreciated how difficult it must be for someone like DeVries to be thrust into such a tight-knit group as outsider—then find himself with absolutely nothing to do. He was glad Red was taking care of the young engineer.

"Hey," he shook DeVries gently. "Sleeping Beauty. Wake up."

DeVries snorted, stirred, peeled his eyelids. "Hnnhh?"

"You'll get a crick in your neck, sleeping like that. And I gotta use the can. Hit the sack."

DeVries stumbled, a little glassy-eyed; then nodded and said, "Sorry, Gunny. G'night, Red."

"Good night, Willum. Sleep tight."

Gunny chuckled. "And don't let the bedbugs bite."

DeVries reeled a little, but made it safely back to his hammock. He collapsed into it and faded back into oblivion. Red quietly put away the cards and slid the table aside as Gunny settled in the head.

"How much of that sleepy-time did you give him, Red?"

"Only three cc's. He needed it."

Gunny finished his business; then sighed. "Yeah. I bet he did. Red—" He paused before opening the door.

"Yes, Gunny?"

"Oh, nothing." Gunny didn't lack for courage; but expressing his feelings was one thing he'd never had the luxury of doing. So he simply said, "Good night, Red."

"Good night, Gunny."

In the privacy of his own thoughts, he added, "Thanks for being such a damn good friend."

As he climbed back into his hammock, he realized he needed that friendship tonight in a way he couldn't explain. He drifted back into sleep without difficulty, content that Red was there, watching over them.

3

The Enemy has established a large staging area north of the mines, where expected. I enter a holding area for ore carriers which arrive in a convoy. I survey our surroundings. There are no Enemy physically present at this facility. I scan the mining complex. The operation is entirely automated. The mine has been drilled into the face of a sheer cliff and descends 12.5 kilometers beneath it. 

The cliff stretches away to the west as a tall ridge which drops and breaks at the tip into two forks like the tongue of a Terran viper, creating two separate ridgelines, one overlooking the mine and the other overlooking a valley to the north, where the Enemy has concentrated a battle force. Terrain around the tips of these forked ridgelines is more open, providing the ability to move cross-country into the valley where the Enemy force waits. These two ridges are the goal of my Dismount Teams. 

Another long, low ridgeline runs east-west directly south of the mine, almost like an island. The mine's access road loops completely around this ridge so that arriving and departing ore carriers do not have to pass one another in the confined area of the mine itself. Outside the main facilities plant are open sheds which cover stacks of standard structural steel pipe, internal diameter 75 millimeters. 

I determine that this pipe is used for steam fittings for pumping steam and hot ore slurry. Other open sheds house stacks of ore slugs in a standard Enemy unit of measurement, which translates to 73.99 millimeters by 147.98 millimeters. Large tanks house petrochemicals used in some capacity, I am not sure what. I am not a miner. I simply note their location and volume. 

The reason for the presence of processed ore slugs becomes apparent: to speed up production capacity, the Enemy has installed a pre-processing facility to convert ore slurry to slugs. This facility also functions on fully-automatic status, converting hot ore slurry to finished ore slugs for easier transport. This plant clearly allows faster turnaround time for the ore cars, which now do not have to be cleaned by hand between trips to remove ore encrustations from their hoppers. The Enemy is impatient for war materiel. I file this discovery for proper reporting to FleetCom. The Fleet is due out of FTL in another seven hours. We must be ready to transmit our final intelligence report by then. 

Ahead of me, ore cars begin to transmit their readiness to receive another load to the computer which operates the mine facilities plant. They transmit in turn as they approach the end of the access road. When my turn comes, I transmit on the proper frequency that I have experienced technical problems en route and must retire from the queue to await maintenance. A computerized response directs me to park between the storage sheds and the nearest of the ridgelines. This is happily near the spot in which I must take up my mission position in accordance with my Commander's plan. 

I move out of line. The parking spot I choose places me exactly where my Commander has requested me to position myself for this mission. I am now behind the shoulder of the "island" ridgeline. My rear hatch is in shadow. I am ready. 

"Doug, are the Dismount Teams ready?"

"DT's, prepare to move out!"

"DT-1 ready," Gunny says. 

Milwaukee seconds him. "DT-2 ready."

My Chameleon screen's projection will cover the opening of my rear personnel hatch. The Dismount Teams move into position near the hatch, awaiting my signal. They are suited for stealth. 

"Set suit outer-skin controls to 16.71 degrees centigrade." They adjust suit controls and wait until their suits chill down to the proper thermal signature. Their equipment is ready: passive scanners, man-portable weapons, line-of-sight communications gear, grid screens behind which they will dig in for the duration of this reconnaissance mission. 

Similar to the energy-conversion screens I carry, these grids will absorb Enemy energy-weapons fire and convert it to a useable form to power their lightweight infinite repeaters. These repeaters will automatically return fire at anything which fires at the grid screens. Residual byproduct heat means the screens can protect the teams for a only a short time should they come under fire, offering minimal shielding, which is superior to no shielding. None of my boys has ever needed to use the grid; but I do not allow my Dismount Teams off my deckplates without it. 

All equipment is carried in stealth-rigged packs which function in the same manner as stealth suits. I monitor the drop in temperature as the Dismount Teams adjust pack external temperatures to match their suits. Weapons are covered with thermal coverings to prevent the air in their barrels, which remains at the same temperature as the inside of my Crew Compartment, from triggering thermal alarms the Enemy may have in place. I scan the area. We are in shadow. No Enemy signatures register on my sensors. 

"Go with care, my children," I whisper. I open my rear personnel hatch. 

My Dismount Teams salute my rear hatch scanners and exit. I close the hatch and watch their progress. They wait until their presence is screened by arriving ore cars, then move down the long ridgeline to the west. They pause, then vanish from my view behind the blunt end. I wait. The teams reappear, dodging arriving ore carriers to cross the road. It is an extreme risk to cross the road in this manner, but less of a risk than scaling the sheer wall and rappelling down the only other approach to the twin forked ridgelines. They reach the shadows of the far ridge. I monitor their climb. 

DT-1 has the farthest to travel. DT-2 takes up position where our Commander has instructed, on the near ridgeline of the twin forks. I can see my boys dig in and set up their grid screen. They do a good job. I must use all my sensors to locate them and I know where to look. DT-1 travels beyond my line of sight to the far ridgeline. I worry. I am never at ease when I cannot see my boys. 

DT-1 has orders to scan the valley north of their position for the Enemy. DT-2 will relay their findings to me in coded burst transmissions which will sound to the Enemy like background static in clear air. DT-2 signals that DT-1 has taken position. We wait. Banjo monitors readings from my sensors. Doug relays instructions and reviews mission plans again. We wait. DT-2 transmits preliminary data in a single burst. I decode it for Doug while preparing a file for transmission to FleetCom. 

"Red, DT-1 reports a mother-load of 'em in that valley. Not as many as we found at that processing plant, but they see twenty Yavac Scouts, a couple of Class C heavies, maybe five hundred infantry. No spaceport facility; but they have air capability. Five air scouts. A heavy transport. Gunny says he'll forward a detailed transmission when he finishes scanning everything into a data file. There's activity to the east he wants to monitor—looks like maybe this enclave's about to be bigger, he says. DT-2, out."

My Commander swears in language he does not often use. 

"You could order 'em back," Banjo says. 

"Yeah. And if that activity to the east turns out to be critical reinforcements in Deng fighting strength, we'll kill a shipload of Marines taking this pit. We wait."

The waiting grows increasingly difficult. 

* * *

Gunny's career had ensured visits to a lot of alien worlds. This one, nicknamed Hobson's Mines because only mining generated sufficient cash to buy imported technology, was one of the most rugged he'd encountered. Tectonic forces had buckled its surface into fantastic canyons and cloud-piercing mountain ranges in the more remote areas, while erosion and ancient continental glaciers had "gentled" some areas into merely jagged ridgelines and glacial valleys with the occasional alluvial plain. Where they sat now, Gunny had a commanding view of the terrain for kilometers; yet he could see very few ground features except for what lay in the valley directly to the north and the ridgeline just south of him, where Milwaukee had dug in with DT-2.

In the distance, ridge after ridgeline marched away in the fading twilight, clothed in ruddy light and the low-growing, thorny scrub which clung tenaciously to the stony soil. The valley to the north was a classic, U-shaped glacial valley. It was—outside of the processing plant region—the largest stretch of flat land Gunny had yet seen on this mineral-rich world. It made an ideal staging post for the Deng. Farmsteads the length of the valley were now abandoned, their animals grazing wherever the concentrations of Deng hadn't driven them off.

The terrain around Gunny's position was an open, gentle slope to the north and the west; directly east, the ridgeline where he'd dug in soared upward in a nearly vertical wall. Behind them, to the south, the ridgeline sloped gently down into a V-shaped cut that separated Gunny and DT-1 from the other fork of the snake-tongued double ridges. DT-2 had dug in there for the duration. Beyond them were the mine and the ridgeline which concealed Red.

He watched and recorded troop movements into and out of the valley, noting that another mass of infantry came in by air. Wrong direction for someone coming from the processing plant. They must have another base of operations we don't know about farther east. Gunny noted that in his growing data file. Meanwhile, more troops continued to flow in from the east, arriving by air. Heavy transports were bringing in more big Class One Yavacs. Additional scout-class Yavacs came in, as well.

They know something's up. They're reinforcing hell out of the mines. Dammit, how many more of 'em are scheduled to arrive here? Worse, what looked like a whole infantry division was headed west up the long, open valley, escorted by a point guard of Yavac armored scout vehicles, each as large as Red, moving on jointed, multiple legs like their creators.

Gunny shivered inwardly and glanced at the chronometer inside his faceplate. Fleet was due out of FTL in seven minutes. They had to relay what they knew to date so Red could warn FleetCom. Leave it to the damn spodders to wait till Fleet's due out of FTL to start a major troop movement. Red's transmission would instantly give away her position; but the mission was more important than the men.

Even when Red was one of the "men."

He glanced at Eagle Talon Gunn and Icicle Goryn, read in their faces that they, too, knew the score. One LRH unit or thousands of Marines and an entire world lost. . . .

Wordlessly, Gunny compressed his data files and encrypted them, then sent them to Milwaukee in a burst transmission.

"They've seen us, Gunny!"

"What?" Gunny jerked around toward Eagle Talon's position just in time to see the hellfire blaze of energy weapons fire streak through the twilight. "Shit—!"

The screen flared and sizzled under the impact.

"We're taking fire! Milwaukee, get DT-2 the hell out of—"

The screen flared and sizzled again.

"One Yavac Scout visible, Gunny," Eagle Talon said tersely. "Closing on our position—"

"BEHIND YOU!" Icicle shouted, pointing toward DT-2's position. Another Yavac Scout was moving in fast, monstrous in the growing darkness, guns trained on the Dismount Team trying to scramble toward Red.

Gunny yelled into his transmitter, "Milwaukee! Behind you! Get under that screen! That's two Yavacs—no, three, God— They're coming out of nowhere—"

Energy weapons tore into the hillside, forcing DT-2 back under the cover of their energy screens. Gunny checked the time. Fleet still hadn't dropped out of FTL. They were pinned down and completely on their own.

"We've gotta keep 'em away from Red's position until she transmits to FleetCom. Let's entertain 'em, boys."

He could tell from their eyes that Eagle Talon and Icicle were every bit as terrified as he was. That didn't stop them from opening up with all available weapons. Eagle Talon took charge of the infinite repeaters, depressing the stud which activated the automatic-fire sequence and tracking controls. Icicle added energy-rifle fire to the automatic weapons fire their screens now generated with every new hit. The temperature under the screens began to climb with every murderous energy bolt that slammed into it. Their suits would compensate for a while; but only for a while. He glanced at the chronometer again: six minutes before estimated Fleet arrival.

It was going to be a long, long six minutes.

Gunny unslung his own rifle and opened fire.

I receive a coded burst from DT-2, transmitting Gunny's report. FleetCom is due in six minutes, twenty seconds. Two point seven seconds later I receive a second coded burst which translates as "We are compromised." Explosions light the darkening sky: energy weapons have been fired at DT-1. I receive a third coded burst: "We are taking fire." More explosions occur along the far ridgeline. Only the tip of my sensor array is exposed above the shoulder of the ridgeline I am concealed behind. I watch DT-2 attempt to scramble down from their position. The appearance of a Class One Yavac Scout cuts off their retreat. It fires into the hillside. My boys scramble for safety under their screens. 

Under the strict rules of engagement which govern my mission parameters, I can do nothing to help them until FleetCom has made contact and I have transmitted my intelligence files. I understand this need. But I also understand the need for urgent action. These are my boys. My overriding responsibility, programmed at the deepest levels of my psychotronic circuitry, is to safeguard their welfare. I must help them. 

I must. 

I review the tactical situation in which my Dismount Teams are trapped. I find a potential solution. I move quietly toward the storage sheds where the colony has stored stacks of pipe. 

My Commander speaks sharply. "We can't engage, Red. Not until FleetCom makes contact." The fluctuations in his voiceprint register extreme stress. 

"Yes, Doug. I am making preparations to help our boys the moment I have transmitted Gunny's reports. I think I see a way to improve our chances of extricating them without directly engaging the Enemy."

"Let's hear it."

I am already preparing key elements of my plan as I explain. 

"We must create a diversion. I can't do that myself without coming out of hiding; but I can use these pipes and ore slugs to create one while remaining concealed. A diversion may give them a chance to get off those ridgelines and back inside."

"Do it. DeVries, belay that! Strap in! Banjo, help him. Red, advise me when you receive FleetCom signal."

I set up ranks of pipes, pushing them into the ground with my external manipulator arms. I drain petrochemicals from the nearby storage tanks and pour dark liquid into the pipes. I retrieve ore slugs and drop one slug into each pipe. I am nearly done when I receive FleetCom's signal. They have dropped out of FTL twenty-three seconds ahead of schedule. 

"FleetCom signal received, Doug. Transmitting."

I transmit my Dismount Teams' surveillance reports, so critical to the success of this campaign, in burst encryption mode. My transmission may give away my position to the listening Enemy. We must take evasive action. I move even as FleetCom signals receipt of encrypted surveillance reports. My duty is discharged. We have successfully completed this mission. 

"FleetCom has acknowledged receipt of the encrypted data, Doug."

"Let's do it, then."

I move west, far enough to locate DT-1 with the tip of my extended whip array, and prepare to rescue my boys. 

The world under the grid screen was hot.

Hotter outside, of course, in a figurative sense, but literally hot as Hell inside and getting hotter by the minute. Every time another energy bolt blasted that grid, the temperature went up another five degrees. Their suits protected them from the worst of it; but when the air temperature under the grid screens hit 93 degrees centigrade, even the suits began to malfunction. Gunny didn't need a palm reader to know their future was very, very short.

"Shit—ahh, shit . . ." Eagle Talon snatched his hand off the controls of the lightweight infinite repeater. The fire-control mechanism had burned through the suit glove.

The gauge in Gunny's suit climbed past 98. To the south, Milwaukee Petra's screens took another direct hit.

"Milwaukee! Can you read?"

Static . . .

Then, patchy: ". . . over?"

"Can't stay here much longer! Deng are bringing up massed infantry against us from the north!"

He didn't know how much—if any—of that made it through. Another bolt slammed into the screens. Eagle Talon had found a loose chip of rock to depress the control stud on his weapon. He resumed firing at the Yavac Scout directly north of their position. Trouble was, the damned thing was too big for their little weapons. They'd been armed to deal with unarmored personnel and light ground transports, not something as big and tough as a Yavac Scout.

Hell, they weren't supposed to get caught in the first place. That didn't matter now, of course. What mattered was surviving. His hindbrain kept whispering, "run!" He ignored it. The Yavac Scouts had them nicely trapped, anyway; there literally wasn't anywhere to run.

One Yavac had walked down the access road between the tongue-shaped ridgeline and the wedge-shaped "island," cutting off retreat toward Red. Another sat between Gunny and Milwaukee's respective positions, just off the tip-ends of the double ridgeline. From there it could fire at both Dismount Teams—which it did with murderous accuracy. The third sat to the north, in the shallow valley, pinning them down while the mass of the Deng battle force moved into position. At their back was that damned sheer rock wall.

They were surrounded.

And a mass of Deng infantry boiled up from the valley, bolstered by heavy covering fire from the Yavac armored scout. The Enemy infantry moved like a black, shaggy growth of bread mold, spreading out westward along the tongue-shaped ridgeline and moving forward in a primal wave that Gunny knew nothing short of a Mark XXI Combat Unit's firepower could possibly stop.

They didn't have a Mark XXI Combat Unit.

All they had was Red. And she was no match for even one armored scout-class Yavac. That mass of infantry would roll right over them unless they ran; but the Yavac Scouts covered every possible line of retreat with withering fire.

"Gunny!" Icicle Goryn called from his belly-down position. "How come those damn Yavacs aren't using anti-personnel shells? We'd 'a been dead by now if they had."

The implications chilled him. "Little bastards want prisoners to interrogate, that's why!" He grabbed the com-link to DT-2. "Milwaukee, they're after prisoners! Do you copy? They want prisoners to interrogate. Over."

Through the static came a faint reply. ". . . copy."

A series of bolts hit the screen in rapid succession. Icicle yelled and jumped backwards. His suit sleeve had brushed the screen. The fabric melted around his skin. Icicle kept screaming until Gunny managed to inject a pain killer. Icicle still whimpered; but the pain dropped to bearable levels. Eagle Talon had switched tactics, overriding automatic controls to turn the infinite repeaters on the mass of infantry boiling up toward them.

Gotta get us outta this deathtrap before those hairy little bastards swarm all over us. . . . 

Another series of energy bolts slammed into the screen. Gunny saw the screen buckle and begin to go—

"EAGLE! JUMP! CLEAR THE SCREEN!"

The AmerInd made it. Icicle was slower to respond. Gunny dragged him. The buckling screen settled like melting wax, collapsing from the center toward the edges. Icicle's shoulders and head were still under it—

A corner of the mesh dropped across his faceplate. Icicle screamed in reflex and clawed at the glowing strands. Most of them came clear, burning his hands to the bone. One strand got through. Icicle screamed again, a sound infinitely more terrible than his earlier cry. Gunny jerked his helmet completely off, but the damage was done. Icicle was blind, burned terribly across the face. He was still screaming. This time, Gunny dumped enough painkiller into him to put a horse under.

It was barely enough to deaden the pain.

Icicle curled onto his side, whimpering like a child, unable to see the Enemy's guns trained on them. Gunny snatched his rifle off his shoulder and fired at the Yavac Scout in a red rage. The Yavac returned fire: energy bolts that hit in a precise arc, driving them back toward the ruins of their grid screen, denying them an escape route.

Down in that broad northern valley, the infantry was closer, moving at a dead run across broken ground. Gunny turned his fire on them, bringing down dozens of multilegged, hairy horrors. Eagle Talon fired into the massed infantry with good result.

The nearest Yavac Scout began to climb the ridge.

I have placed my makeshift weapons in three banks of six along the backside of the ridge, facing them in slightly different directions. I extend my main sensor array into the clear above the shoulder of the ridge for a tactical update. 

"Doug, our boys are in trouble. Their grid screens are overheating. They won't take much more before reaching meltdown point. We must assist them now."

"Can't expose you, Red, you're not built to handle a Deng armored scout."

"I will take precautionary measures, Doug. I will expose only my gun, long enough to fire. I see three Yavac Scouts, one barely visible around the edge of that farthest ridge. It sits at the head of the valley Gunny has been reconnoitering. If I move west, all three Yavac Scouts would be in range. When I touch off the diversion, distracting them, I could land crippling blows very quickly by popping my infinite repeater up over the shoulder of the ridge."

Before my Commander can answer, DT-1's grid screen takes multiple direct hits in rapid succession. The grid melts and collapses. One of our boys is partially trapped under it. My video input magnifies the sight as the grid melts through Icicle's faceplate. My audio sensors pick up the screams. The Yavac nearest my position begins to climb the lower slope of the ridge. 

"Do it!" My Commander's voice is ragged with stress. 

I move 300 meters farther west and turn my guns on the ranked pipes, igniting the petrochemicals in sequence with short blasts from my infinite repeater. A quarter of the makeshift mortars detonate without launching their projectiles. Three-quarters fire as planned. It is enough. I move rapidly away from my position as all three Enemy Yavac units turn toward the arcing ore slugs and open fire on my former position and the airborne slugs. 

Gunny hugged the stony ground, putting himself between Icicle and the climbing Deng scout. All he could do was lie there, panting in horror while firing at it with no result. The monstrous, misshapen thing just kept coming. Muffled explosions beyond the ridge where Red had concealed herself startled him. The rumbling BOOMs startled the damned Yavacs, too; all three turned and fired at some sort of incoming projectiles.

"GET 'EM RED!" he yelled.

As though on cue, Red's turret-mounted articulated arm popped up over the shoulder of the ridge, exposing her infinite repeater. She fired in rapid sequence. The nearest Yavac's main gun exploded; milliseconds after that she nailed the main guns on both other Yavacs, putting them out of commission. Gunny heard the ragged cheer from DT-2. The Yavacs returned fire from their smaller weapons systems. Gunny saw Red's main sensor array go in a burst of light and debris.

Oh, God . . . 

Without that array, her main control system for her own guns—not to mention her reconnaissance equipment—was blown. She could shoot; but she couldn't aim or see nearly as well. The lightweight infinite repeater sank out of sight. Then, in a nightmarish moment that brought Gunny's breath to a shuddering halt in his dust-filled lungs, Red backed out from behind that ridge, Chameleon screens engaged to imitate the configuration of a Yavac Scout. She fired wildly at her former position.

Milwaukee and his men tried running for it during the confusion. Yavac small-weapons fire drove them back mercilessly. Gunny's heart sank. "Good try," he whispered. "But ain't no way you're gonna pull this one off, Red. Three against one and you with your main array blasted to hell and gone . . . Been nice knowing you, little lady. . . ."

He wished he'd told her, after all, how he felt.

I reconfigure Chameleon screens to match the visual and electronic signature of a Deng Class C Yavac Scout. I have little armor on my hull. What I require is a shield. I use external armatures to pick up large stones, which I place in front of my hull, maximizing the rocky surface area. They will not withstand more than one direct hit; but it is the best I can do. The rocks—like my true appearance—are hidden behind the Chameleon screen. 

I move into the open, transmitting on enemy frequencies and firing at my previous position. The Enemy swings toward me and hesitates. I hear an Enemy demand for identification. DT-2 attempts to break out and is driven back. I fire at the Enemy climbing the ridge toward DT-1, striking the same point multiple times in 0.92 seconds. The Enemy's hull is breached. It explodes and burns. I have killed one Enemy. 

The Enemy nearest me launches five mortar grenades. These do not arc toward me. They arc toward DT-2. I fire at the grenades midflight. I am unable to aim precisely enough to pinpoint each one so I fire sweeping bursts. Four grenades explode midair. The fifth detonates just above DT-2's grid screen. The grid screen explodes. 

"Milwaukee! Milwaukee, respond!" There is no answer. I am frantic. 

Gunny calls on his line-of-sight suit-link. "Red! Red, tell Hart to get the hell out of here! We're done for! There's a mess of—"

His transmission is interrupted by another explosion between his position and mine. The nearest Yavac fires at me. I attempt to withdraw behind the shoulder of the ridge again. The Yavac follows. I move the stones I carry in an attempt to block projectile weapons fired at my hull. I fire back at the Enemy, aiming for vulnerable legs rather than the armored hull. Concentrated fire destroys four jointed legs on its near side. The Yavac topples, crippled. Its remaining gun systems discharge as it falls. I am hit directly in my turret. Internal diagnostics scream that I am crippled. My turret-mounted articulated extension-arm is unusable. My gun is severely damaged. I am defenseless. 

The Yavac fires again from the ground before I can move out of range. One blast hits the rock in my starboard armature, obliterating my shield. The other hits my port armature. Internal sensors report extreme damage to the port armature. It is bent and useless. The starboard armature remains operational. I retreat from the limited sweep available to the Enemy's guns. This places me between the crippled Enemy and my Dismount Teams. As I retreat between the two forks of the double ridgelines, it attempts to circle with me, but with its port-side legs gone, it only scrambles in place, unable to turn and fire on me. 

"Red!" my Commander says, "we have to—"

The third Yavac Scout has emerged from behind the forked tip of the ridge where DT-1 is trapped. It is firing on me. I take direct hits to my hull. I am not designed to withstand this. I rock on my treads. Internal systems overload and spark. I cannot think properly for 23 nanoseconds. I am hit again. Hull breach! Radiation floods my Command Compartment from the power plant of the destroyed Yavac Scout nearby. 

"Doug!"

Internal vid monitors reveal a terrifying sight. My Commander has been hit. His command chair is in pieces on the floor. My Commander is in pieces on the floor. I grieve. I keen in anguish. Banjo is screaming in pain. Burns and lacerations cover the upper half of his torso. My Commander and Assistant Commander are unable to advise me. 

The only remaining officer aboard is Warrant Officer Willum DeVries. He is screaming in pain from his own injuries and has not issued an order. Unlike a Mark XXI Combat Unit, I am designed to take direction from a human commander. For an agonizing 0.007 seconds, I do not know what to do. I must decide something. My responsibility circuitry howls, demands action. I am driven to a decision by my responsibility programming. 

"Willum! Help Banjo onto the emergency Medi-Unit table."

I lower the door to the head, forming an emergency operating surface. My engineer has also been wounded, but is capable of unharnessing himself. He tries to carry Banjo. I take evasive action, attempting to elude another direct hit. My responsibility programming overrides all other factors. I must rescue my trapped boys. I climb frantically toward DT-2. The remaining Yavac circles and vanishes around the northernmost fork of this ridge. I emerge near DT-2. Willum has almost gained the waiting Medi-Unit emergency surgery table. My internal armatures reach for straps to hold Banjo to the operating table while I maneuver. 

The Yavac emerges over the shoulder from the northern side of the ridge. It moves at high speed. It fires. I am hit again. I reel and lose ground. Willum and Banjo impact my interior hull. Low-level radiation warnings sound inside my Crew Compartment. Using my starboard external armature, I lift the remains of the grid screen from DT-2's position. 

My boys are dead. 

The single mortar grenade I could not stop has killed them. 

I keen my anguish and turn to rescue DT-1. The third Yavac runs through DT-1's position on course for me. It crushes Icicle Goryn under one careless foot. My other boys run in opposite directions. The Yavac fires on them. I charge, drawing fire to myself. Eagle Talon goes down. The Enemy has blown away his legs. I rage. I hate. The Enemy is murdering my helpless children. 

The Enemy must die. 

I reel from multiple direct hits. I continue the charge on broken treads. My independent-drive wheels still function. I run directly under the Yavac Scout. I ram its legs. Using my starboard armature, I grab the nearest set of joints and pull. Metal bends. Metal screams. The joint breaks in my grip. I seize another joint and pull. My armature bends. The joint screams. The Yavac topples. It lands on my turret. It explodes. High-level radiation warnings go off my internal sensor scale. 

I shift. The Yavac's debris slides off. My remaining Dismount Team member is alive at a distance of 12.095 meters to starboard. I move to pick him up. Despite critical injuries, I recognize Gunny. He is burned even through his protective suit, which the explosion has shredded. He is badly hurt. I cradle him in my starboard armature. I must get him and Willum DeVries clear of this deathtrap. 

"Get— get to safety," Gunny whispers through his suit-link. "I'm done for— Gotta—save yourself—"

"Hush, Gunny . . ."

I cradle him close and prepare to run for pickup point at the best speed of which I am still capable. A mass of Enemy infantry bursts over the crest of the ridge. I pivot away from their weapons to place my bulk between them and Gunny. My treads are broken. The turn takes too long. Enemy fire catches Gunny in three places. I hear him scream. His life signs falter and fade. 

I rage. 

I turn. 

I charge. 

The Enemy dies under my broken treads. 

"Red . . ."

A weak voice from inside the Crew Compartment. 

"Help me, Red—I'm hurt . . ."

I halt.

I do not have the luxury of revenge. Willum DeVries still lives. One chick still needs me. It is enough. I retreat at top speed. I take additional fire from above. Yavac airborne ships have lifted from the Enemy base. I dodge and slide down the ridge toward the access road. I take another direct hit to the turret. I cannot withstand many more direct hits. I broadcast a broad-band distress call to any listening member of the invasion fleet. 

A ship-class infinite repeater opens up from orbit. My call is heard. 

"Got here just in time to pick those damned airborne ships off your backside, LRH-1313. Can't do more. Report to pickup point and hold position. You may have to wait a while. It's hotter than Hell just north of you."

I respond with thanks. I run for pickup point. I scan Willum DeVries' injuries. Worry and dismay flood my entire psychotronic neural net. Willum is badly injured. Radiation poisoning has already critically weakened him. There is a chance I can keep him alive with chelation treatments until a real physician can tend his injuries. I cannot lose my last chick. I cannot. Willum is attempting to climb onto the emergency treatment bed. Using inboard armatures, I lift him into position. I strap him in with restraint webbing to prevent him from sliding off. I administer a heavy dose of pain killers for the serious injuries he has received and begin treating blood loss and shock. 

His cries of pain begin to calm. 

I am needed. I am frantic. 

I run for pickup point. 

Willum knew he was dying.

He'd suffered terrible burns and lacerations in the explosion that had killed Doug Hart. Then he'd broken something—several somethings—inside his chest when another explosion had flung him against Red's inner turret. Another explosion had flung him the length of the Crew Compartment, breaking bone in his left cheek and nose. His cheek had swollen until his left eye was useless.

He might've survived all that.

But not the radiation from that last, exploding Yavac . . .

Willum spent a long time lost in terror and the grip of pain medication that barely kept agony at bay. Everything had gone to hell and he was dying alone . . .

No, not quite alone.

Red was talking to him. About chelation treatments and shipboard medical facilities. He wanted to believe her. But he'd taken a good, hard look at the dose he'd picked up, back when the pain was bright and new and he could still function while enduring it. No amount of effort by Red was going to keep him alive to see the inside of any ship's hospital.

Talking was agony. But Red sounded so panic-stricken, he drove himself to speak around the pain in his face. "Red . . ."

"Yes, Willum?"

"No use . . . Chelate me . . . if you want; but it's no use. Not gonna make it."

Willum had never heard a psychotronic unit go into a state of panic. Until now. Red began to babble frantically, voicing aloud alternatives to chelation treatments, blaming herself for every one of her crew members' deaths, pleading with him to hold on just a little longer. That was the worst of all. He couldn't bear it. But when she whimpered that she would die with him, that she'd drive herself off the edge of the nearest canyon, Willum knew he had to stop her.

"No . . ."

He fumbled with the catches on the webbed restraints she'd used to keep him from falling off the makeshift operating table. He slid off, stumbled, caught himself with outstretched hands against a blood-spattered wall. Can't let you do that, Red. Not your fault. . . . 

Her inboard armatures attempted to grasp him. Willum tried to elude and fell flat. Pain jolted through him despite the drugs in his system. He lay flat for long minutes, lost in the grip of pain and confusion. When his mind cleared a little, he realized Red couldn't reach him on the floor. She was still pleading with him. "Willum, please, you must get back to bed!"

He belly-crawled toward the Command Compartment.

"Willum, get back into bed, please, you're not rational, the radiation poisoning is affecting your mind, I must begin treatments immediately—"

He was in desperate pain and so sick he wanted to curl up and vomit out his guts; but he remembered her specs. And he remembered how to program and rig dead-man switches and leave embedded codes and commands in her psychotronic circuitry. He blinked hard, trying to keep his vision clear, and finally reached the Command Compartment. Willum crawled into it and slammed shut the pneumatically controlled door. Red's armatures were trapped outside. He threw a mechanical lock, keeping her out. Can't let her suicide over us . . . 

He remembered that midnight canasta game and Red's poignant warning to beware asking for more than you were equipped to handle. He'd wanted to be needed.

Well, he was now.

Red needed him, more than anyone had ever needed him, as an engineer or a friend. He couldn't fail her.

"Willum? Willum, what are you doing? Please tell me." Although her armatures were trapped outside, her video pickups and voice were in here with him. He crawled through Doug Hart's remains and gained Banjo's chair at the Action/Command console. "Willum, please come back to the emergency Medi-Unit. This is my fault, I should never have engaged the Enemy, I'm not built for it, but they would have killed everyone— Willum! Come back to the Medi-Unit! Please . . ."

His hands trembled violently. So hard to think. To write the lines of code. To reason out what had to be done first, how to phrase it, how to tap into the neural net, how to properly interface—

"Willum Sanghurst DeVries! Belay that and come back to the Medi-Unit this instant!"

"Red . . ." he said hoarsely, trying to distract her from panic. " 'Member that . . . canasta game?"

He embedded another code in his program, typing in the word "CANASTA" with unsteady fingers.

"Yes, Willum . . ." She sounded uncertain, but more like herself. Good, keep her mind off it, keep her talking about something besides suicide. 

"Gonna let me . . . finish that game . . . right? I'm down a . . . shipload of points. How many? Don't remember . . ." Pain jolted through his whole face with every word. Involuntary tears streamed from his good eye, all but blinding him.

"You currently trail me by one thousand fifty points, Willum. Please come back to the Medi-Unit. We will finish the game soon, after your treatments. . . ."

Willum didn't bother blinking this time. Even without the wetness, his vision was damn near shot anyway. He typed by feel. He could see the program in his mind: the moment his lifesigns went null, the dead-man switch would trigger a series of commands. Red would halt instantly. A viral worm would travel through her memory banks. It would erase enough to keep her from recalling what had happened on that ridge. It would copy that memory data into a largely empty portion of her games-database, with programmed blocks to keep her from accessing it. It would embed trigger codes to allow for retrieval of that missing data by the Navy, would embed other trigger codes to access rewritten versions of what happened to her crew.

Willum's hands trembled as he struggled to write commands to restructure those memory files. Can't let her remember what really happened, she'll suicide if they restart her with that intact. . . . He typed commands for the worm to install the sanitized version in Red's experience data banks once she was safely picked up at the rendezvous point. He typed commands to leave instructions for the Navy on how to repair the worm's temporary damage.

"Willum . . . Please . . ."

Red's voice pleaded with him, faint and very far away.

Almost . . . Almost . . .

There!

"Execute `Null-Null String.' " His own voice was a shadowed whisper through the pain in his face.

But it was done. . . . 

Red was safe.

He fell trying to get out of Banjo's chair. He didn't have the strength to stand up again. The deckplates sloped sharply.

"Red? What—" Panic smote him. He was too late, she was going to jump. "Red, the deck's tilted—"

They slipped and slid backwards, gained ground again. Red's independent-drive wheel controls screamed protest. She kept going.

"Please don't be alarmed, Willum. We're approaching pickup point. The slope is quite steep: 50.227 degrees. Please, please come back to the Medi-Unit. I can't reach you where you are."

It wouldn't do him any good; but it would make Red feel needed for these last few, critical minutes. One thing Willum still knew, and knew in his bones: how achingly powerful a thing it was to be needed.

He opened the door.

And began to crawl.

On level ground, he might have gone the whole distance.

Uphill, Willum made it as far as the empty deckplates at the foot of Red's emergency Medi-Unit table.

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