"What's going on? Did the Yiribians get hostile?" He shook his head. "Invaders twelve degrees off galactic center."
"This close to Administrative Alliance?"
"Yes. And if Jebel Tarik doesn't attack first, Tarik's had it. They're bigger than Tarik, and Tarik's going to bump right into them."
"Jebel's going to attack them?"
"Yes."
"Then come on, let's attack."
"You are going with me?"
"I'm a master strategist, remember?"
“Tarik is in danger," the Butcher said. “This will be a greater battle than you saw before."
"The better to use my talents on, my dear. Is your boat equipped to hold a full crew?"
"Yes. But we use the Navigation and Sensory detail of Tarik by remote control."
"Let's take a crew, anyway, just in case we want to break strategy in a hurry. Is Jebel riding with you this time?"
"No."
Up the hall Slug turned the corner, followed by Brass, the Navigators, the insubstantial figures of the discorporate trio, and the platoon.
The Butcher looked from them to Rydra. "All right. Come on."
She kissed his shoulder because she couldn't reach his cheek; the Butcher opened the ejection hatch, and motioned them inside. "Get in, gang!"
Allegra, as she started up the ladder, caught Rydra's arm. "Are we gonna fight this time. Captain?" There was an excited smile on her freckled face.
"There's a good chance. Scared?"
"Yep," Allegra said, still grinning, and scurried into the dark tunnel. Rydra and the Butcher brought up the rear.
“They won't have any trouble with this equipment if they have to take over from remote control, will they?"
"This spider-boat is ten feet shorter than the Rimbaud. Things are more cramped in discorporate quarters, but everything else is the same."
Rydra thought: We've worked the sensory details on a forty-foot one-generator sloop; this is a breeze, Captain—Basque.
"The captain's cabin is different," he added. "That's where the weapon controls are. We're going to make some mistakes."
"Moralize later," she said. "We'll fight like hell for Jebel Tarik. But on the chance fighting like hell won't do any good, I want to be able to get out of here. No matter what happens, I've got to get back to Administrative Alliance Headquarters."
"Jebel wanted to know if the Yiribian ship will fight beside us. They're still hanging T-ward."
"They'll probably watch the whole business and not understand what's going on, unless they're directly attacked. If they are, they can pretty well take care of themselves. But I doubt they'll join us in an offensive."
"That's bad," the Butcher said. "Because we'll need help."
"Strategy Workshop. Strategy Workshop," Jebel's voice came over the speaker. "Repeat, Strategy Workshop."
Where language charts had hung in her cabin, a viewing screen—replica of the hundred-foot projection in Tarik's gallery—spread over the wall. Where her console had been were ranged and banked assortments of bomb and vibra-blast controls." Gross, uncivilized weapons," she commented as she sat down on one of the curved shock-boards where her bubble seat had been. "But effective as hell, I would imagine, if you know what you're doing."
"What?" The Butcher strapped himself beside her.
"I was misquoting the late Weapons Master of Armsedge."
The Butcher nodded. "You see to your crew. I'll go over the check list up here."
She switched on the intercom. "Brass, you wired in place?"
"Right."
"Eye, Ear, Nose?"
"It's dusty down here. Captain. When's the last time they swept out this graveyard?"
“I don't care about the dust. Does everything work?"
"Oh, everything works all right. . ." The sentence ended with a ghostly sneeze-"Gesundheit. Slug, what's happening?"
"All in place. Captain." Then muffled: "Will you put those marbles away!"
"Navigation?"
"We're fine—Mollya is teaching Calli judo. But I'm right here and'll call them soon as something happens."
"Keep alert."
The Butcher bent toward her, stroked her hair, and laughed.
"I like them too," she told him. "I just hope we don't have to use them. One of them is a traitor who's tried to get me twice now. I'd rather not give him a third chance. Though if I have to, I think I can handle him this time."
Jebel's voice over the speaker: "Carpenters gather to face thirty-two degrees off galactic center. Hacksaws at the K-ward gate. Ripsaws make ready at the R-ward gate— Crosscut blades ready at T-ward gate."
The ejectors clicked open. The cabin went black and the view-screen flickered with stars and distant gases. Controls gleamed with red and yellow signal lights along the weapon board. Through the underspeakers the chatter of the crews, back with the Navigation department of Tarik, began.
This is gonna be a rough one. Can you see her, Jehosaphat?
She's right in front of me. A big mother.
I just hope she ain't seen us yet. Keep us cool, Kippi.
"Drill presses, Handsaws, and Lathes: make sure your components are oiled and your power-lines plugged in."
"That's us," the Butcher said. His hands leapt in the half-dark among the weapon controls.
What's the three ping-pong balls in the mosquito netting?
Jebel says it's a Yiribian ship.
Long as it's on our side, baby, it's fine with me.
"Power tools commence operations. Hand tools mark out for finishing work."
"Zero," the Butcher whispered. Rydra felt the ship jump. The stars began to move. Ten seconds later she saw the snub-snouted Invader rooting toward them.
"Ugly, isn't it," Rydra said.
"Tarik looks about the same, only smaller. And when we come home, it will be beautiful. There's no way to enlist the Yiribians' help? Jebel will have to attack the Invader directly at her ports and smash as many as he can, which won't be a lot. Then they'll attack, and if they still outnumber Tarik's spider-boats, and surprise doesn't play heavily on Jebel's side, then that's"—she heard fist strike palm in the darkness— "it."
“You can't just lob a gross, uncivilized atom bomb at them?"
"They have deflectors that would explode it in Jebel's hands."
"I'm glad I brought the crew then. We may have to make a quick exit to Administrative Alliance Headquarters."
"If they let us," the Butcher said, grimly. "What strategies then to win?"
"Tell you soon as the attack starts. I have a method, but if I use it too much I pay high." She recalled the illness after the incident with Geoffry Cord.
While Jebel continued to set up formations, the men chatted with Tarik and the spider-boats slipped ahead in the night.
It started so fast she nearly missed it. Five hacksaws had slipped within a hundred yards of the Invader. Simultaneously they blasted at the ejector ports, and red beetles scurried the sides of the black hog. It took four and a half seconds for the remaining twenty-seven ejectors to open and shoot their first barrage of cruisers. But Rydra was already thinking in Babel-17.
Through her distended time sense she saw they did need help. And the articulation of their need was also the answer.
"Break strategy. Butcher. Follow me with ten ships. My crew is taking over."
The maddening feeling that her English words took so long on her tongue! The Butcher's request—“Kippi, put hacksaws on tail and leave them there!"—seemed like a tape played at quarter speed—But her crew was already in control of the spider-boat. She hissed their trajectory into the mike.
Brass flung them at right angles to the tide, and for a moment she saw the hacksaws behind her. Now a hairpin turn and they drove behind the first sheet of Invader cruisers.
"Warm their behinds!"
The Butcher's hand hesitated at a weapon. "Drive them toward Tarik?"