“Bnalm of Knyfh, sir. It was necessary to have an officer take over in the Solarian’s stead.”
“I told you,” Yael put in.
Melody closed her eyes. “Oh, Skot, you just had to get in on the action!” she muttered, pained. “But I needed you here.”
Llume approached. “Skot knew that a high-Kirlian entity would have a better chance of getting through than a low one, and his officer’s expertise would enable him to operate the ship more effectively. I would like to go also.”
“Llume, you know you’re a prisoner of war! Even if I could trust you aboard an Andromedan ship, it would be unethical—”
“I am a Slash,” Llume said.
“Precisely. An Andromedan—” Melody paused. “Oh. You mean you honor the Lot of *?”
“I could readily disable a hostage ship.”
“No,” Melody said firmly. “You will not turn traitor to your galaxy on my account.”
Llume retreated. Melody tried to analyze the strong emotion she felt, but was interrupted by Captain Mnuhl’s announcement on the net. “Lan of Yap.”
Tensely, Melody watched the viewglobe. Nothing happened. But of course it would take a moment for the agents to react, assuming they had completed their takeovers. To orient on the other ships, to make their announcements…
The net erupted. “Trey of Swords—Milky Way.” “Fourteen of Cups—Milky Way.” Then a jumble of voices.
Suddenly there was firing in the hostage fleet. It seemed to have turned on itself, with ships battling each other at point-blank range.
“Phenomenal success!” Mnuhl’s exultant voice came over the net. Melody had supposed Knyfhs lacked emotions, but of course she was wrong about that too. “Three… four… six ships blasted! Seven!”
“Like a chain of fireworks!” Yael exclaimed. “There’s another—and another!”
“It worked!” Melody said unbelievingly. “It actually worked!”
“I must admit I had reservations,” Mnuhl said. She could barely distinguish his voice amid the melee of communications, but the proximity of his ship gave him an advantage. “I anticipated perhaps two ships inactive. But now we have ten inactive! Hammer was caught completely offguard!”
“He was deceived by the nonmilitary mind,” Melody murmured, still hardly believing it herself. Yet the evidence was before her. Hard-hitting Hammer had never thought of resubversion.
“Analysis,” Mnuhl said. “Initial optimism exaggerated. Ten enemy ships destroyed, but this does not indicate that a similar number have been retaken. Some may have fired upon two or more neighbors. Projected losses to enemy, all factors; sixteen vessels.”
“They lost five before,” Melody said. “That brings them down to forty-five, against our thirty-one. We’re gaining on them.”
“Yes, certainly,” Mnuhl agreed. “It was a tactical masterstroke. But we remain at a disadvantage. We have merely culled their most vulnerable units, and they still outnumber us.”
Now a separation took place in the enemy fleet. “Our retakes are drawing apart, as directed,” Melody said. “Six ships.”
“An apparent loss of ninety percent of our transfer agents,” Mnuhl reminded her. “Considering the success, a favorable ratio.”
A favorable ratio! Was Skot of Kade among the statistics of acceptable loss? Gary? The two young women? The other gallant Knyfhs and Polarians and Canopians and Spicans?
“Recoveries are being pursued,” Mnuhl reported.
“Can we help them?”
“Only by closing upon the enemy fleet.”
“Do it, then. They took a terrible risk for us; we can do the same for them.” Then, conscious that the enemy could overhear this dialogue, she stopped talking on the net.
Llume rolled near again. “You can help them only by distraction,” she said. “They will be subject to the fire of the enemy for some time.”
“No, we can surround our six ships and protect them,” Melody said. “The hostages won’t be able to—” But then she realized what the problem was. It took a lot of energy to accelerate, and a lot to decelerate a huge spaceship. The six fleeing ships had a head start, but the pursuing hostage fleet would be in phase with them. The loyalist fleet, approaching from the opposite direction, could pass right through both the six and the forty-five without having any protective effect.
The Ace of Swords began to move, the chemical acceleration pressing Melody sidewise. She suffered vertigo; now she could not decide which way was down. Her command seat held her in place, however.
Llume had no problem; she merely tilted on her wheel to match the new vector and stayed in place.
“Well, at least we have six more ships,” Melody said. “Counting those recoveries, we shall have thirty-seven to their forty-five. That’s not such a bad ratio.”
“Not such a good ratio either,” Llume warned her. “By this time Admiral Hammer will have rounded up some captive transferees and will know everything they know. He will rout out any others remaining in his fleet and try to use them against you. If he retains a transfer unit—”
“Sour grapes,” Yael said. “You thought of a good tactic, so everyone says it doesn’t count.”
Sour grapes: another Solarianism. Melody traced down the imagery. Grapes were succulent fruits of Sphere Sol that developed on vines. When ripe, they were sweet, suitable for consumption. A carnivore was said to have desired some grapes, but found them to be out of reach. A carnivore? Such a creature consumed flesh, not fruit. There must be a confusion.
The other Polarian host appeared. It was Captain Mnuhl. “There will soon be battle,” he said. “Ships will be lost, and we may become unable to remain in contact. I think it wise to employ the Knyfh cluster-charge. This is a generalized magnetic field similar to the net that poses no threat to individual ships, but will tend to draw derelicts in to a common center. This will facilitate rescue of personnel in the absence of Intergalactic Convention.”
“By all means,” Melody said. “We shall want to save any entities we can, from any ships—ours or theirs. The great majority of entities are ours, and there is information we’ll want from any hostages we might capture.”
He made a glow of agreement and departed.
The two fleets accelerated toward each other, the six repossessed ships between. Melody was pleased to note that one of the six was Mintakan. Had they recovered the missing transfer unit, or had it been destroyed? She wished she could be sure it was not operating in the remaining enemy Atom. Llume had made a good point there.
In the globe it seemed as if the six ships would be crushed between the converging masses of the two main fleets, but she knew that they were mere dust motes in the hugeness of space. With an average separation between ships of five thousand miles, there would be no collisions. What seemed like masses in the globe were actually diffuse clouds in space.
What she could see in her globe, the Andromedans could see in theirs. When the Ace of Swords got close enough to fire on the enemy, the enemy Swords would be close enough to fire on the Ace. Suddenly she had a queasy feeling; she felt incompetent to handle it. She wanted to turn command of the ship over to Skot for the action, and of course could not, and not merely because he was gone. The hero-fool! She envied him.
“Coming into range of enemy vessels, sir,” a Knyfh officer said. “Seven of Cups, followed by Ten of Disks.”
What should she do? She had no experience at this sort of thing! Was that why Captain Mnuhl had made his last personal check, to see how she was taking the prospect of coming under fire herself? He should have stayed a little longer, and he would have seen her dissolve!