"What skills are required?" Pat asked.
Gorben searched for words. "It is difficult to explain, sir. Only we can smell the exact momentof full potential."
Pat was at a loss. "You smell with your nosewhen the weapon is ready to be fired?"
"Not with the nose, sir, with all the senses. Wesmell it with our hands, our bellies, our—"
"Do you feel something, some charge, some indication of power?"
"You can say that, sir. Yes, we smell, feel, sense,I can't explain."
"And why is this important?"
Gorben's face was serious. "Should the closedsystem be allowed to accelerate beyond capacity,sir, the
results would be disastrous."
"Explosion?"
"The Devil Destroyer would overflow and release its purity in the immediate area of the Devil Destroyer
itself, and we would feel its purity instead of the satans."
Pat had more questions, but two priests camewalking casually toward them, looking at Gorben questioningly.
"Honored One," Gorben said, "I am supposed toleave the temple immediately upon the completion of my schooling."
"Go, then," Pat said. "Keep up the good work."
Pat wished for a good book on theoretical physics, or the use ofSkimmer's library for an hour. Onthe surface of it, the weapon Gorben called theDevil Destroyer was just another beam weapon.Perhaps it was more powerful, but it didn't makesense that any beam weapon would be overwhelming enough to justify Corinne's sincere belief thatthe Brenden's small fleet could take on and destroy the UP.
He started back toward Corinne's private apartment, took a corridor that he had not walked before, discovered a golden door. The door was locked.As he tried to open it a priest came around the corner of the corridor and nodded, then halted.
"Sir," the priest said, "that is the private sanctuary of the adepts. Respectfully, sir, I must tellyou that no one other than those who have takenthe sacred oath are allowed inside."
"Thank you," Pat said.
"I was seeking you, sir," the priest said. "Thegoddess requires your presence in the rear garden."
The priest led Pat to an exit at the rear of the temple. TheSkimmer, grand old squatting, squarish space tug that she was, sat in an open areapast the flowering garden. Corinne stood beside it,waiting.
"I thought you'd be more comfortable on your own ship," she said.
"Where are we going?"
"There is a test I think you should witness," shesaid.
Once aboard, she gave him coordinates for ashort blink, which he executed after taking theship up a few thousand feet on thrusters.
Brenden's fleet, two thousand ships strong, layin close formation in open space, Dorchlunt's sunon the left flank of the formation. Corinne established contact, spoke softly into the communicator, then directed Pat to putSkimmer below andsunward of the fleet.
"The old cruiser, there at the front of the formation, is unmanned," Corinne said. "There are onlytest animals aboard."
As she spoke, the cruiser's flux engines came tolife, sending a glow from the thrusters. The ship accelerated quickly away from the vanguard of thefleet.
"Only the flagship will fire," Corinne said. Theflagship, on the point, was a sleek new dreadnaught.
The target ship was getting almost beyond visibility and nothing had happened, and then, forone brief moment, the old cruiser seemed to glow.The glow disappeared and nothing was changed.The cruiser sped on, detectable now only by ship'sinstruments.
"Cory," said a voice onSkimmer's communicator, "let's see if that man of yours can fly. Go latchon to that cruiser and stop it and wait until I get there."
"Will do," Corinne said. She nodded to Pat. HeputSkimmer into motion. She hadn't done a tugjob in a long time, but the program was still therein the computer. It didn't take long to catch up with the cruiser, utilizing one quick blink, andthen the old man eased theSkimmer alongside the ship until the hulls were almost touching, enclosed the cruiser inSkimmer's powerful field, and decelerated. The flagship emerged quite close, using the mass of the two ships as a target for a close blink,and two men in space gear emerged from a lock.
Pat stayed on the bridge, keeping an eye onthings, using the time to scan the cruiser. The shipgave no more indication of life, or of activatedmachinery, than had the long-abandoned colonyship which swam its eternal orbit around Dorchlunt.
A mountain of a man with hair the same color as Corinne's came onto the bridge first, havingshed his space gear. He was resplendent in a uniform which was very similar to that of an X&AAdmiral. Another man in uniform followed him.
The red-haired giant studied Pat for a moment."By God, Cory," he said, "you found yourself ahandsome one, but is he a fighter?"
"He handled those two renegade cruisers," Corinnesaid.
Pat felt as if someone were talking about him in his absence. But then Corinne looked at him andwinked. "Pat, this is my very big brother, the Brenden."
Do you shake hands with a dictator? Pat wondered. Brenden solved the problem, lumbering forward, hand outthrust, and there was no childishsqueezing contest, just firm contact, with Brenden'sgreen eyes boring into his.
"Pat, is it?" Pat nodded. "I hope you soon bedthis wench, Pat. It'll damn well take some of thesharp edges off her tongue."
"Brenden," Corinne said, blushing.
"By God," Brenden roared, laughing, "if sheweren't my sister and I didn't know her I wouldn'tbelieve she's been living on Zede all these years,movie star and all, and virginity still intact. But Ido know her, and I remember how even when shewas a little girl she was always saying that shewas never going to love a man until she found theright one, if you know what I mean."
"He knows what you mean, loudmouth," Corinne said.
Brenden laughed, then sobered. "Well, Pat, I understand you're with us. You've had fleet experience?"
"No," Pat said. Do you say "sir" to a dictatorwho has ambitions to rule the galaxy?
"Too bad," Brenden said, "but we'll find a place for you. You can fly, I saw that." He grinned. "AndI reckon you've already scanned the target ship?"
"She's dead in space," Pat said.
"Yep. Let's suit up and go take a look," Brendensaid, turning with an agility surprising in one solarge.
In the corridors of the cruiser there was an odd smell, a rank, hot smell. "Pat," Brenden said over his
shoulder, as he led the way, "winning the battle is just the beginning. I don't think we'll have tokill all of them. I think they'll see the light afterthe first two or three engagements, and then there'llbe just a few of us to run one helluva big empire.I'm gonna need good men. I trust Cory's judgment,because when I first started to claw my way upfrom that hard-scrabble mining claim in the boonieson Taratwo she was right there beside me,clawing and scratching right along with me. Onlyperson in the world who can hold her own withme in a fair fight, boy. Don't ever get her riled.She'll use all them ancient trick things on you and kick you in the balls, too."
"I haven't seen that side of her," Pat said, grinning at Corinne.
"See that you don't," Brenden said. "Yep, she'sa fighter. No fear at all, and willing to do what ittakes. Made no fuss at all when I said she'd be ofthe most service to us under a name other thanBrenden out there on that Zede planet snowingthe big dogs. Way I got it figured, Pat, Cory's mypartner, and half of everything I have is hers, andthat's a chunk, or will be very soon. You're herman—" He halted, turned. "Cory, why in hell didn'tyou marry him down there on Dorchlunt? Godknows you had enough priests and a few hundredgods to swear to." He roared with laughter.
Brenden was still chuckling when they reacheda squadroom. In cages lay dead animals, pigs, goats,a dog.