Smaller asteroids crowded the rim areas of the Belt. Larger asteroids, the largest as big as small planets, crowded the middle. There were so many asteroids that only those about the size of a city, or larger, had classification numbers. Even then, there were hundreds of thousands; and ten times as many unclassified.
Five minutes later the weapons core instructed the computers which served it to configure themselves to Attack, SemiManual. A warning harmonic warbled politely through the Bridge. Headup displays and target simulations were superimposed on the Bridge screen. Cyr fired once (Target Destroyed) and twice more (Target Reached) as She started running and Kaang parallelled Her movements. Cyr was about to resume grooming her nails, but this time there was a slight break in the usual pattern. The warning harmonic sounded again, louder.
“Counterattack coming,” Joser said. “She’s charging down our throats, like She did with the Cromwell.”
“That’s the second time in two hours,” Cyr said, with a trace of irritation.
But it was now only a matter of standard procedure. It was dealt with routinely, as on the previous occasion; Foord’s preparations included an array of counters to the Cromwell Manoeuvre. By the time Cyr finished complaining, it was over. The Charles Manson’s weapons had refocussed on Her without difficulty as She rushed towards them; Kaang had matched Her course and speed, but in reverse, to maintain beam range; She had slowed, realising the manoeuvre was compromised, and Cyr had beaten Her off with a succession of beam-firings. Her flickerfields held and She retreated deeper into the Belt, to find fresh cover. Kaang moved them slowly forward, maintaining range. The weapons core started counting another five minutes.
“I wonder,” Kaang said, to nobody in particular, “why Her fields aren’t energy absorbent, like those on that missile?”
“The missile was unmanned,” Joser said. “Maybe energy-absorbent fields are harmful to living things.”
“Are you assuming,” Cyr asked, “that there are living things on that ship?”
“Are you assuming,” Smithson asked, “that it’s a ship?”
“I hardly think,” Foord murmured, “we have time for metaphysics.”
“Yes we do, Commander,” Cyr said. “If it goes on like this, we do. I’ll start on my toenails next.”
Almost unnoticed, one of the ship’s other sentience cores updated the navigation files by deleting various numbered asteroids from the Belt. It was a thoughtful and necessary exercise; the Charles Manson had already rewritten the map of a substantial part of the Belt’s outer rim, and would probably continue to do so. Proper and accurate records had to be kept.
Five minutes later the weapons core instructed the computers which served it to configure themselves to Attack, SemiManual. A warning harmonic warbled politely through the Bridge. Headup displays and target simulations were superimposed on the Bridge screen. Her cover was AL-4091, a mid-sized asteroid whose destruction took two beam-firings. She broke and ran, again deeper into the Belt, and Cyr reached Her with four shots before She found cover. Kaang took the Charles Manson forward sufficiently to maintain beam range.
The second phase of the engagement had now lasted six and a half hours. Foord called a short break for status reports; they were duly made and he duly listened, though they revealed nothing more than the quietly satisfactory situation of which he was already well aware.
“Thank you,” he murmured. “No further orders.”
He nodded to Cyr, and the weapons core started counting another five minutes. Allowing for the taking of status reports, it was eight minutes elapsed time when the core instructed the computers which served it to configure themselves to Attack, SemiManual. The break in the rhythm was noticeable, like a delayed heartbeat, but the iterative cycle easily reimposed its pattern. The warning harmonic warbled politely, and the headup displays and target simulations reappeared on the Bridge screen. Her cover was AK-5004, another mid-sized asteroid whose destruction took two firings. She broke and ran, still going deeper, and Cyr reached Her with five shots before She found fresh cover. Kaang parallelled Her movements, maintained beam range, and brought them to rest again. Another five-minute count began.
“Cyr.”
“Commander?”
“If we were Her, how much more of this could we take before the use of our flickerfields started to drain us?”
“Fifty hours before actual danger, but noticeable impairment after thirty.”
“Smithson, can we assume…”
“If She’s a ship like us, and not something else, Her flickerfields are likely to drain Her at a similar rate. Say impairment after thirty hours. But we’ll bore Her to death in ten.”
And that, thought Foord comfortably, would be just as acceptable. He had entered the second phase strangely unaffected by the near-disaster of the first, yet he entered it with the most ordinary and commonplace of strategies: careful, dogged, monotonous, unvarying attrition. After nearly seven hours the advantage it yielded was still only slight; but it was measurable, like a pile of shopkeeper’s pennies. And it was growing, in penny pieces. There had been no sudden realisation that they were the first opponents ever to gain any advantage over Her; like the advantage itself, the realisation came gradually and without drama.
Ironically, the institutional processes to which Foord had been subjected, the learning of conventional methods before being allowed unconventional ones, had often been useful to him. At Horus 5, he had wanted to open with a flourish of the unexpected. In the Belt, he had decided to open with conventional, mind-numbing routine. A free-form battle in the Belt would have played to Her advantages, whereas this monotonous attrition played to one of his—the superior range of their particle beams. And it was working. Even if Her flickerfields didn’t drain Her, She still couldn’t break out of the stalking pattern they had locked on Her; and if they did drain Her, and the pattern could be held for long enough, She would be impaired, perhaps fatally.
“Communication, Commander,” Thahl said.
“I thought I told you we’re accepting no…”
“I think you should accept this one, Commander.”
Thahl pointed at the antiquated microphone which stood incongruously on Foord’s console. Its red Incoming light was glowing. Such microphones were the Department’s standard means of communication. They were voice only—the Department did not do visuals—and carried a dedicated MT channel from Earth; they were not as antiquated as they looked.
“Department of Administrative Affairs to Foord, Charles Manson. Acknowledge, please.”
Foord saw Joser stiffen; then irritated himself by wondering, Did I see it because I was looking for it?
“This is Foord. Identify yourself, please.”
“Clerical Officer Lok, Office of Miscellaneous Vehicles, Department of Administrative Affairs. The Department is sorry to trouble you, Commander; this is a routine procedural matter only. If it’s not convenient…”
“Hold for validations, please.”
Foord glanced at Thahl and Joser, who began checking—Thahl for the source of the signal, Joser for its distinctive embedded signature and its voice pattern. These were three of the validations: the fourth was vocabulary and forms of address.
So far, the fourth appeared to check. In the unlanguage in which the Commonwealth clothed its private parts, the Department dealt with many Affairs, none of them Administrative; it never felt sorrow, or anything else, for those it troubled; the Office of Miscellaneous Vehicles was the Department’s Outsider section; Clerical Officers had more power than generals; and routine procedural matters, were not.