I wonder what he gets paid for this, Karr thought, determined to look it up when he got back. Not enough, 1 bet. Then again, who in their right mind would do this job sokly for the money?
Something swam toward them on the screen—something squat and tripartite, like a stunted ant, its outline a neutral black. The cameras seized the image instantly, enhanced it. Somewhere in the heart of the Enclave a computer calculated the math of the machine's surface and deduced by that whether it was friendly or hostile. The shape changed color. Now it glowed a cool, relaxing blue.
Friendly. Karr let out his breath, then laughed uneasily. How quickly his fighter's instincts had taken hold again. That old familiar buzz.
He watched the screen, waiting tensely now. I have been fighting much too long, he thought. All of my life, it seems.
Yes, but recently it had got much worse. Since he'd been made General he had come to conceive the world solely in terms of threat. It was true what the old Marshal said. There was no safety anymore.
They drifted on, like a shark basking in the depths. Things sniffed them from a distance, then moved on. Then, suddenly, one latched on to them. It came in fast from half a li up, spiraling toward them at first as if it were damaged and falling. The cameras saw it, enhanced it. For a fraction of a second its image was clear on the screen, outlined in black.
"Fu Ian te. . . ." Jeng Lo mumbled. Rotten . . .
The color changed. The screen glowed red.
Hostile! Shit! Karr looked for something to press. His whole body ached to hit out at the oncoming hostile—to punch it or shoot it—but there was nothing he could do. It was up to Jeng Lo now.
"Hit the fucker! Hit it!"
The image seemed to expand, the red glow intensify. He felt a tiny shudder, felt the craft pushed to one side as if by a giant hand as the missile hit. On the screen the image shattered in slow motion, replaced by the Mandarin symbol K'uei, meaning to cut open and clean a fish, or to kill a sacrifice.
"Wu Shi!" Jeng Lo crowed triumphantly as the craft steadied. Fifty!
Fifty what? Karr wondered. Was that his strike rate for the week? The number of kills he'd made? He shivered. It had been so fast. A matter of two, maybe three seconds at most.
Not only that, but he felt absurdly grateful to Jeng Lo. The speed of his response had saved them. His instinct had been good. Even before the computer had confirmed it, he had known. Fu Ian te. Too right the bastard had been fu Ian te!
They sank lower, almost on the floor of the Rift now, searching, looking for rogues and runaways or anything unusual. Mines clustered thickly down below. They tickled them with radar as they passed above, soothing them with friendly codestream, searching . . .
"What's that?"
Jeng Lo grunted. For a second or two he was absolutely still, then he began to twitch twice as energetically as usual, both hands dancing across the control pads.
Karr's mouth had gone dry. It couldn't be ... It couldn't . . .
The familiar shape glowed red.
"No!" Karr shouted, half lifting himself from the couch, the restraint harness pulling him back. "No!"
Jeng Lo's hand hesitated, then withdrew. On the screen the image pulsed a warning red.
A man—a running man—out here? Karr shook his head at the impossibility of it.
"What's he running from?"
Jeng Lo punched up a sector map, then enhanced it to show their locality. Their craft was at the center of the screen, the running man a speck of red to their left. To their right, drifting in slowly, were a pair of blips, their parallel paths leaving Karr in no doubt as to what they were after.
"Deal with them, then let's pick him up."
Jeng Lo nodded, but even as he made to turn the cruiser something struck them with the force of a giant hammer.
"K'uei!" Karr yelled, his senses screaming as the ship disintegrated about him in a searing flash of flame. He died . . .
AND WOKE, gasping, his chest on fire, his nerve ends singing, his skin feeling as if it had been burned in a thousand places.
"Sir? . . . Are you all right, sir?"
Karr lay there, letting his heartbeat slow, the trembling pass from him, then gave the smallest nod.
It had been so real.
Another voice, older, deeper in register than the first, spoke to him from close by, to his left. "General Karr? Are you all right?"
He turned his head and opened his eyes. A face swam into view. It was that of the A.A.D. Project Director, Harrison.
"I died," he said.
Harrison nodded. "You had us all worried. That wasn't meant to be part of the show."
Karr tried to laugh, but it came out as a groan. His chest hurt.
"Lie still," Harrison said, laying a hand on his brow. The feel of it was cool and reassuring. "Your nervous system had quite a shock just now. It'll need a while to settle."
You bet, Karr thought, remembering the moment the missile had struck. Though he'd been safe—though his body had been here all the while, secure in this couch inside the unit—his mind hadn't known that. His mind had been out there in the Rift, in the robot cruiser.
"It's powerful," he said. "Too powerful. We should consider some kind of safety system. Maybe concoct some kind of drug cocktail to be injected into the men as soon as something like this happens. Why, the shock of it could kill them."
There was an embarrassed silence, an exchange of looks between Harrison and the duty oficer. Harrison looked back at Karr.
"I'm afraid Jeng Lo didn't make it. The strain on his heart . . ."
Karr felt a shock of disbelief pass through him. He turned, seeing at once the pale still figure on the couch beside him. "But it wasn't real. . . ."
"It was too much for him," Harrison continued. "Fifty missions . . . it takes a toll. Most don't make it past thirty."
"Fifty . . ." Karr let his head fall back onto the couch, understanding. Thirty missions. Was that all they got out of their pilots? Just thirty missions? It was a good reason for trying something like this. But would this new system make it any better?
"And the running man? Was he real?"
Harrison looked to the duty officer, who shrugged. "I ... I'll find out, sir. A man, you say?"
"In the Rift. We saw him, just before the missile struck. He was being pursued."
The officer laughed. "Impossible, sir. He'd not have survived more than a few seconds."
Karr looked directly at the young man. "We saw him, Lieutenant. Before the hostile got us. Now go and check it, unless you want to be flying missions yourself!"
The young officer blanched. "Sir!" he said straightening to attention. With a curt bow he turned and left the room.
Karr looked to Harrison. "I understand the reasoning behind this. That drug-induced belief that every situation is a life-or-death one gives our men an edge out there. But if they're going to have to go through this every time they get it wrong, we'll lose just as many as we were by sending them in."
Harrison nodded thoughtfully. He turned, looking across at his two assistants who were standing nearby, then looked back at Karr. "We can do tests, of course. See if we can come up with something that acts . . . well, like a parachute, I guess. Something to damp down the shock. But drugs need a while to take effect. It's those first few instants that do the damage, and I can't see what we can do about that."
"Work on it," Karr said, undoing the harness and sitting up. He took a deep breath, letting his head steady, then swung his legs around so that he was sitting facing Harrison. He was naked, a web of wires taped all about his body. At a signal from Harrison the two assistants came across and started to remove the wires.