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  "They're sending a hold on the Priority One," said Hoond in an even voice. "And coordinates for a new destination." She knew it was no use showing any emotion; Bannin would have enough for both of them. "Looks like they're sending us to the middle of nowhere," she said almost to herself, then noted that they'd be receiving sealed orders for additional jumps after the first.

  Reston Bannin burrowed down into the command chair and clamped his jaws shut tight. He would remain that way until the hold on the ship's departure was lifted. He was still sitting in exactly the same position three hours later when the JumpShip's docking collar locked the Leopard Class DropShip to its side. He was still in the same position when the skipper of the DropShip reported to the bridge of the Telendine.

  Reston Bannin was good and ready for the unfortunate skipper. He'd had plenty of time to prepare his speech to the junior commander about the inefficiency of the Draconis Combine, about the temerity of the military in general, and about the overblown egos of the people in the control station. The tirade would be a work of art. It would start abruptly, become soft and mellifluous, then end in a high-pitched scream. It would be a beautiful piece of rhetoric, not giving the battered skipper the least opportunity to interrupt or to answer.

  Unfortunately the speech was never given. When Parker Davud, the DropShip captain, floated onto the bridge of the Telendine, it was with an air calculated to send Bannin over the edge. Following close behind him was a Draconis Combine sho-sa in full combat gear. The great speech died on Bannin's lips. He was fully capable of chewing out a pilot, but hadn't nearly enough spine to take on a member of the combine's regular military as well. But then the appearance of the third man onto the bridge almost gave him the courage. Seeing that the man was obviously both a 'Mech pilot and a mercenary, Bannin squirmed in anger. MechWarriors were bad enough with their insufferable arrogance, but mercenaries made Bannin's skin crawl. He bit his lip. "Welcome aboard the Telendine" he said. "The jump points have been plotted and laid in. We can make the transit at once."

  "Whatever you say, boss," replied the pilot. "Ready when you are." The comment was casual, not at all the attitude a DropShip pilot should have toward a JumpShip master. He thumbed toward the sho-sa. "This here's the man with the say-so. I go with him."

  "I have noted your ship, Master Bannin," said the sho-sa. "I am Yubari Takuda of the Draconis Elite Strike Team 6654. I am in command of this mission and in charge of the Vost Lance until they arrive at their destination. Please assign an appropriate officer to escort me on an inspection of your ship. Pilot Parker Davud and Mister Garber Vost will remain in the DropShip and await my return."

  Bannin squirmed deeper into his command chair. He could escort Takuda as was proper, but the JumpShip master had no intention of showing that much courtesy. He could assign Elizabeth Hoond, but she was even more necessary to the bridge than Bannin. The job fell to the third officer on board, even though he was more a warrant officer than a real one. Bannin pressed the companel. "Mr. Jacobs to the bridge." He turned to Takuda. "My engineer will escort you while my first officer and I prepare for departure."

  If Takuda was aware of the insult he did not show it. "I will be honored by assistance from your fine engineer," he said smoothly.

  Jacobs appeared on the bridge moments later, still wearing his utility belt and wiping his hands on a rag. He was surprised to see the conclave around Bannin's chair. "Ready when you are, Reston," he said. "What's going on?"

  "You will escort Sho-sa Takuda through the Telendine. Show him everything. Take as long as he needs. The Sho-sa is a DEST officer so there is nothing he does not know." Bannin added a slight sneer to the last comment.

  "I will be honored by your expertise," said Takuda to Jacobs. "I am sure that our inspection of the ship will be most thorough." He turned again to Bannin. "Many thanks for your hospitality, Commander." Takuda made a slight bow from the waist.

  Four hours later Jacobs reported from engineering that the inspection was complete. At almost the same moment, the space station released the Telendine from its imprisonment. Reston Bannin had not moved from his command seat, and he gave the command to get the ship going even before Hoond could finish repeating the message. Warning klaxons sounded through the diminutive hull of the JumpShip as the thrusters maneuvered the ship toward the hypothetical, mathematical point from which it would make its interstellar jump through hyperspace. The ship steadied for a moment as it rotated onto the correct heading. Then it stepped forward and through the door.

  The reaction was almost instantaneous. First a slight shudder as the ship made the transition to K-F drive, then another more jarring shock. The sensors on the bridge exploded in a shower of sparks. Hoond, crouched over the navigational console, had just enough time to raise her hands to her face to protect her eyes from the surge. Both she and Bannin were strapped into their seats, secure against a possible accident, but even with their restraints they thrashed about from the impact.

  As the smoke cleared from the bridge, the foul air drawn swiftly away by the fans of the life support system, warning lights flashed from every station. The automatic crash sirens howled out of control. The overhead lumenpanels died as power was diverted to stabilization thrusters. The battle lanterns replaced the departing light with a soft glow.

  Hoond removed her hands from her face and studied the navigation console. "Current speed seven hundred thousand kilometers," she reported.

  "What? We can't be going that fast."

  "Yes, sir. I know that. But that's what's being shown."

  "Where are we?"

  "I have no idea. Transferring readouts to your station." Hoond fingered a pressure-activated switch on the arm of her chair.

  The information was transferred immediately to the sponson-mounted monitor beside Bannin. He saw the numbers glowing serenely from the screen. He saw them but did not comprehend, could not comprehend, the information they represented. The speed of the Telendine was as the navigator had reported: the ship was tumbling through space at a velocity of more man seven hundred thousand kilometers per hour. The polar grid coordinate readout was nothing but a series of nines. Bannin stared at the numbers, his mind numb. Commanders of starships did not have to know everything, only where to look in their ship's computer information banks to find the answers. But right now Bannin lacked enough information even to ask an intelligent question. Indeed, he was afraid to ask anything for fear that the answer would be even more confusing than the information he already possessed.

  "Sensors report a habitable planet," remarked Hoond.

  "There's something in orbit around it. Something metallic. I'm not sure, but the readings match a deployed JumpShip sail. It's bigger than we are." She was scanning the rapidly approaching star and its associated cluster of satellites. She continued to study the monitor, the green glow of the light giving her face a deathly pallor. "We're going too fast. There's no way we can approach it safely. Window of opportunity for maneuvering is passed. We'll have to abandon and take our chances in getting the boat down to the planet." She turned toward Bannin when he made no reply. Her commander was still staring at the monitor, his face a mask of fear and doubt.

  Hoond looked back to her own station, saw the numbers representing the point of no return scrolling downward with alarming rapidity. "We'll have to abandon now, sir." There was still no answer from the command chair. She turned back and reached down between her legs to grasp the red emergency override handle. Bracing her feet, she pulled upward with surprising force. The response was instantaneous. All the battle lanterns on the bridge blinked out and came back on. The sliding doors that had closed on impact with the cosmic anomaly slid open. There was a rush of escaping air as the Telendine's life support system began to compensate for the vagaries of pressure. The loudspeakers welded to the corners of each compartment blared their pre-recorded warning: "Now hear this. Now hear this. Abandon ship. Abandon ship. This is no drill. This is no drill. Abandon ship. Abandon ship."

  Hoond
glanced back at her station. A series of red lights glowed along the arm of her chair. She depressed each in sequence, waiting until the light changed to green before going on to the next. The buttons represented the escape sequence that would implant the Telendine's current coordinates (as if they meant anything) as well as the azimuth and range to the nearest habitable planet into the lifeboat and the docked DropShip. The sequence also released those same two smaller vessels from th JumpShip. With the panel showing all green, Hoond cut away from her station and moved toward the ship's immobilized commander. Gently, she uncoupled the restraining harness and got him out of the chair. The man didn't fight or resist; it was like directing a somnambulist.

  The corridor to the lifeboat station glowed red from the emergency lighting. It didn't take long to reach the tiny escape shuttle, where Jacobs was already in place in the command seat. According to standard operating procedure, the first crew member into the shuttle took the command chair. There was no precedence in an emergency. Hoond buckled the still docile Bannin into an open seat and took her position beside Jacobs. Together they went down the escape check list. The door slid shut. Jacobs thumbed the thrusters, and the Telendine II slid gently away from the stricken mother ship.

  As they cleared the hull, they could see the DropShip fighting to get free of the docking collar, which had been warped by the violence of the impact and the subsequent gyrations. Under full thruster power as it struggled to break free, the DropShip suddenly ripped its way clear with a final lurch and then tumbled away from the Telendine.

  Jacobs let the escape shuttle hang for a moment as he waited for the DropShip to steady itself in a flurry of thruster fire onto a parallel course. Then he opened the thruster engines, and the Telendine II began its journey toward the unknown blue orb that was the only safe haven for the tiny crew and anyone else who had survived inside the DropShip.

  4

  Parker Davud gripped the controls of his DropShip with such force that his knuckles went dead white while the blue orb hanging against the blackness of eternity grew larger with alarming speed. The velocity indicator on his panel told him that their speed was well above safe entry velocity. This was going to be a hairy landing—assuming merc would be any landing at all. If he didn't do it right, the DropShip could hit the atmosphere and flip off into space like a stone skipping across the surface of a pond. That was what would happen if Davud played it too safe. And if he were too bold, if he took the DropShip in at too great an angle, it would burn up as it passed through the atmosphere. The approach would have to be right on me money. There would be no second chance.

  And that was because of their approach speed and the structural damage to the ship. The struggle to break free from the gyrating carrier had warped the DropShip's keel and ridgepole. At that very moment, the life support panel was showing that the hull was bleeding oxygea at kilograms per second. That wasn't an immediate problem because the ship carried hundreds of kilograms in reserve, but there'd be no time for a second pass if the first one failed. Davud could seal the bridge compartment and let the cargo bay bleed. They would let him survive, but wouldn't make the troops very happy.

  Although life support concerns were a nagging concern for the future, they were unimportant to the hazardous present. Davud nosed the ship down slightly to keep the planet's expanding rim just at the edge of the viewer, but the screen blanked out occasionally as the forward thrusters fired repeatedly in response to his commands to reduce velocity. With Davud diverting fuel from the wing tanks to the forward holding area, the DropShip shuddered as the thrusters fired again. Warning lights showed the level of fuel available, while the graph showing current rate of use indicated that nothing would be left for a final push. He cross-fed fuel from the maneuvering jets in the after section to compensate for the increased expenditure forward.

  Off to the right Davud was aware of the lifeboat expelled by the Telendine, but its existence had little meaning to him. He didn't care what happened to it or its occupants as long as they didn't interfere with his approach vector. The lifeboat was so small that the DropShip could run over it with hardly a noticeable bump, but if it became entangled in some important part of the ship, the task of landing might become impossible. He hunched over the controls and watched the panels in front of him.

  He knew that the ship's instruments had been damaged by whatever the Telendine had hit during its transition through hyperspace. Even though the numbers were going crazy, he'd been trained to trust instruments rather than his sight or his senses. Without an "up" or "down" in space, the instruments were the only consistent reference point a DropShip pilot had. Davud winced slightly as a companel screen to his right erupted in a shower of sparks, filling the flight deck with the acrid scent of burned insulation and ozone. Meanwhile, life support in the cargo bay was rapidly falling to a warning, if not critical, level. Davud concentrated on the remaining micronavigational screen.

  Inside the cargo bay Vost and his men had finally gotten the four 'Mechs and the Phoenix Hawk LAM under control. They'd managed to secure the two Locust 'Mechs against the after bulkhead, which had held them relatively stable during the pummeling immediately after the misjump. The other two 'Mechs, a Javelin and a Panther, had come partially free from their storage along the bay's lateral perimeter. The Panther's right arm had broken the restraining shackle holding it against the exterior bulkhead, and even the hydraulics had not slowed its thrashing. Vost had had to climb over the scaffolding that composed much of the bay's interior to reach the 'Mech's cockpit, where he'd clapped on his neurohelmet, and fired up the machine to get it under control. If not for people being hurled across the bay, that task should have presented few problems.

  DEST commander Yubari Takuda had braced himself at the rear of the cargo bay, just outside the door to his stateroom, and snapped on the safety tackles. From there he could see and direct the members of his four DEST sections as they wrestled with the hurtling objects. It was an interesting problem.

  An object in weightlessness was easy to move and control, but that didn't mean the object had no mass, that it was like a balloon. It wasn't. Just because an object was weightless did not deprive it of mass. Even when weightless, a five-hundred kilogram weapons pack still had a mass of five hundred kilograms. With the DropShip constantly decelerating, the free objects in the cargo bay were "falling" toward the front of the ship. They weren't falling very fast, but they still had enough momentum to crush the unwary. Takuda hung in his place in the aperture, snapping orders and warnings into his headset. The DEST team members were so well-trained that they responded instantly to his curt commands.

  The mercenary 'Mech pilots and their small technical support team were concentrating on their 'Mechs and any objects that came near them; the rest of the flying objects were left to the responsibility of the DEST members. That meant Takuda's people had to control not only their own materiel, but also the spare parts containers hurtling toward the forward bulkhead. They could have let them fly, but Takuda knew that the DropShip's skin had been ruptured. He could hear the sibilant hiss of the escaping atmosphere. The thought of a steel box crashing into the bulkhead was not very reassuring.

  The DropShip shuddered violently, threatening to tear loose all the newly secured equipment. Takuda at first felt the strain of the harness against his legs and chest, but the strain began to relax even though the shuddering increased. He was also aware of a growing sensation of heat. Throwing a glance toward the small vision port near the personnel access door, he saw that the ship's exterior had begun to glow with the heat of re-entry. Takuda was not an ostentatiously religious man, but he said a short, silent prayer for himself and his team. To die in service to the Draconis Combine was an honorable death, but he knew that he had more to offer than merely becoming an unknown cinder in some unknown and forgotten corner of this galaxy.

  While these thoughts passed through Takuda's mind, the glow of the ship's outer skin increased, and with it the heat inside the cargo bay. He saw his T
alon Sergeant, Gun-so George Bustoe, recoil from the side of the DropShip as the heat penetrated his insulated combat suit. Takuda's own forehead and back were beginning to perspire. Hot air dried his mouth; he forced himself to breathe through his nose as much as possible. With the DropShip now shuddering and bucking as violently as a bull, he would have been helpless except for the safety straps.

  On the bridge of the doomed DropShip, Parker Davud continued to fight the controls. The instruments exploded in sparkling fountains as system after system overloaded, overheated, and died. This was seat-of-the-pants flying now, and Davud had to strain every muscle to keep the hurtling tonnage in a manageable configuration. He could see the approaching ground through the occasional gaps in the glare that swept across the forward view panel. There was no way to choose the best landing site; this would be a one-pass, dead-stick landing. Just above the edge of the panel he saw an opening in the thick vegetation below. It wasn't nearly big enough to handle the Leopard Class DropShip, but it was the only one in sight. Davud pulled back hard on the control column, at the same time yawing the ship right and left to help bleed off speed.

  With every fiber in his body concentrated on getting the ship to the ground as close to one piece as possible, Davud temporarily stopped breathing. There was simply no energy left for it. His heart may have stopped as well. But his brain, his arms, his legs, and his hands did not. As the DropShip careened over the treetops, the lofty branches whipping against the underside of the fuselage, her captain extended the control flaps and began his landing flare. The nose of the DropShip rose. Speed and lift vanished. The nose dropped for the last time, and pilot Parker Davud watched as the trees at the end of the grassy area rushed toward him. Then the belly of the ship struck the soft ground and the ship plowed in. The nose buried itself for an instant, threatening to flip the ship over on its back. Then the lifting body shape took control and the nose came horizontal, cutting a furrow in the ground and into the trees. It came to a stop.