"Now-Cole, you said you had an idea?"

"Yeah-Jen and I think it might be possible to rig the big guy for planet-to-space work. We've been

trying to come up with the best way to acquire and track the target-"

"Which target?"

"Well . . . we're pretty sure we can take out the orbital station, and any ships docked there.

Distant stuff, without the use of satellite-based scans, is going to be harder-"

"But I think we could do it," a woman said. "If we take out the station, then get the satellites linked to us-"

"How many hours?" the professor asked.

"Six or seven to mount the weapon, and it'll take a lot of personnel."

"We may not have six or seven hours," the professor said. "We need to know if they're coming, and

how soon. Jen, what about scan within atmosphere? Is there any way to get access to the satellite

data?"

"Not right now. What we have here is basically old-style radar, for spotting and guiding air traffic, and a little local-weather scanner. The range is so short that we couldn't spot incoming LACs in time to do anything useful. We haven't needed more than that; we had the satellite data for longscan. We really need those satellites, and for that we'll need to break their lock. It's not going to be easy, and it's going to take time."

"Which, again, we may not have. Bob, what about Project Zed?"

"Operational. And we really don't want them to have it."

"It actually works?"

"Oh yeah. If this were a ship, and not an island, I could flip the switch and they'd never find

us. A big improvement over the earlier models. Unfortunately, as it is an island, it's easily located no matter what cloud we wrap around ourselves."

Margiu realized with a start that they were talking about new stealth gear.

"Could it be used to cover a retreat in the aircraft? If we took the data and ran for the mainland?"

"I suppose." The other man looked thoughtful. "We haven't tried it on aircraft . . . how much can

those planes lift?"

"I'll ask," the professor said. He glanced at Margiu, who headed for the door again. She passed the question off to Lightfoot, and went back to the professor. In that brief interval, the discussion had already turned too technical for her understanding, but it came to an abrupt end when someone pounded on the door.

"Come in," the professor called.

Ty came in. "I've found two things-one's a datalog showing transmissions to this station from Stack Three five days ago. From Bacarion. I think someone here's on their payroll."

"Most likely," the professor said. "And?"

"And a transmission from orbit to this station, just now. Personal for Lieutenant Commander

Vinet."

"For Vinet! I'd never have guessed he was part of it," Swearingen said. "He's such a fusspot. Did you answer it?"

"No, just acknowledged receipt, using the same sig code that was logged for reply to the others.

But I did take a look-"

"Wasn't it encrypted?" someone asked.

"Yah, but a simple one. Not hard to break. Thing is, he's not only part of it, they were telling him they'd be coming down in a day or so, and not to worry-that they'd prevented anyone from sending word from the station. So here we are, nobody else knows what's going on."

Margiu spoke up. "We have to get word out somehow!"

The professor looked at her. "You're quite right, Ensign. And we have to keep them upstairs from

finding out that we're here, if possible, to give ourselves time to work-to get word out somehow, to destroy what we can't protect."

Margiu noticed that he didn't say "to get away safely."

"We'll need the troops that came with you, Gussie, to keep the baddies out of our hair."

"Right. Ty, did your guard come back with you?"

"No, I left him there to guard the equipment."

"Ensign, we'll need Major Garson." Margiu told Lightfoot, who hurried off, and in a minute or two

Garson appeared.

He listened to Ty's report, scowling. "I'll put Vinet under arrest, then. I wonder how many baddies were with him."

"And I wonder how many are with you, sir," the professor said.

"None, I hope," Garson said. "Can you people take care of the rest of it?"

"Building a tightbeam with the power to a ship insystem, yes. Building a scan to locate such a

ship, yes. Destroy the more delicate research, and the records, yes. But it will take time, Major.

There are only fourteen of us, and some of the work is specialized enough that only one person can do it. So we'd best get at it." He nodded to Garson, and the major withdrew. The professor turned to the group. "One thing worries me."

"Only one?" Swearingen asked, grinning.

"If they don't know we're here, they won't be in as big a hurry to get down here . . . but when

the cloud cover goes, they'll be bound to take a look. And they'll see our transports sitting there like a sign in capital letters: TROUBLE HERE."

"We could send them back," Swearingen said. "But then we'd be stuck here. Besides, the latent heat

would still show on a fine-grain IR scan."

"If you just want to hide the planes from scan," Bob said, "we can do that with Zed. Set it for just those parameters. It'd be a good test-"

"And if it fails, they'd not only know we were here, but they'd also know about Zed."

"It's a lot quicker to dismantle and destroy than the big guy," Bob said.

"How many more hours of darkness? And does anyone have a clue about the weather?" The professor

looked around the group.

"Local sunrise is at 8:13 tomorrow; it'll be light before that, of course, if it's clear."

"And we have no weathersats . . . but we can always go outside and look."

When they opened the door, a squad waited to accompany them. The professor told Ty to get back to

the communications shack; half the squad went with him. With the others he went outside to look at the weather. Outside, a cold wet wind scoured the ground. Margiu stayed close to the professor, looking up only once to see that no stars showed.

"I can't tell," the professor said finally. "Bob, go on and rig Zed to cover the planes. We'll start dismantling the other stuff-"

"Professor-" That was Major Garson. "We can't find Vinet, or several others. I want all of you back inside, until we find him."

"That could take days," Swearingen said. "Some of the labs are underground, connected by tunnels."

"Ty's at the communications shack," the professor said. "He has guards, but-"