As senior ship, even though we don't carry the squadron flag, we rate first separation. This is a tradition of Tannian's Fleet. To the proven survivors go the small perks. Will the head start be worth anything in the long run?

Suddenly, we're beyond the moment of peak tension. The sealed orders have come through. The mother

is about to drop hyper. We'll be operational soon.

The Old Man's face is stiff and pale when he leaves his stateroom. His upper lip is lifted to the right in a faint sneer. He gathers Westhause, the First Watch Officer, our two Ops Chief Petty Officers, and myself. He whispers, "It doesn't look good. Figure on being out a while. It's beacon to beacon. Observation patrol. We start at Beacon Nineteen, Mr. Westhause. I'll give you the progression data after I've gone over it myself."

Well. I may get time to break the ice after all. Running beacon to beacon means there's been no enemy contact for a while. If they're out there, they're slipping through unnoticed. Because nothing is happening, the squadron will roam carefully programmed patterns till a contact occurs.

I begin to comprehend the significance of our being on our own. We'll be out of contact completely, unless we touch the rare instelled beacon. No comforting mother ship under our feet.

No pretty ladies in a sister ship to taunt and tease when Throdahl isn't using the radio more professionally. Alone! And without the slightest notion how near we are others of our kind.

This could get rough, emotionally. These men aren't the sort I'd choose as cellmates.

Some three hundred observationIsupport beacons are scattered around Climber Fleet One's operations zone. On beacon-to-beacon patrol a Climber pursues a semirandom progression, making a rendezvous each twelve hours. Ours is to be an observation patrol initially, meaning we're supposed to watch, not shoot.

The Commander shuffles order flimsies. "I'll tell you what we're looking for when I get this crap straight."

"What're observation pauses?" I ask the First Watch Officer. The Old Man says we have to program several into our beacon progression.

"Just go norm to see who did what last week."

"I don't follow."

"Okay. If we're not looking for something specific, we'll make equally spaced pauses. Say each four hours. If Command is looking for something, we'll drop hyper at exact times in specified places. Usually that means double-checking a kill. Ours or theirs."

"I see."

The beacons are refitted hulks. They form a vast irregular three-dimensional grid. When a Climber makes rendezvous, it discharges its Mission Recorder. In turn the beacon plays back any important news left by previous callers. The progress of a patrolling squadron is calculated so no news should be more than twenty-four hours old. It doesn't work that well in practice, though.

One in twenty beacons is instel-equipped, communing continuously with beacons elsewhere and with Climber Command. Supposedly, a vessel can receive emergency directives within a day and news from another squadron in two. On the scale of this war, that should be fast enough.

Sometimes it does work, when the human factor doesn't intrude too much.

The other firm occasionally stumbles onto a beacon and sets an ambush. The beacons are manned but have small crews and few weapons. Climbers approach them carefully.

Fortune has smiled on us in a small way. The competition hasn't broken our computer key codes. If ever they do, Climber Fleet Tannian is in the soup. One beacon captured and emptied of information would destroy us all.

The other firm wastes no time hunting beacons. It takes monumental luck to find one. Space is big.

We're operational now. Past our first beacon.

Operational. Operational. I make an incantation of it, to exorcise my fear. Instead it has the opposite effect.

The web between the beacons. The spider's game. The vastness of space can neither be described nor overstated. When there's no known contact the Climber's hunt becomes analogous to catching mites with a spider's web as loosely woven as a deep-sea fishing seine. There are too many gaps, and they're too big. Though Command keeps the holes moving, ships still slip through unnoticed.

Climbers often vanish without trace.

After we leave the beacon the Commander repeats all the tests made at Fuel Point. We commence our

patrol in earnest.

I watch a Climber die. Twice. Our first two observation pauses bracket the event. We drop hyper, allow the light of it to overtake us, then jump out and let the wave catch us again. Like traveling in time.

There's little but a long, brilliant flash each time, like a small nova. The spectrum lines indicate massive CT-terrene annihilation. Ops compartment remains quiet for a long time. Laramie finally asks, "Who was it, Commander?"

"They didn't tell me. They never tell me-----" He stops.

His role doesn't permit bitterness before the men.

"Forty-eight souls," Fisherman muses. "I wonder how many were saved?"

"Probably none," I say.

"Probably not. It's sad. Not many believers anymore, Lieutenant. Like me, they have to meet Him,

and Death, face to face before they'll be born again."

"It's not an age of faith."

For four hours men not otherwise occupied help maul the data, searching for a hint that the other

firm precipitated the Climber's doom. Nothing turns up. It looks like a CT leak.

Climber Command will add our data to other reports and let it stew in the big computer.

"It doesn't much matter anymore," Yanevich says. "She blew three months ago. The way they

bracketed us, they were rechecking something they already knew. Glad we didn't have to take a closer look."

"There wouldn't be anything to see."

"Not this tune. Sometimes there is. They don't all blow. Ours or theirs."

I feel cold breath blowing down the back of my neck. Firsthand studies of a gunned-out hulk aren't my notion of fun.

There's nothing going on in this entire universe. Beacon after beacon, there's nothing but bored, insulting greetings from squadron mates who were in before us. Decked out in his sardonic smile, the Old Man suggests the other team has taken a month's vacation.

He doesn't like the quiet. His eyes get narrower and more worried every day. His reaction isn't

unique. Even the first-mission men are nervous.

First real news from outside. Climber Fleet Two says a huge, homebound convoy is gathering at Thompson's World, the other team's main springboard for operations against the Inner Worlds.

Second Fleet hasn't had one contact during the forty-eight hours covered by their report.

Neither have we.

"Them guys must be taking the year off," Nicastro says. Today he's Acting Second Watch Officer, in Piniaz's stead. Weapons is having trouble with the graser.

I'm exhausted. I hung around past my own watch to observe Piniaz in command. Guess it'll have to

wait. The hell with it. Where's my hammock?

Climber Fleet Two reports a brush with hunter-killers way in toward the Inner Worlds. Nothing came of it. Even the opposition's baseworlds are quiet.

This patrol zone is dead. We're caught in a nightmare, hunting ghosts. You don't want action, but you don't crave staying on patrol, either. You start feeling you're a space-going Flying Dutchman.

Beacon after beacon slides by. Always the news is the same. No contact.

Once a day the Commander takes the ship up for an hour, to keep the feel of Climb. We spend the rest of our time cruising at economical low-hyper translation velocities. Occasionally we piddle along in norm, making lazy inherent velocity corrections against our next beacon approach. There isn't much to dp.

The men amuse themselves with card games and catch-the-eido, and weave endless and increasingly improbable variations in their exchanges on their favorite subject. To judge by their anecdotes, Throdahl and Rose have lived remarkably active lives during their brief careers. I expect they're doing some creative borrowing from stories heard elsewhere. They have their images to maintain.