Sal opened a coverplate on the starboard foredeck and lifted up a folded, telescoping derrick. The cover was cross-dogged, but even so Johnnie doubted that it would survive the muzzle blasts of the 18-inch guns firing above it. After a battle there would be considerable damage to all the dreadnoughts, whether or not they'd been struck by enemy shells.
Sal spread the extensions that were meant to clamp the lifting points of a skimmer. "Hop in," he said. "Your limousine awaits."
His face turned serious. "Ah—but if you think you might slip, we'll go by the regular landing stage."
M4434 had pulled away from the dock and was curving toward the Holy Trinity. Flotsam and the opalescent stains of oil wobbled in the hydrofoil's wake; the motion brought bright flashing teeth to life in the harbor as well.
"I'm fine," said Johnnie, setting one boot on either clamp and gripping the hinge where the arms joined. He was sure he'd be all right; and he'd rather drop into the watery killing ground below than admit to Sal he was afraid. "Lower away!"
With a loud squealing—from the winch brakes rather than the monocrystalline cable—Johnnie dropped smoothly toward the harbor. Sal waved from the control box.
As the dreadnought's gray-green hull slid past, Johnnie looked down—and rotated dizzyingly as the motion changed his center of mass. A skimmer would be held by three arms, not two and the hinge. He braced himself erect again, as though he were preparing to be shot.
"I don't want us staving our sides in with this nonsense!" Captain Haynes shouted from close by. "Be ready to fend off forward!"
Strong hands caught Johnnie by both forearms and pulled him in, over the amidships rail. "Step back, sir," said Walcheron.
Johnnie obeyed. Because the sailors were holding him, he didn't fall back into the cockpit when his heel stubbed the coaming.
"I'm okay," he gasped, realizing as he spoke that he really was.
"Bring us around, Watkins," Haynes ordered the torpedoboat's commander. "Let's get home, man!"
The cable hummed its way back onto the take-up reel. Johnnie looked up. Sal was peering down past the pronounced flare that directed waves like a plowshare instead of sweeping them into the superstructure when the dreadnought was at speed.
The young Angel officer waved. Johnnie started to return the gesture, but he had to grab the rail as the M4434 accelerated in a tight turn.
"Good hunting, John!" Sal shouted past the rumble of the auxiliary thruster.
Johnnie started forward toward the gun tub.
"Ensign Gordon," Haynes ordered. "Come into the cockpit with me."
The guard boat, more than a half mile away, had already drawn back the net's inner layer. The hydrofoil headed for the gap at all the speed the hull motor alone could provide. The little vessel bucked and pitched as it crossed the vestiges of its own wake.
Johnnie swung his legs over the low bulkhead, trying not to kick any of the five men already in the small enclosure. "Yes sir?" he said. He wondered if he ought to salute.
Haynes, seated at one of the paired control consoles, looked up at him. "Who told you to go buggering off on your own, Gordon?" he demanded. "It would've served you right if I'd just left you to find your own way back, you know."
The hydrofoil's helmsman and the commanding officer—an ensign—kept their eyes studiously on the business of running the boat, but Haynes' two staff lieutenants stared at Johnnie with sycophantic amusement.
"I—" Johnnie began, but this was a test too—life was a test—and he wasn't going to tell this man what directions he'd gotten from Uncle Dan.
"Sir," he resumed, "I thought this was a good opportunity to familiarize myself with the Angels' operation, seeing that we may be acting in concert with them in the coming action."
"Did you think that indeed, Ensign?" the captain said with a sort of heavy playfulness. Even his initial attack had lacked the anger Johnnie would have expected to underlie the words. "That we'd be 'acting in concert' with Admiral Braun?"
"Yessir," Johnnie said.
The helmsman throttled back as the torpedoboat entered the netted lock area. Crewmen had rifles and grenade launchers ready in case there was a repetition of the excitement when they locked through from the open sea.
The guard boat's hull bore a line of fresh patches where stray bullets had raked her. All the visible members of her crew were waving.
"Well, Gordon," Haynes said, "you're right. Perhaps I shouldn't judge you by the maternal side of your family."
Johnnie kept his lips pressed together. Uncle Dan didn't need a junior ensign to defend him, and anyway—don't be sorry. Be controlled.