WITH THE LIGHTNINGS(131)

Daniel's braking thrust meant the Princess Cecile in effect dived toward the planet, spiraling around Kostroma in an increasingly tight orbit. As the corvette approached the surface, Kostroma and the extended volume of the Kostroman atmosphere subtended a greater portion of the Bremse's orbit.

The Princess Cecile passed into Kostroma's shadow. The Bremse's cannonfire ceased; a better commander would have ended the vain process long before. Shooting at the Princess Cecile degraded the cruiser/minelayer's own sensors and eroded the bores of weapons meant for the Bremse's defense.

Of course the Bremse's captain probably didn't think he had much to fear from the Princess Cecile's low-acceleration missiles. He might well be correct.

Chief Baylor launched a single round. Daniel's control inputs went to the Attack Board and were automatically figured into the launch commands. What the Attack Officer had to do was to calculate, with the help of his sensors and AI, where the target would be when his missile arrived.

This was a relatively simple—"relatively" being the key word—process when the vessels were at normal engagement speeds and ranges. A ship moving at a significant fraction of light speed, attacked by a missile at its terminal velocity of .6 c, had no time to maneuver.

Since the missile's course was based on sensor data that was several minutes old, the chances were very high that the target had done something in the interim that would cause the attack to fail. You didn't have to worry about the target reacting to your missile, however, except with point-blank slugs of ions in an attempt to decelerate the projectile by converting its substance to gas and forward thrust.

At these cislunar ranges, the target could see a missile in realtime from the instant of launch. The Princess Cecile's low-acceleration weapons weren't a serious threat to the Bremse unless the cruiser/minelayer's entire bridge crew was asleep; even then the automatic avoidance system, meant for maneuvering in the constricted space over a major harbor, would probably get them out of the way.

The Bremse's missiles, though . . .

"Blue vessel is launching!" Dorfman said. Daniel was already aware of the dot separating from the icon highlighted blue, the traditional hostile designator in Cinnabar service. "Defensive batteries are live!"

Daniel released a control key, reducing the Princess Cecile's thrust by a fraction. Three more dots appeared at ten-second intervals, the shortest period at which missiles could be launched without the exhaust of preceding weapons damaging those that followed.

The missiles accelerated at a full twelve gees, but the corvette would be a thousand miles away when they reached the calculated impact point. The Princess Cecile handled beautifully, and with Daniel Leary at her controls she was safe until she was too close to Kostroma to continue maneuvering.

The trick wasn't merely to stay alive till then, however. Daniel was trying to pilot two vessels, his own and the Bremse. He was dragging the cruiser/minelayer behind him like a dog on a leash. If the corvette was here, the Alliance captain would strive to put his vessel there.

The process would continue in infinite sequence until there was a point Daniel had calculated before the Princess Cecile lifted from Kostroma; or until the Princess Cecile and her Cinnabar crew disintegrated in a gush of molten metal because her young captain had cut things a little too close.



"You're not authorized to be here," said the older female soldier who seemed to be in charge of the guard detail. "This place is top security!"

"We were just lifting off to launch a message cell," Adele said. "The ship blew up and damaged us, so we had to dock here. We need to contact the Bremse so they can send down aid to the surface."

She picked at the cuffs of her gauntlets. She couldn't see them clearly because of the way the sleeve ballooned, and she hadn't paid any attention to the method of closure when Woetjans sealed them for her.

"Somebody help me off with these damned gloves," Adele said peevishly. She held her hands out to Dasi, ignoring the guns pointed at her and her fellows. The node was weightless, but everyone aboard it was floating within thirty degrees of the hatch's alignment.

"How did you get here?" asked a technician; a man in his sixties, at least twice the age of the other Willoughbies. "Only the supply vessels are supposed to be able to dock without being destroyed by the defenses."

Willoughby was a center of electronic manufacturing and had provided a haven for disaffected Alliance citizens. The latter had been both a thorn in the side of Guarantor Porra and the key to the recent Alliance capture of the planet: feigned refugees had subverted Willoughby's automatic defense array when the Alliance fleet arrived.