sir,” Jenkoit found himself responding before he remembered Kinjie had been seriously injured and didn’t deserve such respect anymore. “We were in a bounce trajectory on the back side of their moon and had to shift before we struck.”
“Where have we shifted to?”
“Sir, we re-bounced.”
“You what?” Kinjie’s voice was incredulous. “A bounce is occasionally a good trick. Once! Do you really think you are going to surprise someone as sharp as that captain on Exceltor twice with the same trick?!”
Jenkoit’s heads lowered a fraction and his cilia developed a slight droop. He didn’t respond. His crew looked on in amazement to see him dominated by an injured krane!
Kinjie turned on the bridge crew next, barking commands in the odd tone that his use of a single head-hand produced. “Get the crew working on an emergency reload for a new shift-ring! What the space are you looking at! Have you located the humaniform cruiser and you’re just standing there with your mouths open waiting to tell me?”
“No sir,” a chorus.
“Well then get moving for the Mother’s sake! Have the gunroom detail someone to reestablish a rescue port on Zoaden. Also see if we can open a port on the stern fragment of Xajion. Maybe we can use some of its weaponry. Target a safety transfer behind P5. Target a maximum accumulator escape shift back toward Kaldon. Start destroying those ground based microwave antennas. How many shift-rings do we have left for this boat?”
“Five, sir.”
“Mother’s Mother! So, after we shift out of this damned bounce, we’ll only have one shift to play with if we’re to save three for an escape back to Kaldon?!”
“Yes sir,” Jenkoit said weakly, feeling totally humiliated.
BRIDGE—HUMANIFORM CRUISER EXCELTOR—COMETARY EARTH ORBIT
1421 EST
Azimus broke out of his reverie and became motionless for a moment. “Sir, the numbers say that the krane stealthing is not good enough for us to have missed them coming out from behind the moon. They may, of course, have had a high enough velocity for us to have missed them, but a velocity that high would not produce an orbit around either that moon or P3.”
“So what do you think? Are they launched out from behind that moon at a high velocity? Could they have landed back there?”
“Sir, this is a big moon. Its gravity may be low but it’s still way too high to land a ship.”
Suddenly the ensign working with Azimus shouted. “Sir, double shift-flash behind that moon! Ring diameters both about 6 meters, probable krane destroyers. Flash brilliance low, they didn’t come from very far sir.”
“How close?”
“No more than a few light seconds sir.”
“What? Did anyone else pick up their origination flash?” Leis looked around the bridge to see a lot of shaking heads.
“They bounced!” Azimus leapt out of his own chair and pumped a fist with his proclamation. “That’s why we didn’t find them! The bastards bounced!”
“Could they have re-bounced?!” A dawning light of amazement crossed the captain’s face as he shouted, “Get a vertical view on those last two shift-sites! If they re-bounced, they’re toast.”
JOHNSON SPACE RADAR STATION—WHITE SANDS, NEW MEXICO
1425 EST
Specialist Juan Gomez was about a mile away from the station on his way home when it happened. Because of all the excitement he’d stayed way past the end of his shift that morning. First they’d been called on to try to locate, resolve, and identify the object that had produced that big flash directly overhead at 0206 their time. He’d been outside on break to smoke a cigarette at the time and the flash had startled him. He’d been running back into the building within seconds, trying to get the attention of everyone for what he’d thought was an aircraft explosion. To his amazement over the next few hours it became obvious not only from their own radar, but on feeds from other sites, that the
“Where have we shifted to?”
“Sir, we re-bounced.”
“You what?” Kinjie’s voice was incredulous. “A bounce is occasionally a good trick. Once! Do you really think you are going to surprise someone as sharp as that captain on Exceltor twice with the same trick?!”
Jenkoit’s heads lowered a fraction and his cilia developed a slight droop. He didn’t respond. His crew looked on in amazement to see him dominated by an injured krane!
Kinjie turned on the bridge crew next, barking commands in the odd tone that his use of a single head-hand produced. “Get the crew working on an emergency reload for a new shift-ring! What the space are you looking at! Have you located the humaniform cruiser and you’re just standing there with your mouths open waiting to tell me?”
“No sir,” a chorus.
“Well then get moving for the Mother’s sake! Have the gunroom detail someone to reestablish a rescue port on Zoaden. Also see if we can open a port on the stern fragment of Xajion. Maybe we can use some of its weaponry. Target a safety transfer behind P5. Target a maximum accumulator escape shift back toward Kaldon. Start destroying those ground based microwave antennas. How many shift-rings do we have left for this boat?”
“Five, sir.”
“Mother’s Mother! So, after we shift out of this damned bounce, we’ll only have one shift to play with if we’re to save three for an escape back to Kaldon?!”
“Yes sir,” Jenkoit said weakly, feeling totally humiliated.
BRIDGE—HUMANIFORM CRUISER EXCELTOR—COMETARY EARTH ORBIT
1421 EST
Azimus broke out of his reverie and became motionless for a moment. “Sir, the numbers say that the krane stealthing is not good enough for us to have missed them coming out from behind the moon. They may, of course, have had a high enough velocity for us to have missed them, but a velocity that high would not produce an orbit around either that moon or P3.”
“So what do you think? Are they launched out from behind that moon at a high velocity? Could they have landed back there?”
“Sir, this is a big moon. Its gravity may be low but it’s still way too high to land a ship.”
Suddenly the ensign working with Azimus shouted. “Sir, double shift-flash behind that moon! Ring diameters both about 6 meters, probable krane destroyers. Flash brilliance low, they didn’t come from very far sir.”
“How close?”
“No more than a few light seconds sir.”
“What? Did anyone else pick up their origination flash?” Leis looked around the bridge to see a lot of shaking heads.
“They bounced!” Azimus leapt out of his own chair and pumped a fist with his proclamation. “That’s why we didn’t find them! The bastards bounced!”
“Could they have re-bounced?!” A dawning light of amazement crossed the captain’s face as he shouted, “Get a vertical view on those last two shift-sites! If they re-bounced, they’re toast.”
JOHNSON SPACE RADAR STATION—WHITE SANDS, NEW MEXICO
1425 EST
Specialist Juan Gomez was about a mile away from the station on his way home when it happened. Because of all the excitement he’d stayed way past the end of his shift that morning. First they’d been called on to try to locate, resolve, and identify the object that had produced that big flash directly overhead at 0206 their time. He’d been outside on break to smoke a cigarette at the time and the flash had startled him. He’d been running back into the building within seconds, trying to get the attention of everyone for what he’d thought was an aircraft explosion. To his amazement over the next few hours it became obvious not only from their own radar, but on feeds from other sites, that the
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