Martinez's mind whirled as he tried to shift from the virtual world, with its icon-planets and plotted trajectories and rigorous calculations, to the officer who wished to talk to him.

  “I'll take it,” he said, and then Kamarullah's face materialized in the virtual display, and at offensively close range. Martinez couldn't keep himself from wincing.

  “This is Martinez,” he said.

  Kamarullah's square face was ruddy, and Martinez wondered if it was the result of some internal passion that had flushed his skin or an artifact of transmission.

  “Captain Martinez,” Kamarullah said, “you have just fired missiles. Are you aware that you can't possibly hit the enemy at this range?”

  “Main missile engines ignited,” Vonderheydte reported, as if to punctuate Kamarullah's question.

  “I don't intend to hit the Naxids with these missiles,” Martinez said. “I'm intending to mask a maneuver.”

  “ Maneuver? Out here?” Kamarullah was astonished. “Why? We're hours yet from the enemy.” He gazed at Martinez with a fevered expression, and spoke with unusual clarity and emphasis, as if trying to convince a blind man, by the power of words alone, that he was standing in the path of a speeding automobile. “Captain Martinez, I don't think you've thought this out. As soon as you saw the enemy, you should have given the squadron orders to rotate and start our deceleration. We need to let Squadron Commander Do-faq join us before we can engage.” His tone grew earnest, if not a little pleading. “It's not too late to give up command of the squadron to a more experienced officer.”

  “The missiles-” Martinez began.

  “Damn it, man!” Kamarullah said, his eyes a little wild. “I don't insist that I command! If not me, then stand down in favor of someone else. But you're going to have your hands full managing a green crew without having to worry about tactics as well.”

  “The missiles,” Martinez said carefully, “will mask the arrival of the squadcom's force. I intend to keep the existence of the heavy squadron a secret as long as I can.”

  Astonishment again claimed Kamarullah. “But that would take hours. They're bound to detect-”

  “Captain Kamarullah,” Martinez said, “you will stand by for further orders.”

  “You're not going to attempt any of your-your tactical innovations, are you?” Kamarullah said. “Not with a squadron that doesn't understand them or-”

  Martinez's temper finally broke free. “Enough! You will stand by! This discussion is at an end!”

  “I don't-”

  Martinez cut off communication, then pounded with an angry fist on the arm of his couch. He told the computer to save the conversation in memory-there had better, he realized, be a record of this.

  And then he stared blindly out into the virtual planetary system, the little abstract symbols in their perfect, ordered universe, and tried to puzzle out what he should do next.

  “Comm,” he said. “Message to Squadron Commander Do-faq, personal to the squadcom. To be sent through the wormhole relay station.”

  “Very good, my lord. Personal to the squadcom.”

  Again Martinez waited for the light to blink, a little glowing planet that came into existence in the virtual universe, and he said, “Lord Commander Do-faq. In my estimation, our great advantage in the upcoming battle is that the enemy do not yet know of the existence of your squadron. As we approach the enemy, I will fire missiles in an attempt to screen your force for as long as possible. I will order Light Squadron Fourteen into a series of plausible maneuvers in order to justify the existence of the screen.

  “If you agree with this plan, please order your force onto a heading of two-nine-zero by zero-one-five absolute, as soon as you exit the wormhole, and continue to accelerate at two gravities. This will allow you to take advantage of the screen I have already laid down.”

  He looked at the camera and realized that he should perhaps soften the effect of having just given an order to an officer several grades superior in rank.

  “As always,” he said, “I remain obedient to your commands. Message ends.”

  He fell silent as the recording light vanished from the virtual display, and as he thought of the message flying from Corona to Do-faq through the power of communications lasers, a deep suspicion began to creep across his mind. He began to wonder what might happen if his messages to Do-faq weren't getting through. If, somehow, the wormhole relay stations were under the control of the enemy.

  The only thing that made his suspicions at all plausible was that the arrival of the Naxid squadron shouldn't have been a surprise. The station on the far side of Wormhole 2 should have seen the Naxids coming hours ago, and reported to the commander of Hone-bar's ring station, who in turn should have relayed the information to Do-faq, whose arrival he'd known for the better part of a month. In fact, there should have been a long chain of sightings, all the way from Comador.

  Why hadn't the information reached him? he wondered. Had half the Exploration Service joined the rebels?

  If it had, and if his messages to Do-faq hadn't got through, he'd better order that his last two messages be beamed just this side of the wormhole, so that Do-faq would receive them as he flashed into the Hone-bar system.

  He was on the verge of giving the order when Shankaracharya's voice came into his earphones. “Message from Squadron Commander Do-faq via Wormhole One station. 'Yours acknowledged. Light Squadron Fourteen to head course two-eight-eight by zero-one-five absolute and commence deceleration at four point five gravities.'”

  “Acknowledge,” Martinez said automatically, while panic flashed along his nerves. Do-faq's order was in response to his first message, and would send Martinez's squadron on a wide trajectory around the Soq gas giant, wide enough to permit Do-faq's ships to take an inside track, closer to the planet, to make up some of the distance between the two squadrons.

  The order was perfectly orthodox and sensible. Unfortunately it wasn't compatible with the plan of the battle as Martinez had mapped it out in his mind.

  It would take nearly five minutes for the last transmission, with its suggestion for maneuver on the part of Do-faq, and another five minutes for Do-faq's response to come back. But in order for Light Squadron 14 to embark on Martinez's plan, it would have to begin its maneuver before Do-faq's reply could possibly arrive.

  In order for Martinez to continue with the plan that he had devised, he was going to have to disobey Do-faq's order.

  Suddenly he wished that the Exploration Service had been corrupted, that the messages hadn't got through the wormhole stations.

  “Comm,” he said, “message to squadron. Rotate ships: prepare to decelerate on course two-eight-eight by zero-one-five absolute. Stand by to decelerate on my command.”

  Shankaracharya repeated the order and then transmitted it to the squadron. Martinez gave the order also to Corona's pilot, and the acceleration cages in Command sang in their metallic voices as Eruken swung the frigate nearly through a half-circle, its engines now aimed to begin the massive deceleration that Do-faq had ordered.

  He watched the chronometer in the corner of the display and watched the numbers that marked the seconds flash past. He thought of Do-faq's dislike of Kamarullah, who Do-faq blamed for wrecking a maneuver, and how Do-faq's vengeance had followed Kamarullah over the years and deprived him of command.

  How much in the way of retribution could Martinez expect if he disobeyed Do-faq during an actual battle?

  And yet, within the ten-minute lag, it was very possible that Do-faq would countermand his own order, and agree to Martinez's plan.

  Brilliant light flared on the virtual display. Solid flakes of antihydrogen, suspended by static electricity in etched silicon chips so tiny they flowed like a fluid, had just been caught by the compression wave of a small amount of conventional explosive in the nose of each of the three missiles Martinez had launched. The resulting antimatter explosion dwarfed the conventional trigger by a factor of billions. Erupting outward, the hot shreds of matter encountered the missiles' tungsten jackets and created three expanding, overlapping spheres of plasma between Light Squadron 14 and the enemy ships, screens impenetrable to any enemy radar. The screen would hide any number of maneuvers on the part of Martinez's force.

  The plasma would also screen the arrival of Do-faq's eight heavy cruisers.

  The sight of the explosions made up Martinez's mind, and words seemed to fly to his lips without his conscious order.

  “Comm: message to the squadron. Rotate ships to course two-nine-two by two-nine-seven absolute. Decelerate at five gravities commencing at 25:52:01.”

  Mentally he clung to a modest justification: Light Squadron 14 was not technically a part of Faqforce any longer; Martinez's squadron command was theoretically independent until Do-faq actually entered the Hone-bar system&.

  None of that, however, would make the slightest difference to Martinez's career if Do-faq chose to inflict vengeance on his junior.

  The order would swing the light squadron through a course change that would shoot it over Soq's south pole and slingshot it toward the enemy at a very narrow angle that would put it on a trajectory to place it between Hone-bar and the oncoming Naxids. This would place the squadron in an ideal position to further conceal the existence of Do-faq's oncoming heavy ships.

  Martinez gave the order to Eruken, and again the acceleration cages sang as, in obedience to the laws of inertia, the couches rotated easily within them.

  “Let me help you with that, my lord.” The murmured comment from Signaler Trainee Mattson snapped Martinez away from his concentration on the tactical display.

  “Display: cancel virtual,” Martinez said. He reached a hand to the curved bars of his acceleration cage, seized it in a fist, and swung his weightless body to a position where he could look directly at the communications cage.

  Shankaracharya was staring at his communications board, his wide eyes ticking back and forth over the displays in apparent bewilderment. Signaler Trainee Mattson, teeth gnawing his lower lip, tapped away at his own display.

  “What is going on, comm?” Martinez demanded.

  Shankaracharya gave Martinez a startled look. “I'm sorry, my lord,” he said. “I-I didn't hear the order. Could you repeat, please?”

  “Course two-nine-two by two-nine-seven relative,” Mattson said helpfully.

  “Absolute, not relative!” Martinez said. “Check the record! All commands are recorded automatically! Call up the command display, everything should be there!”

  Mattson gave a quick, nervous shake of the head at this reminder. “Very good, my lord.”

  Shankaracharya was now busy at his own display. Martinez could see that his hands were trembling so severely that he kept pressing the wrong parts of the display, then having to go back and correct.

  “What was that time, my lord?” Shankaracharya asked.

  “Never mind. I'll take the comm board myself.”

  He had been communications officer on the Corona prior to the Naxid revolt: he could do the job easily enough, and there was no way he could allow such a critical operation to remain in the hands of a trainee and a very junior, suddenly very erratic lieutenant. In the profound silence of the control room, Martinez let go of the cage and called up Shankaracharya's board onto his own display. Mattson had managed to get most of the message onto the board, excepting only the time of acceleration. A glance at the chronometer showed that all the ships might not have time to perform the maneuver in time, so he advanced the time half a minute to 25:52:34.

  He sent the message, as well as the time correction to Mabumba on the engines board. Martinez was still minding the comm board when the call from Kamarullah came.

  “Martinez,” he answered. “Make it quick.”

  Kamarullah's image was flushed a brighter color red than it had been before. “Are you aware that you've disobeyed a direct order from a superior officer?” he demanded.

  “Yes,” Martinez admitted. “Is that all?”

  Kamarullah seemed staggered by Martinez's confession, and was without words for a few seconds. “Are you mad?” he managed finally. “Is there any reason why I should consider obeying this order?”

  “I'm beyond caring if you obey my orders or not,” Martinez said. “Do as you please, and we'll see what a court says afterward. End transmission.”

  A few seconds later Corona's engines fired and delivered a kick to Martinez's tailbone that threw his couch swinging along the inside of a long arc. This was followed by a series of shorter arcs until the couch finally settled, with Martinez's suit clamping gently on his arms and legs to prevent his blood pooling, and the iron weights of gravity stacking themselves one by one on his bones.

  Corona groaned, its frame shuddering as the acceleration built, jolting as if a giant were stamping on the deck. The display showed that Kamarullah's ship had, in fact, obeyed Martinez's order, and done so correct to the second. Whatever Kamarullah intended, it wasn't open mutiny.

  A few minutes later, Do-faq's squadron appeared through the wormhole, rotated to two-nine-zero by zero-one-five absolute, and fired their engines. Relief bubbled in Martinez's heart like the finest champagne.

  Do-faq had done as Martinez had asked. Martinez had not ended his career with an act of disobedience.

  Martinez was too drained by the five-gravity deceleration to celebrate, and he knew he had work to do. Fighting against the deadening anesthesia the high gee wrapped about his mind, Martinez planned and ordered another series of missile launches that would, as his original plasma clouds cooled and dispersed, reinforce the screen behind which the loyalist squadrons could maneuver.

  If he commanded a larger ship he'd have a tactical officer to make these calculations and suggest solutions to problems, but as Corona was only a large frigate he had to do all the work himself.

  With gravity dragging at his brain he couldn't be certain that his calculations were completely correct so he added more missiles just to make certain.

  Antimatter tore itself to pi-mesons and gamma rays in the solar wind, and plasma fireballs expanded in the darkness. Behind the torn, hot matter, Do-faq's squadron plunged onward, unobserved. Martinez, fighting to think as desperately as he fought for breath, launched more sets of missiles.

  A little over two hours after entering the Hone-bar system, Corona's squadron made a furious burn across Soq's south pole, briefly reaching ten gees as every person aboard sank groaning into unconsciousness. When Martinez battled his way to awareness like a punch-soaked fighter swinging wildly at an enemy he could barely perceive, he put all his concentration into forming and sending an order for the squadron to reduce its deceleration to two gravities.

  Martinez gasped and rolled his neck as the weight of gravity came off. With the relief of the interminable pressure he could feel alertness pouring back into his brain as if someone had opened a tap. He called up the abstract, perfect virtual display, and watched little burning figures fly across darkness.

  Light Squadron 14 had now swung on a course that would cause it to pass close to Hone-bar, inside the most probable course taken by the enemy. The Naxids, for their part, hadn't altered their course, and in fact had no reason to-they were still two hours from learning of the loyalists' existence.

  Martinez ordered another missile barrage-and ordered one of his light cruisers to make it, a ship with a greater store of missiles than his own frigate. He gave no orders for the missiles to explode, or where-he just pushed them out ahead of the squadron in the expectation that they would be useful later.

  The Naxids were most likely intending to stay in the Hone-bar system-their deceleration flares implied that-but it was possible they intended to slip by Hone-bar's sun and continue on to Wormhole 3 and the Hone Reach. Whatever their purpose, the appearance of Martinez's squadron on their displays might make them change their plans completely. If they had been ordered to avoid battle, they might blaze away for Wormhole 3 even if their original intention had been to stay. And even if they had been intending to pass on, the sight of a weaker squadron might convince them to engage.

  In any case, Kreeku would have to make his decision very soon after detecting Martinez's arrival. His squadron would be on the verge of passing Hone-bar's sun when they first saw Martinez's engine flares, soon to be followed by maneuvers completely obscured by a screen of radiation from exploding antimatter missiles. Kreeku would have to conclude that the maneuvers were intended to bring on an engagement-Martinez might be intending to obscure a flight for Wormhole 3, but Kreeku couldn't assume that.

  So the question was whether Kreeku would fight or not-and given that the Naxids would believe themselves superior in numbers, Martinez assumed that Kreeku would commit to battle. He would sling his forces around Hone-bar's sun at a sharp angle and head more or less for Soq.

  And then, three hours later when Kreeku finally saw what course Martinez had taken shooting out of Soq's gravity well, he would have to decide whether or not to react. He would either crowd in toward Martinez, in effect pinning him against Hone-bar, or engage from a distance. How aggressive was he?