"And then he threw up," Rick put in. "He always brings that up. Michaels is pretty much a pacifist. He wants everyone to know he didn't have a choice."

"He left the corpse in the hall to be found by the other," Bob continued, "and was hoping it would pause or something and then he could kill it. But the second one ran away the instant it saw the first one dead. He chased it but it got away to its ship and took off, never to be seen again.

"After that he lasered a message to the Patrol and within a few months the ultraspeed delivery ship the Patrol shot out of the cannon used the mass of the comet to slow down, then they gathered up Michaels and some artifacts and used the comet to fling them back into the Solar System."

"I still don't know what kind of ship that was," Rick said. "I never heard of this cannon thing before Michaels brought it up."

"The cannon is on Mercury," Bob said, "and the Patrol uses it to throw supplies and personnel out to the deep stations beyond Pluto's orbit. It costs a hell of a lot of money to use."

"It's scary, too," Pops put in. "I've ridden it a few times. Someone screws up on the field gradient by even a fraction of a percent, and you're either suddenly sausage or a pancake."

"You two have no idea about what kind of uproar his message created in the High Command when we intercepted it," Bob told them. "There Intelligence was, right in the middle of getting a war off the ground, and here comes this report of hostile aliens in the Oort cloud with advanced technology and maybe FTL technology. They wanted that alien 'stuff' in the worst way, and they threw together that cannon shot in one hell of a hurry. And once that stuff came back, the Phi Nonsense group got a burst of funds and went from four guys to four hundred overnight-"

" 'Phi Nonsense'?" Pops asked.

"That was the name of the subgroup dedicated to studying alien contact scenarios. No one ever thought the group would actually be needed. That's where the name for the Phinon Project came from."

The meal was almost over when Rick asked, "Are you hoping the Phinons show up at the comet while we're there, Bob? And you too, Pops? You're anxious to try fighting them ship-to-ship, aren't you?"

"I'm a wee bit anxious," Bob replied with a grin.

"You bet I'm hoping for it!" Pops answered, almost leering with delight. "I have a score to settle with those bastards. And besides, the Patrol needs to know how the Hyperlight would fare in an engagement. It's not every day you get to indulge in revenge for the good of the nation."

"How about you, Rick? You want to see what Arie's 'improved' weaponry can do, don't you? Aren't the laser cannons powered from their own mass converter now?"

It was Rick's turn for a guilty grin. "Guilty as charged. I'm a man. My brain's hard-wired for it."

The next day Bob directed everyone's attention to the screens. They'd dropped out of hyperdrive and were in the vicinity of the comet. "See that? If I'm not mistaken, that's OEV 1. We'll be in visual range in about fifteen minutes."

"Where's the comet?" Pops asked.

"The ship that picked up Michaels would have given the cometary mass a hell of a kick," Bob said. "It's probably-" He paused to check his scanner display. "The nearest large body is 42,000 kilometers away. That should be it."

This was their first time since leaving the Solar System that they'd had to try to match velocities with anything, and despite the ultra-high capabilities of the ship, this took time. But shortly Bob had the Hyperlight doing a slow pass alongside the huge bulk of OEV 1.

"I'm surprised she's not tumbling," Rick said.

"She has a power core separate from the main drive," Bob told them. "The Phinons didn't hit that. The attitude thrusters will probably maintain her orientation for decades." He was watching the screens intently. "In a couple seconds we'll be able to see where they blasted the ship."

OEV 1 had been fueled by antimatter and could have made it to the stars and back if anyone had wanted to spend decades aboard her. The drive tubes were 300 meters long, and the whole drive section was separated from the data gathering and life section by a boom another 200 meters in length. "Right there," Bob said, pointing. "See that slice right through the reaction chamber? Michaels says they did that from one hundred thousand kilometers away. The emergency systems dumped all the antimatter to space after the breach and the ship was dead in the water."

"That's damn good shooting," Rick said.

"Now we're going to do a pass on the life section," Bob said. "I saw Michaels just before we left, Rick. He told me about something I'd like to show you guys if I can find it."

Moments later, Bob pointed again. "Okay, freeze the screen. Right in the middle. I'm going to magnify it ten times."

"What is that?" Pops asked when the magnified image appeared.

"That's a Phinon's leg," Bob replied. "When Michaels was chasing the second one, once it got back to the airlock it had to blast through the outer door since it wasn't going to open with the inner one destroyed already. The decompression carried the Phinon out and it impaled its leg on that jagged piece of hull metal."

"Wait a minute. How did Michaels survive the decompression?" Pops asked.

"He said that the minute he saw them using beam weapons inside a spaceship he went and put his spacesuit on."

"A prudent move," Pops observed.

"He said he was just in time to watch the Phinon cut its leg off with its weapon and race off faster than hell back to its ship," Bob finished.

"Hold on, again. The Phinon still had its weapon while Michaels was chasing it, and it didn't shoot at him, and after it was impaled, it cut its leg off but still didn't shoot Michaels while he was watching it?" Pops asked.

"It's fight or flight," Bob said. "Not and/or. But that's enough sightseeing, here. The Patrol took everything of value from the ship when they picked up Michaels. Now let's see what's on that comet. They only popped down to look at the refinery and collect a few artifacts. There might be more to learn down there."

"Let's hope so," Rick said. "So far, we haven't found out anything new about the Phinons."

"Sure we have," Pops said. "We found out that we can fly through hyperspace for a day without having a flock of Phinons come after us. We'll be at the comet in a few minutes. I'm going to get my power suit on. Which of you two are coming with me down to the surface?"

"Bob, we're not landing on the comet, are we?" Rick asked. "If the Phinons show up we shouldn't-"

"Relax, Rick. We're not landing. Pops is going to jump down."

"I'll go down this time," Rick said. "But I don't have a power suit."

"You'll be safe as a baby in my arms," Pops told him.

"How long before Bob sets off the neutrino bomb?" Pops asked.

Rick checked the time in his heads up display. "Another five minutes," he said.

Rick had found the drop down to the surface of the comet as uneventful as Pops had promised, and was impressed by the old man's skill at maneuvering his power suit. Pops had canceled their slight velocity within twenty meters of the surface, then brought them down as smooth as could be hoped. Now, gripfields in their boots held them reasonably tightly to the ground in the trivial gravity.

They'd already looked over the "refinery" that Michaels had discovered. But after a brief inspection, they concluded there wasn't anything new that they could learn from it. Now they were waiting for Bob to detonate a neutrino bomb nearby. He'd placed the bomb out in space on one side of the comet, and was now positioning the Hyperlight on the other side, a hundred klicks away, to see what the blast would illuminate inside the comet.

Rick looked into the sky, noticing the bright star that was the Sun. He held up his thumb and covered it, and realized he'd also covered up the entire domain of human civilization. Then he turned to look at the rest of the stars in the sky, spread his arms wide and couldn't encompass it, and thought about destiny.

It suddenly came home to him just how much was at stake.

"What the hell are you doing?" Pops asked. He'd obviously been watching Rick's gestures.

"Just thinking about something," Rick said.

"Twenty seconds to detonation," Bob suddenly said over their comms. "Just to be safe I'd say you should look at the ground. You in particular, Rick. Pops' power suit can probably take the flash, but I don't know about yours."

"Okay," Pops acknowledged. They both looked at the ground, which suddenly brightened as if the comet had been moved to Earth orbit, then darkened again rapidly. Although the neutrino bomb expended 95 percent of its energy in neutrinos, that 5 percent given up as photons was not to be ignored.

Neutrino investigation of small masses was old technology, and within minutes the Hyperlight's computer flashed down a processed image of the interior of the comet which Rick and Pops watched on the inside of the faceplates of their suits. "The expert system is going over the data now," Bob told them. "I told it to look for unusual cavities." Then: "Damn. Wait until you see this," and he flashed down an updated image.

The shadow image that was the interior of the comet looked like it had layers of spider webs superimposed on it. "Ever see anything like that, boys?"

"No."

"Nope."

"I've never read one of these before," Pops said. "But I gather each strand represents a tunnel or cave?"

"Bingo," Bob said.

"Artificial?" Rick asked.

"Has to be," Bob replied. "Guess we know what that means."

"Yeah," Pops said. "Where's the nearest spot to us where the network breaks the surface, Bob?"

There was a pause during which Rick discovered his palms were sweating. "You ever go caving, Rick?"

he heard Pops ask, but didn't reply. He was still staring at the image of the comet.

He felt a tug on his arm and dissolved the image to look out directly into the face of Pops staring into his helmet. "You okay, kid? If it helps, I'm scared, too."

"About eighty-five meters northeast of the refinery it looks like a tunnel comes out," Bob reported.

"Let's go," Rick said, but his voice nearly cracked on "go."

"That's the spirit," Pops said. "But I'll go first."

"Damn right you will! You're wearing the power suit."

They'd defined a coordinate system before landing on the comet so they knew just which way to head, and soon they were standing next to a dark shaft about twelve meters across and no way to tell how deep. Lying right next to the shaft was a circular piece of something, also twelve meters in diameter. It looked like it had the remains of a hinge on the side nearest the hole.

"I guess that was the door to the airlock," Rick said.

Pops shined his light down into the shaft. "I can't see any interior door. This tunnel is open to vacuum. Maybe they all are."

"Abandoned? I hope so. But why would the Phinons abandon this comet?" Rick wondered.

"Why do they attack us?" Pops replied. "It's anyone's guess right now. Are you ready?"

Rick looked into the shaft, wishing there was some way to pierce the gloom below the limit of Pops' light. "Yes."

Pops picked Rick up and jumped directly into the center of the hole. They hovered there a moment while Pops oriented the suit, then he cut the jets and they dropped slowly into the unknown.

The elevator doors opened and Sammi was caught by the-there wasn't any other word to use than "romance"-of the image she saw. There was Chris Dykstra, supporting himself slightly with his cane, looking out at the vast array of stars, almost as if it were his domain.

Sammi had come to the observation bubble at Dykstra's request, though he hadn't said why he wanted to meet her here. She had seen him so little since the party, and had missed their talks, much more than she'd been admitting to herself, she now realized.

He still hadn't noticed her arrival. "Chris?"

He turned and smiled. "So good to see you again, Sunshine," he said.

"I tried to see you last week when you were supposed to come back, but I was told you were delayed a day," Sammi confessed as she joined him where he was standing.

"Yes. Dr. Hague refused to return to the Moon without taking along his squirrels, and no amount of discussion was going to change his mind. So we had to make plans to transport thirty-two squirrels up to Luna."

"How did you catch them?"

"Arie has been feeding them for months. He pretty much just told them to hop into his cage, and they did. What took time was setting up a place for them to stay when we got here. Arie has them in his lab, now, and he's constructed, er, is constructing continuously, quite a home for them. 'Elaborate' hardly describes it.

"But tell me about you. How has your work been going?"

"Slow but steady," Sammi replied. "I'm pretty sure I can get the bugs to do everything we want, and I've been able to get them to manufacture their own tools now. But I've been wondering about the latency period. Do we want the Phinons to notice the infection quickly, or should it take weeks before the infection becomes apparent?" She did not mention her qualms about how many Phinons should ultimately die.

"Hmm. That's going to depend on how we intend to go about getting them infected, and how we want them to spread the disease to others," Dykstra said.

"That's what I think, too. I guess I should work on both a fast and slow version," Sammi said.

"I think that would be wisest."

"But I don't think you asked me here to talk about my work, did you?"

"No," Dykstra said, and then a troubled look came over his features, and he turned away from her to stare out into space, almost as if he was looking for something, perhaps the men in the Hyperlight. Finally, he turned back to her and said, "Tomorrow they'll be officially overdue.

"We purposely kept you in the dark as to most of the details, Sammi. There was no point in involving you more than necessary during the construction of the ship. One of the compromises I finally worked out with Knoedler was to let the men spend two days out of contact while putting the Hyperlight through her paces. They can't radio out of hyperspace, and we haven't developed the hyperspatial equivalent yet, though it's certainly possible to do. At any rate, tomorrow morning the Hyperlight will not return to Fort Conger Station, and Colonel Knoedler will have cause to start asking questions. He's been suspicious of me all along, but he'll need the delay of the ship to give him leverage to start making my life difficult. I want you to be ready in case he asks you any questions."

"What do you want me to tell him?"

"Mostly the truth. You knew I wanted a more involved first trip, and I asked you if having a live Phinon would help you in your work. But all that was months ago and you don't know any of the details. But if you're pinned down, I want you to lie about your understanding of the gravity of the matter. You're just a civilian who got caught up in this and to you the whole business just looked like policy squabbling among the higher-ups."

Sammi understood the logic of this, but she felt a little offended. "Chris, I know you want me to save my ass, but really, that's kind of-"

"Stop!" he snapped. She hadn't seen those flames in his eyes directed her way before, and she was taken aback. "This has nothing to do with saving your ass. When this is all over you'll testify as to the truth with everyone else. But we need you to be able to keep working unimpeded. Now that the Hyperlight is finished, others can build more. Men with better tactical minds than mine, like Knoedler himself, can plot defense strategies. But you're the only genano engineer we have. It would take months for others to get up to your speed, and then I doubt that they'll ever be as effective as you. This is your war in more ways than just because you happened to be born when you were . . . ."