Cinc Mendez said, "We've got three enemy subs. Our detectors are tuned up to high pitch."

"Limit the range so our subs will be outside the sphere of influence."

"Already did that. The enemy's using magnetic depth charges, laying an undersea barrage as they advance."

"I'll talk to the sub command." Rhys cut off. Scott listened to the increasing fury of explosions. He could not yet hear the distinctive clapclap of heat rays, but the quarters were not yet close enough for those undependable, though powerful, weapons. It took time for a heat ray to warm up, and during that period a well-aimed bullet could smash the projector lens.

"Casualty, sir. Direct hit aboard destroyer Bayonet."

"Extent of damage?"

"Not disabled. Complete report later."

After a while a glider pilot came in on the beam.

"Sh.e.l.l landed on the Polaris, sir."

"Use the scanner."

It showed the h.e.l.ldivers' battlewagon, part of the superstructure carried away, but obviously still in fighting trim. Scott nodded.

Both sides were getting the range now. The hazy clouds still hid each fleet from the other, but they were nearing.

The sound of artillery increased. Problems of trajectory were increased by the violent winds of Venus, but accurate aiming was possible. Scott nodded grimly as a crash shook the Flintlock.

They were getting it now. Here, in the brain of the ship, he was as close to the battle as any member of a firing crew. The screens were his eyes.

They had the advantage of being able to use infrared, so that Scott, buried here, could see more than he could have on deck, with his naked eye.

Something loomed out of the murk and Scott's breath stopped before he recognized the lines of the Doone battlewagon Misericordia. She was off course. The captain used his hush-mike to snap a quick reprimand.

Flitterboats were going out now, speedy hornets that would harry the enemy fleet. In one of them, Scott remembered, was Norman Kane. He thought of Ilene and thrust the thought back, out of his mind. No time for that now.

Battle stations allowed no time for wool gathering.

The distant vanguard of the h.e.l.ldivers came into sight on the screens.

Cinc Mendez called.

"Eleven more subs. One got through. Seems to be near the Flintlock.

Drop depth bombs."

Scott nodded and obeyed. Shuddering concussions shook the ship.

Presently a report came in: fuel slick to starboard.

Good. A few well-placed torpedoes could do a lot of damage.

The Flintlock heeled incessantly under the action of the heavy guns.

Heat rays were lancing out. The big ships could not easily avoid the searing blasts that could melt solid metal, but the flitterboats, dancing around like angry insects, sent a rain of bullets at the projectors. But even that took integration. The rays themselves were invisible, and could only be traced from their targets. The camera crews were working overtime, snapping shots of the enemy ships, tracing the rays' points of origin, and telaudioing the information to the flitterboats.

"h.e.l.ldivers' Rigel out of action."

On the screen the big destroyer swung around, bow pointing forward.

She was going to ram. Scott snapped orders. The Flintlock went hard over, guns pouring death into the doomed Rigel.

The ships pa.s.sed, so close that men on the Flintlock's decks could see the destroyer lurching through the haze. Scott judged her course and tried desperately to get Mendez. There was a delay.

"QM--QM--emergency! Get the Zuni!"

'Here she answers, sir."

Scott snapped, "Change course. QM. Destroyer Rigel bearing down on you."

"Check." The screen blanked. Scott used a scanner. He groaned at the sight.

The Zuni was swinging fast, but the Rigel was too close--too d.a.m.ned close.

She rammed.

Scott said, "h.e.l.l." That put the Zuni out of action. He reported to Cinc Phys.

"All right, captain. Continue R-8 formation."

Mendez appeared on a screen. "Captain Scott. We're disabled. I'm coming aboard. Have to direct sub-strafing operations. Can you give me a control board?"

"Yes, sir. Land at Port Sector 7."

Hidden in the mist, the fleets swept on in parallel courses, the big battlewagons keeping steady formation, pouring heat rays and sh.e.l.ls across the gap. The lighter ships strayed out of line at times, but the flitterboats swarmed like midges, dog-fighting when they were not harrying the larger craft. Gliders were useless now, at such close quarters.

The thunder crashed and boomed. Shudders rocked the Flintlock.

"Hit on h.e.l.ldivers' Orion. Hit on Sirius."

"Hit on Mob ship Apache."

"Four more enemy subs destroyed."

"Doone sub X-16 fails to report."

"h.e.l.ldivers' Polaris seems disabled."

"Send out auxiliary flitterboats, units nine and twenty."

Cinc Mendez came in, breathing hard. Scott waved him to an auxiliary control unit seat.

"Hit on Lance. Wait a minute. Cinc Rhys a casualty, sir."

Scott froze. "Details."

"One moment--Dead, sir."

"Very well," Scott said after a moment. "I'm a.s.suming command. Pa.s.s it along."

He caught a sidelong glance from Mendez. When a Company's cinc was killed, one of two things happened--promotion of a new cinc, or a merger with another Company. In this case Scott was required, by his rank, to a.s.sume temporarily the fleet's command. Later, at the Doone fort, there would be a meeting and a final decision.

He scarcely thought of that now. Rhys dead! Tough, unemotional old Rhys, killed in action. Rhys had a free-wife in some Keep, Scott remembered. The Company would pension her. Scott had never seen the woman.

Oddly, he wondered what she was like. The question had never occurred to him before.

The screens were flashing. Double duty now--or triple. Scott forgot everything else in directing the battle.

It was like first-stage anesthesia--it was difficult to judge time. It might have been an hour or six since the battle had started. Or less than an hour, for that matter.

"Destroyer disabled. Cruiser disabled. Three enemy subs out of action--" It went on, endlessly. At the auxiliaries Mendez was directing substrafing operations. Where in h.e.l.l's the Armageddon, Scott thought? The fight would be over before that overgrown tortoise arrived.

Abruptly a screen flashed QM. The lean, beak-nosed face of Cinc Flynn of the h.e.l.ldivers showed.

"Calling Doone command."

"Acknowledging," Scott said. "Captain Scott, emergency command."

Why was Flynn calling? Enemy fleets in action never communicated, except to surrender.

Flynn said curtly, "You're using atomic power. Explanation, please."

Mendez jerked around. Scott felt a tight band around his stomach.

"Done without my knowledge or approval, of course, Cinc Flynn. My apologies. Details?"

"One of your flitterboats fired an atomic-powered pistol at the Orion."

"Damage?"

"One seven-unit gun disabled."

"One of ours, of the same caliber, will be taken out of action immediately.

Further details, sir?"

"Use your scanner, captain, on Sector Mobile I8 south Orion. Your apology is accepted. The incident will be erased from our records."

Flynn clicked off. Scott used the scanner, catching a Doone flitterboat in its focus. He used the enlarger.

The little boat was fleeing from enemy fire, racing back toward the Doone fleet, heading directly toward the Flintlock, Scott saw. Through the transparent sh.e.l.l he saw the bombardier slumped motionless, his head blown half off. The pilot, still gripping an atomic-fire pistol in one hand, was Norman Kane. Blood streaked his boyish, strained face.

So Starling's outfit did have atomic power, then. Kane must have smuggled the weapon out with him when he left. And, in the excitement of battle, he had used it against the enemy.

Scott said coldly, "Gun crews starboard. Flitterboat Z-g-4. Blast it."

Almost immediately a sh.e.l.l burst near the little craft. On the screen Kane looked up, startled by his own side firing upon him.

Comprehension showed on his face. He swung the flitterboat off course, zigzagging, trying desperately to dodge the barrage.

Scott watched, his lips grimly tight. The flitterboat exploded in a rain of spray and debris.

Automatic court-martial.

After the battle, the Companies would band together and smash Starling's outfit.

Meantime, this was action. Scott returned to his screens, erasing the incident from his mind.

Very gradually, the balance of power was increasing with the h.e.l.ldivers.

Both sides were losing ships, put out of action rather than sunk, and Scott thought more and more often of the monitor Armageddon. She could turn the battle now. But she was still far astern.

Scott never felt the explosion that wrecked the control room. His senses blacked out without warning.

He could not have been unconscious for long. When he opened his eyes, he stared up at a shambles. He seemed to be the only man left alive.

But it could not have been a direct hit, or he would not have survived either.

He was lying on his back, pinned down by a heavy crossbeam. But no bones were broken. Blind, incredible luck had helped him there. The brunt of the damage had been borne by the operators. They were dead, Scott saw at a glance.

He tried to crawl out from under the beam, but that was impossible. In the thunder of battle his voice could not be heard.

There was a movement across the room, halfway to the door. Cinc Mendez stumbled up and stared around, blinking. Red smeared his plump cheeks.

He saw Scott and stood, rocking back and forth, staring.

Then he put his hand on the b.u.t.t of his pistol.

Scott could very easily read the other's mind. If the Doone captain died now, the chances were that Mendez could merge with the Doones and a.s.sume control. The politico-military balance lay that way.

If Scott lived, it was probable that he would be elected cinc.

It was, therefore, decidedly to Mendez's advantage to kill the emprisoned man.

A shadow crossed the doorway. Mendez, his back to the newcomer, did not see Commander Bienne halt on the threshold, scowling at the tableau. Scott knew that Bienne understood the situation as well as he himself did. The commander realized that in a very few moments Mendez would draw his gun and fire.

Scott waited. The cinc's fingers tightened on his gun b.u.t.t.

Bienne, grinning crookedly, said, "I thought that sh.e.l.l had finished you, sir. Guess it's hard to kill a Dooneman."

Mendez took his hand off the gun, instantly regaining his poise. He turned to Bienne.