A Deepness in the Sky

Lighthill waved at the display, and for the first time since the takeover addressed Underville and the others. "The Kindred had callback capability on some of their missiles. We're using that wherever we can. Some of the others, we can attack from above."From above? As if by an invisible eraser, sweeping northward over the continent, a swath of missile markers disappeared. Lighthill turned toward Coldhaven and the other officers, and came to full attention. "Sir, ma'am. Your people might be best at managing the amissiles. If we can coordinate—"

"Damn, yes!" chorused Dugway and Coldhaven. The techs rushed back to their places. There were precious lost moments, re-upping target lists, and then the first of the amissiles scored.

"Positive EMP!" shouted one of the AD techs. Somehow it seemed more real than all the rest.

General Coldhaven dipped a hand at Lighthill, an odd sort of reverse salute. Lighthill said quietly, "Thank you, sir. This isn't quite what the chief planned, but I think we can make it work....Brent, see if you can make the situation map completely truthful."

...Hundreds of new markers glittered across the board. But they weren't missiles. Belga knew the tags well enough to recognize satellites, though these looked like broken graphics. There were missing data fields and there were fields that contained nonsense strings. Moving off the north edge of the display was a strange rectangle. It pulsed with chevron modifiers. General Dugway hissed. "That can't be true. A dozen size-chevrons. That would make it a thousand feet long."

"Yes, sir," said Lieutenant Lighthill. "The standard display programs can't quite handle this. That vehicle is almost two thousand feet long." She didn't seem to notice the look that came over Dugway. She contemplated the apparition a second longer. "And I think it has just about outlived its usefulness."

Ritser Brughel seemed pleased with himself. "We've done pus good even without Reynolt's people." The Vice-Podmaster came over from his Captain's chair to hover beside his Pilot Manager. "Maybe we launched a few more nukes than precisely needed, but that balanced your botch of the amissile fields, eh?" He slapped Xin familiarly on the shoulder. Jau had the sudden realization that his single, frail treason had been detected.

"Yes, sir" was all he could think to say. Ahead, the curve of the planet glittered with a web of lights, the cities they had come to call Princeton, Valdemon, Mountroyal. Maybe the Spiders weren't the people Rita imagined, maybe that was a fraud of translation. But whatever the truth, those cities were in the last seconds of their existence.

"Sir." Bil Phuong's voice came across bridge-wide comm. "I've got a high-level ack from Anne's people. We'll have full automation in a matter of seconds."

"Ha. About time." But there was a note of relief in Ritser Brughel's voice.

Jau felt a thutter of vibration. Again. Again. Brughel's head snapped up, and he gazed off at a virtual display. "That sounds like our battle lasers, but—"

Jau's eyes flickered across the status listings. The weapons board was clean. Core power had jagged as if charging capacitors—but now that was level, too. And, "My pilots aren't reporting any fire, sir."

Thutter. Thutter. They had passed over the great cities, were coasting north into the arctic, over tiny lights scattered across an immensity of dark, frozen land. Nothing there, but behind them...Thutter.The sky lit with three pale beams, diverging, fading...the classic look of battle lasers in upper atmosphere.

"Phuong! What the fuck is going on down there!"

"Nothing, sir! I mean—" Sounds of Phuong moving among his zipheads. "Uh, the zips are working on valid target lists from L1."

"Well, they're totally out of synch withmy target list. Pull your head out, man!" Brughel cut the connection and turned back to his Pilot Manager. The Podmaster's pale face was ruddy with building anger. "Shoot the bloody zips and get new ones!" He glared at Jau. "So what's your problem?"

"I—maybe nothing, but we're being illuminated from below."

"Hunh." Brughel, squinted at the electronic intelligence. "Yeah. Ground radars. But this happens several times on every rev...oh."

Xin nodded. "This contact has lasted fifteen seconds. It's like they're tracking us."

"That's impossible. Weown the Spider nets." Brughel bit his lip. "Unless Phuong has totally screwed up the L1 comm."

The radar tag faded for a moment...and then it was back, brighter, focused. "That's a targeting lock!"

Brughel jerked as if the image had turned into a striking snake. "Xin. Take control. Main torch if it will help. Get us out of here."

"Yes, sir." There weren't many missile sites in the Spiders' far north. But what there were would be nuke armed. Even a single hit could cripple theHand. Jau reached to enable his pilots—

—and the rumble of auxiliary thrusters filled the bridge.

"That wasn't me, sir!"