Intrepid

The undamaged engines showed large white dots of plasma shooting from the huge mouths of rockets. It was easy to spot the two, no three engines that had been sliced off. Plasma shot out from the tiny holes at the end of the containment field. Two other engines showed a skew of white fire where the sides of the engines had been lopped off. Kris described that to the board.

''Is that the damage you had aimed for?'' Captain Krätz asked.

''Basically, yes. I'd hoped to cut all five of them off like we did the first three, maybe nick the four inner ones a bit, but this was what we aimed for, and I think this falls within our desired results.''

''Do you see anything else?'' Captain Drago asked.

''I don't think so. Nelly, do you see anything?''

''It is hard to tell from a single picture, Kris, but note the occlusion of the stars to the right of the motors. The ship could be heeling over to the right. I would need further pictures to establish a trend.''

''This is the next photos, 34,216,'' Cortez said. The range notation was 22,619. It showed the same damage to the engines. It was hard to tell if it showed more heel.

''And photo 34,219.'' Jumping ahead three pictures, and at a range of 29,239, it was still hard for Kris to decide if the ship was heeling or if it was just a function of camera angle.

''Nelly, did you have any visual on the Tourin during the close encounter?'' Colonel Cortez asked.

''I was getting pictures at about half the pace of these, but the resolution was much worse. Does the court have one of the ship's visuals?''

''Yes we do,'' Cortez said. On the short wall facing Kris, a stern view of the liner appeared. The glare from the working engines showed as a single large dot.

''So you had no way to gauge the damage Pulse Lasers 3 and 4 had done,'' Captain Krätz said.

''That is correct, sir,'' Nelly said. ''At that instant, I was operating on the assumption that our first two lasers had missed, and the only hope we had was the second two.''

''Thank you, Nelly,'' Cortez said. ''Lieutenant Longknife, did you have similar assumptions?''

''Colonel Cortez, I had no assumptions at the time. It was happening too fast for me to observe, review, or make a revision to anything I'd planned.''

''That does not surprise me. Let's see the next picture.'' Photo 34,220 had a range notation of 31,445. Three more engines had been cut away from the left-hand lower engine grouping.

There was no evidence that Battery 1 had hit the Tourin.

''And the next picture,'' Cortez said.

The Tourin was tearing itself apart.

''Here we see that Battery 1 did not miss,'' Captain Drago took over the narrative, ''but rather sliced through the damaged area left by Batteries 3 and 4. Meeting no resistance, it was free to penetrate into the power plant and even to the reactor area. The result is catastrophic.''

''Yes,'' Kris whispered. At her neck, so did Nelly.

''I have personally gone over the records of repair and maintenance on the lasers. They were fully overhauled on Wardhaven before you called us to Eden. We bore sighted them after that overhaul. They were not just within specs but well within specs,'' the captain of the Wasp reported. Beside him, both the colonel and the Greenfeld captain nodded. ''As proof of that, I give you the actual results of this shoot. Batteries 2 and 4 just about nailed their targets. Battery 3 was a bit high and to the left. Battery 1 was off a bit more high and to the left, but it hit its target at thirty thousand kilometers and passing at a speed nearly .03 of the speed of light.''

Now it was Kris's turn to nod. ''The equipment functioned better than anyone had a right to expect.''

''So it would seem,'' Captain Krätz said. High praise from a Greenfeld skipper for a Wardhaven ship driver.

''Now one further matter,'' Colonel Cortez said. ''Miss Nelly, I am going to send you the scientific team's pictures that are in evidence. Would you please overlay them and determine if the Tourin was indeed heeling to the right based on the unbalanced engine configuration.''

For longer than Kris would have expected, Nelly was silent, then the large screen changed. ''As you can see from the three stars that became occluded between the first and the sixth picture under consideration, the passenger area of the hull is indeed starting to roll to the right.''

''Our analysis showed that,'' Colonel Cortez said, ''but we were not able to calculate the impact that skid would have on the hull of the Tourin. Applying the spin data that the scientists found to the expected behavior of the reaction mass in its tanks, what would be the effect on the ship?''

''No one has ever calculated that on a ship at such a high level of acceleration and inertia,'' Nelly said.

''Yes, we know. Every computer aboard declined this problem as having too many variables to track and taking too long. Do you think you can do it, Miss Nelly?''

''Let me try.''

Kris glanced at her watch, then tapped its options to stop-watch and started a clock running.