The next megacycles were a tremendous test of crew discipline. Jennings put the situation as well as any when she declared that she felt strange being used as "live bait."
Calhoun chuckled, "You're right," he agreed, pursing his tips, "and nothin' improves a fisherman's luck than fish that are in a bitin' mood." He thought for a moment. "What do you suppose we might do to make ourselves mair interestin' to our quarry over there?"
"Well," Jennings replied, "for starters, we could send a work crew out to 'repair' something on the hull-in those civilian space suits they packed for us."
"Good idea, lass," Calhoun said, nodding his head. He touched the intercom. "Chief Barbousse to the bridge-on the double!"
Less than twenty cycles later, the big rating-and a party of seven "Vishu-Berniaga civilians"-could be seen floating around the port Drive nacelle as they replaced one perfectly serviceable plasma generator assembly with another just like it. His "fumbling" team of professional Blue Capes took nearly two metacycles to accomplish a task that they could easily finish under normal circumstances in barely a quarter of the time.
At length, Calhoun ordered them to finish up and come back inside before the Leaguers became suspicious. "Only a team o' Personnel Officers could be so bumble-headed," he complained, shaking his head, "an' even Leaguers do na send those types out if they want anythin' important done."
After six full metacycles, the Leaguers still had made no overt actions-except for maneuvering to precisely match Prize's purposely irregular course toward Atalanta, and remaining tantalizingly beyond me range of her disruptors. Finally, Brim could endure no longer. "Cal," he said, checking his timepiece, "how about the Chief and I going after the bastards in our launch?"
Calhoun frowned for a moment and shut his eyes. "For certain I ha'na come up with another approach that's half so promising," he said, "e'en though it's a mite maer dangerous than I like." He took off his glasses and polished them for a moment with great concentration. Then, shrugging more to himself than anyone else, he looked up and smiled grimly. "All right, laddie," he said, "give your helm over to Ardelle. I think the time has come that you and your friend the Chief ha' a go at it. Tell me wha' you plan to do-I know you've been thinkin' o't for days, noo."
"Aye, sir," Brim replied. "Ardelle, the helm is yours-ships is trimmed neutral."
As Jennings assumed the controls, Brim glanced at the bender paralleling their course and pursed his lips. "I haven't really done all that much planning, Cal," he admitted at length.
"The Chief and I aren't going to have a lot of time for anything but the most basic dogfighting." He pursed his lips while he rang for Barbousse to meet him at the launch. "As things seem to be right now, I think we'll have the starboard hatch opened first so the Leaguers can't see what we're doing, then I'll run up the launch's spin-gravs until she's just starting to overrun her gravity brakes. At that point, Barbousse'll give somebody a signal to swap the Imperial Comet for our Vishu-Berniaga colors and open the port hatch- fast. The way that launch of ours takes off, I don't think our Leaguers will have much chance to escape before we've at least popped a couple of volleys their way, even if they decide to come out of spectral mode."
Calhoun nodded. "Sounds good so far," he said. "Then what?"
"Well," Brim answered, "I don't know what kind of armor benders carry, but if we accomplish nothing else, any hits we score will sure raise Voot with those little logic units she has all over her hull."
"Aye," Calhoun agreed. "An' if the boffins are right in their guessin', she may be a wee easier to see afterward." He frowned for a moment, then nodded toward the bender. "But after you mak your first run, laddie-then what? Yon bender hae quite a sting from wha I can see."
Brim glanced across at the disrupters mounted on the enemy ship's control bridge. "After that first run, Cal, I don't have much in the way of plans. Possibilities become xaxtdamned near infinite at that point."
Calhoun nodded, then pointed an accusing index finger directly at Brim's chest. "Aye, child," he said, "so they do. But they are precisely why you maun keep your mind's eye firmly on the purpose of your mission. Otherwise you are liable to lead with your chin and waste yourself- plus your ship." His gray eyes narrowed. "I ha' na' heard you speak o' anythin' luik a mission yet. That should ha' been the first thing you' told me aboot. You do ha' an overall goal in mind, do you na'?"
Bran frowned. "Of course I do, Cal," he objected. "We're supposed to capture a bender."
"Aye, right you are, laddie," Calhoun replied calmly. "But that wasn't the first thing on your mind, as I remember. Shootin' was." He shook his head sternly. "That sort of blind bravery ha' served you well in the past-and make no mistake, lad, it wull again, in the future. But you maun be able to do mair than just shoot somethin' to pieces." He raised an eyebrow.
"Today, you may cause only enough damage to deprive yon Leaguers of a means to escape. The real mission is to get a bender safely back to Atalanta an' the intelligence units waitin' there. After you finish with the Leaguers, the rest of us will bring Prize alongside their ship an' board it. I'll grant that burned, twisted wreckage wad be a lot easier for us to board-but it wull be neither interestin' nor useful to the Intelligence people. Do you understand?"
"But..."
Calhoun looked Brim directly in the eye. "I knew that you had all the details somewhere in the back of your mind, you stubborn chield. But it was na' foremost. An' in the entire Universe, nothin' is so important as your mission- notttin'. We have only time to do things right-very little has been set aside for mistakes. Do you understand, laddie?"
Brim nodded his head. "Now I understand," he answered. In fact, he did....
"And the rest of ye?" Calhoun asked, looking from Jennings to Ursis. "The lesson was na'
just for young Brim here."
"I understand, Cal."
"I, too, understand, Number One."
"Good," Calhoun said. "Noo, young Brim. Let me hear those plans of yours again. From the beginning, if you please."
Mind racing, Brim glanced quickly through the Hyperscreens. Outside, their bender was still keeping perfect formation. He nodded, then turned to Calhoun. "What I want to accomplish overall, Cal," he said, "is to keep that bender over there from escaping until you can land a boarding party from Prize- with minimum damage to any of the three ships...."
"Aye, laddie- that's the stuff. Noo, how do you propose to go aboot such a thing?"
Brim closed his eyes, examining every detail he could conjure. Finally he nodded, looking Calhoun square in the face. "On our first run-right out of the hatch, so to speak," he said, I'll have Barbousse concentrate his fire on their KA'PPA antenna. That'll stop them from warning their friends back home that benders may not bend quite everything. Next, I suppose we'll try to take out those disruptors behind the control bridge. After that, we'll concentrate on the Drive nacelles." He nodded. "My best guess says that the 'bending'
mechanisms are located amidships, near the power supplies, so we'll keep away from there as much as possible. Then," he added with a shrug, "we'll try to get her to stop, or at least cut her power so she can be boarded. I don't think there'll be much trouble getting that idea over to them. Disruptors speak a pretty Universal language."
Calhoun chuckled grimly. "Ye hae a true point there, laddie," he said. "Noo, what can we do in old Prize to help you?"
"Well," Brim answered with a grin, "aside from boarding-if the Leaguers do start to move off, I'll expect you to follow as close on their tail as you can. Prize has the only N-ray searchlights. We never had time to mount one on the launch."