The six boarders hovered in the misty passageway like figures in a surrealistic painting. Seconds ticked by, each one stretching excruciatingly. Hazard felt a pain in his jaws and realized he was clenching his teeth hard enough to chip them.
He took his eyes from the screen momentarily to glance at his three youngsters. They were just as tense as he was. They knew how long the odds of their gamble were. The passageway was filled with nothing more than aerosol mists from every spray can the crew could locate in the supply magazines.
«What do you want, Hazard?» Buckbee said at last, his voice sullen, like a spoiled little boy who had been denied a cookie.
Hazard let out his breath. Then, as cheerfully as he could manage, «I’ve got what I want. Six hostages. How much air do your suits carry? Twelve hours?»
«What do you mean?»
«You’ve got twelve hours to convince Cardillo and the rest of your pals to surrender.»
«You’re crazy, Hazard.»
«I’ve had a tough day, Buckbee. I don’t need your insults. Call me when you’re ready to deal.»
«You’ll be killing your son!»
Hazard had half expected it, but still it hit him like a blow. «Jonnie, are you there?»
«Yes I am, Dad.»
Hazard strained forward, peering hard at the display screen, trying to determine which one of the space-suited figures was his son.
«Well, this is a helluva fix, isn’t it?» he said softly.
«Dad, you don’t have to wait twelve hours.»
«Shut your mouth!» Buckbee snapped.
«Fuck you,» snarled Jon Jr. «I’m not going to get myself killed for nothing.»
«I’ll shoot you!» Hazard saw Buckbee level his gun at Jon Jr.
«And kill yourself? You haven’t got the guts,» Jonnie sneered. Hazard almost smiled. How many times had his son used that tone on him.
Buckbee’s hand wavered. He let the gun slip from his gloved fingers. It drifted slowly, weightlessly, away from him.
Hazard swallowed. Hard.
«Dad, in another hour or two the game will be over. Cardillo lied to you. The Russians never came in with us. Half a dozen ships full of troops are lifting off from IPF centers all over the globe.»
«Is that the truth, son?»
«Yes, sir, it is. Our only hope was to grab control of your satellites. Once the coup attempt in Geneva flopped, Cardillo knew that if he could control three or four sets of ABM satellites, he could at least force a stalemate. But all he’s got is Graham and Wood. Nobody else.»
«You damned little traitor!» Buckbee screeched.
Jon Jr. laughed. «Yeah, you’re right. But I’m going to be a live traitor. I’m not dying for the likes of you.»
Hazard thought swiftly. Jon Jr. might defy his father, might argue with him, even revile him, but he had never known the lad to lie to him.
«Buckbee, the game’s over,» he said slowly. «You’d better get the word to Cardillo before there’s more bloodshed.»
It took another six hours before it was all sorted out. A shuttle filled with armed troops and an entire replacement crew finally arrived at the battered hulk of Hunter. The relieving commander, a stubby, compactly built black from New Jersey who had been a U.S. Air Force fighter pilot, made a grim tour of inspection with Hazard.
From inside his space suit he whistled in amazement at the battle damage. «Shee-it, you don’t need a new crew, you need a new station!»
«It’s still functional,» Hazard said quietly, then added proudly, «and so is my crew, or what’s left of them. They ran this station and kept control of the satellites.»
«The stuff legends are made of, my man,» said the new commander.
Hazard and his crew filed tiredly into the waiting shuttle, thirteen grimy, exhausted men and women in the pale-blue fatigues of the IPF. Three of them were wrapped in mesh cocoons and attended by medical personnel. Two others were bandaged but ambulatory.
He shook hands with each and every one of them as they stepped from the station’s only functional air lock into the shuttle’s passenger compartment. Hovering there weightlessly, his creased, craggy face unsmiling, to each of his crew members he said, «Thank you. We couldn’t have succeeded without your effort.»
The last three through the hatch were Feeney, Stromsen, and Yang. The Irishman looked embarrassed as Hazard shook his hand.
«I’m recommending you for promotion. You were damned cool under fire.»
«Frozen stiff with fear, you mean.»
To Stromsen, «You, too, Miss Stromsen. You’ve earned a promotion.»
«Thank you, sir,» was all she could say.
«And you, little lady,» he said to Yang. «You were outstanding.»
She started to say something, then flung her arms around Hazard’s neck and squeezed tight. «I was so frightened!» she whispered in his ear. «You kept me from cracking up.»
Hazard held her around the waist for a moment. As they disengaged he felt his face turning flame red. He turned away from the hatch, not wanting to see the expressions on the rest of his crew members.
Buckbee was coming through the air lock. Behind him were his five men. Including Jon Jr.
They passed Hazard in absolute silence, Buckbee’s face as cold and angry as an antarctic storm.
Jon Jr. was the last in line. None of the would-be boarders was in handcuffs, but they all had the hangdog look of prisoners. All except Hazard’s son.
He stopped before his father and met the older man’s gaze. Jon Jr.’s gray eyes were level with his father’s, unswerving, unafraid.
He made a bitter little smile. «I still don’t agree with you,» he said without preamble. «I don’t think the IPF is workable—and it’s certainly not in the best interests of the United States.»
«But you threw your lot in with us when it counted,» Hazard said.
«The hell I did!» Jon Jr. looked genuinely aggrieved. «I just didn’t see any sense in dying for a lost cause.»
«Really?»
«Cardillo and Buckbee and the rest of them were a bunch of idiots. If I had known how stupid they are I wouldn’t …» He stopped himself, grinned ruefully, and shrugged his shoulders. «This isn’t over, you know. You won the battle, but the war’s not ended yet.»
«I’ll do what I can to get them to lighten your sentence,» Hazard said.
«Don’t stick your neck out for me! I’m still dead set against you on this.»
Hazard smiled wanly at the youngster. «And you’re still my son.»
Jon Jr. blinked, looked away, then ducked through the hatch and made for a seat in the shuttle.
Hazard formally turned the station over to its new commander, saluted one last time, then went into the shuttle’s passenger compartment. He hung there weightlessly a moment as the hatch behind him was swung shut and sealed. Most of the seats were already filled. There was an empty one beside Yang, but after their little scene at the hatch Hazard was hesitant about sitting next to her. He glided down the aisle and picked a seat that had no one next to it. Not one of his crew. Not Jon Jr.
There’s a certain amount of loneliness involved in command, he told himself. It’s not wise to get too familiar with people you have to order into battle.
He felt, rather than heard, a thump as the shuttle disengaged from the station’s air lock. He sensed the winged hypersonic spaceplane turning and angling its nose for reentry into the atmosphere.
Back to … Hazard realized that home, for him, was no longer on Earth. For almost all of his adult life, home had been where his command was. Now his home was in space. The time he spent on Earth would be merely waiting time, suspended animation until his new command was ready.
«Sir, may I intrude?»
He looked up and saw Stromsen floating in the aisle by his seat.