Footfall

For a promise made is a debt unpaid.

—ROBERT W. SERVICE

The screens had not changed for more than an hour.

General Toland set down his coffee cup. “How many snouts does it take to change a light bulb?”

The President wrinkled his brow in puzzlement. “None. They’ve invented torches.”

“No—”

“I have something,” Jenny said.

“Gimlet, this is Michael.”

They’re alive!

Down below all the crews were cheering.

“Michael, this is Gimlet. No new orders. Report if you can.”

“Gimlet, this is Michael. Reporting. We have inflicted heavy damage on the invader mother ship. We have taken severe damage. We have fifty percent casualties. They are definitely running away. We continue in pursuit. Stand by for digital data.”

A picture emerged on the screen below: Michael with his whole portside kicked in. One spurt bomb rack had vanished, and the portside propulsion tower was dented and holed.

“Holy shit,” General Toland muttered. No wonder Ed sounds tired.

More data. A blurred image of the enemy ship. It looked scarred. “Estimate one hour to interception,” Gillespie said. “Jenny, is that you?”

“Michael, this is Gimlet, Colonel Crichton here.”

“Jenny, tell Linda I love her.”

Jenny looked quickly to the screens below. They flowed and changed as Michael’s computer dumped in data. They don’t have enough bombs left to kill their velocity. They can’t come home unless they win.

“Admiral, is there anything I ought to say?” President Coffey asked.

“You’re the politician, Mr. President.”

“Meaning that it’s more important to me than to General Gillespie. Colonel, tell him — dammit. Cut me in.”

“Sir. Michael, stand by for Executive One.”

“General, this is David Coffey. I’ll give your message to your wife. Anything else?”

“For the record: posthumous awards for civilians. I recommend the Medal of Freedom. Dr. Arthur Grace Pelz. Mr. Samuel Cohen. Mr. Harry Reddington. Military personnel — Excuse me. I’ll switch on automatic digital reporting. Mr. President, it’s getting a bit thick—”

“Godspeed, General.”

“Michael out.”

The screens below shifted: a composite picture of Michael, dented and torn. Bombs exploded aft as the big ship accelerated.

Another screen showed a tiny Earth surrounded by colored dots with arrows protruding. Velocity vectors. The Navy would need to learn a whole new way of reading maps if this kind of thing ever became common. The alien invader was a large red spear; Michael, in blue, pursued relentlessly; both vectors pointed away from Earth. Michael’s vector was longer. The dots would be touching within the hour.

Digit ships were orange dots. They swarmed close around the Earth. A few were farther out and tens of thousands of miles away, their orange arrows pointing toward the battle.

Admiral Carrell studied the screen. “The digit ships are no threat. It’ll be all over by the time they get there.”

“Is he going to ram?” General Toland asked.

“He can’t come home,” Admiral Carrell said carefully. “Under the circumstances, what would you do?”

“Damn straight,” Toland said. “Can he do it?”

Carrell shrugged. “General, I expect the engineering people will be working on that question. It would be interesting to know what they think.”

“Sir.” Jenny touched more buttons. Jenny Crichton knew: that was Ed Gillespie, her sister’s husband, with no more than two hours to live and nothing anyone could do about it. Colonel Jennifer Crichton called the engineers.

“Dreamer Fithp here.”

“Engineering.”

“They’re all busy,” Reynolds’ voice said. “So they have me answering the phone.”

“Your projection?”

“I’ll give you Colonel Matthews. Al, they want a projection.”

“Matthews here. We don’t have a projection.”

Admiral Carrell broke in. “Colonel, would you care to explain that?”

“Sir. Given the damage Michael has sustained, and the defense capabilities demonstrated by the enemy, a majority of my analysts believe the most likely event is mutual destruction of Michael and the enemy mother ship. We can’t assign a probability to that. A large minority of our people believe the enemy will be severely damaged but Michael will be destroyed.

“The Threat Team is nearly unanimous: the enemy will do almost anything to prevent severe damage to the mother ship.”

“What does that mean, almost anything?” Carrell demanded.

“Certainly an offer of surrender.”

“Sincere?”

“Sir?”

“My apologies. You can’t know.”

“They’ll also go all out to protect the mother ship. Their warriors aren’t likely to be less courageous than ours. They’ll throw everything they have.”

“No surprise there,” General Toland said.

“Thank you, Colonel. I’ll ask you to use screen five to display your projections.”

“Yes, sir.”

On the screen below, Michael’s blue crept toward the enemy red.

“Sir. We’re getting something.”

“Gimlet, this is Harpoon. We’re getting a tightbeam message on the same frequency the aliens used when they sent that message to the President. It’s for the President.”

“They want to talk!” General Toland said.

“Put them on!” David Coffey ordered.