Wyatt watched him, thinkingHe will raise that gun and fire and that will be the end of it.
The man's voice reached him, thin with distance and surprise. "Hey, it's a man. It's human. It ain't no monster after all—"
From inside the open hatch of the globe Wyatt heard a radio-transmitted voice speaking.
"If you will withdraw your—er—aircraft as a sign of good faith, our representatives will come to—"
Wyatt didn't hear the rest of it too clearly. He was struggling with the reaction of relief. Not only for Earth, but for himself.
After that it was not so difficult. Once the high brass was convinced of the danger, and of Makvern's sincerity, things got done in spite of red tape and provincial stubbornness. The testimony of Burdick and Whitfield, the Apache and the Turcoman, helped immensely.
Makvern's ships were allowed to refuel and take on supplies. They took to space again, but without any nuclear weapons aboard. "Those are my own people," Makvern said. "I can't use that against them."
The air forces of the world were deployed as a second line of defense, coordinated with ground-to-air missile batteries and with squadrons carrying air-to-air missiles. On the ground, the armies readied themselves.
Varsek's fleet came, a great dark arrow of ships into the light of the Sun.
Once more Wyatt was aboard Makvern's command ship, on the bridge. He was acting with others of the regular armed forces of several nations, as liaison officer. He watched the dramatic wedge of ships approach, catching fire on their sun sides as they drew closer until their brazen glitter was painful to the eye. And his heart sank. What Varsek had said was true. Nothing could stand against that fleet.
As though to emphasize that point, Varsek's face appeared in the communic screen.
"So you decided to face me here," he said. "Good. Oh, very good!"
"Perhaps," said Makvern. "Perhaps not. Earth has been warned, Varsek, and now I'm warning you and every man in the fleet. She has powerful armaments, including hydrogen devices, and she is prepared to use them. She can kill a great many of you before she's beaten."
"And who warned Earth?" said Varsek. Both men, Wyatt knew, were speaking to the fleet as much as to each other. "You, Makvern. A traitor's act. Every life we lose here will be your responsibility!"
"Not at all," said Makvern quietly. "You know what the situation is. All you have to do now to avoid any casualties is to withdraw the fleet from Earth without attacking."
"Turn tail and run?" said Varsek. "You should know me better."
Suddenly Makvern's voice blazed fierce, white-hot with old rage. "I know you, Varsek! You'll sacrifice every man in the fleet before you'll admit you've been bested. Remember that, you men, when he's ordering you into battle! Try to figure out what real reason you have for attacking and then see whether you think it's worth dying for! If you don't—"
Varsek's great voice drowned him out. "This is a general order to the Task Force. Battle stations, all personnel. Executive officers of destroyer squadrons Three, Four and Five will proceed with landing operations according to plan."
"You heard your commander," Makvern flared. "Go down and die for him, for his ambition and the fat pockets of his friends, if you want to. If you don't, take your ships out of formation and join us. Then we can all go home. Then—"
"Destroyer Squadrons One and Two," Varsek's voice rolled inexorably on, "will attack the enemy ships at once, proceeding at individual discretion. You will use Type Two armaments—these traitors must be destroyed!"
This time it was Varsek who broke the contact with Makvern, and it was as though by that gesture he declared them all dead.
"Well?" said Wyatt tensely.
"God knows," said Makvern. He began to rap out orders, preparing to fight his ships as well as he could.
Wyatt withdrew into a corner out of the way and found Brinna there. She was regarding the preparations inboard and the movements of the fleet with an expert, eager, frustrated gaze. The realization of the defeat of her ambitious plans changed her, Wyatt thought, very little.
"IfIhad the command here—" she said, between her teeth.
"I don't think you could swing the men in the fleet, if you had," he said. "Maybe even Makvern hasn't swung them—"
It didn't look as though he had. The Task Force was breaking up in orderly segments, the heavy attack craft wheeling into position behind their destroyer screens, ready for the screaming plunge downward into the sky. And now from their stations at either side of the forward point of the fleet the two destroyer squadrons leaped toward Makvern's ships.
"Type Two armaments," said Wyatt, "are the lethal ones, I take it. No polite stunning of the victim, just good honest annihilation."
Brinna nodded, her hand closing unconsciously on his.
Makvern was hunched like a bulldog in the forepart of the bridge, rapping orders.
"Hang on," said Brinna. "We move."
They did move, roaring straight up in an effort to get above the oncoming destroyers. Wyatt could see other ships going up with them, while still others dropped and circled. They were trying some kind of a boxing-in maneuver, but the destroyer squadrons were old hands at this game too. They counter-moved with lightning speed. Wyatt did not see any projectile pass through space, but suddenly there was a silent blossoming of fire like the birth of a small sun and one of Makvern's ships ceased to exist in the time it took Wyatt to blink.
"I believe," said Brinna in a steady voice, "that's the first time I have ever seen Type Two projectiles in use except on a test range."
There was a kind of a stunned silence on the bridge. Then once more the ship was in tangential motion, and somebody began to shout, "Look at their formations! Some of Varsek's ships are pulling out—"
"Fire!" said Makvern, and the ship shuddered twice. White stunning beams lanced out and struck a dark iron flank with green fire and sent it staggering away—Wyatt assumed that these beams were powerful enough to knock out not only men but delicate electrical equipment as well.
"They are pulling out," said Brinna. "Breaking up. Look!"
He could see that the orderly formations of Varsek's fleet had become suddenly ragged, some of the ships frankly deserting the ranks and others lagging as though they were hesitant.
"It was the projectile," Brinna said. "Seeing one of their own ships full of men they knew destroyed that way—I think it must have shocked them all as it did me."
The face of a man appeared on the screen, white and strained. "Makvern," he said. "You know me—Shannar, commanding the First Squadron. I'm pulling out—this is murder—"
Varsek's face appeared, super-imposed over Shannar's in a ghastly double image.
"Follow your orders! Destroy—"
"The hell with you," said Shannar. "I'm a soldier, not an executioner."
He faded, and a second face appeared through the image of Varsek. "Me, too. After what you've led us into, the Second Squadron is quitting."
Now Varsek's face stood clear in the screen, and outside in space the dark ships wheeled away and joined the number that were gathering behind Makvern's force.
Varsek, his face distorted with a violent fury, cried out, "Iorderthe commander of every ship to proceed with his assigned duties! If he refuses, I authorize every officer in the chain of command to take over until one loyal man is found. I order this! Prepare to land. I'll destroy Makvern myself if none of you have the guts to do it."
And the great bulk of the flagship moved from where it had hung in space and gathered speed, and bore down upon Makvern's command ship like the ultimate hammer of doom.
"He must have packed the flagship with his most trusted officers," Brinna said.
Ignoring every other craft in space, the enormous ship rushed at them.
Makvern spoke into the communic.
"I don't think you quite understand, Varsek. The situation has changed. You are now fairly well isolated. There's been enough killing. Surrender and we'll see that you get a fair trial at Uryx."
"You won't live to go anywhere," Varsek snarled. He began to talk to others who apparently were in the room with him, out of range of the pick-up. "Why the hell doesn't the fleet move? I ordered them. Order them again, and prepare a projectile, Type Two—What are you waiting for?"
"Sir," said a voice, "have you noticed the disposition of the destroyer squadrons?"
"What of them?"
"They're between us and the target. All of them. The commanders request that you surrender. They say there will be no more Type Twos used on men of Uryx."
Varsek spoke into the communic. "Clear the way," he said. "I'll ride over you and smash you. I command this fleet." He pulled his side-arm from its holster and turned around. "As for you—I thought you were loyal to me. I handpicked you, and this is how you repay me! I order you to prepare a projectile—"
A hard matter-of-fact voice said, "You pushed it too far this time, Varsek. You're one man against a fleet. We have been loyal, but you're not the commander any more."
A stunner beam caught Varsek from the back before he could turn around. He fell below the focus of the screen, and the face of another man replaced his.
The man said, "Varsek has surrendered."
There was a long silence in the command ship. Then the men began to cheer and other voices came over the communics, cheering, and only Makvern turned away so that no one could see his face.
Later, after Makvern had made his speech to the fleet, taking over as commander, he said to Wyatt,
"This is where we part. We go home, to put a stop to this looting and pillaging—it's time Uryx grew up and became an empire to be proud of rather than a nest of outlaws. And you can go home too, knowing that Earth will sleep safe tonight."
Brinna stepped forward. "And what about me?"
"I have that planned," said Makvern sternly. "You'll learn about it in good time."
Wyatt smiled, but did not say anything.
He had no chance to say anything later on, when the ship had landed on the desert near the mesa and Makvern and Brinna had shaken hands with him for the last time, standing on the cool sand in the moonlight at the foot of the ship's ladder. Makvern had moved so quickly while Brinna was occupied with her farewells that she did not realize he was already in the lock and the ladder drawn up until it was too late to follow him. He looked down at her and grinned, and said,
"This seemed to be the best solution to your problem, Brinna. It'll be a long time before Earthmen get into space, and by then you'll be too old to make trouble and I'll be too old to care."
"You mean you're leaving me here?" she shrieked.
"In the care of Wyatt, a brave and stubborn man. Goodbye. And clear away now, we're taking off."
Wyatt hauled the temporarily speechless Brinna to a safe distance. She watched the ship take off into the starry sky and Wyatt did not dare say anything then.
He wasn't at all sure he had made a good bargain. But he was determined to make the best of it.
He started out by kissing her.
After a long enough time, she stopped fighting.