Harry Harrison - To The Stars 3 - Starworld

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Harry Harrison
Book Three - STARWORLD
One
The battered freighter had been on fusion drive ever since it had passed the
orbit of Mars. It was pointed at Earth~r rather at the place where the Earth
would be in a few hours time. All of its electronic apparatus had been either
shut down or was operating at the absolute minimum output-behind heavy
shielding. The closer they came to Earth the greater their chance of
detection. And their instant destruction.
"We're taking the war to them," the political commander said. Before the
revolution he had been a professor of economics at a small university on a
distant planet; the emergency had changed everything.
"You don't have to convince me," Blakeney said. "I was on the committee that
ordered this attack. And I'm not happy with the discrimination target program.
"I'm not trying to convince. I'm just enjoying the thought. I had family on
Teoranta..."
"They're gone," Blakeney said. "The planet's gone. You have to forget them."
"No. I want to remember them. As far as I am concerned this attack is being
launched in their memory. And in memory of all the others savaged and
destroyed by Earth down through the centuries. We're fighting back at last.
Taking the war to them."
"I'm still concerned about the software."
"You worry too much. One single bomb has to be dropped on Australia. How can
you miss an island that big, an entire continent?"
"I'll tell you exactly how. When we release the scout ship it will have our
velocity and will accelerate from that basic speed. The computer cannot make a
mistake because there will be time for only a single pass. Do you realize what
the closing velocity will be? Tremendous!" He took out his calculator and
began punching in figures. The ship's commander raised his hand.
"Enough. I have no head for mathematics. I know only that our best people
modified the scout ship for this attack. The DNA-constructed virus will eat
and destroy any food crop. You yourself prepared the program to pilot the
ship, to locate the target, to drop the bomb. They'll know it's war then."
"It's because I worked on the program that I am unsure. Too many variables.
I'm going down for another test run.
"Do that. I'm perfectly secure, but please yourselL But watch the time. Only a
few hours more. Once we penetrate their detection net it will have to be hit
and run with no staying around to watch the results."
"It won't take long," Blakeney said, turning and leaving the bridge.
Everything has been jury-rigged, he thought as he went down the empty
corridors of the ship. Even the crew. An unarmed freighter daring to attack
the heart of the Earth Commonwealth. But the plan was wild enough to work.
They had been building up speed ever since they had shut down the space drive,
well outside the orbit of Mars. The ship should hurtle past Earth and be
safely away before tlie defenders could launch a counterattack. But as they
passed the planet the small scout ship they carried, secured to the outer
hull, would be launched under computer control. This was what worried him. All
the circuitry was breadboarded, lashed together, a complicated one-shot. If it
failed the entire mission failed. He would have to go through all of the tests
just one last time.
The tiny spacecraft, smaller even than a normal lifeboat, was secured to the
outer hull by steel braces equipped with explosive bolts. A crawl tube had
been fixed in place so that the scout ship shared the larger ship's
atmosphere, making installation and servicing that much easier. Blakeney
slipped in through the tube, then frowned at the circuits and apparatus bolted
onto the walls of the tiny cabin. He turned on the screen, punched up the
inspection menu and began running through the tests.
On the bridge an alarm sounded hoarsely and a series of numbers began marching
across the watch operator's screen. The political commander came and looked
over his shoulder.
"What does it mean?" he asked.
"We've crossed their detection web, probably the outermost one from Earth."
"Then they know we're here?"
"Not necessarily. We're on the plane of the ecliptic
"Translation?"
"The imaginary plane, the level on which all of the planets in the solar
system ride. Also all of the meteororic debris. We're too far out for them to
have caught any radiation from the ship so we're just another hunk of
spacejunk, a ferrous meteor. Now. The web's alerted to us and more apparatus
will be trained in our direction. Laser, radar, whatever they have. At least
it should work like that. We'll find out soon. We're recording all their
signals. When we get back we'll have a record of everything. When it's
analyzed we'll know a good deal more about how their setup works."
When, the political commander thought, not ij~ Nothing wrong with the morale.
But there was another half to this mission. The virus strike. He looked at the
time readout and called through to the scout ship.
"We're entering the red zone now. Less than half an hour to separation. How
are you doing?"
"Just finishing up. As soon as I clear this program I'll join you.
"Good. I want you to...
"Pulsed radar locked onto us!" the watch operator called out. "They know we're
here." An auxiliary screen lit up near his elbow and he pointed to the
readout. "Our reflectors have been launched. So where they had one blip on
their screens before they now have a half dozen all the same, but separating
at different speeds on different courses.
"They won't know which one is the real ship?"
"Not at the moment. But they know what we've done and they'll start analyzing
course predictions, forward and back in time. They'll spot the real one. But
by the time their computers have worked that out, ours will have initiated
other defenses. It's a good program. Written by the best physicists and
comptechs."
The political commander was less than reassured by the operator's reasoning.
He did not like to think that his life depended on the non-random dispersal of
magnetic charges and electrons that made up the program. Playing an
intellectual game with the enemy computers. He looked out at the tiny sparks
of the stars, the growing disc of the Earth, and tried to imagine the web of
light beams and radio waves surging around them. He could not. He had to take
it on faith that they were there and working at speeds infinitely beyond his
own. A human being could not fight a battle in space. The machines did that.
The crew were just captive spectators. His hands were clenched tightly behind
his back, though he was not aware of it.
There was a series of stiiall thudding sounds, more felt than heard, followed
by an explosion that actually shook the deck beneath his feet.
"We've been hit!" he called out unthinkingly.
"Not yet." The watch operator glanced at his screens. 'All of our remaining
dupes and reflectors have been launched, then the scout ship. Mission
accomplished-but now we have to get out of here. Fusion drive cut... space
drive circuits now energized. As soon as the gravity fields allow we'll be on
our way.
The political commander's eyes widened at a sudden thought; he turned sharply
about.
"Where's Blakeney?" he called out. But no one on the bridge had heard him.
They were counting the seconds, waiting for the missiles that must have surely
been launched in their direction.
The political commander felt a sudden arrow of despair. He knew where Blakeney
was.
He had been right, absQlutely right! And they called themselves comptechs.
They couldn't write a program to win at tic-tac-toe. Orbital mechanics, fine,
simple trig and geometry and calculus. Child's play. But comparison plane
orientation was apparently well beyond them.
Blakeney watched with satisfaction for less than a second while the cursor on
the computer roved all over the highly amplified image of Earth-then froze on
the great sweep of a circular storm over Europe. He switched on the override
and put his finger on the screen, on the only bit of Australia clear of the
cloud cover of a tropical storm. When the glowing blob of the cursor jumped to
this spot he typed in POSITIVE IDENTIFICATION and took his finger away. At
least the moronic thing could be counted upon to stay there once orientated.
None too early. The engine note changed as the course shifted, just moments
later. Good. He followed the program display, then unlocked the launching
switch as they hurtled toward the top of the atmosphere, ready to release
manually if there were any more difficulties.
There were none. At the same instant that zero appeared on the screen the
ejection mechanism thudded heavily. As the ship arced slowly away to avoid the
outer traces of atmosphere, the heavy ceramic container was hurtling toward
Earth. He knew what would be happening next; this thing at least had been well
designed. Layer after layer of ablative material would burn away as it
impacted on the thickening air. It would grow hot-and slow down-with the
frozen virus locked safely into the cryogenic flask inside. Then a layer of
ceramic would fall away to reveal an opening for the air to enter, to impact
on a pressure gauge inside.
At exactly 10,769 meters, in the middle of the jet stream, the explosive
charge would explode releasing the contents of the flask.
The wind would carry the virus across Australia, perhaps to New Zealand as
well-a carefully designed virus that would attack and destroy any and all of
the food crops grown on Earth.
Blakeney smiled at the thought as the missile hit.
It had an atomic warhead so that, to the watchers below, there was suddenly a
new sunjust visible through the douds.
Two
The TWA jet had left New York a few hours after dar~. As soon as it had
reached its cruising altitude it had gone supersonic and cut a booming path
straight across the United States. About the time it was crossing Kansas the
western sky had grown light as the Mach 2.5 craft caught up with the setting
sun. The sun was well above the horizon again when they lost altitude over
Arizona, and the passengers who had seen one sunset in New York City now
witnessed a far more colorful one over the Mojave desert.
Thurgood-Smythe squinted into the glare then opaqued his window. He was going
through the notes of the emergency meeting that had been hurriedly called at
the UN and had no eyes either for the glories of the sunset or the massed
technology of Spaceconcent opening up before him. His attache case rested on
his knees with the flat VDU screen pulled out of its slot. The figures, names,
dates marched steadily across the screen, stopping only when he touched the
keyboard to correct any transcription errors made by the speech recorder. It
had been programmed for his voice, but still substituted one for von a good
deal of the time. He made the corrections automatically, still taken aback by
the momentous changes and the immense gravity of the situation. What had
happened was unbelievable, impossible. But happened it had.
There was a jar as they touched down, then he was thrust forward against the
safety harness as the engines reversed. The screen and keyboard disappeared at
the touch of a button; the dark window cleared and he looked out at the white
towers of the space center, now washed with glowing ochre by the sun. He was
the lirst passenger off the plane.
Two uniformed guards were waiting for him; he nod~ded at their snappy salutes.
Nothing was said, nor did they ask for identification. They knew who he was,
knew also that this was an unscheduled flight arrangeA for his benefit.
Thurgood-Smythe's beaklike nose and lean, hard features had been made familiar
by the news reports. His short-cropped white hair appeared severely military
compared to the longer-haired styles currently in fashion. He looked exactly
what he was; someone in charge.
Auguste Blanc was standing at the ceiling-high window, his back turned, when
Thurgood-Smythe came in. As Director of Spaceconcent his office was naturally
on the top floor of the tallest administration building. The view was
impressive; the sunset incomparable. The mountains on the horizon were
purple-black, outlined against the red of the sky. All of the buildings and
the towering spaceships were washed by the same fiery color. The color of
blood; prophetic perhaps. Nonsense! A cough cut through Auguste Blanc's
thoughts and he turned to face Thurgood-Smythe.
'A good flight, I sincerely hope," he said, extending his hand. A thin,
delicate hand, as finally drawn as his features. He had a title, a very good
French one, but he rarely used it. The people he needed to impress, such as
Thu rgood-Smythe, took no heed of such things. ThurgoodSmythe nodded sharply,
impatient for the formalities to be out of the way.
"But tiring nevertheless. A restorative, then? Something to drink, to relax?"
"No thank you, Auguste. No, wait, a Perrier. If you please."
"The dry air of the airship. Not humidified as we of course do in the spacers.
Here you are." He passed over the tall glass, then poured an Armagnac for
himself. Without turning about, as though ashamed of what he was saying, he
spoke into the bottles of the cocktail cabinet. "Is it bad? As bad as I have
heard?"
"I don't know what you have heard." Thurgood-Smythe took a long drink from his
glass. "But I can tell you this, in all secrecy...
"This room is secure."
..... it is far worse than any of us thought. A debacle." He dropped into an
armchair and stared sightlessly into his glass. "We've lost. Everywhere. Not a
single planet remains within our control-"
"That cannot be!" The sophistication was gone and there was an edge of animal
fear in Auguste Blanc's voice. "Our deepspace bases, how could they be taken?"
"I'm not talking about those. They're unimportant. All of them on low-gravity,
airless moons. They aren't self-sufficient, they must be supplied regularly.
More of a handicap than an asset. They can't be attacked-but they can be
starved out. We're evacuating them all."
"You cannot! They are our foothold, the cutting edge of the blade for
conquest..
"They are our Achilles' heel, if you wish to continue this stupid simile."
There was no trace of politeness, no touch of warmth in Thurgood-Smythe's
voice now. "We need the transport and we need the men. Here is an order. See
that it goes out on the Foscolo net at once." He took a single sheet of paper
from his case and passed it over to the trembling director. "The debate is
done. Two days of it. This is the combined decision."
Auguste Blanc's hands were shaking in the most craven manner so that he had
difficulty reading the paper he grasped. But the director was needed. He was
good at his job. For this reason, and none other, Thurgood-Smythe spoke
quietly, considerately.
"These decisions are sometimes harder to make than to implement. I'm sorry,
Auguste. They left us no choice. The planets are theirs. All of them. They
planned well. Our people captured or dead. We have most of our space fleet
intact, there was no way they could get at them, though a few were sabotaged,
a few deserted. We're pulling back. A strategic withdrawal. A regrouping."
"Retreat." Spoken bitterly. "Then we have lost already."
"No. Not in the slightest. We have the spacers, and among them are the only
ships designed for military use. The enemy have freighters, tugs, a handful of
deserters. Many of their worlds already face starvation. While they are
thinking about survival we shall reinforce our defenses. When they try to
attack us they will certainly be defeated. Then, one by one, we will reoccupy.
You and I will probably not see the end, not in our time, but this rebellion
will eventually be stifled and crushed. That is what will be done."
"What must I do?" Auguste Blanc asked, still insecure.
"Send this command. It is a security order to all commanders to change codes.
I am sure that the old one is compromised by now."
Auguste Blanc looked at the incomprehensible series of letters and numbers,
then nodded. Encoding and decoding were a computer function and he neither
knew nor cared how they operated. He slid the sheet into the reader slot in
his desk top and tapped a series of commands on the keyboard. A few seconds
after he had done this the response sounded from the computer speakers.
"Command issued to all receivers listed. Response received from all receivers
listed. Communication code has been changed."
Thurgood-Smythe nodded when he heard this and put another sheet of paper onto
Auguste Blanc's desk.
"You will notice that the orders are issued in very general terms. The fleet
to be withdrawn to Earth orbit as soon as possible, all advanced bases to be
deactivated, the Lunar bases to be reinforced. As soon as enough transports
are available they will be used to ferry troops to the Earth-orbiting
colonies. They will be occupied in force. I have positive information that the
colonies' sympathies are with the rebels, not with their home world. And the
same thing will be done with orbital satellite stations. Do you have any
questions?"
"Will there be a shortage of food? I heard that we are going to go hungry. I
had my wife send in a large order for food but it was not filled. What does it
mean?"
The man is a coward-and a fool, Thurgood-Smythe thought to himself. Worried
about his failure to be a hoarder! I suppose that is a new word to him. And to
most people. They'll find out what it means when we shoot a few of them. For
hoarding, and spreading defeatist rumors as well.
"I'll tell you the truth," ThurgoodSmythe said aloud, "but I'm going to give
you a warning first. We are in a war, and morale is very important in wartime.
So people who spread false rumors, who attempt to hoard food depriving others
of their share-these people are aiding the enemy and they will be punished.
Punishment will be imprisonment and execution. Am I expressing myself clearly
enough for you?"
"Yes; I didn't really understand. I really am sorry, had no idea..."
The man was trembling again; Thurgood-Smythe tried not to let his distaste
show in his expression. "Very good. There will be no starvation on Earth-but
there will be shortages and rationing. We have always imported a certain
amount of prole food, but I don't think either of us will worry if their
rations are short. More important is the fact that a blight has destroyed all
of the Australian food crops for this growing season....
"Blight? All their crops... I don't understand."
"Mutated virus. Spread by bombing from space. Self-eliminating after a few
months but it will mean completely replanting all of the food crops with
imported seed."
"You must destroy them all! Criminal rebels-they are trying to starve us to
death!"
"Not really. They were just delivering a warning. It appears that in
enthusiasm for revenge some of our space commanders took individual actions.
At least two rebel planets have been effectively destroyed. The rebel reaction
was to send this ship to bomb Australia. It could just as easily have
decimated the entire world's food crops. It was a message. We of course took
out the attacking ship. But we have sent a return message agreeing to their
terms. Planetary bombings only of military targets."
"We must wipe them out, every single one of them," Auguste Blanc said,
hoarsely.
"We will. Our plan is a simple one. Withdraw all our forces to Earth orbit to
secure against any invasion or occupation of the space colonies and
satellites. Then selective reconquest of the planets, one by one. All of our
spacers are being fitted with weapons. The enemy have only a few ships manned
by traitors. They may have won these battles. We will win the war...
"Urgent report," the computer said. A sheet of paper emerged from the desk
top. Auguste Blanc looked at it then passed it over.
"It is addressed to you," he said.
Thurgood-Smythe read it quickly, then smiled.
"I ordered all reports of enemy ship movements to be screened and analyzed.
They need food more than we do. They have now sent a number of ships to
Halvm6rk. One of the largest food planets. I want those ships to land and load
completely. Then leave..."
"So we can capture them!" Auguste Blanc was exuberant, his earlier fears
forgotten for the moment. 'A genius of a plan, Thurgood-Smythe, may I
congratulate you. They brought this war upon themselves and now they will pay.
We will take the food and give them starvation in return."
"Exactly what I had in mind, Auguste. Exactly."
They smiled at each other with sadistic pleasure.
"They have only themselves to blame," ThurgoodSmythe said. "We gave them peace
and they gave us war. We will now show them the high price that must be paid
for that decision. When we are done with them there will be peace in the
galaxy forever. They have forgotten that they are the children of Earth, that
we built the commonwealth of planets for their sakes. They have forgotten what
it cost to terraform all of their planets to make them suitable for occupation
by mankind, the cost in lives and money. They have rebelled against our gentle
hand of rule. We shall now clench this hand into a fist and they shall be
punished. They started this rebellion, this war-but we will finish it."
Three
"You're going now," Alzbeta said. She spoke calmly, almost emotionlessly, but
her hands were clenched hard on Jan's. They stood in the shadow of a great
bulk grain carrier, one of the shining cylinders of metal that rose up high
behind them. He looked down into her gentle features and could find no words
to answer with; he simply nodded. The love in her face, the yearning there,
they were too much for him and he had to turn away.
It was the irony of life that after all his lonely years on this twilight
planet, now, married and a father-to-be, with a measure of peace and happiness
at last, now was the time he had to leave. But there were no alternatives. He
was the only one here who would fight for the rights of the people of this
agricultural world, who might possibly see to it that some day a complete and
decent society might grow on this planet. Because he was the only one on
Halvmo~rk who had been born on Earth and who knew the reality of existence
there and in the rest of the Earth Commonwealth. Halvmo~rk was a deadend world
now, where the inhabitants were agricultural slaves, working to feed the other
planets for no return other than their bare existence. In the present
emergency the rebel planets would expect them to keep on working as they
always had. Well they would farm still-but only if they could be free of their
planetary prison. Free to be part of the Commonwealth culture, free to have
their children educated-and finally free to change the stunted and artificial
society forced upon them by Earth. Jan knew that he would not be thanked, or
even liked, for what he was going to do. He would do it still. He owed it to
the generations to come. To his own child among others.
"Yes, we must leave now," he said.
"You are needed here." She did not want to plead with him, but it was in her
voice.
"Try to understand. This planet, big as it is to us, it's really only a very
small part of the galaxy. A long time ago I lived on Earth, worked there very
successfully, and was happy enough until I discovered what life was really
like for most of the people. I tried to help them-but that is illegal on
Earth. I was arrested for this, stripped of everything, then shipped out here
as a common laborer. It was that or death. Not too hard a choice. But while
the slow years passed here, the rebellion that I was a part of has succeeded.
Everywhere but on Earth. For the moment my work here is done, the corn has
been saved and will go out to the hungry planets. But now that we have fed the
rebellion I want to make sure that we share in the victory as well. Do you
understand? I must go. And it is time. The orbits have been calculated and
these ships will have to lift very soon.
Alzbeta looked steadfastly into Jan Kulozik's face as he spoke, memorizing
those thin, taut features. She put her arms about his wiry and hardmuscled
body then, pressing tight against it, so that the child within her was between
them, in the sheltered warmth of their bodies, clutching hard as though when
she released him she might never hold him again. It was a possibility she did
not consider, yet it was lurking just out of sight all of the time. There was
a war being fought among the alien stars and he was going to it. But he would
come back; that was the only thought she would let her brain hold on to.
"Come back to me," she whispered aloud, then pulled away from him, running
toward their home. Not wanting to look at him again, afraid that she would
break down and make him ashamed.
"Ten minutes," Debhu called out from the foot of the boarding ladder. "Let's
get aboard and strap in."
Jan turned and climbed up the ladder. One of the crewmen was waiting in the
airlock and he sealed the outer hatch as soon as they had passed through.
"I'm going to the bridge," Debhu said. "Since you've never been in space
you'll strap in on deck
"I've worked in free fall," Jan said.
The question was on Debhu's lips, but he never spoke it. Halvmdrk was a prison
planet. It no longer mattered why anyone should have been sent here. "Good,"
he finally said. "I can use you. We have lost a lot of trained men. Most of
the crew have never been in space before. Come with me to the bridge."
Jan found the operation a fascinating one. He must have arrived on Halvmo.(rk
in a ship very much like this one-but he had no memory of it. All he
remembered was a windowless prison cell on a spacer. And drugged food that
kept him docile and easily controlled. Then unconsciousness, to waken to find
the ships gone and himself a castaway. It had all happened far too many years
ago.
But this was very different. The ship they were aboard was identified only by
a number, as were all of the other tugs. It was a brute, built for power
alone, capable of lifting a thousand times its own mass. Like the other tugs
it lived in space, in perpetual orbit. To be used only once every four Earth
years when the seasons changed on this twilight planet. Then, before the
fields burned in summer and the inhabitants moved to the new winter
hemisphere, the ships would come for their crops. Deep spacers, spiderlike
vessels that were built in space for space, that could never enter a planet's
atmosphere. They would emerge from space drive and go into orbit about the
planet, only then unlocking from the great tubes of the bulk carriers they had
brought. Then it would be the time to use the tugs.
When the crews changed over the dormant, orbiting ships would glow wi~th life,
light and warmth as their power would be turned on, their stored air released
and warmed. They in their turn would lock to the empty bulk carriers and
carefully pull them from orbit, killing their velocity until they dropped into
the atmosphere below, easing them gently down to the surface:
The carriers were loaded now, with food to feed the hungry rebel planets.
Their blasting ascent was smooth, computer controlled, perfect. Rising up,
faster and faster through the atmosphere, out of the atmosphere, into the
eternal blinding sunlight of space. The computer program that controlled this
operation had been written by comptechs now centuries dead. Their work lived
after them. Radar determined proximity. Orbits were matched, gasjets flared,
great bulks of metal weighing thousands of tonnes drifted slowly together with
micrometric precision. They closed, touched, engaged, sealed one to the other.
'All connections completed," the computer said, while displaying the same
information on the screen. "Ready to unlock and transfer crew."
Debhu activated the next phase of the program. One after another the gigantic
grapples disengaged, sending shudders of sound through the tug's frame. Once
free of its mighty burden the tug drifted away, then jetted toward the deep
spacer that was now lashed to the cargo of grain. Gentle contact was made and
the airlock of one ship was sealed to the other. As soon as the connection was
complete the inner door opened automatically.
"Let's transfer," Debhu said, leading the way. "We usually remain while the
tugs put themselves into orbit and power down to standby status. Not this
time. When each ship is secure it is cleared to depart. Every one of them has
a different destination. This food is vitally needed."
A low buzzer was sounding on the bridge and one of the readouts was flashing
red. "Not too serious," Debhu said. "It's a grapple lock, not secured. Could
be a monitoring failure or dirt in the jaws. They pick it up when we drop
planetside. Do you want to take a look at it?"
"No problem," Jan said. "That's the kind of work I have been doing ever since
I came to this planet. Where are the suits?"
The tool kit was an integral part of the suit, as was the computer radio link
that would direct him to the malfunctioning unit where the trouble was. The
suit rustled and expanded as the air was pumped from the lock; then the outer
hatch swung open.
Jan had no time to appreciate the glory of the stars, unshielded now by any
planetary atmosphere. Their journey could not begin until he had done his
work. He activated the direction finder, then pulled himself along the handbar
in the direction indicated by the holographic green arrow that apparently
floated in space before him. Then stopped abruptly as a column of ice
particles suddenly sprang out of the hull at his side. Other growing pillars
came into being all around him; he smiled to himself and pushed on. The ship
was venting the air from the cargo. The air and water vapor froze instantly
into tiny ice particles as it emerged. The vacuum of space would dehydrate and
preserve the corn, lightening the cargo and helping to prevent the
interplanetary spread of organisms.
The frozen plumes were dying down and drifting away by the time he came to the
grapple. He used the key to open the cover of the control box and activated
the manual override. Motors whirred, he could feel their vibration through the
palm of his hand, and the massive jaws slowly ground apart. He looked closely
at their smooth surfaces, at what appeared to be an ice-crystaled clump of mud
flattened on one of them. He brushed it away and pressed the switch in the
control box. This time the jaws closed all the way and a satisfactory green
light appeared. Not the world's most difficult repair, he thought as he sealed
the box again.
"Return at once!" the radio squawked loudly in his ears, then went dead. No
explanation given. He unclipped his safety line and began to pull back in the
direction of the airlock.
It was closed. Locked. Sealed.
While he was still assimilating this incredible fact, trying to get a response
on his radio, he saw the reason.
Another deep spacer came drifting across their bow, reaction jets flaring,
magnetic grapples hurling toward them, trailing their cables. Clearly visible
on its side in the harsh sunlight was a familiar blue globe on white.
The flag of Earth.
For long seconds Jan just hung there, the sound of his heart pounding heavy in
his ears, trying to understand what was happening. It suddenly became obvious
when he saw the spacelock on the other ship begin to open.
Of course. The Earth forces weren't going to give up that easily. They were
out there, watching. They had observed the food convoy being assembled, had
easily guessed the destination. And Earth needed the food in these hulls just
as much as the rebel planets did. Needed it to eat-and as a weapon to starve
their opponents into submission. They c6uld not have it!
Jan's anger flared just as the first of the suited figures emerged and dropped
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HarryHarrisonBookThree-STARWORLDOneThebatteredfreighterhadbeenonfusiondriveeversinceithadpassedtheorbitofMars.ItwaspointedatEarth~rratherattheplacewheretheEarthwouldbeinafewhourstime.Allofitselectronicapparatushadbeeneithershutdownorwasoperatingattheabsoluteminimumoutput-behindheavyshielding.Theclos...

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Harry Harrison - To The Stars 3 - Starworld.pdf

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分类：外语学习 价格：5.9玖币 属性：110 页 大小：264.37KB 格式：PDF 时间：2024-12-19

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