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There was one problem, however, for the Mekinese skippers. When they engaged a ship from Kandar, they died. Still, no ship left the scene of the battle to report defeat. It was absolute and complete. It was not only a defeat. It was annihilation. The Mekinese fleet was destroyed to the last ship, even to the armed transports carrying bureaucrats and police to set up a new government on Kandar.
Then he heard artillery-fire over the communicator, and voices gasped that the Mekinese garrison was charging out of its highly-fortified encampment. Bors sent down a missile to break the back of the counter-attack. Then the communicator gave off the sound of gunfire and men in battle, and presently yells of triumph. He took the Horus away.
There was a murmur, which could not be said to be either agreement or disagreement. The king looked about him. "We cannot continue to fight!" he said sternly, "not unless we can defend Kandar which we can't as against the Mekinese main fleet. We were prepared to sacrifice our lives to earn respect for our world, and to leave a tradition behind us.
"Yes, sir," said a brisk voice. "The broadcast's right, sir?" "It is," said Bors. "You're mining the grid set-up. We'll blow it before we leave. There's no point in letting Mekin set down transports loaded with troops to punish innocent people because they heard the Mekinese accurately described. Make 'em land on rockets and there won't be so many landing." "Yes, sir. Will do, sir." A click.
But even Mekinese would not use such stupendous numbers of missiles against one ship unless that ship was famous; unless rumors and reports said that it was invincible and dangerous and the hope of oppressed peoples under Mekin. The Horus received very special attention. Then she vanished. At one instant she was in full career toward the fleet of enemies.
She couldn't put thirty-six missiles into space at one firing. She would have disappeared in atomic flame at the first exchange of fire. But the Mekinese were not so generous. They came up in full force loaded for bear. They obviously intended not a fight but an execution. Mekinese tactics depended heavily on fire-power of such superiority that any enemy was simply overwhelmed.
One actual fighting ship, he stipulated, would form part of this illusory space-navy. He volunteered the Horus for it. That ship would signal to the Mekinese when they arrived. It would make the king's proposal to surrender, on the Mekinese promise to spare the civilian population of Kandar.
The Mekinese will be here two days later." King Humphrey and Captain Bors's uncle stared at him. "And," said Bors, "the same source of information says there's a Mekinese cruiser waiting underwater off Cape Farnell to lob a fusion bomb at the fleet as it's ready to lift." King Humphrey said, "But nobody can possibly know that two liners will come tomorrow! One hopes so, of course.
He relaxed. Gwenlyn tried to read. She did not succeed. She was excessively nervous. Bors was not. The fleet re-formed itself well out from Kandar. It made for a rendezvous over a pole of the gas-giant planet which was the fourth planet from Kandar's sun. It was almost, but not quite in line with that yellow star toward the base, from which the Mekinese flotilla would come.
Bors and the others could see the rushing, shining flood of missiles as it poured through space upon the motionless targets. "There!" Bors pointed. "The king's ship's breaking out! Away over at the edge. I wonder if the Mekinese will notice!" There were very tiny sparkles off at the side of the radar-screen. They increased in number.
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