The Insurrection

Everything I said then still holds true." "I know you think it does, Willis," Enwright said. "You may even be right. God knows I don't want to go down in history as the first Navy commander to fire on other Ter-rans! But I don't see that we have any choice. If Bigelow

Skyatch isn't in rebel hands, it's going to need all the help it can get, and the same is true of the Fleet base, the repeaair yards in Killiman--the entire cluster, for that matter.

"Admiral, please," Enwright's voice was urgent, "send in a few destroyers first. Find out what's happening before we barge in in force. The cans will have the entire task force behind them--and they can say so. That should stop any itchy trigger fingers long enough for a parley." "With respect, Admiral," Rivera said harshly, "I think that would be a mistake. If Bigeiow Skywatch is still loyal, it could touch off the very incident Captain Enwright wants to avoid.

Take the entire task force. Show them the odds, and they'll cave in." "Don't delude yourself, Commander," Enwright said colby. "If these people've gone this far, they're readv to go further. The actual presence of the task force won't achieve anything except to up the stakes for everyone!" "Perhaps," Forsythe said softly, "but if the entire task force is there, we can be certain anything that happens is over quickly, Willis." His heart ached at his flag captain's look of desolation.

"Face it, Willis," he said gently. "We can't afford delays. There's no way to keep this quiet--we can't even try to; we need to warn the other Fleet bases, warn the government, warn everyone--and the word is bound to leak. We need to be certain a resolution follows the news as quickly as possible, or other Fringe Worlds will be tempted to follow suit. You know that as well as I do." Enwright looked away from the thin, troubled face with the wise old eyes. Yes, he thought, some of the other Outworlds will follow suit if the Kontravians aren't stopped. But this is the wrong way to do it. He knew it was the wrong way. Or did he? Was that the TFN officer in him, or was it the Fringer? His intellect, or the confusion of his loyalties? He looked back.

"Please, sir. Talk to them first." "I'll talk to them, Willis." Steel showed through For-sythe's compassionate tone. "But from the flag bridge of this ship with the task force behind me." He rose, termi-rating the meeting.

"Gentlemen, check your departments.

I want a complete status report in one hour. We will then formulate our precise plans." His staff saluted and left. Willis Enwright walked slowly to the hatch and paused, then turned back to his admiral, his face older than his years.

"Sir, what if they don't surrender? What will you do ff they fight?" "Do, Willis?" Forsythe felt the cold of interstellar space blow down his spine. "I'll honor my oath to defend and preserve the Constitution -comany way I must." "You'll open fire, then," Enwright sid almost inaudibly. "If I must," Forsythe said steadily.

"But consider this, I beg of you. What you see as a personal choice may not seem like one to others." He seemed to be trying to tell Forsythe something, but the old admiral was too worried and heartsick to hunt for the meaning.

"I understand that, but I don't have an option. No one can ask more of any man than that he do his duty as he sees it." He shook his head sadly. "No matter how painful it is." "Yes, sir. I hope we all remember that," Enwright said quietly. Then he drew himself up and gave Forsythe the sharpest salute the admiral had ever seen from him. He stepped through the hatch, and it closed behind him.

DUTY "Captain Enwright and Admiral Forsythe are both dead.t" The gasping words came hoarse over the com cha

'I'hey're all dead on flag bridge!" the voice went on desperately. "There's fighting evereavwhere... crew quarters... officer country... power rooms... We need help, for God's sake! We--was The snarl of a laser pistol slashed across the words and the voice went silent. The blinking light codes on Windrider's fire control screens chilled his blood, and his hands clenched on the gu

Jason Bluefield Windrider couldn't believe it. No, he told himself grimly, he could believe it; he just didn't want to. Mutiny was an obscenity to a man like him, but he understood the mutineers. Not long ago, some of them would have been guests in his quarters, discussing the crisis, wondering where their true duty lay. It seemed they'd decided aboard Anderson.

He looked into the strained faces of his control team. They knew what was happening aboard the flagshipbut what could thev do about it? For that matter, what could he do? He and ('is ratings sat at the very. core of a tremendous hull, 285,000 to

The communicators muttered, ghostly voices blurring in his battlephone implant as frantic commanders conferred, afraid to expose their i

And that was their true curse, Windrider thought savagely. Navy training and their own inclinations forced them to act. They weren't politicians (the word was a vicious epithet in his thoughts) who could confer and debate and duck responsibility. When you put on Navy black and silver, you put your judgment on the spot. "An imperfect response now is a thousand times better than recognizing the perfect response too late." That was what the Academy taught but there were only imperfect responses to this!

Windrider shook his head angrily. The universe was crumbling before his eyes and he was philosophizing? Yet what else could he do?

But now its hungry breath was in his face, hot and stinking as a pseudopuma's.

It wasn't fair! Hadn't the bureaucrats known? were they so blind to human needs and loyalties they hadn't even considered what might happen out here?

But of course they had. That was why the Marine contingents aboard the transports consisted almost entirely of I

Yet the politicos had miscalculated, he thought grimly. They'd guessed at the hatred they were about to unleash, but not how quickly the flames would erupt. Their pla

Besides, the Navy's monumental dependability was the bedrock of the Federation; it had never occurred to them that the Fringers in the Fleet might be as conscious of planetary loyalties as any Corporate Worlder. So they hadn't "sanitized" the Fleet as they had the ground forces.

Perhaps they couldn't have, really, given the high proportion of Outworlders in the Fleet. Only a few ships had "reliable" I

Faced with the unfaceable, Enwright had acted, Forsythe had reacted, and laser fire had gutted Anderson's flag deck. But they were only the first casualties; WJ-NDRIDER could already taste the blood to come, and it sickened him.