Zach Hughes - For Texas and Zed

Ironically, it was good Empire metals which went into the forges at the Blink Space Works to turn out armaments at a pace which had every available worker on overtime. Within a year, every spaceworthy hull under the Texas flag would be armed with a minimum of one Darlene space rifle, but no one was sure that Texas would be allowed a year.

The growing makeshift fleet trained in near space. Scouts ranged into the galaxy, watching for movement of a large Empire fleet toward the rim.

Lex's hole in the head was healing. He was on his feet, still in hospital, given the freedom of the place. He visited Arden Wal, still under observation, and upon walking into the room stopped in mid-stride.

She was dressed in professional whites and she looked even more beautiful than he remembered.

"Hello, Lex."

"Emily."

"I've been meaning to drop in," she said, "but we've been so busy."

The surge of pure joy in him drove out all else. He forgot, for the moment, that it was because of him that Texas was preparing to fight for its life. He forgot the years of loneliness out there in the Empire. She had changed so little, except that she was wearing her hair differently.

He walked toward her, oblivious of the curious look from Wal. His arms went out. She, with complete poise, met him, embraced him in a sisterly way, pushed him back. "My, you're a man now."

It was then, with her hands on his arms, holding him f at arm's length, that he saw the ring. She noted the change of expression. "Yes, I've chosen. He's a doctor. I want you to meet him."

The sun which had begun to glow in his heart died. "Yeah, sure." He swallowed. "Well, sure is nice to see you again, Emily. Hope I didn't break in on anything."

"Oh, no. In fact, I'm glad you stopped by. Captain Wal is very much disturbed. He seems to think that it's his fault Texas is threatened. I've been telling him that the transmitter in your instrument was much more powerful than the one in his, that his seems to be intended for purely local use."

Lex wasn't listening. He stayed a decent interval, said comforting things to Wal, then left to go out of the hospital without permission and get drunk for the first time in his life. Really drunk. Forgetting, falling-down drunk.

When he awoke, back in his room, he had no idea how he had arrived there, but he knew a dead dream when he met one face to face and kicked himself mentally for letting it get to him, because he'd always known that it was nothing more than a dream, that she was older, that the way things were she'd surely choose a man of her own age, probably a man in her own field of interest. But a dream dies hard, especially a dream which had sustained him through the years of Empire service, when he was so much alone.

A visit from Billy Bob, in the uniform of a lower officer of the fleet, helped in a small way, but his release from hospital helped more and then a silent, solitary run into the desert on Zelda cleared away the last of the hospital smells from his nostrils. He came home on Zelda , flying low and fast, knowing that it was time to stop mooning over girls and start helping Texas. He joined the continuing conference in the big house and was questioned by the Admiral and the Rangers about fleet tactics in the Empire.

He had already dictated all he knew. "I think you'd do better to talk with Captain Wal," he said. "He's spent his life learning fleet tactics."

"I realize that he's your friend," Murichon said, "but he's still Empire."

"Ex-Empire," Lex said. "He came here to escape a sure death sentence and now he's learned that he was never a trusted officer of the Empire, as he'd believed all his life. This thing about the thought monitor has hithim hard. He feels that he was betrayed when it was implanted. He thinks that every officer in the fleet must have such a unit, which makes someone very, very powerful. He was a Fleet Captain, which is a pretty high rank. There are only six active grades above that. I think he's fed up with a system which feels that it has to extend some form of secret control down through the higher ranks to include a man who is capable of direction of the operation of a full fleet He'll fight with us, Dad. I know he will."

"He couldn't go into space with that thing still in his head," Admiral Reds said. "He'd be spotted from a distance, assuming there are monitoring devices on the flagship, or whatever. He'd become a prime target, in addition to endangering others."

"But he can tell you more about Empire tactics than any man on Texas," Lex said. "And I'd also suggest you give both Jakkes and Form an opportunity to serve. Jakkes knows as much about the beam and ray weapons as anyone I know and Form can talk specifics about Empire power plants."

"We have, of course, questioned your friends," Reds said.

"But have you treated them as friends? Have you allowed them to act on good faith rather than as suspected aliens?" Lex asked.

"They are aliens," Andy Gar said. "And, I might add, the first to be on Texas soil since you brought home that Empire girl who started all of this."

"That's a little unfair, Andy," Murichon said calmly. "We've always faced the possibility of the Empire tracking us home. We all knew it would happen sooner or later."

"Sorry, boy," Gar said. "I don't like the idea of losing good men in an unnecessary fight, that's all."

"I'm going to be fighting, too," Lex said, but he wasn't quite sure that would be enough. No matter what his father said he blamed himself for the crisis and he was just one man. He could not, alone, face the danger which his actions had brought down on Texas.

He attended a briefing session. The fleet captains were there and the speaker was Arden Wal. Wal was not in uniform. His small stature had called for clothing in sizes not available except in children's stores and he was dressed in teenage blue jeans.

"You can be sure, gentlemen," Wal told the group, "that it will be done by the book. The fleet discourages initiative. One of three planetary approach plans will be used, and my guess is, depending on the fleet commander assigned to the expedition, that it will be one of two, for you yourselves left in Lex's brain the information regarding population and industrial capacity of your planet. The fleet will approach with confidence, emerging into. space about here—" He pointed with a baton. "—to form in lines for maximum deployment of firepower. They will not, at first, think of attacking the planet directly, since the planet is the prize. They want it intact with its agricultural capacity. Their detectors are quite good enough to spot any and all ships lying in wait for them, but they are not equipped with that rather marvelous double-blink generator which your people have developed. I would suggest that the strike be made during or slightly before the final blink brings the fleet into formation. It will not be necessary to destroy the entire fleet—"

"Question," said Admiral Reds. "Why do you say that? That we shouldn't destroy the entire fleet?"

Wal was not rattled. "One, for humanitarian reasons, Admiral. Two, should you show such overwhelming strike power, the ability to destroy an entire fleet without losses, the Empire will, to put it plainly, be scared shitless. The brass back at Empire central might declare Texas to be a galactic threat: In which case, the next strike would be made from deep space with planet-killing missiles. I need not remind you that one missile, getting through the first line of defense, is enough."

"So your thinking is to show just enough power to drive the fleet away," Reds asked. "But wouldn't that

assure another attempt in greater force?"

"The Empire won't give up easily," Wal said. "But you will buy time, and you will confine the war to space, rather than escalate it into planetary stages."