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auxiliary seats along the walls were occupied.
The vacant chair was directly behind Pakkpekatt, who was seated in the
middle along one side of the oblong table. Lando opted to leave the
chair vacant, settling instead for standing in front of the panels
where the ship's history was recounted.
"We can begin now," Pakkpekatt said, indirectly acknowledging Lando's
presence. "I'd like the report from the tracking team first. Keep it
succinct."
"Yes, sir," said a slender officer seated to Lando's right. "Close
approach was twelve-point-zero-zero-one kilometers. Initial target
response occurred point-eight seconds after close approach and lasted
six seconds.
Secondary target response occurred six seconds later--" "Not long on
patience, are they," Lando said.
Two officers laughed, then immediately looked sheepish.
"--and resulted in an aborted jump of two-point-eight kilometers along
the flight vector."
"Nor am I, as a rule, General Calrissian. If you could confine your
comments to matters germane to this meeting--" "I think the quick
trigger these folks have shown is absolutely one hundred percent
germane," Lando said. "Whatever the meaning of that signal we all
heard, they don't wait very long for the right response on our part.
We'd better be awfully sure of ourselves the next time we cross that
line."
"Thank you for your thoughts, General," Pakkpe-katt said in a decidedly
ungrateful tone. "Was there anything else, Agent Jiod?"
The slender officer shook his head. "Only that by
all appearances, the hyperspace entry and exit of the target were
indistinguishable from those of a ship equipped with our standard Class
Two fusion engine and motivator."
"Very good," Pakkpekatt said, glancing meaningfully at Lando. "Report
of the scanning team, please."
"There were a total of twenty-eight distinct variances and events
detected by the combined sensor array during the encounter. The six
we've been able to identify ..."
Leaning his broad back against the plaque, Lando suffered silently
through six more reports before Pakkpekatt called for the one which
most concerned him.
"Foray commander, your report on team readiness."
The foray commander, Bijo Hammax, was one of the few officers under
Pakkpekatt's command for whom Lando still had any respect after a
month's exposure.
Technically astute and mentally tough, Bijo had been a member of the
Narvath underground and fought with the Alliance regulars through the
last year of the Rebellion.
"The team is as ready as can be," Bijo said, standing slowly. "We've
identified two suspected hatchways and a couple of candidate sites in
case we have to cut our way in. Of course, we'll take active soundings
right off the hull as soon as we have the cofferdam up, and be ready to
adjust accordingly. I'Ve got one man down with a cold and not fit for
work in a suit, but that shouldn't affect our ability to do the job."
"Have you isolated this sick man from the rest of your team?"
"He isolated himself, at the first symptoms," said Bijo.
"Can I assume that you'd have no problem being ready for a go order at
fifteen hundred hours tomorrow?"
"None at all, Colonel."
"Thank you." As Bijo sat down, Pakkpekatt
turned toward the other end of the room. "General Calrissian, what
can you tell us about the vagabond's hailing signal?"
Lando was taken by surprise at being called on. "I can tell you that
it's a dual-frequency carrier, modulating up to a thousand times a
second. I can tell you that the data capacity is at least fifty
thousand units, and could be ten times that. And I can tell you that
we still don't know if they're saying 'Halt or I'll shoot' or 'Welcome
to the Cold Space Bazaar, transmit credit information immediately."
Have your people had any better luck?"
Pakkpekatt looked down the table for an answer.
"Er, the contact protocol team believes that the signal recorded by the
Hrasskis and in today's contact was an automated collision alarm," a
young rating said, his voice touched by nervousness. "In our opinion,
it has no informational content. It's simply meant to be heard loudly
and clearly, no matter what sort of communications receivers an
approaching ship might use."
Lando walked forward to the table and leaned down to rest his weight on
it. "Are you saying that the vagabond jumped to avoid a collision that
was never going to happen?"
"You have another explanation, General?"
"How about that it was trying to get away from US?"
"Do you think the target didn't know we were here until the intercept
took place?"
"No, I--" "Then why would the target wait until now to try to get
away?"
"I'll give you three answers for the price of one," Lando said.
"Because some animals freeze first when a predator's nearby. Because
until now, we hadn't made any aggressive moves. And because we flunked
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