"Believe me, Miriam," he said in his most winning voice, "you'll never be mistaken for part of the furniture. And I'm grateful to Ian for giving me an out for including you in the discussion. Now, where was I?

Oh, yes, the effect of Second Zephrain on the Innerworlds. You see, the rebels were already on the defensive, but the Innerworlds didn't really realize it. The insiders knew, of course; why should the rebels come to us anymore? They already had everything they wanted in Innerwodd space. So they reverted to a holding stance and turned their attention in your direction, and there wasn't a lot we could do about iSo, especially not now that the rebel yards appear to be keeping pace with their losses in everything but heavy battle-line units. Now, however, they've run slap into your new technologies, and it's clear the new developments give the Rim a tremendous combat advantage. But that advantage doesn't apply to the Innerworlds, because there's no way to send us the data through Orion space. Oh, our RandD efforts have been spurred, of course but so have the rebels', and, for that matter, the Orions'. In engineering matters, knowing for certain that a given thing can be done is half the battle. But even so, RandD takes time.

"So the cabinet and admiralty have decided to make the time lag in development an asset rather than a liability. They've decided on a coordinated attack to open up a corridor between the Rim and the rest of the Federation now, while only the Rim has the new weapons. The purposes, of course, are manifold, but one of the obvious ones is to hit the rebels before they have time to develop the same weapons and, simultaneously, to get actual samples of the technology into Innerwodd hands. Once we can apply Innerworld industrial capacity to turning out the new weapons you've already developed, we'll be able to put an end to this war.

"And that, to answer your question, is why I'm here: to coordinate this end of Operation Yellowbrick, the campaign to reunite the loyal segments of the Federation." "But..." Miriam paused. "Excuse me.

I may be a Navy brat, but I'm also about as unmilitary a person as you re ever likely to meet. Still, it occurs to me that there are a dozen rebel-held systems on the most direct warp line between Zephrain and the Innerwodds, aren't there?" "Thirteen, to be exact," Sanders replied.

"Yes, I know that sounds like a lot of systems to blast your way through. But if we attack from both ends simultaneously.., well, I've lost most of my initial skepticism now that I've seen this ship. I knew about her in a general way, but nothing I'd heard or read quite prepared me for the impact.

How many Nelsons do you have?" "Six. Four more in a month or so," Trevayne responded absently. He'd taken on a thoughtful, brooding look while the other man had been speaking. - Sanders' well-schooled features hid his astonishment. Ten of these leviathans, constructed and manned by a thinly-populated region like the Rim! Trevayne was right: these people were... formidable.

Miriam puffed on her cigarette and looked worried.

Abruptly Trevayne looked up, and the introspective look was gone.

"Yes," he said. "I agree. It can be done.

And this damned deadlock is going to continue as long as the Federation is split into two parts, neither strong enough to scotch the rebellion. Every month of delay will only create a greater subliminal acceptance of the status quo by everyone involved. So when is our offensive scheduled to begin?" "The details are in my subconscious, to be retrieved under deep hypnosis by means of... a certain trigger word I'll tell you how to obtain later." Cautious habits die hard. "But it' about three standard months from now." "Three months! Bloody hell, man! D'you realize what's involved? Nobody in history's ever tried to mount a sustained offensive through this many warp connectionsl The supply problem alone... we'll have to commandeer half the bleeding freighters in the Rim just to haul ammunition! And I don't suppose you have detailed information on the defenses we'll encounter along the way, now do you? I INSVPECTIO certaingg'y.dofft] And no bloody way to get it, either--you can only send probes so far, you know." "Ah, but think of the incentive you have: getting rid of me]" Sanders beamed innocently at them. "Not wishing to belabor the obvious, I haven't mentioned that I'm your permanent guest until we fight our way back to the Innerworids. After all, it's out o pounds the question for me to go back through Orion space now that they know approximately what your new weapons can do. I may be a techni-cai near-figg'iterate, but I have seen sggme of what you've got at first hand. Leornak would hate it, but he'd have to arrange an "accident" and go back to drinking domestic Orion booze!" Trevayne laughed. Miriam smoked her cigarette and glanced back and forth between the two men, very thoughtfully.

There s little leisure for anyone after their arrival at Xanadu. The welter of details inundated them so completely that it was several days before Trevayne and Sanders could sit privately in Trevayne's office discussing his plans for a final fleet operational exercise.

"Are you sure you won't come along? I can promise you quite a show." "Thank you, Ian, but the trip out here was all the spacing I can handle for a while at my age." Trevayne snorted. If Sanders had been much younger he wouldn't have left him on the same planet with Miriam.

"No, seriously," Sanders insisted. "I've been chronically @u fatigued lately. I think I'm still having trouble with this twenty-nine-hour day. One loses one's adaptability in such things, you know. Still, I wouldn't have missed this for the Galaxy. I was getting bored with Old Terra and the cabi- net, not necessarily in that order." Trevayne was quiet for a moment, regarding his blotter with pursed lips as ff the mention of the cabinet had started a new train of thought. When he looked up, he spoke with some hesitancy.

"Kevin, if you don't mind my asking... how well do you know Prime Minister Dieter?" "Personally? Hardly at all. He's not an easy man to know. Why?"

"Oh, I was just wondering what you think of him." "Or," Sanders grinned, "put another way, how did the man responsible for the mess wind up as prime minister? Actually, it was pretty much a matter of elimination; every other Corporate World delegate was too discredited, and we're just damned lucky he was available. He's had to accept a pretty broad spectrum of ministers-- all the way from Amanda Sydon as Treasury. Minister to Roger Hadad from Old Terra as Foreign Minister but he combined Defense with the premiership, and that gave him a leg up. By now, he's firmly in control and shaping up very nicely." Sanders shrugged.

'lat's one" of' his great strengths, you know: he's a detail man. And his other strength is his ability to face new realities squarely... not an easy thing to do, but, then, he's had a lot of experience since the MaeTaggart assassination. Now that he's learned how, he's very much in the mainstream tradition of the Federation, of course. You know the Federation has never been a monolithic ideological state. Centralized, yes, but not monolithic; it couldn't have been, even when it was "restricted to the Solar System. The rebels recognized that when they opted for such a loose, federalized system, but realists have always known the Federation could only function as a template on which diverse cultures and interests could interact and reach compromise accommodations." He stopped rather abruptly, his mischievous look suddenly returning. "Anyway, whatever else can be said of Dieter, he's unquestionably a superb judge of character. After all, he brought me out of retirement, didn't he?" Sanders rose from his cluttered desk and stretched.

He was the last one left in his offices in Government House--not surprisingly, at this hour of the night. The staffTrevayne had assigned to him had all gone home, leaving him to cope with the effects of Xandau's damned, long day as best he could. Ever since he'd arrived, he'd felt as if he'd stayed up far too late. Which, he decided, he really had in this case. He switched off the light and started to leave, but stopped on seeing the figure silhouetted in the door to the still-lighted outer office.