The fellow was stirring, recovering from the unexpected clout of a rifle butt. Colonel Ivan promptly put a foot on his neck to prevent his rising.

Robert the Fox was back with a nod that dispositions had been made. “They may have been scouting us for days. That's a Psychlo radio!”

“Yes, and bomb fuse. I think there's more here-'

A bomb exploded in an orange blast about fifty feet away.

An assault rifle hammered out.

There followed a period marked only by the startled rush of birds and monkeys through the drip of rain.

Jonnie got back to the log. Nothing was happening in the compound. Robert put two riflemen in position to cover it. “We're boxed,” he said. “Nicely planned raid.”

“Take the rear first,” said Jonnie. “Clean them out back there!”

“Charge!” bawled Colonel Ivan. Then something in Russian.

There was an instant hammering of assault rifles.

Bursting grenades racketed and smoke poured through the rain.

Running feet of men covering each other as they went forward in alternate waves.

Screams!

Russian and Scot battle cries!

Then a lull. Then another furious hammer of assault rifles.

Another lull.

A voice, hoarse, rising way above the birds and rain, “We surrender!” English? Not French? The Coordinator looked confused.

Some distant running feet as Robert the Fox threw some of his men back of the voice to prevent a trap.

Jonnie grabbed a blast rifle from a Scot and threw himself down. “Pinpoint.” “No Flame.” He cut loose with a savage burst at the breathe-gas cooler housing. The ancient outside metal peeled away under the repeating impacts like hide.

There was a clank and a hiss over there. Jonnie gave it another burst.

They waited. No Psychlos came rushing out. The place must be flooded with air over there. But there was no reaction.

The rain came down and the birds and monkeys quieted. Drifting smoke, black powder smoke from the grenades, was harsh to the nose.

Jonnie looked toward the ore plane landing field beyond the short road. Deserted.

The Scot carrying radio equipment answered his beckoning. The covering scrap of a tarpaulin was cascading rain. Jonnie checked the set. Working. He flipped to planetary pilot band and picked up the mike.

“Flight to Nairobi, standing by,” said Jonnie. It would sound like routine pilot traffic but a code had been prearranged with the two ships they had left near the power plant. “Nairobi” meant “Fly in to our beacon” and “Standing by” meant “Don't come in shooting, but be alert.”

Dunneldeen's voice crackled back, “All passengers aboard.” They were on their way.

Jonnie took the mine radio off his belt and turned it to “Constant Bleep,” which was used by miners when trapped or caught in a cave-in. It would act as a radio beacon for the planes. He stabbed a finger at three of his force. As the men passed, he handed one of them the mine radio to put in a tree at the field.

Assault rifles held low, running wide of the compound, pausing to give one another cover, they raced toward the landing field. Shortly, one of them, seen as a blur through the dull curtains of rain but brighter out there on the field edge, raised a hand in an “all clear.” They would give the planes landing cover as they came in.

Jonnie slung the blast rifle over his shoulder and hobbled across the compound perimeter, his cane not sinking so deep on this more traveled ground. He could hear pumps going further south. That would be where the mine workings were. He saw that a branch of the power cables they had used to trace this place turned off halfway up the road to the field. He followed it.

A squat hut made of stone sat there in the trees, festooned with insulators and surrounded by pipes. He recognized it as a fuel and ammunition manufacturing unit. Ha! They had one at this branch mine; probably to utilize all the excess power available from the hydroelectric plant.

The ground around it was roughed up with recent foot and flatbed traffic. The door was ajar. He gave it a push with his cane.

What a jumble! Fuel and ammunition canisters were usually stacked neatly on racks in these places. Side bins usually contained the various minerals used in concocting the contents of the canisters. A recent flurry of activity had left minerals spilled on the floor, and damaged unusable canisters underfoot. This place had been very busy very recently. He knew it took a bit of time to stir up and charge the brews that became fuel and ammunition and seal them into canisters. Had they worked here flat-out for days? A week?

He made his way over to the exit road that must go to the main minesite, using a short cut between the two roads. He looked at the brush on both sides of the exit road. Ordinarily his educated eye would have been able to track this easily, but the pouring rain made it more difficult.

He bent, examining some twigs broken from the underbrush that bordered the road. Some breaks, the ones that pointed toward the compound, must be several days old. Others, very fresh, still leaking sap, were broken in the direction of the main minesite up near a lake that old man-maps said had been called Lake Victoria.

A convoy had come in here many days– weeks?– ago and had gone out hours ago. A big convoy!

He glanced up the exit road, half-expecting to see trucks or tanks coming down it, back to the compound.

Their tactical situation was not ideal.

They had a small force of Brigantes holding out in the woods back of them. Somewhere, near or far, there must be the better part of a thousand Brigantes. And up this road– he looked at the traces of the ground drives-there were a very large number of Psychlo vehicles. Ore flatbeds? Tanks?

He heard their planes now. That sound wouldn't matter after all the uproar of this recent skirmish. And any convoy on that road wouldn't hear anything above their own motor drives. The vast canopy of treetops that made this place a twilight not only prevented anyone from looking down at the exit road and seeing anything on it, but also prevented anyone on it from seeing up.

A poor tactical situation. They could not fight a convoy, probably escorted with tanks, in this water-saturated, hemmed-in forest. Their planes were of no use to them.

He made his way over to the landing field. Sky! Not much sky but enough to get ore freighters up and down through. Leaking sky, but sky! He hadn't seen any sky in three days.

The soldiers were in the trees, covering the field. The mine radio bleeper was set in a fifteen-inch diameter vine that coiled like a huge snake up a tall tree. Maybe this field had once been bigger, but the jungle and the trees had encroached deeply.

The big marine attack battle plane wound down from directly overhead, letting the smaller battle plane cover it from above as was proper. Then the plane mushroomed a puddle of field water into a geyser and came to a halt. It was Dunneldeen. He swung the door open and sat there grinning, glad to see Jonnie.

Robert the Fox came rushing up. The side door of the big plane swung open and the officer of the remaining part of their force looked questioningly. Robert waved to him to sit tight, no emergency, and got into the smaller battle plane with Jonnie and Dunneldeen.

Jonnie was rapidly filling Dunneldeen in on the events. “There's a convoy on that road headed for the main minesite," concluded Jonnie. “I think they came down here for fuel and ammunition and then went back.”

“Ah,” said Dunneldeen. “That explains it.”

Typical Dunneldeen, he had not been sitting quietly waiting for their call. He could get that, he said, back at the dam or way upstairs. So he'd left the big attack plane at the dam and on radio standby so they could recall him, and he'd been keeping the main minesite, up at what they used to call “Lake Albert,” under surveillance by going way up and following normal traffic routes. His instruments and viewscreens could penetrate rain and cloud– even though they couldn't see a thing through the canopy of trees.