Dane thought that they would be loaded into a mobile or 'copter and taken
away. But instead they were marched down, through the ranks of portable
flamers, scramblers, and other equipment, to an open space where anyone
on duty at the visa-screen within the control cabin of the spacer could
see them. An officer of the Patrol, the sun making an eye-blinding flash
of his lightning sword breast badge, stood behind a loud speaker. When
he perceived that the three prisoners were present, he picked up a hand
mike and spoke into it--his voice so being relayed over the field as
clearly as it must be reaching Weeks inside the sealed freighter.
"You have five minutes to open hatch. Your men have been taken. Five
minutes to open hatch and surrender."
Ali chuckled. "And how does he think he's going to enforce that?" he
inquired of the air and incidentally of the guards now forming a square
about the three. "He'll need more than a flamer to unlatch the old girl
if she doesn't care for his offer."
Privately Dane agreed with that. He hoped that Weeks would decide to hold
out--at least until they had a better idea of what the future would be.
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