"Nuclear warhead number two will be a ground blast, to knock out our generator."

Falcone nodded solemnly. "The second one doesn't even have to be a nuclear warhead. Conventional warhead will do, if they've got the generator pinpointed."

"Okay," said Doug, looking at each of them in turn. "The first thing we've got to do is figure out what they can throw at us. Then we've got to look for ways to defend ourselves against each possible threat."

"Lotsa luck," Falcone grumbled. He was built like a fireplug, with short thick arms and a nearly perpetual scowl on his dark face. Instead of the usual coveralls he preferred to wear dark turtlenecks and comfortable, loosefitting jeans that he jammed into scuffed old cowboy boots.

"There may be a way to defend against a nuclear warhead," said Deborah Paine.

Doug felt his eyebrows hike halfway to his scalp.

"The physicists have been using the mass driver's magnets to power a particle accelerator," Paine said. "If we could focus the beam on an incoming warhead, it could destroy the nuclear device's switching and fusing mechanisms."

"Are you sure?" Doug asked.

"It's actually pretty old stuff," she replied, "from the antimissile defenses that the Peacekeepers maintain in Earth orbit."

"So it turns the nuke into a dud, huh?" Falcone asked.

"Yes. The warhead will crash onto the crater floor but the bomb won't go off."

"That'd still do some damage to the solar panels," Clemens pointed out.

"Yeah, but not that many of 'em," said Falcone.

Doug asked, "Could we actually focus the particle beam that way?"

Paine shrugged. It looked delicious to all the men around the table, even though they knew she didn't do it for their benefit.

I'll have to ask the physicists about it," she said. "We should have plenty of time to aim the beam, if they fire the missile from Earthside. Days."

"Suppose they take over L-l and use it as a staging base. They could fire the missile from there."

Nodding, Paine said, "That would still give us a couple of hours or so, maybe more."

"Maybe less," Anson said, "if they fire it at high boost."

"Maybe."

Doug turned to Cardenas. "Kris, what are you and Zimmerman developing? Anything useful?"

She sighed. "Willi's got this bug in his ear about using nanomachines to make a person invisible. I was hoping something practical might come out of it, but so far as I can tell he hasn't accomplished a thing."

"And your own work?" Doug prompted.

"We can be a big help medically, of course. As far as weaponry is concerned, I haven't come up with anything except the gobblers. We can program them to eat metals, if you like."

"We can't strew the whole crater floor with gobblers," Doug said.

"Why not?" Anson shot back. "It's only be for a short time."

Doug ticked off on his fingers, "One, they'll most likely land during daylight-"

"You can program gobblers to operate in sunlight, can't you?" Anson asked Cardenas.