For a moment she could not figure how to do that, then, as she finally reached the interface sphere, remembered how and sent the required signals. As the ship detached from the drill, the pressure within the drill shaft exploded underneath Heliotrope, hurling it up and away from the planetoid, and throwing Orlandine to the floor. Not enough to move the ship far, but the constant blast of methane following it out through the open shaft continued the job. More missiles coming in now, and the ship’s lasers, now underpowered, were having problems hitting them all. Orlandine dragged herself to her feet and connected to the interface sphere, immediately gaining a greater perspective. Heliotrope steadily rose on a large methane geyser. The CTDs below were slowly moving into position, the bacilliform objects still shooting up towards them. The exhausts of all the missiles speeding towards her surrounded the planetoid like a cage. By now the reactor had nearly built up enough energy to fire up the fusion engine again, but not yet because of the drain from deploying the lasers.

No more time.

Orlandine sent the signal to detonate. The glare from below shone blue-green through the ice in the crust, and then the crust itself heaved up. The methane geyser became gigantic, accelerating Heliotrope further, and hurling up boulders and bergs behind it. The final flash followed a few seconds later, then . . . nothing.

Not enough chlorine?

Not so, the planetoid became increasingly luminous, began to stand out more visibly from the darkness of space. The first crack opened up a hundred miles from her landing point, and out of it glared bright white light. More cracks appeared rapidly, and Orlandine observed a chunk of rock and ice the size of Gibraltar lifting away from the planetoid on a swirling explosion of arc-light. Next, in seeming slow motion because of the sheer scale of the blast, the planetoid came apart. Over there a continent-sized piece of the crust departed almost with balletic grace, but which had to be travelling at thousands of miles per hour. Below her, a rising swarm of boulders that could grind up Heliotrope like a sardine tin thrown into the works of some huge engine. And there, a gust of flame stabbing out like a solar flare.

Fusion start.

Instantly onlining the engines, Orlandine flung her ship towards safety. Only then did she notice the warnings from her physical diagnosticer. She had lost about a litre of blood, which must now be washing around inside her spacesuit. She would have to attend to that later. To herself she half smiled, half grimaced, as the USER ceased to function—roasted in white fire.