The Erie Morningstar was now clearly aware of what the Clarke was up to and was attempting evasive maneuvers. Coloma compensated and recalculated and was pleased with her results. There was no way the Erie Morningstar wasn’t going to get kissed by the Clarke.

The first of the new set of missiles plowed into the Clarke, followed by the second and then the third and fourth in rapid succession. The Clarke went dark. It didn’t matter; the Clarke had inertia on its side.

The Clarke crumpled into the Erie Morningstar as the fifth and sixth missiles struck, shattering both ships.

Coloma smiled. Her Colonial Defense Forces orders were, should she engage a hostile ship that attacked either her or Earth Station, to disable the ship if she could and destroy it only if necessary. They wanted whoever was in the ship, in order to find out who was behind everything the Colonial Union was coming up against.

That ship is definitely disabled, Coloma thought. Is it destroyed? If it is, it had it coming. It went after my people.

Sitting there in the dark, Coloma reached over and patted the Clarke fondly.

“You’re a good ship,” she said. “I’m glad you were mine.”

A seventh missile tore into the bridge.

*   *   *

Wilson couldn’t see Lowen but could track her. His BrainPal vision showed her as a tumbling sprite twenty klicks to the east. Well, fair enough. He was tumbling, too, because of his hasty exit from Earth Station; his BrainPal gave him an artificially stabilized view of things. Wilson was less concerned about her tumbling and more concerned about her utter silence. Even screaming would be better because it would mean she was conscious and alive. But there was nothing from her.

Wilson pushed it from his mind as best he could. There was nothing he could do about it right now. Once they were in the atmosphere, he could maneuver himself over to her and see how she was doing. For now, all he needed to do was get her through the burning part of reentry.

Instead of thinking about Lowen, Wilson had his BrainPal turn its visual attention to Earth Station, which floated darkly above him, save for the occasional flare as the missiles struck another area of the station. Wilson did a status check of the Colonial Union diplomatic ships at Earth Station. The Aberforth, the Zhou and the Schulz were all pulling away from Earth Station at speed, with or without their diplomatic contingents. Their captains were probably aware by now that one way or another, Earth Station was going up like a Roman candle.

The Clarke was missing or not responding. That was not good at all. If it wasn’t there, then it wouldn’t matter whether the shuttle got everyone out or not; they would have met their fate on the ship. Wilson tried not to think about that.

He especially tried not to think about Hart.