ows posed his question.

"We couldn't get through directly to Hanno to find
out why the message was cut short. So we went
spunnel to the Terminals and patched in to the
Depot on coded conventional. Hanno reports his
spunnel transmitter was destroyed. He was certain
he was hoodwinked into permitting a saboteur aboard
and screamed about a security breach on the Sentinel
Support Plan. He said the 'saboteur' escaped before
the alarm could be acted on. A damned lucky delay,
I think."

"Did you enlighten Hanno?"

"No, sir. Too risky for Sentinel, and he has no
need-to-know. I did tell him to run deep background
checks and truth verification tests on all Depot
personnel. He objected, thinking he had already
pinpointed the culprit. I told him to do it anyhow,
slap into the brig anyone who didn't pass,
and report the results to me under highest
classification through the construction site's
spunnel center."

"Good. No question they've been infiltrated. We
must consider the depot compromised for classified
until Hanno assures us he's cleared the problem
from his facility."

The President touched a button on his desk,
running the message through again in its entirety.
He switched the screen dark.

"The Outer Region's target might be the depot,
but I wonder." Ram said. "Perhaps destroying
the depot's spunnel transmitter is prelude to
an attack. If it is, they must realize that the
incident set off alarms throughout our defenses.
They'll also know we can maintain spunnel contact
and relay messages to and from our patrollers
and other craft through the construction site."

"Considering Hanno's report on what happened,
the attack on his spunnel transmitter focused on
keeping this message from getting through, not to
merely destroy the machine. That alone would not
have been worth the effort."

"We're down to one comm spunnel link in the Special
Zone," Dynal added. "The one we built on Planet
Pluto is controlled by Narval's people."

"Does Sentinel have access to the transmitter at
the Terminals?"

"The sender would need to personally key in
the clearances as well as the text," said Ram,
"otherwise the message would be compromised.
Sentinel would be compromised. We do have the
last resort."

"Have you checked it lately?"

"We run random tests from this end to be certain
that it's ready to function. As you know, sir, it
has its uncertainties and imposes a high price."

"Back to the message," Camari sighed