popping into existence
at the rate of hundreds per minute. Missiles were rolling off the ends
of assembly lines like half-pint tin cans out of can-making machines.

The Strett warcraft, skeletons and missiles, would emerge into normal
space anywhere within a million miles of Ardvor. The Ardan missiles were
powered for an acceleration of one hundred gravities. That much the Kedy
brains, molded solidly into teflon-lined, massively braced steel
spheres, could just withstand.

To be certain of breaking the Strett screens, an impact velocity of
about six miles per second was necessary. The time required to attain
this velocity was about ten seconds, and the flight distance something
over thirty miles.

Since the Stretts could orient themselves in less than one second after
emergence, even this extremely tight packing of missiles--only sixty
miles apart throughout the entire emergence volume of space--would still
give the Stretts the initiative by a time-ratio of more than ten to one.

Such tight packing was of course impossible. It called for many billions
of defenders instead of the few millions it was possible for the Omans
to produce in the time they had. In fact, the average spacing was well
over ten thousand miles when the invading horde of Strett missiles
emerged and struck.

_How_ they struck!

There was nothing of finesse about that attack; nothing of skill or of
tactics: nothing but the sheer brute force of overwhelming superiority
of numbers and of over-matching power. One instant all space was empty.
The next instant it was full of invading missiles--a superb exhibition
of coordination and timing.

And the Kedy control, upon which the defenders had counted so heavily,
proved useless. For each Strett missile, within a fraction of a second
of emergence, darted toward the nearest Oman missile with an
acceleration that made the one-hundred-gravity defenders seem to be
standing still.

One to one, missiles crashed into missiles and detonated. There were no
solid or liquid end-products. Each of those frightful weapons carried so
many megatons-equivalent of atomic concentrate that all nearby space
blossomed out into superatomic blasts hundreds of times more violent
than the fireballs of lithium-hydride fusion bombs.

For a moment even Hilton was stunned; but only for a moment.

"Kedy!" he barked. "Get your big stuff out there! Use the boosters!" He
started for the door at a full run. "That tears it--that _rea