hour's
time. Also, I want you to relay my signal to General Itjes."

"First let me be sure I understand you. Are you offering terms for our
surrender?"

"I'm doing nothing of the kind and you know it. Your planet and your
people are, for the moment, my hostage. I will reestablish contact in
one hour and ten minutes. At that time I will expect a patch-through
to Itjes. In the meantime my ships will continue to take up positions
around you. If they are fired upon, even once, I'll turn the
battleships loose on the cities." He signaled his Com Officer to end
the transmission.

The Third Fleet, three quarters of which was now discharged from the
carrier, began to form up into fully operational task forces, each with
a battleship in its center, and to move into place in a wide belt
encircling the planet, then turned facing outward like a bristle of
spears. Or more aptly, since the guns of the battleships faced inward
as well, like a crown of thorns.

Hayes' plan was cruelly simple: to put a gun to the head of Schiller,
and force General Itjes and the remainder of the Coalition fleet into a
fight they couldn't win. His deepest concern was for the passage of
time, which might bring enemies and forces unlooked-for. By recent
intelligence the nearest significant Soviet presence was at least a
week distant. But how many of the smaller nations of the Coalition
might be willing to risk their own national forces, it was impossible
to say. But here Hayes held to the confidence of the bully, believing
that each would be more concerned with their own personal survival, and
thus bring them all into peril.

The allotted time passed. The task forces stood at the ready. Itjes
continued to move swiftly toward the system, and the entire planet
scrambled into plans of evacuation that few had believed would ever be
used.

And when they received news of the plight of fully half their
space-bound population, and of their dearest home save earth, the East
German forces of other Coalition patrols, near and far, with leave or
without it, broke off and began to converge on Schiller. Were it not
for the time factor ---the majority of these would not arrive (or even
receive the message) for days---Hayes might have had a problem.

And even in the coming duel with Itjes' divided force, the scales might
have been more evenly balanced, but for the simple disparity in the
weapons-systems of a wealthy superpower, and those of a gro