rcely. His second
shot destroyed the motor-drive to the bridge's double doors, sealing
them shut. After another threatening wave at the benumbed circle of
men, he turned to the astonished face of Robeson on the screen.

"Calder, what in God's name?"

But the man's senses were gone. All that remained were hatred and
death, wrenched forward through bitter tears.

"You, NIGGER!" The word was terrible to hear. "You killed him too!"
And he shot the screen as well.

"Now listen to me, all of you! We're going to fight those red bastards
if we have to do it alone. Move the ship forward, battle speed One!"
He aimed the pistol at the hesitating officer, who feeling himself cast
into Hell, obeyed.

*

What the Soviet commanders aboard the carriers Lenin and Brezhnev
heard, was Robeson telling them that Hayes was dead and the bridge of
the Dreadnought in chaos---imploring them not to begin what couldn't
later be stopped, and might lead to galactic holocaust. But what they
saw was the prow of the behemoth coming towards them and starting to
fire. Their instructions had been to eliminate Hayes, and if
necessary, the entire Third Fleet.

The Dreadnought continued to move forward; it was nearly at the
midpoint between two armies. And now the Eisenhower moved forward as
well. That this was caused by Robeson putting a tractor beam on his
ship's counterpart, and trying unsuccessfully to check its advance they
could not know, because they had stopped listening. And so, very
naturally, they began to fire back.

But then a very different kind of 'miracle' occurred.

From out of the rent and improperly sealed Gate on the Commonwealth
left, and from the outlet of the distant Gate to their right, whose
silvery sheet now fluttered as in a haunted breeze, the horrible black
anti-matter of Nothingness began to seep out like an inky cloud.
Perhaps drawn each to the other, perhaps triggered by the living metal
that now stood equidistant between them, like ill-shaped hands it oozed
slowly together, a darkness that would envelope the stars.

And with it came a sound: a silence so awful, a death so complete and
eternal, that Time itself seemed to ripple like a black wave between
the two armies.

Instinctively they drew back, unnerved and unhinged. But the
Dreadnought remained perfectly still, immobilized, while the hands of
Unmaking drew nearer.....

And then they met. The solid-huge metal of that once proud and
fear