ess went up another notch.

"Ten minutes ago CIC reported an object approaching us from the south at
an altitude of fifty miles."

Approaching from the south, the Captain thought. So it couldn't have
been from the _Josef_. And fifty ... miles ... up. That was two hundred
and fifty thousand feet. A guided missile, perhaps? But whose? There
were only friendly countries to the south.

"It's passed directly overhead," McCandless continued, consciously
trying to make his voice sound factual, "and continued in the direction
of _Josef_. It settled towards sea level, then stopped a mile up."

"Stopped, Lieutenant?"

"Yes, sir. It's hovering over the _Josef_ now." McCandless paused. When
he started again, his voice was shaking. It was funny he hadn't noticed
it before, the Captain thought. You could almost smell the fear in the
wheelhouse. "CIC estimated its speed overhead as being in excess of a
thousand miles an hour and its size about that of the _Josef_ itself."

The Captain felt the sweat gather on his temples and ran his hand half
angrily over his forehead and through his thinning silver hair. He was
too old a man to let fear affect him any more and he was too tired a man
to waste his energy mopping his forehead every few minutes in a gesture
that would show his feelings to the crew. Maybe it was only vanity, he
thought, but when your muscles went soft and started pushing back
against your belt and your hair turned gray and started a strategic
retreat, you tended to take more care of your reputation. It wasn't as
fragile as the rest of you, it didn't tarnish with the gold of your
braid or sag with your muscles. And he had enjoyed a reputation as a
fearless man of sound judgment.

"Did you order up a drone plane?"

McCandless nodded in the dark. "It went up a few minutes ago, sir. The
television picture should be coming in any moment."

It would be an infra-red picture, the Captain thought. It wouldn't show
too much, provided the plane could get close enough to get anything at
all, but it would show something.

"Have you made any evaluations, Lieutenant?"

He could feel the tenseness build up again in the compartment. Everybody
was listening intently, waiting for the first semi-official hint of what
had gotten them up in the middle of the night.

Then McCandless voiced what the Captain had already taken to be a
foregone conclusion.

"I think it's a spaceship, sir." McCandless waved at the stars beyond
the po