“It comes, the light!”
“Let me put it in the form of an analogy,” Branch said.
“If you have two chess players of equally high skill, the game’s end is determined when one of them gains an advantage.
Once the advantage is there, there’s nothing the other player can do, unless the first makes a mistake.
If everything goes as it should, the game’s end is predetermined.
The turning point may come a few moves after the game starts, although the game itself could drag on for hours.”
“And remember,” Margraves broke in, “to the casual eye, there may be no apparent advantage.
Not a piece may have been lost.”
“That’s what’s happened here,” Branch finished sadly. “The CPC units in both fleets are of maximum efficiency.
But the enemy has an edge, which they are carefully exploiting.
And there’s nothing we can do about it.”
“But how did this happen?” Ellsner asked.
“Who slipped up?”
“The CPCs have deduced the cause of the failure,” Branch said.
“The end of the war was inherent in our take-off formation.”
“What do you mean?” Ellsner said, setting down his drink.
“Just that.
The configuration the fleet was in, light-years away from battle, before we had even contacted their fleet. When the two met, they had an infinitesimal advantage of position.
That was enough.
Enough for the CPCs, anyhow.”
“If it’s any consolation,” Margraves put in, “it was a fifty-fifty chance. It could have just as well been us with the edge.”
“I’ll have to find out more about this,” Ellsner said.
“I don’t understand it all yet.”
Branch snarled: “The war’s lost.
What more do you want to know?”
Ellsner shook his head.
“Wilt snare me with predestination ‘round,” Margraves quoted, “and then impute my fall to sin?”
Lieutenant Nielson sat in front of the gunfire panel, his fingers interlocked. This was necessary, because Nielson had an almost overpowering desire to push the buttons.
The pretty buttons.
Then he swore, and sat on his hands.
He had promised General Branch that he would carry on, and that was important.
It was three days since he had seen the general, but he was determined to carry on.
Resolutely he fixed his gaze on the gunfire dials.
Delicate indicators wavered and trembled. Dials measured distance, and adjusted aperture to range.
The slender indicators rose and fell as the ship maneuvered, lifting toward the red line, but never quite reaching it.
The red line marked emergency.
That was when he would start firing, when the little black arrow crossed the little red line.
He had been waiting almost a year now, for that little arrow. Little arrow.
Little narrow.
Little arrow.
Little narrow.
Stop it.
That was when he would start firing.
Lieutenant Nielson lifted his hands into view and inspected his nails.
Fastidiously he cleaned a bit of dirt out of one.
He interlocked his fingers again, and looked at the pretty buttons, the black arrow, the red line.
He smiled to himself.
He had promised the general.
Only three days ago.
So he pretended not to hear what the buttons were whispering to him.