"Yes, they will. You're going to keep pushing at them until they have no choice but to kill you."

"Everybody dies," he muttered.

Diane pushed a lock of hair back away from her face. "Sure. Be a hero. Save the world. I can't stop you. I won't even try. But I've got a daughter to think of, to protect. I don't want to die and I don't want her to be killed. I don't want you to die!"

"So what do you want to do?" he asked.

"I want to find someplace safe."

"Where?" He almost laughed. "There aren't any safe places. There's going to be killing here, Diane. Maybe a lot of it. Frank Colt won't let me take Moonbase away from America without a fight. Leonov will have to shoot his way to independence. Then we'll have to take the space stations —more killing. It's inescapable. We've got to kill to prevent killing. It's a cosmic joke."

"There's nothing funny about it."

"I know."

"I can't go with you on this, Chet. You'll have to do it without me."

"I know." He had known it all along.

Pat Kelly looked scared. There's no other word for it, Kinsman decided. Pat is scared.

The two officers had spent most of the morning going over all the contingency plans for repelling attack and keeping Moonbase secure. He and Kelly had checked, using the picture phones, every vital area of the base. They had then called in, one by one, every key person, military and civilian: the personnel chief, the head of maintenance, the director of the hospital, the Officer of the Day—every man and woman in charge of a department or an important group of people or a vital piece of equipment.

To each of them, Kinsman gave the same speech; "We are in a maximum-security status. War is imminent. I intend to declare our independence from Earthside and try to prevent the war from starting. We will act together with the people of Lunagrad. Selene will become an independent 413 nation. Both the United States and Soviet Russia will try to stop us, and there might be bloodshed. We'll try to avoid it, but we've got to be ready to face that possibility,"

The night fears were gone from his mind, or at least buried deep enough so that he could ignore them. Kinsman felt strangely calm, at peace with himself for the first time in a decade.

The people he spoke to were shocked, surprised. Some smiled with sudden relief. Some were angry and showed it. Of those who agreed with his purpose. Kinsman asked only that they explain the situation to the people under them. To those who became tight-lipped and clench-fisted, he offered a shuttle flight back to Earth. And then called in their second- in-command.

As the long day wore on, the entire absurd idea began to seem almost natural, inevitable. We're thumbing our noses at the two most powerful nations in the world. Why? Oh, because I killed a Russian girl once. And, incidentally, we're trying to save the world. So what's new with you? Kinsman began to feel lightheaded.

Diane was the last one to come into his office.

"You know what's going down," Kinsman said to her as Kelly watched nervously from the couch. "Can we depend on your cooperation, or should we relieve you of duty at the comm center?"

Diane smiled, despite herself. "I just got the job; I'd hate to give it up so soon."

Kinsman felt his hopes soar. "Then you'll work with us?"

"I guess I'll have to."

"I thought you didn't want any part of this," Kinsman said, remembering their conversation earlier that morning.

Without an instant's hesitation Diane replied, "I don't. At least, I didn't. I was scared. Middle-of-the-night scared. But it's daytime now. You're going ahead with it, even though it's crazy."

Kinsman nodded.

"Okay," Diane went on. "If you're going to do it, then I've got to go along with you."