"Dammit, Kinsman, if you—" Murdock's face began to turn red.

"Relax, Colonel, relax. I won't let you down. Not when there's a chance to put a few hundred miles between me and all the brass on Earth."

Murdock stood there fuming as Kinsman left with Anne. They paced hurriedly out to his car and sped off to the medical building.

"You shouldn't bait him like that," Anne said over the rush of the dark wind. "He feels the pressure a lot more than you do."

"He's insecure," Kinsman replied, grinning. "There are only twenty people on base qualified for orbital missions and he's not one of them."

"And you are."

"Damned right, sugar. It's the only thing in the world worth doing. You ought to try it."

She put a hand up to her wind-whipped hair. "Me? Fly in orbit? I don't even like airplanes'"

"It's a clean world up there, Annie. Brand-new every time. Your life is completely your own. Once you've done it there's nothing left on Earth except to wait for the next time."

"My God, you sound as if you really mean it."

"I'm serious," he insisted. "Why don't you wangle a ride on one of the shuttle missions? They usually have room for an extra person."

"And get locked inside a spacecraft with you?"

Kinsman shrugged. "There are worse things."

"Some other time. Captain. I've heard all about you guys and your Zero Gee Club. Right now we have to get you through preflight and then off to see the General."

General Lesmore D. ("Hatchet") Hatch sat in dour silence in the small briefing room. The oblong conference table was packed with colonels and a single civilian. They all look so damned serious, Kinsman thought as he took the only empty chair, at the foot of the table. The General, naturally, sat at the head.

"Captain Kinsman." It was a statement of fact.

"Good morning, sir."

Hatch turned to a moonfaced aide. "Borgeson, let's not waste time."

Kinsman only half-listened to the hurried introductions 107 around the table. He felt uncomfortable already, and it was only partly due to the stickiness of the crowded little room. Through the only window he could see the first faint glow of dawn.

"Now then," Borgeson said, introductions finished. "Very briefly, your mission will involve orbiting and making rendezvous with an unidentified satellite."

"Unidentified?"

Borgeson went on: "It was launched from Plesetsk in the Soviet Union. It's a new type, something we haven't seen before. We don't know what it contains or what its mission is. We don't even know if it's manned or not."

"And it is big," Hatch rumbled.

"Intelligence," Colonel Borgeson nodded at the colonel sitting on Kinsman's left, "had no prior word about the launch. We must assume that the satellite is potentially hostile in intent. Colonel McKeever will give you the tracking data."

They went around the table, each colonel adding his bit of information. Kinsman began to build up the picture in his mind.