them.
"Alex, this is Mary. What is it?" Alex thought she sounded tired, and who could blame her? She had been standing by in Mission Control ever since the launch. She must have been catnapping right at the console. Quickly and concisely, he told her of their IR visibility.
"I don't know what we can do about that, Alex, except to keep you posted on troop movements so you can avoid them. Their search planes have been quartering steadily southeast toward your position."
"Give them decoys."
"Say again?"
"Give them bogeys. I've got it scoped out. Have SUNSAT beam down a few hotspots here and there around the glacier. If they're, looking for IR targets, let's give 'em their heart's desire."
Mary fell silent and Alex could sense her working through the calculations. Power was the one thing besides people that the habitats could spare. Space was full of power, supplied by a friendly, all-natural nuclear fusion generator. All you had to do was catch it . . .
SUNSAT did that. The U.S. government had nearly completed a demonstration power satellite before the Congress changed their minds and proxmired it. They'd needed the money for dairy farm subsidies or corporate bailouts or something else real useful. The entire space budget, start to finish, was less than what HEW had spent in a decade, less than the cost overruns at the Defense Department; but space was "frills," so they always cut there first. The station had floated in orbit, nickels and dimes away from being operational, until the crunch came and the habitats decided to cut loose from Earth.
Peace and Freedom had pooled their resources and finished SUNSAT, so light, heat and power were the few things that Mary never worried about. The space habitats might starve, or asphyxiate, or die in a solar flare; but they would have power.
"Roger, Piranha," Mary said finally. "I will check with Winnipeg Rectenna Farm on power demand and see how much
"Alex, this is Mary. What is it?" Alex thought she sounded tired, and who could blame her? She had been standing by in Mission Control ever since the launch. She must have been catnapping right at the console. Quickly and concisely, he told her of their IR visibility.
"I don't know what we can do about that, Alex, except to keep you posted on troop movements so you can avoid them. Their search planes have been quartering steadily southeast toward your position."
"Give them decoys."
"Say again?"
"Give them bogeys. I've got it scoped out. Have SUNSAT beam down a few hotspots here and there around the glacier. If they're, looking for IR targets, let's give 'em their heart's desire."
Mary fell silent and Alex could sense her working through the calculations. Power was the one thing besides people that the habitats could spare. Space was full of power, supplied by a friendly, all-natural nuclear fusion generator. All you had to do was catch it . . .
SUNSAT did that. The U.S. government had nearly completed a demonstration power satellite before the Congress changed their minds and proxmired it. They'd needed the money for dairy farm subsidies or corporate bailouts or something else real useful. The entire space budget, start to finish, was less than what HEW had spent in a decade, less than the cost overruns at the Defense Department; but space was "frills," so they always cut there first. The station had floated in orbit, nickels and dimes away from being operational, until the crunch came and the habitats decided to cut loose from Earth.
Peace and Freedom had pooled their resources and finished SUNSAT, so light, heat and power were the few things that Mary never worried about. The space habitats might starve, or asphyxiate, or die in a solar flare; but they would have power.
"Roger, Piranha," Mary said finally. "I will check with Winnipeg Rectenna Farm on power demand and see how much