The color of Broghuilio’s face darkened even further. "What are you talking about? Reported details of what?"

"The sophisticated interplanetary offensive and defensive capabilities that Earth has been developing for several decades," JEVEX informed him.

"JEVEX, WHAT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT?" Broghuilio exploded. "Earth disarmed years ago. You have reported that consistently. Explain this."

"There is nothing to explain. I have always reported what I have just said."

Broghuilio brought his hands up to massage his eyes, then wheeled around suddenly to throw out his hands in an imploring gesture to those around him. "Am I going mad, or is that idiot machine having some kind of a fit?" he demanded. "Will somebody tell me that I have been seeing and hearing what I think I have been seeing and hearing for all these years. Have I been imagining things? Were we told that Earth had disarmed, or were we not? Do those weapons that we just heard about exist, or do they not? Am I the only sane person in this room, or am I not? Somebody tell me what’s happening."

"JEVEX reports the facts," Estordu said lamely, as if that explained everything.

"HOW CAN IT BE REPORTING FACTS?" Broghuilio shouted. "It’s contradicting itself. Facts are facts. They can’t contradict."

"I have contradicted nothing," JEVEX objected. "My records all indicated that-"

"Shut up! Speak when you are spoken to."

"My apologies, Excellency."

"What Verikoff said about VISAR must be true," Estordu muttered in a worried voice. "VISAR could have been manipulating JEVEX when they were coupled together, before JEVEX disconnected-for years, maybe. Now that JEVEX is isolated, possibly we’re receiving the truth for the first time." A ripple of alarmed voices ran around the War Room.

Broghuilio licked his lips and looked suddenly less sure of himself. "JEVEX," he commanded.

"Excellency?"

"Those reports-they were received direct from the surveillance system?"

"Of course, Excellency."

"Those weapons exist? They are being mobilized now?"

"Yes, Excellency."

Wylott was looking uncertain. "How can we be sure?" he objected. "JEVEX says first one thing and then another. How do we know what is true?"

"So, do we do nothing?" Broghuilio asked him. "Would you just sit there and hope that the Terran assault force doesn’t exist? What would it take to convince you-a hundred thousand of them coming for your throat? And what would you do then? Imbecile!" Wylott fell silent. The others around the War Room looked at one another with apprehension.

Broghuilio clasped his hands behind his back and began pacing slowly. "We still have a card up our sleeve," he said after a few seconds. "We have decoded their top-level secure communications, and we know their plans. We may have fewer weapons, but we are immeasurably ahead of Earth technically. We command a vastly superior firepower." He looked up, and his eyes began to gleam. "You heard those primitives-the main advantage they were counting on was surprise. Well, they no longer have that advantage. So, Verikoff calls us a rabble, does he? Let him send in his horde of Terran primitives. We will be waiting for them. He will find out who are the rabble when they come up against Jevlenese weapons."

Broghuilio turned back to face Wylott. "The operation at Thurien must be suspended for the time being," he declared. "Recall our forces at once and redeploy them for defense of Jevlen. This is not a time to be concerned about upsetting orbits at Gistar. Project the transfer ports in to where the ships are now, and get them back here as soon as possible. I want them in position by this time tomorrow."

New orders went out to the commanders of the task force at Thurien, who prepared their vessels for immediate transfer back. But they were in VISAR-controlled space, and JEVEX reported that its attempts to project entry ports into that region were being jammed; the ships could not be brought back without getting clear of Gistar first. Broghuilio had no choice but to extend his deadline by an extra day and order his force to get away under its own power. An hour later it was streaming in full flight back toward the edge of the Thurien planetary system.

"Phase One completed successfully," Caldwell announced with satisfaction from Thurios as he watched the data displays being presented inside the Government Center. "We’ve got the bastards on the run. Now let’s make sure we keep things going that way."

Chapter Thirty-Five

The transfer ports were ready and waiting outside the system of Gistar as arranged, and the Jevlenese warships peeled out of formation to enter them in relays with crisp, disciplined, military precision. What they didn’t know was that by then VISAR was controlling the transfer system, not JEVEX, and such were VISAR’s manipulations of JEVEX’s internal functions that JEVEX didn’t know it, either. Upon exiting back into normal space, one squadron found itself at Sirius, another at Aldebaran, and another near Canopus, while the rest reappeared strewn in ones and twos across Arcturus, Procyon, Castor, Polaris, Rigel, and assorted other stars in between. Thus they were out of harm’s way for the time being and could be rounded up later. That completed Caldwell’s Phase Two.

With a cigarette in one hand and a cup of black coffee in the other, Hunt stood on the patio outside Sverenssen’s house, watching a protesting group of people in brightly colored garb being herded into an Air Force personnel carrier by the pool while a vigilant semicircle of Special Forces troopers looked on from a short distance back. The most recent captives had arrived at Sverenssen’s expecting a party, but had found the CIA waiting instead. With VISAR controlling the surveillance there was no longer any need to conceal the activity around the house from orbital observation, but Clifford Benson had decided to maintain a low profile all the same, mainly to take advantage of just this kind of opportunity to extend further his suspect list of Sverenssen’s acquaintances. But that was really just a precaution to identify any collaborators that might have been recruited locally. VISAR had found included among JEVEX’s records a complete organizational chart of the Jevlenese operation on Earth, and with that information now in Benson’s and Sobroskin’s hands, the rest of the network would soon be mopped up.

A concentration of Ganymean spacecraft had been building up on the periphery of the Jevlenese planetary system, and at that point it would have been possible for VISAR to shut off all of JEVEX’s services from the Jevlenese in the same way that it had done with the Jevlenese element across the Thurien-administered worlds. The problem, however, was that the Jevlenese had clearly been preparing for a war situation for some time, and there was no way of telling what other stand-alone and backup systems they might possess that were capable of operating without JEVEX. Hunt and Caldwell therefore decided that simply pulling the plug, sending in the Ganymeans, and hoping for the best was not the way to go. Instead they opted to continue applying pressure until either they obtained the unconditional surrender that Verikoff had demanded, or the Jevlenese operation somehow fell apart from the inside. Also they hoped that the reactions they observed inside the Jevlenese War Room would reveal whether or not, and if so to what degree, the Jevlenese could in fact carry on without JEVEX.

Behind Hunt, a flap opened in the plastic sheeting with which the back of the house had been temporarily repaired, and Lyn stepped out through what had been a glass-panel wall of the corner room. She moved over to where he was standing and slipped an arm lightly through his. "I guess this place is off the list for the party rounds from now on," she said, looking across at the VTOL down by the pool.