“I think you have done splendidly,” said Jonnie. “You say bombs fall in the lake above the dam. Is there any dam injury?”

Chief Chong-won beckoned a Chinese engineer and they chattered for a moment in Mandarin. Then Chong-won said to Jonnie, “Not so far. But some have sent water over the top of the dam and they have put in the flashboards to reduce the spillway. If the lake were to drop in volume, we would have no electricity.”

The whole lowest floor of the “pagoda” was wide open on all four sides. The pagoda was really just a fancy roof. The metal transshipment platform was in plain view. The

Chinese had polished it until it shone even in the subdued light.

Jonnie walked under the high roof to get a better look at where they had put the all-important console. Then he smiled. Over on the other side of the platform they had built a stand with sides in the shape of a huge, savage-looking, winged beast!

Angus was there at the console and he waved. “It’s something, isn't it?” said Angus.

Yes, it really was. A huge head, two wings, a curling tail. Armored metal. Painted gold and red.

“A dragon,” said Chong-won. “Once it was the emblem of Imperial China. See, it is laminated molecular armor.”

Not only that, but it had a top! The console was set into the dragon's back and a cover was made of dragon scales so the operator could work the console without anyone's observing what he was really doing. There were two stools on the raised console platform and a side shelf for papers and a computer. And all armored. Nothing was going to hurt that console. Or see what was being done with it either.

Such a far cry from the materialistic Psychlo, who was without paintings or art. And what these Chinese could do!

“See?” said Chief Chong-won. “It is the same as those other dragons.” He pointed to a dragon that formed the roof point of the pagoda nearby. Each corner had one. And then the chief pointed to some unfinished work over by the bank. “Each bunker was supposed to have its dragon over the entrance. We have not had time to put them up.” They were much smaller dragons, made of baked clay and painted in gold and red.

The console looked fine under the protective cover. Angus had a copy of the coordinate book there and was drilling himself without punching anything. He was figuring how to convert the figures in the book to this moment of time and the console buttons. "I’ve got it pretty well,” said Angus. “It just takes quite a bit of time to do the calculations. There are eight separate movements listed for each planet and you have to pick where on the planet. But it is not too hard.”

Jonnie looked up. Another bomb had just hit somewhere. "If all that would stop, we'd be in business. I don't have any idea when it will or exactly what we can do with this console yet.”

Chief Chong-won was pointing at the inside of one of the huge posts that held up the pagoda roof and protected the platform and console from rain. They had rigged mine spotlights on each post so that they spotlighted the platform center. "At night,” he said, “they won't shine outside.”

Jonnie wanted to go over to the operations bunker, but the chief detoured him into a large underground room in the side wall of the bowl. It was nicely tiled and had a platform at the end for a speaker. It had chairs and would hold about fifty people. Very nice.

Then Chief Chong-won showed him a sample of thirty little apartments they had made for guests and visitors. They were in addition to pilot and personnel berthings. These Chinese engineers could certainly build in wood and tile and stone, particularly when assisted by Psychlo machinery.

Jonnie was interested in gun emplacements all around that could cover the platform and the bowl interior. Given troops, the place could really be defended. But they did not have all that many troops.

He finally got to the ops room. It was a busy place. It was a miniature of the one they had found in the American underground base. A huge map of the planet was in the center. As reports came in from the adjoining communications office, men with long poles were pushing about small lead models of planes and the war vessels in orbit. Enemy vessels were red with tags. Their own planes were green with tags.

Stormalong was there in his white scarf, leather coat, and oversized goggles. He had two Buddhist communicators on either side of him and they were talking into close-to-the-mouth microphones that excluded any speech but theirs. Their shaved heads gleamed under the too-large headphones they wore.

Jonnie was told they were operating a planetary battle channel– used by Stormalong-and a planetary command channel used by Sir Robert. The Scot War Chief had a thirteen-year-old Buddhist boy operating his channel.

Nobody had to brief Jonnie. It was all there on the big operations board. Singapore was really catching it. There was a lot of antiaircraft being used at the Russian base. Dunneldeen was flying air cover for Edinburgh.

Thor was flying air cover for Kariba. Nothing was happening at the Lake Victoria minesite or any of the rest. But where it was hot, it was very hot.

Jonnie listened in to the babble on both battle and command channels. It was all in Pali which he didn't speak.

There was a third station, manned by a Scot officer, that was monitoring enemy traffic.

Down at the end of the room where there were some spare desks, Glencannon was hunched over a pile of pictures. Jonnie glanced at them. They seemed to be viewscreen runoffs of an air battle. The one he had when the Swiss was killed? Glencannon had another stack, apparently just taken. They were of the huge monster overhead.

Glencannon seemed very agitated, his hands shaking. He had not really recovered from that courier run, seemingly, for Stormalong didn't have him flying. He didn't answer when Jonnie spoke to him.

The operations board was not good, but Jonnie did not have anything to contribute. It was simply a slugfest. He wondered how long places not protected with atmosphere armor cable could hold out. Edinburgh was particularly vulnerable. A worry about Chrissie passed through his mind. He hoped she was safe in a bunker under Castle Rock. Sir Robert answered his question. Yes, they were all in bunkers up there. It was mainly antiaircraft that was protecting the place. Dunneldeen was taking care of strafing planes that tried to come in. The antiaircraft was taking care of bombs.

Jonnie thought he had better look at this antiaircraft they had here. He had never seen the Psychlo guns in action. Not up close.

He went out. Chief Chong-won had vanished, attending to other duties. Chinese families with their children and an occasional dog were sitting about, mostly in and near rifle pits. They looked a bit worn, a bit worried. Some of the children were crying. But the parents smiled broadly, and got up and bowed as Jonnie passed. It made him hope their confidence was not misplaced.

The exit from the bowl was a curving underground passage under the cable so it wouldn't have to be turned off each time anyone went in or out. The curves were to prevent bomb flash and fragments from getting in.

He went to the first antiaircraft gun emplacement. The gun was shielded. The two gunners were in Russian bulletproof battle dress. A Scot officer saw him and got out of a pit.

“We don't have enough of these,” said the Scot, pointing at the gun. “We can't cover the lake. It 's all we can do to cover this bowl.”

Jonnie went over to the gun. It had computer sights that zeroed in on anything moving. What one had to do was hit a trigger and the gun calculated the speed and direction of a moving object, sent a blast concussion into its path, then found the next moving object and hit that.

He looked up. An enemy plane at about two hundred thousand feet was barely discernible. Jonnie knew the range of this gun was short of that by about fifty thousand feet. So did the enemy apparently.