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Carefully they push
the blade beneath the Adjutant's fallen form. The blade cuts through the
composite splinter.
Finally the resistance slackens. The form of the Adjutant
appears to relax slightly.
Grasping the splinter firmly, Philo hesitates, as if trying to
get his timing from the Adjutant's scan-beam cycle.
And then in a swift, single motion, Philo pulls the splinter up
and out of the Adjutant's frame.
There is a pause. But the Adjutant's scan-beam continues to
oscillate.
"Get set up!" Philobuster directs Windham.
And while Windham is busy setting up the pedal-generating
apparatus, Philo is making connections between circuits, bundles,
transistor-chips, and the like.
Connections are being made with clamping and pastes that will
join into the microcirutry. After applying a little joint solder, Philo runs
final tests upon the project to be sure that the right circuits have been
spliced.
Philobuster then attaches the bypass harness onto the
relay-fluctuator that he has adapted to handle the currency fluctuations that
seem to be endemic in the Ajutant's functions.
Meanwhile, Windham is hooking his apparatus into Philo's
connections.
At about the same time, they step back and both exclaim,
"Done," But then they realize in horror that there is no one on the
treddle-generator. They motion for Bowdy, but she is already astride the
machine grinding away as best she can.
"There is more resistance here than I had thought,"
Bowdy puffs.
"Yes, I suppose we will require additional manual
input," Philo states.
"The conversion of biological energy to mechanical, quite
something to behold," Windham replies.
"Don't look at me, I've got sentinel-duty," Gammon
retorts.
"Perhaps volunteers could be obrtained from amongst our
compatriots?" Philo suggests.
"That's a possibility," Windham acknowledges.
Then Philo asks of Windham, "Do you think our people are
capable of sustaining the necessary levels."
"Ah, that is the brilliance of my design," Windham
answers his colleague, "The torque is set such that even the slowest
revolutions of the pedal-wheel will generate levels of amperage and current
that our project here should require to sustain further functions, so long as
the pedal wheel is being turned."
"Philo," Bowdy gasps, "Puhleeae...Dooo."
Philobuster sizes up his subject, and then turns to
Windham, "Perhaps the obtainace of volunteers and helpers would be most
fortuitous at this moment, do you think so."
"Agreed," Windham answers affirmatively, "I shall
endeavor to expedite the matter," and departs.
In a matter of centons, Windham returns with his impressments.
Actually, finding sufficent labor went well, whether due to Windham's
requests, or a desire to do something positive, or just an oppurtunity to
stretch the muscleage somewhat.
Bowdeccia climbs down and gratefully turns the pedal-generator
over to the releif crew.
Bowdy is trying to catch her breath when she notices Gammon with
his head cocked, focussing on the outside.
The two Raider/fuel drone lashups approach the solar system of
the lost planetoid from the backside of the sun-star once again.
There is no particular advantage to this approach other than
having traversed this route previously, the way has been recorded. There
probably has been no time to set up a planet-based early warning system. Also
if there is already a very strong hostile contingent, there were limits of
what two Raiders burdened by fuel-drone lashups could accomplish.
The two Raiders of the Seventh Flight settle in a near-orbit,
only slightly deeper than their first trip. Once in a stable orbit, the two
Raiders begin the somewhat complicated process of separation.
Initailly the supply of fuel coming from the drone is shut off,
and the fuel receptacle on the Raider is closed.
And then the drone follows its program and fills the tether
line, with the inert argonite.
Where the gantry-frame attaches to the Raider is released, the
final step is to fire small explosive bolts.
It is a risky enough manuveur, because even with the lower-grade Tylium in
use, the risk of an impact detonation was still present.
The preferred method would have been to have the gantry attached
by pins made of superconducter-grade frozen nitrogen. And then it would have
merely been a matter of shutting off the refrigerant and allowing the
nitrogen to dissapate into the vastness of space.
The Apex gives the signal, and the pins on both Raiders are
blown. There is only the slightest of vibrations as the pins blow out the
last connections.
With the Raiders still in existence microns later, the Apex
signals the left drivers to increase speed. The Raiders come clear of the
gantry assemblies.
The Apex Centurion in the leading Raider now audibleizes,
"Go," and the two free Raiders pull away from their support frames
and pinwheel-spin on an arcing orbit back towards the base on the lost
planetoid.
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