ts dead; two
impossible-to-replace patrollers destroyed."

Rubbing his chin vigorously, he grated, "We
confirmed that the bandit beamer drew back into
an underground tunnel that cuts into an ice gorge
south of Coldfield. Their weapons' cache is even
now being approached by unidentified tugs. No doubt
that they're Narval's thugs and they're going to
clamp a tow beam on the stores and haul them off to
some subsurface storage or assembly shop. Once the
weapons are assembled, installed and calibrated we
could be on the receiving end of more nastiness."

Leaning forward over the table, he looked directly
at the President. His hand transformed into a fist,
and he pounded the table in cadence with his words.

"Mr. President," he said, "the real hell of it is
we can't stop them, and we've got no one to blame
but ourselves. It's downright unrealistic to keep
our self-defense forces in the Special Zone so far
below what's needed to protect our vital interests."

"What do you suggest, Jim," the President shrugged,
"break our treaties with the Outer Region? What'll
that get us?"

Jim looked directly into the President's eyes.
"But they're the ones violating the treaties,"
he growled. "If we've ever needed irrefutable
evidence, we've just had it rammed down our
throats. We'd better get off our duffs and do
something."

Allen Dynal, Minister for Intelligence, nodded in
agreement, but did not speak. His turn was coming.

Selvin leaned back, turned his head to scowl at the
view tank. Together, they contemplated the forming
scene.

The Admiral's outburst had given subject matter
guidance to the computer. The display shifted to
the Planet Pluto Special Zone. Two tiny red lights
flashed rapidly at the coordinates where the
attacks had occurred. A steady blue light tracked
the hijacked stores.

Selvin continued. "The entire sector from which
this attack was launched is honeycombed with
utility passages and subsurface supply and
maintenance shops," he said. "They date back to
when our earliest construction cadres went in.
The subsurface should have been returned to its
original state when we had no further use for the
tunnels and galleries. We did start to collapse the
ice walls and overheads; obviously, we didn't get
very far."

Selvin sighed, heavily.

"Understandable," he went on. "Hundreds of
junctions and cutouts were dug to serve one-time
needs. They were never mapped. The same can be
said for subsurface te