there in two minutes. Have your man flash his reds
and greens at one-second intervals. I will respond
with standard flitter yellows at the same spacing.
Over. Out."

Zolan carefully adjusted the controls to slip the
flitter away from the screening vessels. Clear,
he maneuvered his craft close to a space buoy
that marked the route through Fandango.

A yellow-green striped tug appeared in the distance
and grew larger. The Gateway's diameter could expand
to pass the largest freighters or close completely.
It could be straight or as convoluted as a randomly
configured corkscrew. The tug passed through,
flashing the agreed-on signals.

Zolan responded. The tug stopped, reversed heading,
and waited for him to line up. Inside the force
field, the route took them over, under and around
huge freighters and through swarms of shuttles,
tugs, and barges. Five hundred meters from the
depot Zolan pressed a disk on his control column
and a mag beam reached out and locked on to the tug.

The tug's thrusters glowed brighter with the power
to match up both craft. Aligned, Zolan released the
tug, and gentling his thrusters, brought his flitter
to rest on a landing platform that had articulated
from a portal.

Space suit closed and glare screens partially
activated to veil his features, Zolan strode the
Depot's corridors behind his escort. Although he
had docked at the portal nearest his destination,
the spunnel console was still almost a quarter kay
from the air lock.

Reaching the console chamber, Zolan motioned his
guide to wait outside. He entered and inspected
the area for intruders and bugs. It seemed secure.

Approaching the squat spunnel transmitter he noted
that Hanno had activated the system for immediate
use and disengaged all logs and file-for-record
links. Confirming the disconnect, Zolan wasted
no time in preliminaries. Inserting the capsule he
keyed the transmitter to the channels assigned
to Sentinel and set off his burst.

The transmitter was a model that dated back several
centuries to the depot's construction. Zolan knew
from his training for the mission that a spunnel
burst from the depot had to be arranged in parts.
Each segment was to be inserted separately into
the spunnel dispatch slot. The ancient transmitter
could process only so much at a bite.

Zolan held the final segment and reached to insert
it. A couple of seconds and the transmission would
be complete. The console was coded to dissol