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my harness. I checked the fuel reserves, and muttered a curse under my breath. That maneuver had cost me 42 percent of what was in the tanks; I’d have enough for braking, final course corrections, and atmospheric entry, but practically zero for fudge factor. Like I said, the lifeboat was little more than an uprated version of the cargo pod I’d flown on Highgate. Even the training craft I had piloted at the Academia del Espacio was more sophisticated.
    In the bottom of the ninth, I’d earned myself another chance at bat. Yet there was no room for strikeouts, and my next foul ball would be my last.
    I let out my breath, closed my eyes for a second. Eighteen hours until I reached Coyote. Might as well offer my apologies to the home team. Groping beneath the couch, I found a small packet. I ripped it open and pulled out a cheap headset. Slipping it on, I inserted the prong into the left side of the console, then activated the com system.
    â€œHello?” I said, tapping the mike wand with my thumb. “Anyone there? Yoo-hoo, do you read?”
    Several long moments passed in which I heard nothing, then a male voice came over: “CFSS Robert E. Lee to CFL-101, we acknowledge. Do you copy?”
    â€œLoud and clear, Lee . This is”—I thought about it for a moment—“the Lou Brock . We copy.”
    A few seconds went by. I imagined bridge officers glancing at each other in bewilderment. Then a more familiar voice came online. “CFL-101, this is Commodore Tereshkova. Please use the appropriate call sign.”
    â€œI am using an appropriate call sign.” I couldn’t help but smile. “Lou Brock. Outfielder for the St. Louis Cardinals. One of the great base-stealers of all time.”
    While she was trying to figure that one out, I checked the radar. The Lee was near the edge of my screen, about eight hundred miles away. So far as I could tell, it was keeping pace with me; I had little doubt that, if Tereshkova ordered her helmsman to do so, the ship could intercept my lifeboat within minutes.
    â€œAll right, so you’re a baseball fan.” When Tereshkova’s voice returned, it was a little less formal. “You’re very clever, Mr. Truffaut. I’ll give you that. If you’ll heave to and allow yourself to be boarded, I’ll see what I can do about getting you tickets to a game.”
    I shook my head, even though she couldn’t see me. “Thanks for the date, Commodore, but I’m going to have to take a rain check. Maybe next time you’re in town?”
    For a moment, I thought I heard laughter in the background. In the meantime, I was sizing up my fuel situation. If the Lee started to close in, I could always fire the main engine again. But I needed to conserve as much fuel as possible for retrofire and atmospheric entry; as things stood, I had barely enough in reserve to do that. The Lou Brock was no shuttle, and my margin for error was thin as a razor.
    â€œEnsign, you know as well as I do that this is pointless.” The commodore no longer sounded quite so affable. “My ship is…”
    â€œFaster, sure. No question about it.” I switched back to manual override, then raised a forefinger and let it hover above the engine ignition switch. “And you know as well as I do that there’s no way in hell you can board me if I don’t want you to do so. Allow me to demonstrate.”
    I touched the red button, held it down. A quick surge as the engine fired. I counted to three, barely enough time for the lifeboat’s velocity to rise a quarter g, then I released the button. On the screen, the Lee had drifted a few millimeters farther away. “See what I mean? Get too close, and I’ll do that again.”
    No answer. If she had any remaining doubts whether I was an experienced spacer, that little display settled them. The Lee was capable of overtaking my lifeboat, sure, but her ship didn’t have the