Commander Cenn had left hours before - at the first detection of the coming enemy. There was no way of altering the plan now. It worked or it didn't, but the admiral felt quite comfortable. As did the officers. As did the men.
Again watch the fireflies.
Like a deadly ballet dance, in precise formations, they sparked.
The Foundation fleet edged slowly backwards. Hours passed and the fleet veered slowly off, teasing the advancing enemy slightly off course, then more so.
In the minds of the dictators of the battle plan, there was a certain volume of space that must be occupied by the Kalganian ships. Out from that volume crept the Foundationers; into it slipped the Kalganians. Those that passed out again were attacked, suddenly and fiercely. Those that stayed within were not touched.
It all depended on the reluctance of the ships of Lord Stettin to take the initiative themselves - on their willingness to remain where none attacked.
Captain Dixyl stared frigidly at his wrist watch. It was 1310, "We've got twenty minutes," he said.
The lieutenant at his side nodded tensely, "It looks all right so far, captain. We've got more than ninety percent of them boxed. If we can keep them that way-"
"Yes! If-"
The Foundation ships were drifting forward again - very slowly. Not quick enough to urge a Kalganian retreat and just quickly enough to discourage a Kalganian advance. They preferred to wait.
And the minutes passed.
At 1325, the admiral's buzzer sounded in seventy-five ships of the Foundation's line, and they built up to a maximum acceleration towards the front-plane of the Kalganian fleet, itself three hundred strong. Kalganian shields flared into action, and the vast energy beams flicked out. Every one of the three hundred concentrated in the same direction, towards their mad attackers who bore down relentlessly, uncaringly and-
At 1330, fifty ships under Commander Cenn appeared from nowhere, in one single bound through hyperspace to a calculated spot at a calculated time - and were spaced in tearing fury at the unprepared Kalganian rear.
The trap worked perfectly.
The Kalganians still had numbers on their side, but they were in no mood to count. Their first effort was to escape and the formation once broken was only the more vulnerable, as the enemy ships bumbled into one another's path.
After a while, it took on the proportions of a rat hunt.
Of three hundred Kalganian ships, the core and pride of their fleet, some sixty or less, many in a state of near-hopeless disrepair, reached Kalgan once more. The Foundation loss was eight ships out of a total of one hundred twenty-five.
Preem Palver landed on Terminus at the height of the celebration. He found the furore distracting, but before he left the planet, he had accomplished two things, and received one request.
The two things accomplished were: 1) the conclusion of an agreement whereby Palver's co-operative was to deliver twenty shiploads of certain foodstuffs per month for the next year at a war price, without, thanks to the recent battle, a corresponding war risk, and 2) the transfer to Dr. Darell of Arcadia's five short words.
For a startled moment, Darell had stared wide-eyed at him, and then he had made his request. It was to carry an answer back to Arcadia. Palver liked it; it was a simple answer and made sense. It was: "Come back now. There won't be any danger."
Lord Stettin was in raging frustration. To watch his every weapon break in his hands; to feel the firm fabric of his military might part like the rotten thread it suddenly turned out to be - would have turned phlegmaticism itself into flowing lava. And yet he was helpless, and knew it.
He hadn't really slept well in weeks. He hadn't shaved in three days. He had canceled all audiences. His admirals were left to themselves and none knew better than the Lord of Kalgan that very little time and no further defeats need elapse before he would have to contend with internal rebellion.
Lev Meirus, First Minister, was no help. He stood there, calm and indecently old, with his thin, nervous finger stroking, as always, the wrinkled line from nose to chin.
"Well," shouted Stettin at him, "contribute something. We stand here defeated, do you understand? Defeated! And why? I don't know why. There you have it. I don't know why. Do you know why?"
"I think so," said Meirus, calmly.
"Treason!" The word came out softly, and other words followed as softly. "You've known of treason, and you've kept quiet. You served the fool I ejected from the First Citizenship and you think you can serve whatever foul rat replaces me. If you have acted so, I will extract your entrails for it and burn them before your living eyes."
Meirus was unmoved. "I have tried to fill you with my own doubts, not once, but many times. I have dinned it in your ears and you have preferred the advice of others because it stuffed your ego better. Matters have turned out not as I feared, but even worse. If you do not care to listen now, say so, sir, and I shall leave, and, in due course, deal with your successor, whose first act, no doubt, will be to sign a treaty of peace."
Stettin stared at him red-eyed, enormous fists slowly clenching and unclenching. "Speak, you gray slug. Speak!"
"I have told you often, sir, that you are not the Mule. You may control ships and guns but you cannot control the minds of your subjects. Are you aware, sir, of who it is you are fighting? You fight the Foundation, which is never defeated - the Foundation, which is protected by the Seldon Plan - the Foundation, which is destined to form a new Empire."
"There is no Plan. No longer. Munn has said so."
"Then Munn is wrong. And if he were right, what then? You and I, sir, are not the people. The men and women of Kalgan and its subject worlds believe utterly and deeply in the Seldon Plan as do all the inhabitants of this end of the Galaxy. Nearly four hundred years of history teach the fact that the Foundation cannot be beaten. Neither the kingdoms nor the warlords nor the old Galactic Empire itself could do it."