The Mote in God's Eye by Larry Niven, Jerry Pournelle Page B

so... Blaine called up the intruder’s deceleration, matched it to the total reflected light, divided . . . so. Sail and payload together massed about 450 thousand kilograms.
    That didn’t sound dangerous.
    In fact, it didn’t sound like a working spacecraft, not one that could cross thirty-five light years in normal space. The alien pilots would go mad with so little room—unless they were tiny, or liked enclosed spaces, or had spent the past several hundred years living in inflated balloons with filmy, lightweight walls . . . no. There was too little known and too much room for speculation. Still, there was nothing better to do. He fingered the knot on his nose.
    Blaine was about to clear the screens, then thought again and increased the magnification. He stared at the result for a long time, then swore softly.
    The intruder was heading straight into the sun.
     
    MacArthur decelerated at nearly three gravities directly into orbit around Brigit; then she descended into the protective Langston Field of the base on the moonlet, a small black dart sinking toward a tremendous black pillow, the two joined by a thread of intense white. Without the Field to absorb the energy of thrust, the main drive would have burned enormous craters into the snowball moon.
    The fueling station crew rushed to their tasks. Liquid hydrogen, electrolized from the mushy ice of Brigit and distilled after liquefaction, poured into MacArthur ’s tankage complexes. At the same time Sinclair drove his men outside. Crewmen swarmed across the ship to take advantage of low gravity with the ship dirtside. Boatswains screamed at supply masters as Brigit was stripped of spare parts.
    “Commander Frenzi requests permission to come aboard, sir,” the watch officer called. Rod grimaced. “Send him up.” He turned back to Sally Fowler, seated demurely in the watch midshipman’s seat.
    “But don’t you understand, we’ll be accelerating at high gees all the way to intercept. You know what that feels like now. Besides, it’s a dangerous mission!”
    “Pooh. Your orders were to take me to New Scotland,” she huffed. “They said nothing about stranding me on a snowball.”
    “Those were general orders. If Cziller’s known we’d have to fight, he’d never have let you aboard. As captain of this ship, it’s my decision, and I say I’m not about to take Senator Fowler’s niece out to a possible battle.”
    “Oh.” She thought for a moment. The direct approach hadn’t worked. “Rod. Listen. Please. You see this as a tremendous adventure, don’t you? How do you think I feel? Whether those are aliens or just lost colonists trying to find the Empire again, this is my field. It’s what I was trained for, and I’m the only anthropologist aboard. You need me.”
    “We can do without. It’s too dangerous.”
    “You’re letting Mr. Bury stay aboard.”
    “Not letting. The Admiralty specifically ordered me to keep him in my ship. I don’t have discretion about him, but I do about you and your servants—”
    “If it’s Adam and Annie you’re worried about, we’ll leave them here. They couldn’t take the acceleration anyway. But I can take anything you can, Captain My Lord Roderick Blaine. I’ve seen you after a hyperspace Jump, dazed, staring around, not knowing what to do, and I was able to leave my cabin and walk up here to the bridge! So don’t tell me how helpless I am! Now, are you going to let me stay here, or...”
    “Or what?”
    “Or nothing, of course. I know I can’t threaten you. Please, Rod?” She tried everything, including batting her eyes, and that was too much, because Rod burst out laughing.
    “Commander Frenzi, sir,” the Marine sentry outside the bridge companionway announced.
    “Come in, Romeo, come in,” Rod said more heartily than he felt. Frenzi was thirty-five, a good ten years older than Blaine, and Rod had served under him for three months of the most miserable duty he could ever recall. The man was a