Seven unmanned NME freighters were prepared to carry Earth's
hope into space. They would be accompanied by a dozen armed ships
supplied by Space Command. The rendezvous of freighters and warships
was only a half-hour's flight time from the space station. Then they
would proceed on the eight-day journey to the site of deployment.
In a private office and laboratory below, Robert Nolan's chief
assistant Beowulf Denn finished making a voice recording of the details
of the launch. He included the number of freighters, the number and
type of Space Command warships appointed to guard them, their course,
hour of departure, and timing of the deployment of the probes.
When he had finished the recording, he inserted the disk into a
computer independent of the NME computer system and speeded up its
contents so that the entire message was less than 0.03 seconds long. He
then encrypted it and transmitted the result on a tight beam
communicator to coordinates in space which he kept only in his head.
After the message had been sent, he destroyed the disk and removed all
signs on his computer that the action had occurred. The message he sent
could be read only one time and then would erase itself, leaving no
trace at the receiving end that it had ever existed.
Seven ships had arrived at O344.
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