Coming in at a fast
clip, each pirate ship only seconds after its predecessor, Crass' crew
strafed the freighters, scoring two direct hits.
With a grin of satisfaction, Lather saw that he would have one more
chance to attack. The protective warships had drawn into a very tight
formation to protect the last freighter. Its hulk was already torn with
a long rip, but its engine still worked and it responded to controls.
The freighter turned and twisted in a random, spiraling forward motion
with the warships close around it. Lather brought the Silver Cloud in
for the kill.
Shooting smoothly through an opening in the protecting ships'
formation, he saw his target and fired. The last freighter blew up
almost in his face. All seven freighters-and their contents-had been
turned into diminutive pieces of whirling space junk. The Silver Cloud
sped through the detritus and passed the far boundary of warships. As
soon as he had passed the last Space Command ship, three of them fired
at him almost at once. Though he was invisible to radar, he was visible
to the eye at the moment he was close to the exploding freighter.
One Space Command laser pierced the Silver Cloud-a narrow but tight
beam. The shaft of weaponlight punctured the crew's living quarters,
and air began to escape from the pirates' spacecraft.
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