Our room at the Candlewood Arms was circular, with one porthole-shaped window. The bed, which fitted perfectly into the circle, took up fully half the room, and was barely big enough for the four of us to sleep on together.

We stirred a few times over the next few hours, since the sounds of roaring engines kept up most of the time, not to mention the odd falling bomb to rattle the window. It was early morning the next day before any of us felt like getting up.

Xato sprang out of bed, whistling going about his shower.

I rolled over to find myself partly entangled with Tsang, who'd cuddled up to me during the night.

“Do you still brag to your friends about me?” I asked.

He opened an eye and shook his head “Nah, I just like being around you, Cylas.”

I couldn't help but blush.

Although Tsang begged that we go and see the sites of Edgetown, Tando insisted that we first stop by the rocket port and check on the progress that the mechanics had made with our battered ship.

We crossed polished streets and ascended a broad escalating staircase up to the level of the rocket port.

When we came to the hangar where our ship lay we were sad to see it still very much battered and in fact in pieces.

A mechanic emerged from one of the rocket tubes and at first I was very startled. The fellow wore a suit of overalls that covered every part of him, from the tips of his toes to his whole face, with only his red hair poking out the top and some goggles to show there was a person inside!

“Hello!” he waved to us, unfastening the mask portion of his uniform to show a white face with a slightly greenish tint. “I'm sorry we haven't had much time for your rocket. You can probably tell from all the bustle lately that we've been awfully busy. You wouldn't believe how they pile up!”

Tando nodded “We believe it, trust me.”

The mechanic nodded “You fellas will probably be here a week yet. There are worse places though, even if we are under siege.”

Xato asked “It's weird, I didn't think the Satellite Lords really did sieges anymore. When did all of this get started?”

“Only two days ago. Luckily we're equipped with a lot of fortifications here. Edgetown was mostly built up back when the enemy did sieges all the time.”

I heard a clatter from a workbench in the corner and turned to see Tsang hurriedly trying to replace a series of metal cylinders on a table. “Sorry!” he shouted. “I was just looking, and...”

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“Say!” Tando said. “What exactly are those things? Not rocket parts?”

The mechanic nodded, taking off his overalls “That's the good news, for you fellas. When you fly out of here you'll have the very latest feature on your ship, a design direct from Selenium.”

I picked one up from the floor and played with the moving parts “I can hardly imagine what that would be. We've already got more gadgets than I can figure out.”

“It's a safety feature for high altitude flight and space travel. These go on various parts of the forward hull. If any part of the ship's outer skin is breached, these cylinders pump out this new chemical. The stuff adheres to the surface of the rocket and seals up the breaks.”

“Sounds miraculous!” I exclaimed. As I spoke I managed to trip a mechanism and the next thing I knew I had a handful of thin clear liquid. “Oops.”

Xato ran a finger through the clear mess on me and sniffed it “I don't see how this stuff could seal anything.”

Our mechanic came and handed me a rag “It's warm in here, just like it will be inside your ship. When you fly in the outer atmosphere or in space it'll be mighty cold. The cold turns this stuff opaque and it seals like glue.”

“Sounds like it could come in handy.” I tried to hand it back but he shook his head.

“Keep that one, call it a free sample. The ones that go on the ship have to be full anyhow.”

In the back end of the hangar some walls had been erected to portion off areas for specialized purposes and from here we heard the sound of rustling.

The mechanic turned and stared in that direction “Now what could that be?”

I started to ask “You don't think...?”

We all fell to the ground at once under the force of a huge explosion out on the landing strip!

A large rocket was in pieces, belching flames. Electric response cars drove out onto the strip, with jets on the front shooting icy water with fuel-neutralizing additives to help stop the blaze. Battle medics rode on the running boards and jumped off near the wreck, marching into the smoking interior to retrieve any possible survivors.

We walked near the action as a group and I saw overhead where rocketmen descended in their falling suits, some of whom looked unconscious or worse!

Roars from the anti-aircraft rays around the city came to our startled ears. The battle was in full swing again!

As one man, we ran to join the effort, but before we could make it to the burning ship, another one came in for a crash-landing before us. Smoke belched from this punished ship also.

We ran to the door and pulled the lever to spring off the outer hatch and ran into the hellish interior. Inside I could hardly see, much less breathe, but we could hear the crew coughing plainly enough.

I whipped out my raygun and blew out a window to help let out the blinding smoke. After that it became an easier task, hauling up the half-dead men out of their stations. Xato and Tsang worked at hacking the pilot's chair loose, as the impact had jammed the poor devil against the controls.

“Hurry!” Tando shouted. “The fire's started up again!”

We didn't dare take the man out of the chair, so we hauled it over the crumpled machinery to the exit. I got between them and tried to lift up the middle, only just realizing what heavy things these chairs could be.

Just as we got out into the open, the streams of fire-retarding water began to fall on us, and the cold of it was a welcome feeling.

We watched as they lifted the pilot into an ambulance along with some of his crew. Two of those we pulled from the burning ship left in bags.