On Mars in the communications tower of Eagle City, technician Mel Golden was puzzled. Some of his data had just dried up. Mel was responsible for monitoring the sats in a large segment of the Asteroid Belt, and a section over a thousand miles in diameter had gone dark. He called to his superior. “Will, I’ve got something curious here.” A slender, middle-aged man with long gray hair walked over to the console. “What is it, Mel?” “Look at this. You asked us to report anything out of the ordinary. Well, occasionally one sat will malfunction, but it looks as if at least a dozen have stopped reporting all at once. I haven’t plotted out the details yet, but there’s an entire section of the Belt where nothing’s happening.” “When did it start?” “Just a moment ago. So whatever occurred out there happened about...”--he thought for a second--“about eleven minutes ago.” “Thanks, Mel. This could be the surprise we’ve been waiting for. I’ll report this immediately.” Will went over to the master communicator in the tower and sent a top priority message to Space Command’s headquarters on Mars, describing the situation. Space Command headquarters forwarded the information to its centers on Earth and the Moon, as well as to Oritz Konig, SE’s Head of Security in Mars Base. Konig’s report to Richard Starlight included these words: “It looks probable that the pirates have taken some sort of action in the Belt. There are no population centers of any size within 10,000 miles of the place, and no known solitary miners. It’s a completely dead spot, and sats are spaced very thinly there. Yet fourteen sats in a sphere at least a thousand miles in diameter were put out within a ten-minute period. No natural phenomenon can explain that. Space Command has the closest ship, but it won’t get to the site for a little more than 22 hours. The nearest backup ship is more than three hours after that. SE doesn’t have a ship of any kind at all within four days of the site, so we’ll have to depend on Space Command for the first reports.” * * * * * “Wake up! Everybody wake up!” Starman Joe Taylor was shouting. “What is it? What’s wrong?” Voices came from several men, jerked awake by Joe’s outburst. “Food! There’s food here!” he burst out. “And water! Someone brought us food and water! Lots of it!” Within seconds everyone was up and crowding around Joe. Now that he had roused his companions, he was bent over a half dozen large boxes, one of which was partially open. He reached in and took out a container filled with fruit. He handed it to one of George St. George’s men, reached into the box again, and withdrew a vessel with water in it. It had a spigot on it as if it were made for traveling. The men began passing it around, drinking deeply. Joe dug in again and brought out another box. He opened it and held it up so that others could see. It contained several layers of items like large crackers.