General Laurel Lance was furious and looking for someone to kill and her gaze had fallen on the luckless Tandy. Although Savage had told her the man was off-limits - for now - her hand was still fingering her belt knife, while she glowered at the man in question.
He was not without a certain amount of anger towards his early recruit. The man had limitations but should have been able to manage to arrange basic things like patrols around the perimeter of the base. There was no point in having subordinates if he had to take care of everything himself. To divert himself, he looked over at the more morale-boosting sight of Nikki, hard at work on her assigned task.
''Have you found anything yet?'' General Lance demanded of the younger woman.
''Working on it'' Nikki said, without looking round. Lance snorted. ''Perhaps you could do better.'' Nikki continued, in the same way and tone.
Lance looked daggers at her.
''It's a waste of time quarreling among ourselves'' Savage said firmly, drawing a grateful look from Cassandra. The two women had disliked each other from the start, for reasons that went deeper than Lance's view of the relationship between Cassandra and Nikki. Nikki, on the rare occasions when she wasn't thinking about technical matters, had a surprisingly liberal view of the world.
Time passed, while Lance continued to simmer and the rest of them tried not to feel impatient.
''Ah, got it'' 'Nikki said at last. She pointed to the large screen, which was now displaying a series of cleaned-up images of people - those who had invaded and attacked the base. For a while they watched in silence.
''Stop'' Savage said abruptly.
''Who are they?'' Cassandra asked. The blonde woman and dark-haired man didn't look like anyone she knew.
''I told you about Rip Hunter'' Cassandra nodded. ''Those two were with him.''
''What is this?'' Lance demanded, pronouncing every word.
He told her. She added Caspar and Dronon to the list of those she obviously wanted to kill.
''We have these'' Nikki pointed to the three personal breach devices taken from the dead attackers. ''I had a quick look and they're set for the same co-ordinates - must be somewhere on Earth 1.''
Nikki had already said that the bomb in the mothership's engines had put that vessel beyond her capacity to repair. Neither Caspar n Dronon had those sorts of skills either. Which left the smaller jump ship.
He asked Nikki.
''It took some damage but it's not beyond repair'' she confirmed. ''I'll have to forage from the mothership some more.''
Dronon looked as if he was about to object. Caspar nudged him.
Lance looked as if she was thinking that this delay was going to mean that more of her comrades were going to be captured or killed - but that led to her selecting the best targets for revenge.
''We're going to find these allies of Hunter'' she declared ''and we're going to kill them.''
On that, Savage thought, they could agree.
