Nine of the flight controllers were now involved, Eads included. Darrow stood by and watched with mounting concern. It had become ceaseless, day and night. They came in on shift, and took the reins of some ongoing brawl from a controller almost dead on his feet from fatigue. Weary and strung out, they handed fights off to replacements at shift rotation. The enemy attacks—mass bombing operations, lightning raids, opportunistic intercepts—were happening all the time. Currently, the rotunda had four points of focus. Two controllers on the far side of the chamber were negotiating interceptions on a wave of bombers over Ezraville. Another had a fighter-on-fighter clash in progress above the Lida Valley. A fourth had control of a Marauder formation heading south. The nine on Darrow’s half of the room were handling the big battle: close on four hundred and fifty enemy bombers, a hundred escorts and fourteen Imperial wings. The chatter and roll of voices was incessant.
