The Aftermath (11 page)

“Three minutes to go,” he said, trying to keep his voice firm and clear.

He was sitting in the command chair. Theo had configured the electronic keyboard to control the propulsion system program. Now his eyes were fixed on the main display screen. Almost everything in the green, so far. Angie was standing behind him on one side, his mother on the other.

Pauline placed her hand on his shoulder. He glanced up at her.

“Theo, I want you to remember that this was a family decision. We all agreed to do it.”

“I know, Mom.”

“If it doesn't go right, I don't want you to blame yourself. We're all in this together.”

Angie said, “It'll go right, Mom. Don't worry.”

Theo thought that his sister's voice sounded high and brittle. Angie's worried too, he thought, but she doesn't want to show it.

Theo focused his attention on the control board. He and Angie had checked the pumps that fed the main engine a dozen times. With their mother helping them, they had inspected every centimeter of the propulsion system's piping and electrical wiring. The board showed no red lights, only a pair of ambers and they were minor backup circuits, not crucially important; everything else was in the green.

“Two minutes and counting,” the computer's synthesized voice said. Theo realized the computer sounded almost exactly like his father's voice. Naturally, he thought. Dad programmed it himself.

They heard a thump and a groaning rattle from deep in the bowels of the ship. Before Angie or his mother could say anything, Theo told them, “Main pump powering up.”

Angie was leaning over his shoulder now, squinting at the countdown checklist displayed on the screen to his right. “Open the hydrogen feed lines at T minus ninety seconds.”

He nodded and placed his finger on the proper key. It's programmed to open automatically, but I'll punch the manual command anyway, he said to himself.

“T minus ninety,” came the synthesized voice. “Hydrogen feed line open.”

A new green light winked on.

“Confirm feed line open,” Theo said, his own voice sounding slightly shaky in his ears.

“T minus sixty seconds. Automatic sequencer on.”

“Confirm automatic sequencer.”

New lights were springing up across the panel. All green, Theo saw. He could hear his mother's rapid breathing. Something deep in the ship shuddered. Hydrogen's flowing, Theo realized. Liquid hydrogen, at more than two hundred fifty degrees below zero. If anything's going to go wrong, he thought, it'll be now.

“T minus thirty seconds. Electric power activated. Magnetic field on.”

“Confirm mag field,” Theo said crisply. The liquid hydrogen seemed to be flowing smoothly: leakage rate minor, no damage to the insulated piping.

“Ten … nine … eight…”

Hydrogen was flowing from the propellant tank to the main engine's thruster. The engine's superconducting magnets were on at full strength. The ship's fusion reactor was putting out its maximum power level.

“… three … two … one … engine thrusting.”

Theo pointed a finger at the central display screen. It showed a green line rising steadily. Thrust. The thrust they needed to slow the ship and get it looping back toward civilization eventually.

“It's working!” Pauline exclaimed, clapping her hands together.

“I don't feel anything,” said Angie, sounding disappointed.

“You won't,” Theo said, feeling enormously relieved. “I told you, remember? You can't blast this old bucket like some rocket ship in an adventure vid. We nudge her gently.”

Angie replied, “I know the thrust level's real low, Thee, but I thought we'd feel
something.
”

He grinned up at her. “Watch yourself pouring liquids tonight. They'll be skewed a little.”

“You did it, Theo,” his mother said, gripping his shoulder tighter. “You did it.”

“We did it,” he corrected. “Angie and me.”

His sister beamed at him.

It wasn't until Theo tried to get up from the command chair that he realized he was soaked through with perspiration.

“You better take a shower, Thee,” Angie said, wrinkling her nose. “You smell pretty disgusting.”

Theo laughed. Back to normal, he said to himself.

*   *   *

That evening, while they were relaxing in the sitting room after a celebratory dinner of real frozen chicken, Theo mused, “If there was only some way to get the antennas working.”

“If there
were
only,” Angie corrected, sitting across the coffee table from him. “Subjunctive. Right, Ma?”

Pauline nodded. “After the conditional
if.
” She was on the sofa, to Theo's right.

With a shrug, Theo said, “If we could get the antennas working we could call for help.”

“But you said we don't have the materials you need to repair the antennas,” Angie pointed out.

“Yeah, that's right. But I'm wondering if there isn't some other way.”

“Like what?”

“Like … I don't know.”

Before Angie could say anything, their mother asked, “Is there anything else on board that could be put to use as a beacon?”

“Or a comm system, so we could call for help.”

Theo shook his head. “We've got all the communications gear we need. It's just that the godda … er, godforsaken antennas are gone. No antennas, no signals out. Or in.”

“Is there something else we can use for an antenna?” Angie asked.

“Not that I can figure out,” Theo answered. “I've looked all through every piece of equipment on the ship. Nothing usable.”

Pauline asked, “Don't we have a radar system?”

“Collision avoidance radar,” said Theo. “That antenna's a mess of melted goo, just like the rest.”

“You mean we're flying blind?” Angie yipped. “We could run into an asteroid?”

“Yes, we're flying blind. No, we won't hit an asteroid big enough to do much damage. It's
empty
out there, Angie.”

“For real?”

“For real. The chances of us getting hit by anything bigger than a dust flake are about the same as … well, it's pretty blinking remote.”

Angela did not look relieved.

Pauline asked, “We are getting hit by micrometeoroids, though?”

“Yes'm. Every day. Nothing big enough to penetrate the hull, but sooner or later I'll have to go out and replace some of the meteor bumpers.”

“Isn't there
anything
we could use for an antenna, Thee?” Angie persisted. “I mean, we've got a whole ship's worth of supplies. Can't we jury-rig some wires or something?”

Theo didn't answer for a long moment, his mind churning, his self-control tottering.

“I've tried,” he said at last. “I've really tried.”

“We know,” his mother said.

“I mean, I've gone through everything I can think of. I really have. I just don't know enough. I've checked all the maintenance vids, all the logistics lists, everything. I can't make it work. I just don't know how to do it!”

They were both staring at him.

“I've failed,” Theo admitted, close to tears. “I can't fix the antennas. I've tried and tried and tried and I can't do it.”

“It's all right, Thee,” Angie whispered.

His mother reached out and touched his shoulder. “You've done your best, Theo. No one can ask more than that.”

“I feel so damned
stupid!
” he blurted, banging the arm of his chair with his fist.

“You are not stupid,” said Pauline firmly. “No child of mine is stupid. You simply don't have the materials you need to repair the antennas. That's not your fault.”

“It's not your fault, Thee,” Angie consoled. “It was the stupid designers. Why'd they have to put all the antennas on the same section of the hull? That was just plain stupid.”

“They weren't designing a man-of-war,” Pauline said. “They never expected an ore carrier to be attacked.”

Fighting to hold back tears of frustration, Theo looked across the coffee table to his sister. “Maybe we could figure out some way to rig up an antenna, Angie.”

“You think so?” she asked.

“I don't know. I can look through the maintenance vids again, I suppose.”

“Do you think there's something in them?” Pauline asked softly.

“I'll look. It's better than doing nothing, I guess.”

“Good. That's all we can ask of you.”

“I'll go through the vids with you, Thee,” said Angie. “Two heads are better than one.”

Theo started to glare at her, but it melted into a grin. “Unless they're on the same person,” he said tamely.

They all laughed together.

ORE SHIP
SYRACUSE
: OUTSIDE

Theo's nose twitched at the sharp tang of his own perspiration that pervaded his space suit. He was floating at the end of a buckyball tether, watching the squat little maintenance robots place a new section of meteor bumper atop the ship's outer skin.

“Your suit temperature has risen five degrees in the past ten minutes, Thee,” Angie's voice sounded in his helmet earphones. She didn't seem worried about it; just doing her job of monitoring his EVA from the command pod.

“Turning up the suit fans,” Theo obediently replied, jabbing a gloved finger on the proper key in the control pad on his left wrist. He heard the pitch of the suit's cooling fans rise slightly. His father had often said the fans sounded like the whine of mosquitoes on a summer night; Theo had never heard mosquitoes, never experienced a summer night on Earth.

“Ten more minutes on the timeline,” Angie called.

He nodded inside his bubble helmet. “We're gonna run a little long. They haven't got the bumper fastened in place yet.”

“We have an extra thirty minutes built into the timeline.”

“Right.” Theo knew his suit held enough air for another hour and more. No sweat, he told himself, then grimaced at the phrase. He was sweating plenty inside the heavily insulated suit. Funny, he thought, this far from the Sun you'd think it'd be freezing out here. But even the wan distant Sun was powerful enough to drench him with perspiration. The suit didn't let heat out, he knew. Maybe I ought to build a radiator into the backpack for long excursions like this.

He had ventured out the main airlock four hours ago to direct the robots in their task of removing this section of pitted old meteoroid bumper and replacing it with a new section, straight from the storage bay. The robots, about the size of a snare drum with four many-jointed dexterous arms, were programmed for simple, repetitive maintenance tasks. Something as complicated as removing the old bumper and replacing it with the new one required constant commands from a human being.

Theo imagined himself to be some kind of wizard out of an old fantasy vid, commanding a squad of trolls or gnomes. He wondered if he could build voice synthesizers into the robots and have them say, “Yes, master,” to him.

At last the job was done. The shiny new bumper was in place and the robots had used their cutting lasers to slice up the pitted old one into sections small enough to feed into the ship's miniature smelter, to be melted down into new raw material.

Theo pictured himself leading an army of laser-armed robots against the type of murdering bastard who had attacked their ship. Slice 'em to bloody ribbons, he told himself.

“What did you say?” Angie asked.

“Huh? Nothing.”

“You mumbled something.”

“Nothing important. I'm coming in now.”

*   *   *

Victor lay in bed, wide awake, beside Cheena Madagascar, who was snoring softly. I ought to feel guilty, he thought, sleeping with this woman instead of my wife. But life takes strange twists. If I want to use this ship to search for Pauline and the kids I've got to keep the captain happy.

Despite himself, he grinned into the shadows of the darkened bedroom. You've got to admit, he said to himself, that if this is what it takes to keep her happy, well … it's better than being poked in the eye with a sharp stick.

Cheena was an accomplished lover, he'd found. At first he'd been surprised at her demand, thinking that a woman who'd prefer to have her children through cloning and avoid being tied to a man in marriage would probably not be all that interested in sex games. But he'd been wrong. Captain Madagascar was passionate in bed, demanding. He'd done his best to satisfy her, and apparently his best was good enough to please her.

According to her calculations, they were nearly finished with the grisly task of picking up the dead bodies from the
Chrysalis
massacre. Soon—perhaps as soon as the next few days—Captain Madagascar could report to Big George Ambrose that the job was completed.

Then what? Victor wanted this ship so he could go deeper into the Belt and find his family, drifting aboard what was left of
Syracuse.
For that, he'd need not only Cheena's agreement, but Big George's as well. They'll tell me my family is dead by now, Victor thought. They'll say searching for them would be a waste of time and effort.

He clenched his jaw in the darkness. And I'll tell George that my family are victims of the
Chrysalis
massacre, too. We've got to find them even if they're dead, like all the others.

But they won't be dead, he told himself. They're alive. Pauline is keeping them alive.
Syracuse
is keeping them alive. I'll find them. If I have to steal this ship from Cheena, I'll find them.

Then a new thought struck him. What if they agree? What if Cheena takes me out searching for
Syracuse?
And we find them? What happens when Pauline and Cheena meet?

*   *   *