Picnic On Nearside

by John Varley

  He managed to put this out of his mind. He was along for the ride, to have fun, and he wasn't a worrier. He had probably dropped a decimal point somewhere in his calculations, or was forgetting a little-known fact of ballistics. Certainly no one else seemed worried.

  When he discovered that the lifeboats were missing, he was more angry than frightened.

  "What are they doing to us?" he asked the steward who had come when he pressed the service bell. "Just because this is the last trip, does that mean we're not entitled to full protection? I'd like to know what's going on."

  The steward, who was an affable man, scratched his head in bewilderment as he once more examined the empty lifeboat cradle.

  "Beats me," he said, with a friendly grin. "Part of the salvage operation, I guess. But we've never had a spot of trouble in over fifty years. I hear the Icarus won't even carry lifeboats."

  Quester fumed. If, sometime in the past, an engineer had decided Hell's Snowball needed lifeboats, he'd have felt a damn sight better if the ship still had lifeboats.

  "I'd like to talk to someone who knows something about it."

  "You might try the purser," the steward ventured, then quickly shook his head. "No, I forgot. The purser didn't make this trip. The first mate... no, she's... I guess that leaves the captain. You might talk to him."

  Quester grumbled as he swam down the corridor toward the bridge. The company had no right to strip the ship before its final cruise. On the way there, he heard an announcement over the public address system.

  "Attention. All passengers are to report to A Deck at 1300 hours for lifeboat drill. The purser... correction, the second officer will call the roll. Attendance is required of all passengers. That is all."

  The announcement failed to mollify him, though he was puzzled.

  The door to the bridge was ajar. There was a string spanning the open doorway with a hand-lettered sign hanging from it.

  "The captain can be found at the temporary bridge," it read, "located on F Deck aft of the dispensary." Inside the room, a work crew was removing the last of the electronic equipment. There was the smell of ozone and oil, and the purple crackle of sparks. The room was little more than an ice-walled shell.

  "What...?" Quester began.

  "See the captain," the boss said tiredly, pulling out one of the last memory banks in a shower of shorting wires. "I just work here. Salvage crew."

  Quester was reminded more of a wrecking crew. He started back toward F Deck.

  "Correction on that last announcement," the PA said. "Lifeboat drill has been cancelled. The social director wishes to announce that he is no longer taking reservations for tours of the engine room. The second officer... correction, the third officer has requested all personnel to stay clear of the reactor room. There has been a slight spillage during the salvage program. Passengers are not to worry; this incident presents no danger to them. The power requirements of the ship are being taken over by the auxiliary reactor. The social director wishes to announce that tours of the auxiliary reactor are suspended. That is all."

  "Is it just me?" Quester asked himself as he drifted by the groups of other passengers, none of whom seemed upset by any of this.

  He located the temporary bridge, at the end of a little-used corridor that was stacked high with plastic crates marked "Immediate Removal—Rush, Urgent, Highest Priority." He insinuated his way past them with difficulty and was about to knock on the door when he was stopped by the sound of voices on the other side. The voices were angry.

  "I tell you, we should abort this trip at once. I've lost the capability to maneuver the ship in the event of an emergency. I told you I wanted the attitude thrusters to remain in place until after perihelenion."

  "Captain, there is no use protesting now," said another voice. "Maybe I agree with you; maybe I don't. In any case, the engines are gone now, and there's no chance of installing them again. There is to be no argument with these orders. The company's in bad shape, what with outfitting the new asterite. Can you picture what it would cost to abort this trip and refund the fares to seven thousand passengers?"

  "Hang the company!" the captain exploded. "This ship is unsafe! What about those new calculations I gave you—the ones from Lewiston? Have you looked them over?"

  The other voice was conciliatory. "Captain, Captain, you're wasting energy worrying about that crackpot. He's been laughed out of the Lunar Academy; his equations simply do not work."

  "They look sound enough to me."

  "Take it from me, Captain, the best minds in the system have assured us that the Snowball will hold together. Why, this old hunk of junk is good for a dozen more trips, and you know it. We've erred, if at all, on the conservative side."

  "Well, maybe," the captain grumbled. "I still don't like that lifeboat situation, though. How many did you say we had left?"

  "Twenty-eight," the other soothed.

  Quester felt the hair stand up on the back of his neck. He peeked into the room, not knowing what he would say. But there was no one there. The voices were coming from a speaker on the wall. Evidently the captain was in another part of the ship. He considered going to his cabin and getting drunk, then decided it was a bad idea. He would go to the casino and get drunk. On the way he passed a lifeboat cradle that was not empty. It was the site of bustling activity, with crews hurrying up and down ramps into the ship. He stuck his head in, saw that the seats had been stripped and the interior was piled high with plastic crates. More were being added every minute.

  He stopped one of the workers and asked her what was going on.

  "Ask the captain," she shrugged. "They told me to stack these boxes in here, that's all I know."

  He stood back and watched until the loading was complete, then was told to stand clear as the nullfield was turned off to allow the boat to drift clear of the Snowball. At a distance of two kilometers, the engines fired and the boat was away, blasting back toward the inner planets.

  "Twenty-seven," Quester mumbled to himself and headed for the casino.

  "Twenty-seven?" the woman asked.

  "Probably less by now," Quester said with a broad shrug. "And they only hold fifty people."

  They were sitting together at the roulette table, pressed into close company by the random currents of humanity that ebbed and flowed through the room. Quester was not gambling; his legs had just happened to give out, and the nearest place to collapse had been the chair he was sitting in. The woman had materialized out of his alcoholic mist.

  It was nice to get back to gravity after the weightless levels of the Snowball. But, he discovered, getting drunk in a weightless state was less hazardous. One needn't worry about one's balance. Here in the casino there was the problem of standing. It was too much of a problem for Quester.

  The casino was located at one end of a slowly rotating arm, which was mounted horizontally on a pivoted mast that extended straight up from Hell's Snowball. On the other end of the arm were the restaurants that served the passengers. Both modules were spherical; the structure resembled an anemometer with silver balls instead of cups on the ends. The view was tremendous. Overhead was the silver sphere that contained the restaurants. To one side was the slowly moving surface of the comet, a dirty gray even in the searing sunlight. To the other side were the stars and the main attraction: Sol itself, blemished with a choice collection of spots. The viewing was going to be good this trip. If anyone was alive to view it, Quester added to himself.

  "Twenty-seven, you say?" the woman asked again.

  "That's right, twenty-seven."

  "One hundred Marks on number twenty-seven," she said and placed her bet. Quester looked up, wondering how many times he would have to repeat himself before she understood him.

  The ball clattered to a stop, on number twenty-seven, and the croupier shoveled a tottering stack of chips to the woman. Quester looked around him again at the huge edifice he was sitting in, the incalculable tonnage of the spinning structure, and laughed.

  "I wo
ndered why they built this place," he said. "Who needs gravity?"

  "Why did they build it?" she asked him, picking up the chips.

  "For him," he said, pointing to the croupier. "That little ball would just hang there on the rim without gravity." He felt himself being lifted to his feet, and stood in precarious balance. He threw his arms wide.

  "For that matter, that's what all the gravity in the system's for. To bring those little balls down to the number, the old wheel of fortune; and when they've got your number, there's nothing you can do because your number's up, that's all there is, twenty-seven, that's all..."

  He was sobbing and mumbling philosophical truths as she led him from the room.

  The ride in the elevator to the hub of the rotating structure sobered Quester considerably. The gradually decreasing weight combined with the Coriolis effect that tended to push him against one wall was more than an abused stomach could take. The management knew that and had provided facilities for it. Quester vomited until his legs were shaky. Luckily, by then he was weightless and didn't need them.

  The woman towed him down the passageway like a toy balloon. They ended up in the grand ballroom.

  The ballroom was a hemisphere of nullfield sitting on the surface of the Snowball. From inside it was invisible. The dance area was crowded with couples trying out free-fall dances. Most of them had the easy grace of a somersaulting giraffe.

  Quester sobered a bit in the near-zero gee. Part of it was the effect of the antinausea drugs he had taken for free-fall; they also tended to reduce the effects of alcohol.

  "What's your name?" he asked the woman.

  "Solace. You?"

  "I'm Quester. From Tharsis, Mars. I'm... I'm confused about a lot of things."

  She floated over to a table, still towing Quester, and fastened him to one of the chairs. He turned his attention from the twisting bodies in the dance area to his companion.

  Solace was tall, much taller than a man or a woman would naturally grow. He estimated she was two and a half meters from head to toe, though she had no toes. Her feet had been replaced with peds, oversized hands popular with spacers. They were useful in free-fall, and for other things, as he discovered when she reached across the table with one slender leg and cupped his cheek with her ped. Her legs were as limber and flexible as her arms.

  "Thanks," she said, with a smile. "For the luck, I mean."

  "Hmmm? Oh, you mean the bet." Quester had to drag his attention back from the delightful sensation on his cheek. She was beautiful. "But I wasn't advising you on a bet. I was trying to tell you..."

  "I know. You were saying something about the lifeboats."

  "Yes. It's astounding, I..." He stopped, realizing that he couldn't remember what was astounding. He was having trouble focusing on her. She was wearing a kaleidoholo suit, which meant she was naked but for a constantly shifting pattern of projections. There seemed to be fifty or sixty different suits contained in it, none persisting for longer than a few seconds. It would melt smoothly from a silver sheath dress to an almost military uniform with gold braid and buttons to a garland of flowers to Lady Godiva. He rubbed his eyes and went on.

  "They're salvaging the ship," he said. "The last I heard there were only twenty-seven lifeboats left. And more are leaving every hour. They're taking the electronic equipment with them. And the furnishings and the machinery and who knows what else. I overheard the captain talking to a company representative. He's worried, the captain! But no one else seems to be. Am I worrying over nothing, or what?"

  Solace looked down at her folded hands for a moment, then brought her eyes back up to his.

  "I've been uneasy, too," she said in a low voice. She leaned closer to him. "I've shared my apprehensions with a group of friends. We... get together and share what we have learned. Our friends laugh at us when we tell them of our suspicions, but..." She paused and looked suspiciously around her.

  Even in his befuddled state Quester had to smile. "Go on," he said.

  She seemed to make up her mind about him and leaned even closer.

  "We'll be meeting again soon. Several of us have been scouting around—I was covering the casino when we met—and we'll share our findings and try to come to a consensus on what to do. Are you with us?"

  Quester fought off the feeling, quite strong since his suspicions began to haunt him, that he was somehow trapped in an adventure movie. But if he was, he was just getting to the good part. "You can count me in."

  With no further ado, she grabbed his arm in one of her peds and began towing him along, using her hands to grab onto whatever was handy. He thought of objecting, but she was much better than he at weightless maneuvering. "May I have your attention, please?"

  Quester looked around and spotted the captain standing in the center of the stage, in front of the band. He was not alone. On each side of him were women dressed in black jumpsuits, their eyes alertly scanning the audience. They were armed.

  "Please, please." The captain held up his arms for quiet and eventually got it. He wiped his brow with a handkerchief.

  "There is no cause for alarm. No matter what you may have been hearing, the ship is in no danger. The stories about the main engines having been removed are lies, pure and simple. We are looking for the people who planted these rumors and will soon have all of them in custody. The chief engineer wishes to announce that tours of the engine room will be resumed—"

  One of the women shot the captain a glance. He mopped his brow again and consulted a slip of paper in his hand. The hand was shaking.

  "Ah, a correction. The engineer announces that tours will not be resumed. There is, ah... that is, they are being overhauled, or... or something." The woman relaxed slightly.

  "The rumor that the main reactor has been shut down is unfounded. The surgeon has told me that there has been no spillage of radioactive material, and even if there had been, the amount was insignificant and would only have been a danger to those passengers with high cumulative exposures. The surgeon will be collecting dosimeters at 1400 hours tomorrow.

  "Let me repeat: there is no cause for alarm. As captain of this ship, I take a very dim view of rumormongering. Anyone caught disseminating stories about the unspaceworthiness of this vessel in the future will be dealt with sternly."

  "Lifeboat drill will be held tomorrow on A Deck, as scheduled. Anyone who has not as yet been checked out on his life jacket will do so by noon tomorrow, ship's time. That is... is that all?" This last was addressed to the woman to his left, in a whisper. She nodded curtly, and the three of them walked off the stage, their magnetized shoes sticking to the deck like flypaper.

  Solace nudged Quester in the ribs.

  "Are those women bodyguards?" she whispered. "Do you think his life is in danger?"

  Quester looked at the way the women gripped the captain's elbows. Not bodyguards, but guards, certainly...

  "Say, I just remembered I still have some unpacking to do," he said. "Maybe I can join you and your friends later on. I'll just nose around, see what I can pick up, you know, and—"

  But he couldn't squirm free of her grip. Those peds were strong.

  "May I have your attention, please? Lifeboat drill for tomorrow has been canceled. Repeat, canceled. Passengers showing up at the cradles for lifeboat drill will be interrogated, by order of the captain. That is all."

  On the way to Solace's room, the two were shoved out of the way by a group of people in uniform. Their faces were determined, and some of them carried clubs.

  "Where does that corridor lead?" he asked.

  "To the bridge. But they won't find anything there, it's been—"

  "I know."

  "I think we're being followed."

  "Wha'?" He looked behind him as he bounced along in her wake. There was someone back there, all right. They turned a corner and Solace hauled Quester into a dimly lit alcove, bumping his head roughly against the wall. He was getting fed up with this business of being dragged. If this was an adventure, he was Winn
ie-the-Pooh following Christopher Robin up the stairs. He started to object, but she clapped a hand around his mouth, holding him close.

  "Shhh," she hissed.

  A fine thing, Quester grumbled to himself. Can't even speak my mind. He thought he was better off before, alone and puzzled, then he was with this mysterious giantess towing him around.

  Of course, things could have been worse, he reflected. She was warm and naked to the touch no matter what his eyes told him. And tall. Floating there in the hall, she extended above and below him by a third of a meter.

  "How can I think of something like that at a time like this?" he began, but she hushed him again and her arms tightened around him. He realized she was really scared, and he began to be so himself. The liquor and the sheer unlikelihood of recent events had detached him; he was drifting along, rudderless. Nothing in his life had prepared him to cope with things like the black-suited man who now eased slowly around the corner in shadowy pursuit of them.

  They watched him from the concealment of the alcove. Many of the lights in the corridor were not working or were mere empty sockets. Earlier, Quester had been alarmed at this, adding it to his list of ways not to run a spaceship. Now, he was grateful.

  "He doesn't look much like a man at all," Solace whispered. And sure enough, he didn't. Nor a woman. He didn't look too human.

  "Humanoid, I'd say," Quester whispered back. "Pity no one told us. Obviously the system's been invaded by the first intelligent race of humanoids."

  "Don't talk nonsense. And be quiet." The man, or whatever it was, was very close now. They could see the ill-fitting pink mask, the lumps and nodules in odd places under his sweater and pants. He passed them by, leaving a pungent odor of hydrogen sulfide.