by Scott Mackay
Cody and Axworthy sat on cable spools in the yard, sipping soup while they surveyed the aftermath.
“I’m having security recruits salvage what they can,” said Axworthy. Cody watched three recruits drag cots, lockers, and undamaged equipment into the emergency shelter across the street. “The bunker is ruined. According to Azim our computer systems are intact, as is our communications apparatus. But half the equipment and supplies have been either destroyed or stolen. Fusion cells remain operational, but the portable oxygen production unit for the bunker is finished, beyond repair. All the pressure suit oxygen tanks have either been emptied or stolen. Two security recruits are dead.”
“Vesta City’s not going to like it,” said Cody.
That Buster’s attack on the bunker would darken Council’s view of the whole situation and gamer support for a full-scale bioextermination against the Meek was a foregone conclusion. Never mind the extenuating circumstances. He felt helpless.
Axworthy shook his head. “No,” he said, “they’re not.” He looked up at the emergency shelter. “How long before the emergency shelter’s ready?” he asked.
“We’re going to double-check the structure one last time,” he said. “We’ve got all the nano-rotted spots cleaned out and stabilized, all the breaches sealed, and plates over the larger holes. The damaged airlocks have been repaired. You have Deirdre Malvern to thank for that. She did a lot of retooling. She’s a wizard in the workshop.” Cody gazed up at the emergency shelter speculatively. “We’ll finish our double-check and then go out to Actinium to make sure the Meek didn’t wreck anything in the control room, and to see if we can get a few more solar panels on-line. It should take us three hours total.”
Axworthy nodded. “Good,” he said. “When you’ve done your check I’m going to have the landers prepare for evacuation of nonessential personnel to the Conrad Wilson. Once the landers have taken the evacuees to the ship I’m going to have them bring back a three-week supply of tanked oxygen for the rest of us. If your new seals on the emergency shelter don’t hold, and the Meek actually succeed in depressurizing this place, we’ll need all the oxygen we can store. Frankly, I don’t know how long Vesta City will want us to stay. The situation is deteriorating. Have you assembled your returning crew?”
“Yes,” said Cody. “They’re going to help with the double-check; then they’ll be ready to go.”
“I’ll have Bruder round up my people. It’s going to take the landers three hours to gear up for the launch anyway.”
Three hours later Cody went out to the surface to watch the launch of the landers. Returning personnel were now onboard and the main thrusters glowed white in the darkness. The Conrad Wilson‘s two landers, though big, were meant to lower and lift equipment in what was essentially an open-to-the-vacuum cage—a cage that protruded like a giant thorax from the midsection. The cabin in front had space for ten. Cody’s own evacuees included Wit, Dina, Huy, Peter, and Anne-Marie. The landers’ engines began to increase thrust, kicking dust and debris into the vacuum, polishing away the gray carbonaceous dirt until there was nothing but bedrock beneath. The landers lifted off. He was glad they were getting away. Higher and higher they rose, shimmering like giant fireflies. They veered east, toward Equilibrium, preparing to orbit Ceres twice before making rendezvous with the Wilson.
Cody went back inside. Ben, Deirdre, Jerry, and Claire still remained. He descended to the center of the city on the Charles Darwin Memorial Turbo Lift, powering the unit with a portable power pack, sinking the equivalent of 130 floors in a minute.
Once back in Laws of Motion Square he helped the others set up operations in the main auditorium of the emergency shelter. He was just stacking some crates of food off to one side when he felt the oddest sensation in his spine, as if his vertebrae were starting to squeeze up one against the other. The food crate he carried felt heavy and he set it down with a loud bang.
Axworthy looked at him. “What’s going on?” he asked. Cody could see Axworthy was feeling it too.
Claire turned around and looked at him. An electronic stylus rolled off her desk onto the floor all by itself. Cody had the sensation that he was in a high-speed elevator, just like the Charles Darwin Memorial Turbo Lift, but going up instead of down. He looked up at the rafters. Dust fell in a sudden bizarre straight line. He heard a distant rumbling. And then he felt the drag on his limbs.
“It’s happening again,” he said, trying to stay calm. “Everybody should get on the floor. Lie down on your back. There’s going to be another grav-core flux.”
Everybody did as Cody told them. And none too soon. A moment later there was a huge increase in gee-force. Cody felt as if five people had jumped on top of him. He heard groans from the crew lying on the floor around him. From out in the city he heard another low rumbling sound then a horrible bang. The grav-core spasmed, leaned on them with the heavy weight of five gees. He felt as if he had 200 pounds pressing against his chest. He could hardly breathe. He looked at Axworthy. Axworthy’s face sagged strangely to one side, pulled groundward by the gravity. The commander glanced up at the communications console.
“Do we still have contact with the landers?” he asked.
But Cody couldn’t lift his head from the floor to check. He heard another bang from somewhere out in the city, followed by something that sounded like thunder, rumbling and prolonged. He felt vibrations through the floor. A skyscraper tumbling down? he wondered. The walls of the emergency shelter creaked, groaned, and the temporary lights flickered, went out, then came back on. He heard Lake Ockham whispering distantly from the end of Isosceles Boulevard as it was jostled by sudden tides. Even the air inside the emergency shelter seemed heavy. Through the crush of it all, while his bones felt as if they were going to break, Cody couldn’t help wondering if this gravity flux was intentional, if it had been timed to coincide with the lander launches. He couldn’t help thinking of Joe Calaminci. He couldn’t believe that Buster would deliberately jeopardize the launches when the people in the landers were essentially following his demand to evacuate.
This grav-core fluctuation went on a lot longer than the last one. Cody clenched his teeth against it. Tears came to his eyes and he broke into a cold sweat, such was the crushing pain of the thing. Incoming hails from the Conrad Wilson crackled over the radio. Azim struggled to pull himself up to the console but his arms started to shake and he carefully lowered himself back to the floor. Cody heard no hails from the landers.
Finally, after nearly an hour, the painful gee-force relented. Cody felt buried under rubble. He began to breathe easier and was able to push himself into a sitting position. Azim again attempted to drag himself to the com-link, and this time was able to acknowledge the Conrad Wilson‘s hail. Cody glanced at Axworthy, who was leaning against the side of the console. The man looked old, his features pulled downward by the gravity.
The gravity lightened further, following its previous rebound effect.
Claire struggled up from the floor and went to her own workstation.
“Azim, can you raise the landers?” asked Axworthy.
“Nothing so far,” said Azim. “I’m accessing the flight data.”
“What about the Conrad Wilson?” asked Axworthy. “Are they okay?”
“They’ve moved to a higher orbit.”
“Claire, do you have any data from site 19?” asked Axworthy. Site 19 was where the large round object was, the suspected gravity-field projector.
But she hadn’t checked it yet. Cody saw that she was checking municipal pressure walls instead.
“I’m afraid we show a drop in pressure,” she said. “A hundred millibars so far. We’ve got a slow leak somewhere.”
“The airlocks?” asked Axworthy.
“No,” she said. “Somewhere in the seams. If current leakage remains the same, we’ll have to go to alternate sources of oxygen in less than three hours.”
Axworthy’s eyes narrowed and he lifted his chin. “The landers were going to bring back
oxygen tanks,” he said. “Azim, have you got that flight data yet?”
Azim turned to his commander, his face slack. “I’m afraid they both went down on the outskirts of Equilibrium. Biofeedback monitors for all crew and passengers show nothing.”
Cody turned to Deirdre. The two stared at each other. The gee-force was easing up more and more, but, if anything, Cody felt heavier. Wit. Huy. Peter. Dina. Russ. Anne-Marie. All gone. If the deaths of Joe Calaminci and Wolf Steiger had been devastating, the passing of these six additional crew members staggered Cody. He stopped breathing again, his throat tight. Deirdre crawled over, put an arm on his shoulder. He shook his head. His legs were splayed out in front of him. The mess hall floor was covered with dust, and there were footprints in the dust, and some of those footprints belonged to Wit, Huy, Peter, Dina, Russ, and Anne-Marie. And that was all that was left of them.
“Cody?” said Deirdre.
Cody looked at Azim. “There’s nothing at all?” he asked.
“Nothing,” said Azim.
“Then that means our only source of oxygen is the pod,” said Axworthy. The gravity reached about one gee and everybody else struggled to their feet. “I’m sorry, Cody, but we’re just going to have to shake this off as well as we can for the time being. I’m sorry about the deaths of your crew. And all those recruits of mine. But we’re stuck here. We have to shake ourselves out of this and get the Actinium OPU supplying oxygen to the emergency shelter as fast as possible or we’re going to be in real trouble.”
Cody gazed at the commander blankly. He remembered Peter Wooster’s words. The math doesn’t add up. Were they going to face the same bleak equation again?
“I’ve got data from site 19 now, Kevin,” said Claire, her voice shaky. Cody turned to Claire, took courage from her, at the way she was forcing herself to concentrate on the task at hand even though she had just lost all those friends. “The gravitational field generator was activated,” she said.
“Is it still activated?” asked Axworthy.
“No.”
“How long was it on for?” asked Cody
“Forty-three minutes, seventeen seconds.” As Claire scrutinized further data, a knit came to her brow.
“What is it, Claire?” asked Axworthy.
“The projection of the thing’s gravitational force seems to extend for nearly a full astronomical unit.” She looked more perplexed than ever. “Why would they do something like that? What do they use this thing for? Did you ever get anything out of Buster on it, Cody? Or Lulu?”
“No.”
“Keep at it, Claire,” said Axworthy. “Analyze everything you can.”
The gravity lightened further and Cody felt his shoulders lift.
“Sir, I’ve had a communication from the Conrad Wilson,” said Azim. “Vesta City says they want everyone off the asteroid as soon as possible. The Conrad Wilson says they can refit the unmanned explorer to evacuate the rest of us, now that the landers have been destroyed.”
“Has Council reached a decision about what they’re going to do about the Meek?” asked Axworthy.
“Not yet, but they still want everyone off. They’ve just received word of the catastrophe and they think it would be the best course. Engineering came up with this plan to refit the unmanned explorer and Council wants them to go ahead with it.”
“How many do they think the explorer can carry?” asked Axworthy.
“It’s big,” said Azim. “They said it can carry all of us.”
“How long will it take to refit?” asked Axworthy.
“They said about seven hours.”
Axworthy lifted his hand to his chin, did some figuring. Then he looked at Cody. “We might make it yet,” he said. He paused, shook his head. “It’s going to be close with that many people in the oxygen pod. But we just might get out of this mess. Cody, we still have the three remaining oxygen tanks from your own crew?”
“Only two left now, and those are only a quarter full. Six hours in each of them.”
Axworthy nodded. “Can you and Ben take those tanks out to Actinium and spend the next six hours working on the OPU? If you two can get the OPU out in Actinium up and running for even just a little while, that will increase our margin. It might buy Engineering Section the time they need to refit the unmanned explorer before all our air runs out.”
Cody nodded, still feeling shocked by the deaths of his crew, but forcing himself to think of the problems they faced and of the possible solutions they might devise. “We can do that,” he said. He looked away as his feet left the ground. He imagined wreckage out by Equilibrium. He imagined bodies. He quickly shook these images away, feeling as if they were the mental and emotional equivalent of quicksand. But now he saw in his mind the Meek children on the pedal planes flying down the wide river. How was Vesta City going to react to this? Was there now going to be a bioextermination? Is that why they wanted to evacuate everybody?
Axworthy looked around, startled as his own feet left the ground.
“Did this happen the last time?” he asked.
Cody nodded. “It seems to rebound with a repulsion effect for a few minutes. A sort of reverse field all around the asteroid.”
Axworthy nodded, simply accepting it, then looked more closely at Cody. “What’s on your mind, Cody?” he asked. “You have that look in your eyes.”
“How do you think Vesta City’s going to react to this?”
Axworthy shook his head. “I’ve got ten recruits poisoned, two with slit throats, my doctor killed by a suspicious suit malfunction, and now another twenty-one killed in crashes. Ceres will rendezvous with Earth in five weeks armed to the teeth with nuclear weapons. You figure it out.”
“Another communication from the Conrad Wilson,” said Azim. “They’re telling us that they’ve revised their fuel estimates and will now have to leave orbit in six hours and forty minutes, that if they follow Ceres sunward much longer than that they won’t have enough fuel to get home. They’ve asked Engineering Section to work as fast as they can on the refit, to see if they can get it done in under seven hours. We’ve also had another communication from Council. They’ve advised us that the Conrad Wilson is the only vessel close enough to make a military response.”
“Have they advised a military response?” asked Axworthy.
“Not yet,” said Azim. “But they expect a decision soon.”
“Does Earth have anything available?” asked Axworthy.
“Nothing in a cruiser class,” said Azim. “Everything’s deployed. They have the Theodore Richards in orbit around Venus—that’s the closest. They have their usual array of orbital defenses, but most of those satellites have been programmed to deal with hostilities Earth-side. The only way Terran authorities can launch a strategic strike against Ceres is to do it directly from Earth, and that means they have to trade distance for lift. That’s got Earth awfully nervous. They don’t want Ceres to get anywhere near Earth before they start firing at it. They’d sooner not risk any of the collateral fallout.”
Axworthy nodded. “So the Conrad Wilson is it, then,” he said. “We’re the ones who’ll have to make the strategic strike if the Council votes that way.” His brow settled. Axworthy’s feet sank back to the floor as the gravity stabilized to .5 gees again. He put his hands on his hips and looked around at everybody. “We’re the ones who will have to end this stalemate once and for all.”
CHAPTER 17
Cody and Ben were out on the surface again standing next to one of the sabotaged optic cables that led to the microwave conversion tower.
“I think it will take us too long to repair this cable now,” said Cody. “It might be faster if we try to find fresh solar panels and sweep them off.”
Ben nodded. “You’re probably right,” he said. “What a way to spend the last six hours of your life, though. Sweeping.”
Cody’s shoulders were still sore from his previous stint of sweeping. “I know what you mean,” he said.
“I’m sure glad
I found a way to divert pressure to the main auditorium only,” said Ben.
“I guess that means less panels to sweep,” said Cody. “How many do you think we’ll need for the auditorium?”
Ben paused, did some figuring. “At least six.”
“If we push ourselves, I’m sure we can do it.”
“I feel highly motivated right now,” said Ben.
Cody found a working solar panel a half-kilometer away from the microwave conversion tower, climbed the rungs to the top, and started sweeping away the coating of micrometeorites. Far in the distance, in the harsh glare of the sun, Cody saw Ben sweeping his own panel. Here he was again, his life depending on sweeping. He checked his oxygen gauge. Just over five hours left. He wondered if the Council had made their decision yet.
He felt Lulu’s presence. But the feeling was distant, tenuous, and quickly faded. He stopped sweeping and looked around. He saw some marrow growing in a patch a few meters away, walked to it, picked it up, crushed it in his hand, ran it over his suit, then threw it up into the vacuum.
He said: Lulu?
The communication he felt from Lulu was faint. Maybe coming from close by, maybe coming from a great distance, a stirring of a breeze that was nearly too difficult to detect, oddly encoded, as if she’d been told by Buster to end any and all communication with him. He was about to call her once more when he was interrupted by Claire Dubeau. Her holo-image appeared in the upper right corner of his visor.