by Tom Clancy
“My God!” Marius shouted over the comlink. “They’re sticking to us. Sticking!”
More of the obvious. The globes were clinging wherever they struck. Cédric could see them becoming affixed to the same areas of Marius’s hardsuit as his own, fastening themselves to its thruster pack and dome collar joint, bunching onto the prehensors of both extremities like crops of giant metal berries. He simultaneously realized they weren’t attaching to Marius’s upper arms and legs, points that had also escaped contact on his suit.
Again Cédric had no chance to wonder what this implied. He was far too cognizant that if either of their hulls suffered a breach, its internal environment would be displaced by sixty atmospheres of pressure — a compression so vastly beyond human tolerance that it would pulp its occupant’s internal organs and burst the very walls of his blood cells.
He felt another of the spheres hit his back. How many were on him now? Ten, twelve?
Beside him, Marius was close to panic. His arms rose and fell against heavy water resistance, rose and fell, flapping in what looked like slow motion as he tried to shake the spheres from his gripper claws.
Cédric knew he was scarcely further away from losing his composure.
“Marius, hold still, I’ll try to pull them off you,” he said. “We need to stay calm, try and get them off each other.”
Marius met his gaze through their rounded dome ports, gathered his wits enough to stop the furious paddling of his arms.
Cédric reached out to Marius with his lefthand prehensor, testing its mobility with his individuated finger control rings. He was somewhat amazed to find that he could still open and close it despite the weight of the spheres attached to two of its four stainless-steel claws.
He clamped the gripper around a sphere lodged at the base of Marius’s neck, gave it a strong tug. It didn’t budge even a little. He tugged harder, microelectromechanical sensors inside the control rings transferring his exertion to the claw as increased output. The sphere would not yield, and now Marius was screaming again, unnecessarily reminding him that it was sticking, it was sticking, the damned thing wasn’t coming off. Cédric could feel himself start to nervously perspire inside his suit and added a prying motion on his third try, straining the gripper’s servos to their limits.
The sphere finally detached from the collar joint — but by just the slightest bit. A few centimeters at most before clamping right back on, pulling along Cédric’s MEMS-AIDED gripper claw with a powerful attraction that jerked his arm up and out toward Marius.
All in a moment’s span his relief had budded, bloomed, and turned to ash gray wilt as fear blew through his heart in a killing frost. He could neither separate the sphere from Marius, nor himself from the sphere, which now joined them as if…
Cédric blinked with the last meaningful realization of his life. Another that seemed so glaringly evident, he could only wonder how it had not dawned on him much sooner.
“They’re magnetized,” he heard himself tell Marius in an almost matter-of-fact tone.
Marius’s eyes were full of terror and confusion behind his view port. In fact, it almost seemed to Cédric that his features had drawn together into a bold, hanging question mark.
Cédric was wondering just what sort of answers were expected of him when the spheres fastened to the hardsuits exploded, and the rushing sea took his thoughts.
* * *
“Well, Casimir? My curiosity pesters.”
“We have total success. The neodymium hunter swarm has acquired and neutralized its targets.”
The yacht owner’s eyes were brilliant ice. “Would damage imagery be too tall a request?”
Casimir’s attention held on the monitor and control boards.
“It could be done,” he said. “The killfish has been recalled beyond the outer edge of the blast zone, and its backscatter sensors show a high density of suspended particulate matter within the zone. But we could task it—”
“No need, bring it back in,” the yacht owner said. “Laziness of imagination is a common failing in this day and age, Casimir. We mustn’t allow ourselves to submit.”
“As you wish.”
The yacht owner reclined on his pale orange sofa, his bone-thin form barely impressing weight into its cushions.
“And his spirit moved upon the face of the waters,” he said in a near undertone. “Fiat lux.”
Casimir’s head turned briefly to regard him over a white uniform epaulet.
“What was that, sir?”
The yacht owner passed his fingertips through the air.
“Old words from an old and very fascinating story,” he said.
TWO
VARIOUS LOCALES
From the Wall Street Journal
Online Weekend Edition:
UPLINK INTERNATIONAL TO COMPLETE STALLED MARINE FIBEROPTIC NETWORK
Experts Agree Venture May Plunge Telecom Giant into Choppy Seas
SAN JOSE — In a move analysts believe marks a critical and risky juncture for the world’s leading telecommunications super carrier, UpLink International announced earlier this week that it has concluded a long-rumored deal with Planétaire Systems Corp to pick up some very large pieces left by the France-based company’s financial tumble.
Once UpLink’s primary European rival, Planétaire has been the most recent telecom industry player forced to make sharp operational cutbacks during a period of global economic uncertainty that has seen many established technology firms struggle and fail. While many in the financial sector expect industrywide earnings to improve at least marginally over the next quarter, Planétaire’s losses have been deeper than some due to a combination of heavy capital borrowing — said to have exceeded $1.5 billion U.S. — for its construction of a submerged fiberoptic cable ring in the waters around Africa and steep declines in revenue from its cellular telephony service elements.
Although the specific terms of the pact have not been disclosed, insiders report that UpLink has acquired all of Planétaire’s existing “wet highway” and terrestrial fiber network equipment and facilities in equatorial African nations, considered some of the most underserved markets on earth, in part due to the region’s continuing political and economic instability. Speaking on CNN’s Moneyline program, however, UpLink vice president and frequent spokeswoman Megan Breen gave high marks to the groundwork laid by Planétaire and expressed confidence in her firm’s ability meet any challenges it may face.
“Planétaire has enjoyed tremendous past success, and I’d be pleased if our agreement allows it to consolidate and direct its assets toward a bright future,” she said. “Our companies have been very competitive, but at the same time worldwide connectivity is a goal we’ve always shared, and UpLink is wholly committed to building upon Planétaire’s established infrastructure on the African continent.”
Ms. Breen emphasizes that commitment is long term, extending into the next decade and beyond. “It’s really a logical outreach for us,” she said. “Our driving corporate philosophy, and the core belief of our founder Roger Gordian, is that the introduction of modern, reliable Internet and telecom services to developing countries parallels the emergence of America’s rail and telegraph system over a hundred years ago and can bring about comparable industrial, political, and social progress.”
But some have suggested that Gordian and company will have to navigate rough waters in a period of rapid financial sea changes — and beware of sinking beneath those shifting currents. The expansion mentioned by Ms. Breen would put considerable strains on the resources of any firm, even one as globally dominant as UpLink. Much of Planétaire’s African network is already connected to Europe via seabed fiber cable and there is speculation that UpLink plans to thread a transoceanic line to the Pacific Rim. This ambitious effort would require retrofitting decades-old portions of the system with high-capacity, next-generation equipment and undersea cable — a high-priced undertaking.
Marine maintenance also can be expensive. Less than a
year ago Planétaire incurred multimillion dollar repair costs when a segment of cable was damaged off coastal Gabon, the small equatorial nation where its African network hub is located. Two specialist deepwater divers were accidentally killed while investigating the service disruption. Although the tragic incident is presumed to have no bearing on Planétaire’s regional pullout, it does point toward the complexity of initiating cable projects in inhospitable and sometimes dangerous environments…
* * *
“What’s wrong?” Pete Nimec said.
“Hmm?” Annie Caulfield said.
“I’m wondering what’s the matter.”
“Nothing’s the matter.”
Nimec was otherwise convinced.
“Come on,” he said, shaking his head. “Something is definitely the matter.”
Annie looked over at him. Nimec looked back at her. She was holding the ladle. He had the spatula.
“What makes you think that?” Annie said, a trifle distantly.
“This right here makes me think it.” Nimec raised the spatula and wobbled it in the air between them. It was a proffer of evidence, his smoking gun, courtroom exhibits A through Z rolled into one.
Still looking somewhat preoccupied, Annie regarded him without comment as a bright, warm, daisy yellow torrent of east Texas sunshine washed through the window of her kitchen, where they were at the electric range fixing breakfast, Annie with her blond hair spilling mussily over the collar of her bathrobe, Nimec already dressed in Levi’s and a T-shirt, Annie’s kids in their pajamas at the opposite end of the house, just stirring under their bedcovers, this being Sunday morning after all.
“You’d better flip that thing,” Annie said finally. She nodded toward the sizzling dollop of pancake batter she’d ladled onto the hot skillet in front of him.
“You sure?”
“Unless, of course, you have some reason for wanting to serve Chris and Linda burned pancakes—”
“Ah-hah. Got you. There it is,” he said.
“There what is?”
“More proof that you’re upset with me.” Nimec gave the implement in his hand another little shake. “I’m using a metal spatula right here. And the skillet’s your expensive nonstick. Means I’m supposed to use a Teflon-coated spatula or screw up the finish, right?”
Annie looked at the blade of the spatula with surprised recognition.
“Yes,” she said. “It does.”
“Ah-hah,” Nimec repeated, and gave her a look that meant his case was closed, open and shut.
He reached past Annie, slipped the spatula into a wall-holder jammed with cooking utensils, pulled a coated spatula from it, and immediately turned the pancake onto its unbrowned side.
“I don’t understand,” she said. “If you know you aren’t supposed to use my metal one—”
“It was a test,” he said before she could finish her question.
“A test?”
“Right,” he said. “I grabbed it to see if you’d notice, and then remind me which spatula I am supposed to use.”
“Oh,” she said.
“But you didn’t,” he said. “Notice or remind me, that is.”
“No, I didn’t…”
“And you always do,” Nimec said. “From the very first time I stayed over. Except once when we had a fight, and you got quiet like you’ve been all morning.”
Annie watched him transfer the finished pancake to a serving tray and then motion for another ladleful of batter. She dipped into the mixing bowl and poured some onto the pan.
“Okay, that’s plenty, or the middle won’t get done,” he said. “Now how about you tell me why you’re mad.”
“I’m not—”
“You are—”
Annie’s sharp look abruptly silenced him.
“That was you and not a Pete Nimec look alike in my bed when I awoke, oh, forty minutes, an hour ago, wasn’t it?” she said.
“What’s that got to do—?”
“Did the actions I initiated at the time seem angry?”
Nimec felt an embarrassed flush in his cheeks. “Well, no…”
“Because if they did, we were having a very serious miscommunication.”
“No, no. Your, uh, our, communication was fine. Great, actually—”
“So when, and why, do you believe I would have gotten offended?”
“Angry,” he clarified.
“Whatever,” she said.
Nimec looked at her a moment, then sighed.
“When you got so quiet afterward,” he said, “I wondered if it could have anything to do with my asking you to take Chris and Jonathan to see the Mariners next weekend. Which I wouldn’t have done, except that I promised to take them myself, and got Gord to swing those lower box tickets for me.”
A moment passed. Annie chin-nodded at the pancake cooking on the skillet. Nimec tossed it.
“Pete,” she said. “Why in the world would I mind going to a ball game with my own son?”
“Well, Jon’s my son…”
“Our respective sons, then,” she said, and suddenly hesitated. “Jon doesn’t have a problem with me, does he?”
“Annie, you know Jon’s wild about you.”
“I thought I knew…”
“He is. Crazy wild, in fact. Don’t ever worry about that.”
“So what exactly do you feel would be the problem?”
Nimec shrugged.
“I don’t know,” he said. “Though I figured you might not appreciate having to fly all the way to the West Coast with me gone. Or maybe just having to sit through nine innings of baseball, not really being that familiar with the game…”
“The boys are always happy to explain its ins and outs to me,” she said. “Last time I got the lecture on the cutoff man, backup cutoff man, and the superduper Zimmer-Jeter rover play for when they both miss a throw. And I’ll be sure to use lingo like ‘lights-out’ and ‘good stuff’ and yell like a maniac whenever Ichiro’s at bat.”
That produced a faint grin on Nimec’s face.
“Guess you are pretty good,” he said.
“Guess I am.” She smiled a little, too, and gestured at the range. “We’d better get the next pancake on.”
They did. Nimec watched Annie go through the simple routine of dipping the ladle into her mixing bowl, and pouring the batter into the center of the pan, and rotating the ladle to spread the batter evenly. He watched her and noticed the golden highlights in her hair from the flood of morning sun through the window, and recalled all at once how those accents had seemed a deeper burnished color when he’d held her against him in the flicker of a bedside oil lamp the night before.
“Annie…” he said softly.
“Yes?”
“Please help me understand what’s bothering you.”
She looked up at Nimec’s face, and he looked down at hers, their eyes meeting, the two of them standing there by the stove in a kitchen filled with what had become a familiar yet preciously special aroma of weekends spent together after weekdays working in different cities, different states, thousands of miles apart, Annie at the Johnson Space Center in Texas, Nimec at UpLink’s main headquarters in California, thousands of miles, so many thousands of miles between them.
“Africa,” she said after a long silence. “It’s being worried about you going to Africa. To Gabon. A stone’s throw from the Congo, where tribal armies that have spent the last quarter century massacring each other in civil wars are usually also in-fighting just as brutally.”
“Annie…”
“And it’s being selfishly, clingingly worried about how much I’ll miss you.”
Silence.
Nimec looked at her, breathed.
“Annie, I’ll only be away a few weeks. There’s nothing to be afraid of—”
“Like when you were in Antarctica last year? For only a few weeks. An entire continent where people aren’t even supposed to have guns, and Cold Corners station was attacked by a small army. Hired commandos. You an
d Meg could have been killed. UpLink has enemies, Pete. That’s just how it is. UpLink has serious enemies around the world and I accept it. But don’t expect me not to worry.”
Nimec said nothing for a while. Then he suddenly moved closer to Annie, dropping the spatula on the counter beside the range, taking the drippy ladle from her hand to let it sink into the mixing bowl, wrapping his arms around her waist and pulling her to him.
“If not for us crossing paths in Antarctica, we wouldn’t be together,” he said. “That’s the other side of it.”
“I know, Pete, but—”
He gently held a finger to her lips, silenced her.
“I try to be careful,” he said. “Always. But these days I try even harder. Before, I wouldn’t care if I was in the field a week, a month, six months. In San Jose, it wasn’t much different. The job was everything, my whole life, and the rest was filling time. All I’d come home to on a Friday night was that pool room you’re always threatening to disinfect. Now, Friday afternoons at the office, I can’t wait to get to the airport. Can’t wait to get things done and come back to you. And that’s how it’ll be in Africa. I’ll get things done, and I’ll come back.”
Annie looked at him, still silent. Bright blue eyes holding on his brown ones. Blond hair shining in the sun. Then Nimec saw her smile and felt her press more tightly against him.
“I love you, Pete,” she said, her lips brushing his chin.
“I love you, Annie,” he said, his throat thickening inside.
“I smell my panny cakes!” Chris shouted from down the hallway.
Annie smiled.
“Little guy’s up,” she said in a furry voice.
Nimec winked at her.
“I hope you mean the kid,” he said, and reluctantly pulled himself back to the stove.
* * *
“ ‘Plunge telecom giant into choppy seas,’ ” Megan Breen read aloud, her head bent over the Journal piece, an errant tress of hair slipping across her cheek. “ ‘Navigate rough waters…’ ”