“Why not stay and fight? Better to die facing the fish!”
I snapped down my visor. “There’s something I must do.” I no longer had any doubt.
“What?”
My voice was even. “I won’t tell you, Mr. Tolliver.” If he knew, he wouldn’t help fly the shuttle. I lined us up in the center of the runway. “Once you take off, swing east.” I peered through the porthole. “You’d better hurry.” The shapes rolled to intersect us.
Smoothly he pushed the throttle forward. Fifteen knots. The outriders changed direction, converged on us. We hurtled down the runway. Twenty knots. A few shapes were left behind; others scrambled alongside. Ahead, more gathered. One waited in the center of the runway. Forty knots.
I had to strain to hear Tolliver’s words. “Lord God, I repent of my sins.” Fifty knots; I checked my straps. “Forgive me my trespasses.” Sixty-five. “If I have offended Thee...” The rest was lost in the roar of the engines. The outrider in the center of the runway skittered toward us with lightning speed.
“Look out—”
“I see it!” As we bore down on the alien shape it launched itself at the cockpit. I reared back in my seat, hands over my face. Something smashed dark and wet into the pilot’s windshield.
“Jesus God!” Goo dripped from the window. Tolliver peered through the mess, searching for the runway. Thick liquid seeped along the windshield toward the pilot’s shattered porthole.
I shouted, “Left rudder! You’re drifting!” Seventy-five knots.
Ahead, the runway was rumpled, where the blast from the rock had shifted the earth. We surged upward, bounced back onto the runway, losing speed. “Hold the nose down!” Sixty-five knots. The end of the runway soared toward us. Seventy.
“We won’t make it!”
“Hold her down! Use the grass beyond the runway!”
He muttered, “Use the trees, you mean.” The windbreak that had once stood at the far end of the parade ground was knocked askew by the blast, but branches still clawed upward to snatch us from the air.
Tolliver shoved the throttle as far forward as it would go. I measured to the end of the pavement, to the end of the grass. Ninety knots.
The trees. We hurtled along the grass. One hundred knots. The trees. One hundred five. THE TREES.
“Hang on.” Tolliver pulled back the yoke, five knots short of indicated takeoff speed. The nose lifted with nightmare deliberation. Our rear wheels floated off the runway. Trees flung themselves at our undercarriage. A scrape. I braced for impact. Scant yards ahead, a clump of trees reared skyward. Tolliver yanked back on the yoke.
“We’ll stall!”
No time for an answer. Our airspeed fell. We floated over the stand of trees. Tolliver dropped the nose. We fell toward the hillside, losing altitude, gaining speed. He leveled off and we were clear. For eons we soared over forest, our airspeed slowly rising. Finally, when it was safe, he gently pulled back on the yoke and we regained precious altitude.
He remarked, “Coming around to the east.”
Thank Lord God. I asked, “At what height do we fire rockets?”
“How the hell would I know? Ask the puter!”
I flipped on the puter circuits. “Advise recommended altitude for rocket ignition.”
The puter’s response was immediate. “Impossible to achieve orbit with cabin damage.”
“Never mind that. What’s the recommended altitude?”
“Rocket engines on safety lock due to compromise of cabin integrity. Ignition will not occur at any alt—”
I pounded the dash. “Override all safeties! Manual ignition! Advise normal altitude for rocket ignition when cabin undamaged and pressurized.”
“Recommended ignition five thousand feet. Safeties overridden. Override is log—”
“Christ!” Tolliver edged away from his porthole. Drops of goo hovered on the broken transplex. One flew off and hit the back of his seat.
I grabbed my pistol.
“Be careful with that!”
“I know.” I aimed at the porthole, set the pistol to continuous beam, held the trigger. The goo smoked and vanished. The porthole glowed red. I aimed at Tolliver’s seat. “Don’t lean back.” I fired at the seat back; its fabric melted instantly at the touch of the beam. The seat insulation glowed, broke into flames. I snapped off the pistol, slapped out the fire with my suited hand. “Don’t sit back until it’s cool.”
“I’ll have to lie back when we accelerate. Put something on the seat, so I don’t have to touch...that.”
“It’s been vaporized.” Nevertheless I unstrapped myself and went back to the cabin. Bezrel gripped his chair. His face was white, his lips wet with spittle. I reached into the storage compartment, found a blanket. A pillow fell to the floor. I thrust it at the boy. “Hold this.” He hugged it, rocking.
I folded the blanket, laid it across Tolliver’s seat, over the scorched hole I’d made. Cautiously he leaned back. “Four thousand feet. Sir, when we fire...”
“Yes?”
“If we don’t burn long enough, we fall into the ocean. Too long and we may disintegrate.”
“I know.” I licked my lips. “Try forty seconds. Be ready to cut off if we shake too hard.”
“Right. Whatever ‘too hard’ means.”
Five thousand feet. Tolliver looked at me. I met his eye, nodded.
He keyed the master ignition; the three rockets caught with a thunderous roar. They flung me back into my acceleration seat.
Five seconds. I glanced down, found the altimeter. Six thousand feet.
Ten seconds. Buffeting. A weight settling on my chest. I panted for breath. Eight thousand feet. Ten thousand. The world grayed. We bumped over a rutted country road.
“Thirty seconds, sir!” Tolliver gripped the sides of his seat. The shuttle shook.
Twelve thousand feet. Thirteen. Turbulence was worse.
“Forty seconds!” With effort he reached for the ignition.
“No!” I fought to inhale. “Need...more altitude.”
“We’ll break up!”
“Go for thirty thousand!” I forced oxygen into my lung.
“We can’t make thirty!” Bangs and thumps shook the cabin.
“Wait.” I heaved to breathe.
“Sixteen thousand!” My head sank into the acceleration pads. They were soft, comfortable, warm. Tolliver’s voice was distant. “Twenty-one thousand!”
One couldn’t swim in the sea; it had been too polluted for nearly a century. But once I’d been to the beach with Father. The sand, above the high-water mark, was warm and comfortable. I wriggled luxuriously, eyes closed against the probing solar glare, while Father watched with silent disapproval. Something in the sea air made it hard to breathe.
“Captain, let me cut the engines!”
I dozed, annoyed by the incessant roar of the waves. “Twenty-five thousand!”
Silence. My body surged against the straps. As my ears cleared I heard an odd whistling. My chest heaved. Greedily I sucked at air. The roar of the engines had eased.
Tolliver held the yoke rigid, eyes straining past the glop on his windshield. I coughed, struggled to an upright position. I gasped, “Altitude?”
“Twenty-eight thousand and rising.”
“Rising, with the engine off?”
“Even a cannonball goes up for a while. Wait.”
We reached the top of our arc. In a moment the shuttle took on the gliding characteristics of a brick. We dropped precipitously despite Tolliver’s best efforts. He said, “We’ll have to fire the engines to hold altitude.”
“I know.” But after thirty minutes burn, they’d overheat. Shuttle jets were designed for landings and little else. I peered at the instruments. “Where are we?”
“Some four hundred miles out, according to the beacons.”
Even at five hundred knots, we’d crash at least an hour short of landfall.
“Radio a Mayday, sir. If we ditch they can meet us with a heli.”
&
nbsp; I shook my head. “No. We need the shuttle.”
“We won’t make it. If we put down in the water, we might—”
“Fly us home!”
Twelve thousand feet. Tolliver slammed his fist into the chair. “God damn you, why?” He waved away my outrage. “You want me to fly this boat into the sea. All right, I’ll die with you! Tell me why!”
I said hoarsely, “I need the shuttle. I can’t say why.”
“You’re afraid I’ll betray you?” he jeered. “To which enemy, Captain? The fish or the planters?”
I swallowed. “Mr. Tolliver, I can’t tell you. Someday you’ll understand.”
“I don’t want to waste my death, to no purpose.”
“We have a purpose.” The corners of my mouth twitched. “And we may not die. There’s safety margin built into the engine specs. Just look at the hangar door.”
After a moment his teeth bared in what might have been a smile. “We’ll have to find out.” His eyes strayed to the panel. “Eight thousand feet, sir. We’d better ignite.”
“Yes.” He lit the jets, and gradually our descent slowed. We flew in uneasy silence.
After a time I unbuckled my seat belt. “Watch the engine temps.” He shot me a look of annoyance. I blurted, “Sorry. Nerves.” Now I was apologizing to a middy. I smiled grimly.
In the fifth row I stooped and slid next to Bezrel. “Are you all right?”
“Yes, sir.” He clutched at the pillow. I waited, but he said no more.
“We’re all frightened, joey.”
His expression was cautious. “I’m fine.”
“All of us, Mr. Bezrel.” I patted his knee, stood awkwardly.
“I want to go home.” His voice was muffled in the pillow.
“We’re almost there.”
“No. Home.”
Didn’t we all. I went back to the cockpit, sat, strapped on my oxygen. “ETA?”
Tolliver muttered, “I don’t think we have one.”
I glowered.
After a moment he said, “Sorry, sir. Say, forty-five minutes.”
Temperatures were high normal, but holding steady. I thumbed the caller. “Captain Seafort to Admiralty House or Governor’s Manse. Acknowledge.” No answer. I tried again; finally the response came.
“Manse to incoming heli. Mr. Seafort? We thought...”
“Is Admiralty House open?”
“No, sir.”
The temperature crept toward the red line. “Where’s Governor Hopewell?”
“Standing by, sir. I paged him. Here he comes.”
“Zack?”
“Yes, lad.” His gruff voice brought a welcome lump to my throat.
“We’re not in the heli, we’ve got a shuttle. Clear the spaceport runway. Have a heli waiting. And find anyone who worked on the shuttle repair crews.”
“Is that all?”
“Yes, but hurry. Our ETA is forty minutes.” The temp needle hovered at the red line.
Tolliver tapped the altimeter. “We’ll have to ditch.”
“Get us altitude.”
“That’ll generate more heat.”
“I know.” But it would gain us time if the engines failed.
On landing jets we climbed slowly to eighteen thousand. The needle inched inexorably into the red. I checked the console. “Thirty minutes. Two hundred eighty miles.”
“The engines won’t last.”
“They have to.”
He cleared his throat. “Sir, do you understand that if we keep burning—”
“Don’t argue!”
“I’m not. If we keep burning and we overheat, the bearings may melt. Even if we landed safely, these engines would never fire again.”
I faced the bitter possibility. “We have to try.”
He shook his head, chose to say nothing. The needle crept farther into the red. A warning signal beeped; I switched it off. Twenty-five minutes.
“Throttle back.”
“We’re at best performance speed now, sir.”
“It might help the temp.”
He throttled back. The temperature didn’t go down, but at least it rose no further.
Twenty minutes.
The speaker crackled. “Incoming shuttle, we have you on radar. What are you—did you fly that thing from the Venturas?”
“Yes.” He would think me glitched. He’d probably be right.
Eighteen minutes. “Mr. Tolliver, how far can we glide?”
“A few miles, at best. We’re not high enough.”
A hundred fifty miles from Centraltown. The temperature needle crept upward. So close, and yet...”
“Shut off the jets.”
“Now, sir? We’ll fall into—” He saw my expression, snapped the switches.
“Mr. Tolliver, watch our distance. Mark off to thirty-five miles.”
“We won’t come near to—”
I ignited the rockets. Tolliver yelled, reached for the shut-offs. I was hurled into my seat. I strained at the yoke, kept us level.
“You can’t burn rockets in flight mode! You’ll tear off the wings!”
“Just for a few seconds!”
“You’re insane!” He reached again for the switch; I slapped away his arm.
“Distance!”
“A hundred twenty miles!”
I forced the yoke back, easing us into a climb. The craft shook abominably. Stress indicators lit like Christmas lights.
“Sixteen thousand feet. One hundred two miles!”
I fought to hold the yoke, barely kept control.
“Please, sir, turn it off!”
I reached for the master switch, diverted my fingers, found the two I wanted. I snapped them off. The turbulence eased.
“Christ, now what are you doing?”
“Flying on center rocket only.” For as long as its fuel held out, or until the battered ship could take no more.
His hands tightened on the yoke. “Let me help control her.” Gratefully I eased my pressure on the yoke. He said, “Are you aware, sir, that some of us prefer to stay alive?”
I glared at him. His eyes danced. “I could relieve you for this, you know. Trouble is, no one would believe me.”
I watched the console. “Sixty miles. Twenty thousand feet. In a couple of minutes we might be close enough to glide in.”
He shook his head. “After this, they’ll have to rewrite the specs.”
“Shuttle, your flight path is not, repeat, not appropriate for achieving orbit.” The voice on the caller sounded anxious.
I grinned, keying the caller. “Very well, we’ll alter course.” My hand went to the console. “Shall we?”
“Ready, sir.”
I cut the switches, and again the roar diminished to the whistle of wind. I watched the altimeter fall.
“We could try the jets again,” he offered.
“Best let them cool first.”
In a few moments we had no choice; we’d lost most of the altitude the rockets had gained. When Tolliver finally tried the jets they wouldn’t catch; I thought we’d plow a furrow into the coast before he finally nursed them to life.
After that, the landing was rather dull.
23
“HOW LONG, THEN?”
The mechanic shrugged. “Who knows? We’ve got spare transplex for the portholes; they’re standard parts. We drained and replaced your engine lubricants. No sign of engine damage, but we’ve only tested at low power. We’re not done.”
“How long?” I glanced at Zack Hopewell.
“Puter simulations say she’ll never go into orbit with the side so badly dented. It’ll have to be completely rebuilt—”
“HOW LONG?”
He tossed the specs to the floor. “Never, if you talk like that. I’m a volunteer, joey. I don’t give God’s own damn if—”
“You listen to me.” Zack’s voice was low and cold. “Have this machine ready to fly in two days, not an hour longer. We’re under martial law and I won’t hesitate to hang you if y
ou don’t.” He took a step toward the mechanic; involuntarily the man darted back. “Understand me?”
The mechanic swallowed. “All right, go easy. But I can’t promise no two days, not with tearing down the body—”
“I’ll assign all the help you need. Get started!” Hopewell strode away, and I followed. He sighed. “Hang the man? Did you hear, Mr. Seafort? He’s one of my countrymen.”
“You saved me from making a fool of myself.” I’d been ready to hurl myself at the mechanic’s throat.
We walked toward Zack Hopewell’s heli. He sat, looked up at me. “You’re sure you’ve found a way?”
I climbed in next to him. “No, but I think so. With Lord God’s blessing, you’ll be safe again.”
“Why won’t you tell us what it is?”
My hand tightened on the door. “Change the subject. Please, I beg you.”
“You won’t return, after.” It wasn’t a question.
“I think not.”
His lined face was without expression. “You carve your own destiny, Captain, as do we all. We’ll miss you.”
“Thank you.”
“After you...go, there will be no Government.”
“Yours is in place.”
“But without authority. I will not pretend to rule by grace of a departed Navy.”
We waited while Tolliver crossed the tarmac. He climbed into the heli’s back seat. “Plenty of shuttle fuel on hand.”
I grunted.
We lifted off. Hopewell said, “Is two days soon enough?”
“It’ll have to be.” I stared at the houses below. “I’ll fly the shuttle alone.”
Hopewell frowned. “I wish you’d—”
“You can’t.” Tolliver. I swung to him, my eyes dangerous. He said, “You’ll pass out.”
“I’ll be all right.”
“Yes, sir. What happened when we went suborbital?”
“That was just one—”
“And when we flew to the station with Jerence?” I had no answer. His eyes were intense. “We’re only alive by grace of a miracle, sir. Don’t ask for another. You can’t handle acceleration with one lung.”
“What do you want of me? The shuttle pilots were all U.N.A.F. and went with the fleet!”
“Yes.” He looked out the window. “I may not be skillful, but I flew her once. Sir.”
Prisoner's Hope (The Seafort Saga Book 3) Page 38