Starhawk

Chapter 7

THEY TALKED ABOUT their favorite assignments, about the ineptitude of the people who ran Union, about politics, about the silliness that reigned on holovision. About the lunacy of people who planted bombs on interstellars. “They go on about the sanctity of life, then they kill innocent people.”

They did not mention the occasional bumps and nudges as they descended closer to the atmosphere.

Shahlah described her feelings when she was assigned to deliver the good news to the winners of the Jamal Touma Science Award. Joshua recalled a run-in he’d had with police after taking umbrage with his sister’s husband, who had attacked her. “I wound up in jail,” he said. “For doing what someone needed to do.”

“You hit him?” asked Shahlah.

“Of course. He’s the one who should have been arrested.”

“Why wasn’t he?” asked Jake.

“My sister wouldn’t press charges.”

And they talked about the Thompson. Where was it?

They interweaved bouts of silence with comments about what they’d do when they got home. (Nobody said “if.”) Shahlah announced that it would be a long time before she tried something like this again. “I thought these things were safe. Otherwise, we’d never have allowed the girls to come on this flight. My father wanted it to be something special. He’ll be heartbroken when he hears what happened.”

“Nevertheless,” said Josh, “I think everyone will appreciate his generosity.”

“Oh, yes.” She paused. “Jake, speaking of appreciation, I’m glad you were in the area. Don’t know what we’d have done—”

“Well.” He wasn’t sure how to respond. If the Copperhead hadn’t been available, maybe they’d have sent a ship with appropriate capacity. “I’m glad we’ve been able to help,” he said.

She approached him, looked into his eyes, and pressed her lips against his cheek. “Thank you,” she whispered.

* * *

“YOU GUYS ARE waiting too long,” Priscilla said. “We’re starting to hit some atmosphere.” But Jake told her to be patient.

And, finally, the AI warned them that the situation was deteriorating and it was time to go. They were crossing one of the oceans, which was bright and gleaming in the sunlight. Jake let Priscilla know they were coming. Then they got into their gear. Jake and Joshua both wore jet packs. When they were ready, the Gremlin captain took a last look around. “I’ve been here almost two years,” he said. “This has been my home.” He sighed, took Shahlah’s hand, and led her into the air lock. “Don’t worry about anything,” he told her. “Just stay with me when we get outside.”

“I’ll be fine,” she said.

The last thing Jake saw before they closed the inner hatch was an image on the navigation monitor. One of the telescopes was pointed down, high mag, at the ocean. Something with a long neck seemed to be looking back at him.

The lock went through the decompression cycle and opened. The Copperhead was about a hundred meters away.

* * *

“IT’S NOT AS frightening as I’d expected,” Shahlah said.

“That’s because there’s no down,” said Josh. “No way you can fall.”

She and Joshua pushed off together. Jake followed close behind. “I’ve never felt anything like this,” she said, sounding almost giddy.

They floated across, talking about how they’d hoped to hear from the Thompson before they left, and how impressed everybody was that the kids had done this without any problems, and how breathless a world was from this angle. Joshua spotted the monument, then lost it as he closed on the Copperhead. The air-lock door was open, and they floated smoothly inside. When they stepped into the passenger cabin, the girls clapped their hands, everybody said hello and how good it was to be together again, and Jake couldn’t help enjoying the moment. Now, if the Thompson would just show up.

The air had already gotten thick. “Listen, everybody,” said Priscilla from the bridge, “please belt down or hold on. We need to do a little acceleration. Just for a few minutes.”

Jake was pleased. She continued to show good sense. He grabbed hold of one of the safety grips that lined the bulkheads.

* * *

WHEN THEY RESET for cruise, he led Shahlah and Joshua below to the cargo deck. They climbed into the lander, closed the hatches, and settled into the seats. It felt good to get back to decent ventilation. But they looked at one another while everybody came to the same realization. Jake shook his head. Shahlah and Joshua both nodded. Do it.

He touched the commlink. “We need to rethink this, Priscilla.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, the air’s better in here than it is in the ship. Bring three of the girls down, and we’ll change places.”

“Okay, Jake. Be there in a minute.”

Shahlah glanced around the interior of the lander. “Why are the windows blocked?” she asked.

“Because,” said Josh, “it gets used sometimes in areas of heavy radiation.”

She shook her head. “This is depressing.”

“I’m sorry,” said Jake. He explained about the flare star.

“I’d like to see that,” she said. “But live. Through a window. Not on a display.”

“Sorry,” said Jake. “Windows won’t work.”

“Nice interior, though,” she said. The seats were imitation leather, the lighting was soft, and the controls were padded. The vehicle was designed to accommodate five, plus the pilot.

“But we need to conserve the air,” said Josh. “No idle chitchat.” So they sat quietly, waiting for Priscilla. Shahlah found a book, FutureTalk, in which experts predicted what the next century was likely to bring. Joshua simply closed his eyes. Jake stared at the back of his hand, thinking how nice it would be to be on a mountaintop somewhere, with unlimited fresh air.

Priscilla arrived with Nadia, Layla, and Sakeena. “We’re going to rotate the girls through every four hours,” she said.

They took over the lander, and Joshua showed them how to access the library. “Same rules here as elsewhere. Breathe normally. Don’t talk, okay? And keep the hatch shut except when you’re going in or out. Washroom is down at the far end of the bay.” Shahlah translated.

They closed the hatch and started back topside. It was 1311 Greenwich time. They had until about noon tomorrow to get some people on board the Thompson.

“By the way,” said Priscilla, “you timed your exit from the Gremlin pretty closely.”

“It’s going down?” said Joshua.

“A few minutes ago.”

* * *

JOHARA WAS ASLEEP in the passenger cabin. The others were reading. “I’ve never seen that happen before,” said Joshua. “Usually, they spend their time playing games.”

Ishraq looked up from her screen. “Priscilla asked us not to.”

“Of course,” he said. “Game-playing gets people excited, and you use more air.”

“I guess,” she said.

Jake and Joshua took seats while Priscilla and Shahlah went onto the bridge. “How about some music?” said Shahlah.

“You think we’d be disturbing anybody?”

“I think they’d love to hear some noise.”

“Okay. What do you suggest?” She put the library on-screen.

“Oh,” Shahlah said. “You have the Cairo Five.” She looked at Priscilla, who nodded.

Shahlah made the selection in English.

* * *

THE MUSIC BOUNCED and banged along in a gallop until Priscilla turned the volume down. Don’t want anybody getting excited. But the Cairo Five rolled in perfect harmony. The rhythms could have been directly out of Manhattan. A few of the instruments were unfamiliar, more strings than would have been used in a Western rendition, and of a different timbre. But Shahlah smiled and Priscilla was on board from the start. And even Jake, who appeared at the hatch.

The Desert Express, oh, the Desert Express,

She rides each night on the Desert Express,

She waves hello then she waves good-bye

Every night on the Desert Express.

* * *

JAKE NEEDED SOMETHING to keep his spirits up, so he fell back on a collection of commentaries by a young journalist named MacAllister. The guy attacked everybody, college professors, women, clerics, Boy Scouts. Nobody was safe. I can imagine no worse condition than being married to a perfect spouse, he wrote. What the hell was that supposed to mean? MacAllister thought he lived in a world populated by blockheads. He recommended voting to reelect President Norman even though he was an idiot. Not good, he admitted, but a step up from Governor McGruder.

The reality was Jake could not keep his mind off the clock. And the Thompson. Joshua sat across the cabin. His display was off, and his eyes were closed though he was not asleep.

Eventually, the Gremlin captain brought up the library, inserted an earpod, and started the Blake Ocala Show. Ocala bored Jake. He was enormously popular back in the U.S., but the guy was smarmy at best. His routines consisted mostly of leering at his female guests, poking fun at politicians, and falling down. “You really like that guy?” he asked.

“No,” said Josh. “He’s pretty dumb. But right now, he’s a diversion.”

* * *

EVENTUALLY, JAKE WENT back onto the bridge. Priscilla was doing a crossword puzzle while Shahlah was reading. “What is it?” he asked.

“A biography of Toraggio,” she said.

“The historian?”

“Well, he was more than a historian. He was a futurist.”

“I think I saw him once,” said Jake. “At Union. Wasn’t he the guy who thought we had to set up off-world colonies if we wanted to survive?”

“Yes,” she said. “He’s largely the reason we’re having the battle over terraforming now.”

“Wonderful.”

“He was also worried about ideologies. He thinks we need to get rid of them.”

“Bear with me, but isn’t that an ideology?”

She dimmed the screen. “I guess. Did you get a chance to talk to him?”

“Not really. Somebody pointed him out to me. He was checking into the Starlight. He’s dead, isn’t he?”

“Two years ago,” she said.

Jake nodded. And pressed his index finger against his lips. They shouldn’t be talking.

Priscilla’s clock chimed. Seventeen hundred hours. She got up and went into the passenger cabin. “We’re going down to the lander again, ladies. Who wants to come? I can take three.”

The kids had already decided. She took Adara, Lana, and Ishraq down and returned a few minutes later with Nadia, Layla, and Sakeena.

“How was it?” asked Josh.

Sakeena wrinkled her nose. “It’s great down there. But you can hardly breathe in here.”

“Yeah,” he said. “I guess it’s a bit stuffy.” He glanced at Jake but said nothing further.

* * *

PRISCILLA’S JOURNAL

The things we take for granted: like being able to breathe. It’s almost impossible to sleep when getting enough air becomes a struggle.

—November 18, 2195