Existence (33 page)

At twice the length,
Spirit
carried five times as many people, served by only a dozen human attendants.

Below her feet, passengers would be jostling for a better view of the Langley Crater, or maybe Arlington Cemetery, while peering ahead for the enduring spire of the rebuilt Washington Monument, with its tip of lunar stone. Or did some of those people already sniff an alert coming on, through their own liaison networks? Were families starting to cluster near the emergency chutes? Tor wondered if she should be doing the same.

This new ladder was something else. It felt almost alive and responded to her footstep by
contracting …
carrying her upward in a smooth-but-sudden jerk. Smart elastics, she realized. Fine for professionals. But most people never took a liking to ladders that twitch. The good news: It would take just a few actual footsteps at this rate, concentrating to slip her soles carefully onto one rung after the next, and worrying about what would happen when she reached the unpleasant-looking “hatch” that lay just overhead.

Meanwhile, the voice in her ear took on a strange, lilting quality. The next contribution must have come from an individual member. Someone generally appreciated.

“Come with me, higher than high,

        
Dropping burdensome things.

Lighter than clouds, we can fly,

        
Thoughts spread wider than wings.

Be like the whale, behemoth,

        
Enormous, yet weightless beings,

Soundlessly floating, the sky

        
Beckons a mammal that sings.”

Tor liked the offering. You almost wanted to earn it, by coming up with a tune …

… only the “hatch” was now just ahead, or above, almost pressing against her face. A throbbing iris of polyorganic membranes, much like the quasiliving external skin of the
Spirit.
Coming this close, inhaling the exudate aromas, made Tor feel queasy.

“Relax.”
The voice was back to business. Probably led by the zep mechanic.

“You’ll need a command word. Touch that nub in the middle to get attention and say ‘Cinnamon.’”

“Cinnamon?”

It was only a query, but the barrier reacted instantly. With a faintly squishy sound, it dilated and the stringy stepladder resumed its programmed journey, carrying her upward.

Aboard old-time zeps, like the
Hindenburg,
the underslung gondola had been devoted mainly to engines and crew, while paying passengers occupied two broad decks at the base of the giant dirigible’s main body. The
Spirit of Chula Vista
had a similar layout, except that the gondola was mainly for show. Having climbed above all the sections designed for people and cargo, Tor now rode the throbbing ladder into a cathedral of lifter cells, each of them a vast chamber in its own right, filled with gas that was much lighter than air.

Hundreds of transparent, filmy balloons—cylindrical and tall like Sequoia trunks—crowded together, stretching from the web-floor where she stood all the way up to the arched ceiling of the
Spirit
’s rounded skin. Tor could only move among these towering columns along four narrow paths leading port or starboard … fore or aft. The arrow in her specs suggested
port,
without pulsing insistence. Most members of the smart-mob had never been in a place like this. Curiosity—the strongest modern craving—formed more of these ad hoc groups than any other passion.

Heading in the suggested direction, Tor could not resist reaching out, touching some of the tall cells, their polymer surfaces quivering like the giant bubbles that she used to create with toy wands, at birthday parties. They appeared so light, so delicate.…

“Half of the cells contain helium,”
explained the voice, now so individualized that it had to be a specific person—perhaps the zep mechanic or else a dirigible aficionado.
“See how those membranes are made with a faintly greenish tint? They surround the larger hydrogen cells.”

Tor blinked.

“Hydrogen. Isn’t that dangerous?”

Her spec supplied pics of the
Hindenburg
—or LZ 129—that greatest and most ill-fated ancient zeppelin, whose fiery immolation at Lakehurst, New Jersey, marked the sudden end of the First Zep Era, in May 1937. (Facts scrolled along the bottom, lured in by attention cues.) Once ignited—
how
remained controversial—flames had engulfed the mighty airship from mooring tip to gondola, to its swastika-emblazoned rudder, in little more than a minute. To this day, journalists envied the news crew that had been on-hand that day, with primitive movie cameras, capturing onto acetate some of the most stunning footage and memorable imagery ever to accompany a technological disaster.

Nowadays, what reff or terr group wouldn’t just love to claim credit for an event so resplendent? So attention-grabbing?

As if reading her mind, the voice lectured.

“Hydrogen is much lighter and more buoyant than helium. Hydrogen is also cheap and readily available. Using it improves the economics of zep travel. Though of course, care must be taken.…”

As Tor approached the end of her narrow corridor, she encountered the trusswork that kept
Spirit
rigid—a dirigible—instead of a floppy, balloonlike blimp. One girder made of carbon tubes, woven into an open latticework of triangles, stretched and curved both forward and aft. Nearby, it joined another tensegrity strut at right angles. That one would form a girdle, encircling the
Spirit
’s widest girth.

Tracking Tor’s interest, her spec spun out statistics and schematics. At eight hundred feet in length,
Hindenburg
had been just 10 percent shorter than the
Titanic.
In contrast, the
Spirit of Chula Vista
stretched twice that distance. Yet, its shell and trusswork weighed half as much.

“Naturally, there are precautions,”
the voice continued.
“Take the shape of the gas cells. They are vertical columns. Any failure in a hydrogen cell triggers a pulse, bursting open the top, pushing the contents up and out of the ship, skyward, away from passengers, cargo, or people below. It’s been extensively tested.

“Also, the surrounding helium cells provide a buffer, keeping oxygen-rich air away from those containing hydrogen. Passenger ships like this one carry double the ratio of helium to hydrogen.”

“They can replenish hydrogen en route if they have to, right? By cracking water from onboard ballast?”

“Or even from humidity in the air, using solar power.

“And yes, the readouts show unusual levels of hydrogen production, in order to keep several cells filled aboard the
Spirit
. That’s why we asked you to come up here. There must be some leakage. One scenario suggested that it might be accumulating in here, between the cells.”

She pulled the omnisniffer—a phone attachment—from her purse and began scanning. Chemical sensors were all over the place, naturally, getting cheaper and more acute all the time—just when the public seemed to want them. For reassurance, if nothing else.

“I’m not detecting very much,” she said. Tor wasn’t sure how to feel—relieved or disappointed—upon reading that hydrogen levels were only slightly elevated in the companionway.

“That confirms what onboard monitors have already shown. Hardly any hydrogen buildup in the cabins or walkways. It must be leaking into the sky—”

“Even so—” Tor began, envisioning gouts of flame erupting toward the heavens from atop the great airship.

“—at rates that offer no danger of ignition. The stuff dissipates very fast, Tor, and the
Spirit
is moving, on a windy day. Anyway, hydrogen isn’t dangerous—or even toxic—unless it’s held within a confined space.”

Tor kept scanning while moving along the spongy path. But hydrogen readings never spiked enough to cause concern, let alone alarm. The smart-mob had wanted her to come up here for this purpose—to verify that onboard detectors hadn’t been tampered with by clever saboteurs. Now that her independent readings confirmed the company’s story, some people were already starting to lose interest. Ad hoc membership totals began to fall.

“Any leakage must be into the air,”
continued the voice of the group mind, still authoritative.
“We’ve put out a notice for amateur scientists, asking for volunteers to aim spectranalysis equipment along the
Spirit
’s route. They’ll measure parts-per-million, so we can get a handle on leakage rates. But it’s mathematically impossible for the amounts to be dangerous. Humidity may go up a percent or two in neighborhoods that lie directly below
Spirit
. That’s about it.”

Tor had reached the end of the walkway. Her hand pressed against the outer envelope—the quasiliving skin that enclosed everything, from gas cells and trusses to the passenger cabin below. Up close, it was nearly transparent, offering a breathtaking view outside.

“We passed the Beltway,” she murmured, a little surprised that the diligent guardians of Washington’s defensive grid allowed the
Spirit
to pass through that wall of sensors and rays without delay or scrutiny. Below and ahead, she could make out the great locomotive tug,
Umberto Nobile,
hauling hard at the tow cable, puffing along the Glebe Road Bypass. Fort Meyers stood to the left. The zeppelin’s shadow rippled over a vast garden of gravestones—Arlington National Cemetery.

“The powers-that-be have downgraded our rumor,”
said the voice inside her ear.
“The nation’s professional protectors are chasing down more plausible threats … none of which has been deemed likely enough to merit an alert. Malevolent zeps don’t even make it onto the Threat Chart.”

Tor clicked and flicked the attention-gaze of her specs, glancing through the journalist feeds at MediaCorp, which were now—belatedly—accessible to a reporter of her level. Seven minutes after the rise in tension caused by that spam of rumors, a consensus was already forming. The spam flood had not been intended to distract attention
from
a terror attack, concluded mass-wisdom. It
was
the attack. And not a very effective one, at that. National productivity had dropped by a brief diversion factor of one part in twenty-three thousand. Hardly enough damage to be worth risking prosecution or retaliation. But then, neohackers seldom cared about consequences.

Speaking of consequences; they were already pouring in from her little snooping expedition. The mavens of propriety at MediaCorp, for example, must be catching up on recent events. A work-related memorandum flashed in Tor’s agenda box, revising tomorrow’s schedule for her first day of employment at the Washington Bureau. During lunch—right after basic orientation—she was now required to attend counseling on the Exercising Good Judgment in Impromptu Field Situations.

“Oh great,” she muttered, noticing also that the zeppelin company had applied a five hundred dollar fine against her account for Unjustified Entry into Restricted Areas.

PLEASE REMAIN WHERE YOU ARE, MS. POVLOV,
said an override message.
AN ATTENDANT WILL ARRIVE AT YOUR POSITION SHORTLY IN ORDER TO HELP YOU RETURN TO YOUR SEAT FOR LANDING.

“Double great.”

Ahead, beyond the curve of the dirigible’s skin, she spotted the massive, squat bulk of the Pentagon, bristling with missiles, lenses, and antennae … still a highly-protected enclave, even ten years after the Department of Defense moved its headquarters to “an undisclosed location in Minnesota.”

Soon, the mooring towers and docking ports of Reagan-Clinton National Skydrome would appear, signaling the end of her cross-continental voyage. Also finished—despite a string of interesting stories, from the Atkins Center to Hamish Brookeman railing at the Godmakers’ Conference—was all chance of a blemish-free start to her new career in Big Time Media.

She addressed the group mind. “I don’t suppose any of you have bright ideas?”

But it had already started to unravel. Membership numbers were falling fast, like rats deserting a sinking ship. Or—more accurately—monkeys. Moving on to the next shiny thing.

“Sorry, Tor. People are distracted. They’ve been dropping out to watch the reopening of the Artifact Conference. You may even glimpse some limos arriving at the Naval Research Center, just across the Potomac. Take a look as the
Spirit
starts turning for final approach…”

Blasted fickle amateurs! Tor had made good use of smart-mobs in the past. But this time was likely to prove an embarrassment. None of
them
would have to pay fines or face disapproval in a new job.

“Still, a few of us remain worried,”
the voice continued.
“That rumor had something … I can’t put my finger on it.”

The “voice” was starting to sound individualized and had even used the first person “I.” A sure sign of low numbers. And yet, Tor drew some strength from the support. Before an attendant arrived to escort her below, there was still time for a little last-minute tenacity.

“Can I assume we still have some zep aficionados in attendance?”

“Hardly anyone else, Tor. Some us are fanatics.”

“Good, then let’s apply fanatical expertise. Think about that
leakage
we discussed a while ago. We’ve been assuming that this zeppelin is making hydrogen to make up for a significant seep, into the air outside. That’d be pretty harmless, I agree. Have any of those amateur scientists studied the air near
Spirit
’s flight path, yet?”

A pause.

“Yes, several have reported in. They found no dangerous levels of hydrogen in the vicinity of the ship, or in its wake. The seep is probably dissipating so fast.…”

“Please clarify. No dangerous levels? Is it possible they found
no
sign of a hydrogen leak
at all
?”