Jupiter's Reef (17 page)

“I know the Gannys,” he said. “I’ll talk to them.”

“You mean you know that stupid dialect. How did they get to talk like that?”

“Cut off from everything, mining ice on an iceberg, I guess,” said Alex. ‘They live in their own world. And they’re amazing folks. They can tell you a dozen different kinds of ice. Off the top of their heads. And they know where to find any kind you want. Fizzy ice for your drinks. Rock ice that lasts a long time and ...”

“What are you talking about?” said Matt. “I don’t care about ice. We have a mission here and I thought that EarthCorp had arranged everything.”

“I told you I’d talk to them,” said Alex.

“You know the dialect?” asked Johnny.

“Yezzer. Ikin talkit okay, Bozwo!”

“What?” said Matt.

The Captain at that point cut off the conversation and directed Alex to his com. “I’m cutting Matt off, sorry. You guys can catch up later. Alex, you can trim your jets,” he said. “We’ll bring you in.”

The computer established a link between the
Houston
’s magnetic grapplers and
Diver
’s microboosters. The two systems worked perfectly together and in less than a minute they were secured inside the hold of the
Houston
.

Something in the pit of his stomach told Alex that they were moving already. He switched on the outside cameras and saw that the hatch of the
Houston
was closed.

“
Diver
. You’re locked down until we make our jump,” said the voice of Captain Piersall. “Spaceguard keeps pushing us. We have to do it now. I think you better secure everything until further notice. We’re moving to the launch point now.”

“But can’t we disembark?” asked Mary.

The news got worse. Not only would they take the jump while still in the
Houston
’s hold, but they had to power down as well. That meant no radio and no cabin power except emergency battery.

Five minutes later they sat in the dim green glow of the cabin, wondering when
Houston
would engage its experimental engines. The glow came from a residual light gathered by panels in the ceiling. In a total power failure they could supply four hours of reasonable light.

Alex flattened his chair and closed his eyes. “May as well relax and pretend we’re luggage.”

Tony Sciarra had no intention of relaxing.

“Why should we?” he said. “We’re in the hold of a test ship that’s never done its test with cargo aboard and we’re the cargo. And ...”

“Enough,” said Alex. “They’ve done tests plenty of times. And they’re going to keep on testing. We’re not the first to travel aboard the
Houston
.”

Tony looked ready to argue but he shrugged and sat down. Then he began strapping himself into his chair.

“Less than nominal, I’d say.”

“Taking a vote, here,” said Alex with his eyes still closed. “The vote for ship’s curmudgeon. One for Tony. All in agreement...?

Everyone cast an ‘aye’ vote.

“Will you accept the task, Tony?” said the Professor. “This may take some resolve. Test your mettle, as they say.”

Tony looked around at all of them. “Are you all from Oz or somewhere?” he said. “The physical position of the hold may cause molecular slippage. A body shielded in polyceramic ... excuse me ...
bonded
polyceramic would have a chance, I suppose. I’m not saying we’re doomed here.”

Everyone swiveled their heads to look at Tony. He was wrapped in a foil quilt that made him look odd in the green light. He looked at them defensively. “Well, I was just saying ...”

As time passed Alex could see the cabin light fading slowly, as if its lifeblood was evaporating. “I’ve never been one for camp songs, does anyone have a good story to tell?”

Johnny laughed. “Did I tell you I saw my wife, Alex?”

A flurry of reactions went around the crew: Mary looked at him with a wide grin, Alex raised both eyebrows, and Tony laughed and said: “You’re married?”

“When did you go to see her?” asked Mary.

“She came to see me, actually. Gave me some of my old collectables and said there was some valuable furniture that came from my family; the side that lived in Baton Rouge before the flooding. She looked good, but I couldn’t wait ’til she left.”

A sound thrummed through
Diver
’s skin and the kitten let out a wail. It hissed twice and tucked its head under Mary’s arm.

The Captain of the
Houston
cut in on the sono-paging system, the only sustained intercom link between the two ships. “How’s it going down there?”

“Care to give a clue as to what’s happening?” asked Alex.

“Powering up,” said Captain Piersall. “Of course you may be already aware that we’re under way. The gantry section is the superstructure that contains
Houston
. Our drive is like a velocity multiplier. Whatever speed we’ve mustered when we push the button determines the amount of boost the G-pulse Drive will give us. Deep space shots will take days to build the appropriate speed. Today we’re doing the usual test run between L-5 and Ganny station.”

“So when do we jump?” asked Tony.

“In about ten or fifteen minutes,” answered Piersall.

“Will we experience any side effects?” asked Alex.

“I doubt it. But we really don’t know how it is in the hold. We’ve carried cargo and animals with no ill effects.”

“But ...” said Alex.

“But no one’s ridden there,” said Piersall. “No humans anyway. A bus load of clones went to Mars and had no problems.”

“They’re not people, though, right?” said Mary.

“Right,” said the Captain, laughing. “They were guinea pigs.”

“I think we’ll be okay,” said Mary, smiling. “At least I know I will.”

There was silence from the Captain.

Alex spoke up quickly. “I look forward to meeting you, Captain Piersall.”

“So do I,” said Mary.

8
Babies slept in Mary’s lap and was purring when the first wave hit. The kitten opened its eyes and looked up at Mary. It opened its mouth to protest when a second wave passed through them, followed by a massive tug that everyone felt in the middle of their stomach. Johnny jumped from his seat and stumbled in weightlessness toward the toilet. It took him a while to get to the head but, to everyone’s relief, he had no accidents on the way.

Listening to Johnny retch when he reached the toilet didn’t make Alex’s stomach feel any better. They all felt sick, including the cat. It started heaving in Mary’s lap, so she put it gently down on the floor. Its little claws dug into the flooring to keep from floating away.

But there were no other waves. Everything was okay with the possible exception of Johnny who had catapulted himself toward the bathroom with such force that he hit his head. Now he peered at everyone in apparent confusion, rubbing his pate. “That must have been it.”

Captain Piersall’s voice reappeared from nowhere. “Okay down there?”

Alex coughed. “Oh sure, that was lots of fun, Captain. Your cargo is down here throwing up.”

“I’m sorry,” said Piersall. “I guess there are some side effects after all. We’ll have to take a look at that. Of course, we aren’t planning to carry people down there.”

“Other than a cargo of clones from time to time?” asked Mary.

The Captain paused before answering. Then his voice resonated once again from the walls of the cabin. “I guess so. We may have to from time to time. Who is this that I’m talking to?”

“I’m just the radio operator, sir,” said Mary.

“How does this sono-paging thing work, Captain?” asked Johnny. “Your voice seems to come from the walls.”

“The sono-pager is a self activating fiberlight system that traces the ship’s wiring. There are resonating points all over the ship. Four resonators are attached to the grapples that hold your ship in place; two fore and two aft. The system lets us talk through the ship without using power and in our case while we’re in G-pulse mode.”

“The ship isn’t powered up during G-pulse?” asked Alex.

“The power is diverted to the pulse system. Making G-waves takes beef. We’re surfing right now, matter of fact.”

Captain Piersall invited the crew of
Diver
to the helm for the rest of the flight to Ganymede. He told them to hurry because it would soon be time for a retro-pulse.

Johnny had to be coaxed from the bathroom. But soon they were floating along a corridor, each holding a strap attached to a cable that pulled them toward the helm. The simple contraption, just a cable and pulley with hand straps, was common on most mining vessels and allowed a low maintenance, low energy way for the crew to move through a ship while weightless. Mary and Alex recognized the system and had grabbed a strap. Tony and the Professor followed their lead. Soon the four of them, with Babies being left aboard
Diver
, found themselves taking an impromptu tour of the
Houston
.

First they moved down a long corridor lit by green glowing panels in the ceiling. Alex noticed there was no metal in evidence.

“Everything’s made of plastic on this ship,” he said, looking back at Johnny.

Tony smirked at him. “Didn’t do your homework, eh, Alex?”

“Meaning?”

“The
Houston
is made of special lightweight plastic. Every piece of the ship was designed to be as light as possible. Principally because the coils that drive the G-Pulse weigh so much.”

The corridor they were being pulled along was largely featureless, with an occasional door of control panel. Everything was bone white and looked sterile as a hospital.

Finally the corridor took a turn upward and the cable brought them to an intersecting cable. A computer voice instructed them to change cables. One by one they made the switch.

At the end of the corridor were two doors. Mary looked at the left hand door and closed her eyes briefly. She seemed about to make a comment when a door on the right, marked HELM slid open.

Inside the helm room were a half dozen people seated in a half circle at various work stations, all dressed in dark blue uniforms. Captain Piersall sat in the middle in an elevated chair that swiveled as they entered the room.

“Crew of
Diver
,” said the Captain. “Welcome to the bridge!” His eyes fixed on Mary and the smile left his face. “I can see that I’ve offended at least one of you, already. But I suspected as much.”

Alex looked at Mary. “Captain Piersall, this is my co-pilot and radio operator, Mary Seventeen. She’s a class-one Sensor. And this is Doctor Tony Sciarra and Professor John Baltadonis.”

Mary was smiling pleasantly as she watched the Captain squirm.

“No Sensor aboard, sir?” she asked.

“Actually we have a Mary Ten in the next room,” he answered. “She’s a class-two, I believe.”

“Designed exclusively for deep space,” said Mary.

The Captain nodded, then he told them to strap themselves in a row of seats at the rear of the bridge, and swiveled his chair back to its normal position.

“Null-wave in seven seconds, sir,” said a man seated next to the Captain.

A large viewscreen stretched across the front of entire bridge. But it was dark. Alex noticed that virtually all the control lights of the panels that line the walls were also dark.

Captain Piersall told everyone to strap in, then he and the rest of his crew leaned back in their seats and closed their eyes.

Alex felt one wave pass through him, then another. The nausea he’d felt before returned, so he looked down the row of seats, past Mary, to see if Johnny was okay. Professor Baltadonis was leaning back with his eyes closed, like the crew of
Houston
. Alex could see Johnny’s jaw clench as he fought being sick.

Suddenly the ship came to life. Lights came on; motors started and noise seemed to come from everywhere. But the most spectacular change was that the wide screen now showed a panorama of Jupiter.

“You know,” said Captain Piersall, “Jupiter is twice the mass of all the other planets combined.”

“Jupiter facts 101,” said Sciarra. “Big deal. The sun contains 99.857% of all the matter in the solar system. That includes planets, comets, asteroids, dust.”

“That makes Jupiter seem downright puny,” said Johnny.

With the king of planets sprawled across the viewscreen everyone seemed to have a comment. Mary leaned over to Alex and whispered: “I knew there was another Sensor here but ...”

“That would have been telling,” Alex whispered. “How’s she doing?”

“Fine,” said Mary. “She knew when I came on board. We’ve talked.”

“Dingers, Mary, will I ever get used to this?” said Alex.

Johnny was discoursing on Jupiter. He had apparently been doing his homework. “The planet is all atmosphere laid down in layers like an onion.”

“Not that many layers,” said Mary.

“I was speaking figuratively, Mizz Seventeen,” said Johnny. “But we all know about gas giants. It’s basic planetology.”

“I’m going to have to ask you folks to return to your ship sooner than I’d thought,” said Captain Piersall. “The Gannys are stirred up about something and Ganymede station is nervous. They want me to dump you and get out.”

“Where’s Matt?” asked Tony. “Shitfire, I almost forgot about him.”

“Howarth is sleeping, I think,” said a woman seated next to the Captain. “He got kind of sick when we took the first curl. He could have done the jump up here but he insisted on staying in his ‘crib,’ I think he called it.”

“Jesus,” said Sciarra. “He called it his crib? Have you checked to see if he’s alive.”

“He’s alive, all right,” said the woman, who Alex took to be the ship’s first officer. “He’s used up his rations making some synthetics. He asked for greebrew the moment he heard about the effects of the pulser.”

“You folks don’t seem to be bothered by the pulse,” said Johnny. “If you don’t mind my asking, what’s your secret?”

Captain Piersall laughed. “Learning not to throw up. That’s my secret.”

“And how exactly do you manage that?” asked Johnny.

“Simple,” answered the Captain. “Never eat within two hours of a flight.”

“I don’t know,” said Alex. “I like the slower pace. Plasma drive is fast enough.”

“What about the pollution?” asked Tony.