Starplex (25 page)

"Excuse me, but I think the PDQ is in trouble," said Rhombus, gesturing with one of his ropes toward part of the holographic bubble. Two Waldahud ships were converging on the Starplex probeship, lasers crisscrossing.

Keith's eyes darted between the holo display and the monitor on his console showing the progress of the flooding.

"Wait," said Rhombus, "the Dakterth is coming up on the stern of the two ships attacking the PDQ. It should be able to draw their fire."

"How are the evacuations coming?" asked Keith.

"On schedule," said Lianne.

"Are we leaking any water into space?"

"No; it's just an internal breach."

"How watertight are our interior doors?"

"Well," said Lianne, "the sliding doors between rooms seal when closed, but they aren't strong. After all, the door panels are designed so that anyone can kick them free of their rails for emergency escape in case of fire. The weight of the water will burst them open."

"What genius thought of that?" asked Thor.

"I think he helped design the Titanic," muttered Keith.

The ship rocked again, heaving back and forth. In the holo display, a cylinder carved out of Starplex's central disk, ten decks thick, was tumbling against the night.

"Gawst has cut out our number-two generator," reported Lianne. "I'd evacuated that part of the engineering torus as soon as he started carving into it, so there were no casualties. But if he can get one more of our generators, this ship won't be able to enter hyperdrive, even if we could get far enough from the star to make that possible."

A burst of light caught Keith's eye. The Dakterth had severed the engine pod from one of the Waldahud ships that had been firing on the PDQ. The pod pinwheeled away. It looked as though it was going to crash into the cylindrical core that had been cut from Starplex, but that was only a trick of perspective.

"What if we vent the water out into space."?" asked Rhombus.

"We'd have to cut our own hole into the ocean deck to do that," said Lianne.

"Where would be the easiest spot?" asked Keith.

Lianne consulted a schematic. "The rear wall of docking bay sixteen.

Behind it is the engineering torus, of course. But right at that location, the torus contains a filtration station for the ocean deck.

In other words, it's already filled with water right up to the back wall of the docking bay, so you'd only have to carve a hole in the bay's wall to get water to pour in."

Keith thought for a moment. And then it hit him. "Okay," he said.

"Get someone with a geological laser down to bay sixteen right away."

He turned to Rhombus. "I know the Ibs need gravity, but what if we cut the artificial gravity, and spin the ship instead?"

"Centrifugal force?" said Lianne. "People would be standing on the walls."

"Yes. So?"

"Well, and each deck is cross-shaped, so the apparent force of gravity would increase as you went farther out into each

"But it would also keep the water from flowing down the central shaft,"

said Keith. "Instead, it would be trying to press against the outer walls of the ocean deck. Thor, could you set up such a spin using our ACS thrusters?"

"Can do."

Keith looked at Rhombus. "How much gravity do you Ibs need for your circulatory systems to work?"

Rhombus lifted his ropes. "Tests have suggested that at least one eighth of a standard-g is required."

"Below deck fifty-five," said Lianne, "even at the ends of the arms, we won't get that much apparent gravity at any reasonable rotation rate."

"But that's only fifteen floors that have to have their Ibs evacuated instead of forty," said Keith. "Lianne, inform everyone of what we're doing. Thor, as soon as no Ib is left below deck fifty-five, start spinning the ship. Bleed off the artificial gravity as we come up to speed."

"Will do."

"People should probably vacate the rooms at the ends of each arm, because of the windows," said Lianne.

"Why?" asked Keith. "They're transparent carbon composite; they won't break even if people are standing on them."

"Of course not," said Lianne. "But the windows are angled at forty-five degrees there, because the edges of the habitat modules slope at that angle. It'll be difficult to stand on them once the apparent gravity shifts so that those sloping windows become slanted floors."

Keith nodded. "Good point. Pass on that advisory as well."

"Will do."

The holographic head of Longbottle aboard the Rum Runner spoke up.

"Polluted waters we are in. Engines overheating."

Keith nodded at the holegram. "Do what you can; if necessary, head away from us. Maybe no one will follow you."

Starplex rocked again. "Gawst has started carving into the central disk beneath our number-three generator," said Rhombus. "And a second one of his ships is carving in from the top of the disk, right above generator one."

"Start spinning the ship, Thor."

The starfield holegram began to rotate. The ship reeled again. "That took Gawst by surprise," said Thor. "His lasers are skittering across the entire undersurface of the central disk."

Lianne spoke up. "Jessica Fong is in position inside docking bay sixteen, Keith."

"Show me."

A frame appeared around part of the starfield holegram--now spinning at dizzying speed. Inside the frame, a picture of the interior of the docking bay appeared, with a space-suited woman floating in midair.

She was tethered to the rear wall--the one that was shared with the engineering torus--and the tether was pulled taut as the ship's rotation flung her outward toward the inside of the curving space door. The bay's floor, crisscrossed with landing reference markers, was more than a dozen meters below her feet, and its roof, covered with lighting panels and housings for winches, was a dozen meters above her head.

"Open channel," said Keith, then: "Okay, Jessica. Behind the bay's rear wall, inside the engineering torus, is a water-filled ocean-deck filtering station. That station opens on to the ocean on the other side. Drill open a big hole in the docking bay's rear wall, Be careful, though: when you do that, water is going to hammer through at you."

"I understand," said Jessica. She reached to her waist and let out more tether. Keith watched breathlessly as she moved through the air across the bay. She wasn't wasting any time; meters of additional tether appeared each second. She finally reached the far side of the bay, slamming against the curving surface of the space door. For a horrible moment, Keith thought she'd been knocked unconscious by the impact, but she soon recovered from the blow and fought to bring the heavy geological laser into position. She was having trouble holding the unit steady. When she fired, her first shot crossed her own tether line, severing it at its midpoint. Fifteen meters of nylon line came crashing down at her; the other fifteen meters whipped around far over her head like a narrow yellow snake. She was now pinned against the center of the space door by the ship's spinning.

Fong's second shot went equally wild, taking out a junction box for the in-bay lighting system. Everything was plunged into darkness.

"Jessica!"

"I'm still here, Keith. God, this is awkward."

In the frame, all that was visible was black--black, and then a pinprick of ruby, as the laser found the rear wall.

Keith watched as the metal began to glow, soften, ripple----and then-The sound of water rushing through, like a high-pressure fire hose.

Jessica continued to shoot the laser, perforating a giant square along the rear wall. A hole here, move the laser a centimeter, another hole, shoot again, over and over-- The emergency lights came on, bathing the entire bay in red.

Seawater erupted from the rear wall. The perforated square of bulkhead metal peeled back, then tore free, flinging across the bay, propelled by a geyser of water behind it.

Keith cringed. It looked as-though the metal wall fragment was going to slap against Jessica, who was already being pummeled by wild fists of water, but she, too, must have seen it coming. There was an explosion of flame behind her, scorching the wall. She'd been smart enough to put on a suit with a thruster pack, and had fired herself up and away just in time. The bay was filling with water, starting at the space door and rising in toward the interior wall Jessica was soon slapped back against the door.

Once the bay had filled, Keith spoke to her once more.

"Okay, now turn around and drill a.hole about ten centimeters in diameter in the outer docking-bay door. Hold the beam emitter right against the door; you don't want to boil the water around you."

"Will do," she said, her space suit now a diving suit. She stood on the space door and held the gray metal cone of .her geological laser like a jackhammer. She then fired down between her feet. Soon, part of the space door was glowing cherry red, then white-hot, and then, and then .

. .

Starplex spun like a top against the night, green starlight winking off its hull.

The five remaining Waldahud ships were approaching.

Two of the ships were. coming in from above and three from below, heading toward the ring of docking bays. Doubtless the ship was rotating too fast for any of the Waldahud pilots to notice the tiny incandescent spot in the middle of the door to bay sixteen, a spot that glowed, flared, and burned away.

And suddenly-- Water began to spray out into space, flinging away from the rapidly rotating ship. And as it hit vacuum, it evaporated immediately into vapor, and then, once enough vapor had accumulated to make for considerable pressure, the water recondensed into liquid, the plankton, salt crystals, and oceanic detritus providing seeds for droplet formation, and then here, shaded from the green star by the intervening dark-matter field, it froze into ice-- Millions upon millions of ice pellets, flinging away from Starplex at high speed, propelled by the explosive force of all the water behind and by the centrifugal force of the rapidly rotating ship. Countless diamonds against the night, winking green in the light of the nearby star-- The first Waldahud ship was hit by a barrage of ice chunks, that ship's speed toward Starplex being added to the pellets' own velocity, making for a truly high-speed collision. The initial half-dozen chunks were deflected by the ship's force screens, shields designed for guarding against single microme-teoroid impacts, not a sustained onslaughtn-Ice pellets ripped through the Waldahud hull like teeth through flesh, tearing up the habitat, expelled air freezing and adding to the hailstorm in space On the bridge, Keith called out, "Now, Thor! Rock the ship!"

Thor compliedew streamer of ice chunks angled off in a different direction, impacting a second Waldahud ship, ripping it open. Then a third ship exploded, a silent flower against the dark background, as frozen bullets ripped into the tanks containing its atmospheric-maneuvering fuel.

Thor rocked the ship the other way, and ice pellets were flung toward the fourth remaining ship. By this time, its pilot had come up with a counterstrategy. He rotated his own ship so that its fusion exhaust cone faced toward Starplex, and he fired his main engine, melting the ice into water drops, which immediately boiled into vapor before they could hit his ship.

But the pilot of one of the other remaining ships had been unprepared for this maneuver, or too preoccupied with saving his own tail by heading toward the shortcut. His course took him in the path of his comrade's fusion exhaust, and the white-hot flames tore into his vessel.

It exploded, leaving only two ships--one of which was Gawst's.

The expanding ring of water pellets deflected most of the ship debris away from Starplex, but the crew of the Waldahud craft that had tried the fusion-exhaust trick wasn't so lucky. A large, jagged piece of hull rammed into their shipt it spinning away, out of control--directly toward the field of dark matterlot seemed almost to regain control when he was a few million kilometers away from the closest of the great gray balls of gas, but by then he was already caught in its gravity. It would take hours for the deadly trajectory to play out its course, but the ship was destined to crash into the darmat-- STARPLEX.

and, at that velocity, even the kind of soft impact that occurred when regular matter hit dark matter would be enough to pulverize the vessel.

Gawst's ship was still intact, holding station with a tractor beam beneath the central disk. There was no way Thor could aim the ice-pellet stream there. Still, Starplex could keep spinning until GaWst ran out of fuel, if need be . . .

"Uh-oh." PHANTOM's translation of the rippling lights on Rhombus.

Thor looked up. "God damn," he said.

Emerging from behind the limb of the green star were one . . . two .

. . five more Waldahud fighters. Gawst had not been fool enough to use all his forces on the initial attack. One of the newcomers was a giant, ten times the size of the smaller probecraft.

Starplex's five dolphin-piloted ships had backed off, avoiding the ice barrage. But now they were linking up in formation, and heading toward the approaching attack force, determined to get to it before it could get to their mothership.

And then . . .

"What the hell?" said Keith, gripping his armrests.

"Jesus "said Thor." Jesus.

The vast field of dark matter had begun to move, slowly at first, but now with gathering speed. It was spinning out into lumpy streamers, greenish on the side facing toward the rogue sun, inky black on the other. The streamers grew longer until they spre ad out over millions of kilometers, tubes of gravel with planet-sized spheres distributed along their length like knuckles on ethereal fingers.

The Starplex probeships dived above or below the stream- ers. The Waldahud pilots found their ships traveling in erratic courses, unable to compensate for the streamers' gravitational attraction. In the spherical hologram, Keith could see the attacking ships staggering in drunken, weaving lines, pulled off course by the hundreds of Jupiter-masses within each dark-matter ribbon.

The streamers were growing with surprising speed. Keith still had trouble with the concept of macrolife living freely in space, but of course most life-forms could move quickly when they wanted to . . .