The Wind From a Burning Woman: Six Stories of Science Fiction (2 page)

Josef! This is unexpected.

Very, Krupkin said. He was a small man with narrow eyes and curly black hair. Compared to Kollerts bulk, he was dapperbut thirty years behind a desk had given him the usual physique of a Hexamon backroomer. Have you ever heard of Giani Turco?

Kollert thought for a moment. No, I havent. WaitTurco. Related to Kimon Turco?

Daughter. California should keep better track of its radical Geshels, shouldnt it?

Kimon Turco lived on the Moon.

His daughter lived in your district.

Yes, fine. What about her? Kollert was beginning to be perturbed. Krupkin enjoyed roundabouts even in important situationsand to call him at this address, at such a time, something important had happened.

Shes calling for you. Shell only talk to you, none of the rest. She wont even accept President Praetbri.

Yes. Who is she? What has she done?

Shes managed to start up Psyche. There was enough reaction mass left in the Beckmann motors to alter it into an Earth-intersect orbit. The left side of the cube was flashing bright red, indicating the call was being scrambled.

Kollert sat very still for a few seconds. There was no need acting incredulous. Krupkin was in no position to joke. But the enormity of what he saidand the impulse to disbelieve, despite the bearer of the newsfroze Kollert for an unusually long time. He ran his hand through lank blond hair.

Kollert, Krupkin said. You look like youve been

Is she telling the truth?

Krupkin shook his head. No, Kollert, you dont understand. She hasnt claimed these accomplishments. She hasnt said anything about them yet. She just wants to speak to you. But our tracking stations say theres no doubt. Ive spoken with the officer who commanded the last inspection. He says there was enough mass left in the Beckmann drive positioning motors to push

This is incredible! No precautions were taken? The mass wasnt drained, or something?

Im no Geshel, Farmer. My technicians tell me the mass was left on Psyche because it would have cost several hundred million

Thats behind us now. Let the journalists worry about that, if they ever hear of it. He looked up and saw Gestina still standing in the French doors. He held up his hand to tell her to stay where she was. She was going to have to keep to the house, incommunicado, for as long as it took to straighten this out.

Youre coming?

Which center?

Does it matter? Shes not being discreet. Her message is hitting an entire hemisphere, and there are hundreds of listening stations to pick it up. Several arent under our control. Once anyone pinpoints the source, the story is going to be clear. For your convenience, go to Baja Station. Mexico is signatory to all the necessary pacts.

Im leaving now, Kollert said. Krupkin nodded, and the cube went blank.

What was he talking about? Gestina asked. Whats Psyche?

A chunk of rock, dear, he said. Her talents lay in other directionsshe wasnt stupid. Even for a Naderite, however, she was unknowledgeable about things beyond the Earth.

He started to plan the rules for her movements, then thought better of it and said nothing. If Krupkin was correctand he would bethere was no need. The political considerations, if everything turned out right, would be enormous. He could run as Governor of the Desk, even President of the Hexamon...

And if everything didnt turn out right, it wouldnt matter where anybody was.

* * * *

Turco sat in the middle of her grandfathers control center and cried. She was tired and sick at heart. Things were moving rapidly now, and she wondered just how sane she was. In a few hours she would be the worst menace the Earth had ever known, and for what cause? Truth, justice? They had murdered her grandfather, discredited her father and driven him to suicidebut all seven billion of them, Geshels and Naderites alike?

She didnt know whether she was bluffing or not. Psyches fall was still controllable, and she was bargaining it would never hit the Earth. Even if she lost and everything was hopeless, she might divert it, causing a few tidal disruptions, minor earthquakes perhaps, but still passing over four thousand kilometers from the Earths surface. There was enough reaction mass in the positioning motors to allow a broad margin of safety.

Resting lightly on the table in front of her was a chart that showed the basic plan of the asteroid. The positioning motors surrounded a crater at one end of the egg-shaped chunk of nickel-iron and rock. Catapults loaded with huge barrels of reaction mass had just a few hours earlier launched a salvo to rendezvous above the craters center. Beckmann drive beams had then surrounded the mass with a halo of energy, releasing its atoms from the bonds of natures weak force. The blast had bounced off the crater floor, directed by the geometric patterns of heat-resistant slag. At the opposite end, a smaller guidance engine was in position, but it was no longer functional and didnt figure in her plans. The two tunnels that reached from the poles to the center of Psyche opened into seven blast chambers, each containing a fusion charge. She hadnt checked to see if me charges were still armed. There were so many things to do.

She sat with her head bowed, still suited up. Though the bubbles contained enough atmosphere to support her, she had no intention of unsuiting. In one gloved hand she clutched a small ampoule with a nozzle for attachment to air and water systems piping. The Hexamon Nexuss trumped-up excuse of madness caused by near-weightless conditions was now a shattered, horrible lie. Turco didnt know why, but the Psyche project had been deliberately sabotaged, and the psychotropic drugs still lingered.

Her grandfather hadnt gone mad contemplating the stars. The asteroid crew hadnt mutinied out of misguided Geshel zeal and space sickness.

Her anger rose again, and the tears stopped. You deserve whoever governs you, she said quietly. Everyone is responsible for the actions of their leaders.

The computer display cross-haired the point of impact. It was ironicthe buildings of the Hexamon Nexus were only sixty kilometers from the zero point. She had no control over such niceties, but nature and fate seemed to be as angry as she was.

* * * *

Moving an asteroid is like carving a diamond, the Geshel advisor said. Kollert nodded his head, not very interested. The charges for initial orbit changemoving it out of the asteroid belthave to be placed very carefully or the mass will break up and be useless. When the asteroid is close enough to the Earth-Moon system to meet the major crew vessels, the work has only begun. Positioning motors have to be built

Madness, Kollerts secretary said, not pausing from his monitoring of communications between associate committees.

And charge tunnels drilled. All of this was completed on the asteroid ten years ago.

Are the charges still in place? Kollert asked.

So far as I know, the Geshel said.

Can they be set off now?

I dont know. Whoever oversaw dismantling should have disarmed to protect his crewbut then, the reaction mass should have been jettisoned, too. So who can say? The report hasnt cleared top secrecy yet.

And not likely to, either, Kollert thought. If they havent been disarmed, can they be set off now? What would happen if they were?

Each charge has a complex communications system. They were designed to be set off by coded signals and could probably be set off now, yes, if we had the codes. Of course, those are top secret, too.

What would happen? Kollert was becoming impatient with the Geshel.

I dont think the charges were ever given a final adjustment. It all depends on how well the initial alignment was performed. If theyre out of tune, or the final geological studies werent taken into account, they could blow Psyche to pieces. If they are true, theyll do what they were intended to doform chambers inside the rock. Each chamber would be about fifteen kilometers long, ten kilometers in diameter

If the asteroid were blown apart, how would that affect our situation?

Instead of having one mass hit, wed have a cloud, with debris twenty to thirty kilometers across and smaller.

Would that be any better? Kollert asked.

Sir?

Would it be better to be hit by such a cloud than one chunk?

I dont think so. The difference is pretty mooteither way, the surface of the Earth would be radically altered, and few life forms would survive.

Kollert turned to his secretary. Tell them to put a transmission through to Giani Turco.

The communications were arranged. In the meantime Kollert tried to make some sense out of the Geshel advisors figures. He was very good at mathematics, but in the past sixty years many physics and chemistry symbols had diverged from those used in biology and psychology. To Kollert, the Geshel mathematics was irritatingly dense and obtuse.

He put the paper aside when Turco appeared on the cube in front of him. A few background beeps and noise were eliminated, and her image cleared. Ser Turco, he said.

Ser Fanner Kollert, she replied several seconds later. A beep signaled the end of one sides transmission. She sounded tired.

Youre doing a very foolish thing.

I have a list of demands, she said.

Kollert laughed. You sound like the Good Man himself, Ser Turco. The tactic of direct confrontation. Well, it didnt work all the time, even for him.

I want the publicGeshels and Naderites bothto know why the Psyche project was sabotaged.

It was not sabotaged, Kollert said calmly. It was unfortunate proof that humans cannot live in conditions so far removed from the Earth.

Ask those on the Moon! Turco said bitterly.

The Moon has a much stronger gravitational pull than Psyche. But Im not briefed to discuss all the reasons why the Psyche project failed.

I have found psychotropic drugstraces of drugs and containersin the air and water the crew breathed and drank. Thats why Im maintaining my suit integrity.

No such traces were found by our investigating teams. But, Ser Turco, neither of us is here to discuss something long past. Speak your demandsyour priceand well begin negotiations. Kollert knew he was walking a loose rope. Several Hexamon terrorist team officers were listening to everything he said, waiting to splice in a timely splash of static. Conversely, there was no way to stop Turcos words from reaching open stations on the Moonthe bastards there would probably be sympathetic to her. They could pick up his messages and relay them back to the Earth. A drop of perspiration trickled from armpit to sleeve, and he shivered involuntarily.

Thats my only demand, Turco said. No money, not even amnesty. I want nothing for myself. I simply want the people to know the truth.

Ser Turco, you have an ideal platform to tell them all you want them to hear.

The Hexamons control most major reception centers. Everything elseexcept for a few ham and radio-astronomy amateursis cabled and controlled. To reach the most people, the Hexamon Nexus will have to reveal its part in the matter.

Before speaking to her again, Kollert asked if there was any way she could be fooled into believing her requests were being carried out. The answer was ambiguousa few hundred people were thinking it over.

Ive conferred with my staff, Ser Turco, and I can assure you, so far as the most privy of us can tell, nothing so villainous was ever done to the Psyche project. At a later time, his script suggested, he might indicate that some tests had been overlooked, and that a junior officer had found evidence for lunar sabotage on Psyche. That might shift the heat. But for the moment, any admission that drugs existed in the asteroids human environments could backfire.

Im not arguing, she said. Theres no question that the Hexamon Nexus had somebody sabotage Psyche.

Kollert held his tongue between his lips and punched key words into his script processor. The desired statements formed over Turcos image. He looked at the camera earnestly. If we had done anything so heinous, surely we would have protected ourselves against an eventuality like thisdrained the reaction mass in the positioning motors One of the terrorist team officers was waving at him frantically and scowling. The screens words showed red where they were being covered by static. There was to be no mention of how Turco had gained control of Psyche. The issue was too sensitive, and blame hadnt been placed yet. Besides, there was still the option of informing the public that Turco had never gained control of Psyche at all. If everything worked out, the issue could be solved without costly admissions.

Excuse me, Turco said a few seconds later. The time lag between communications was wearing on her nerves, if Kollert was any judge. Something was lost there.

Ser Turco, your grandfathers death on Psyche was accidental, and your actions now are ridiculous. Destroying the Hexamon Nexusmuch better than saying Earth--wont mean a thing. He leaned back in the seat, chewing on the edge of his index finger. The gesture had been approved an hour before the talks began, but it was nearly genuine. His usual elegance of speech seemed to be wearing thin in this encounter. Hed already made several embarrassing misjudgments.

Im not doing this for logical reasons, Turco finally said. Im doing it out of hatred for you and all the people who support you. What happened on Psyche was purely evil useless, motivated by the worst intentions, resulting in the death of a beautiful dream, not to mention people I loved. No talk can change my mind about those things.

Then why talk to me at all? Im hardly the highest official in the Nexus.

No, but youre in an ideal position to know who the higher officials involved were. Youre a respected politician. And I suspect you had a great deal to do with suggesting the plot. I just want the truth. Im tired. Im going to rest for a few hours now.

Wait a moment, Kollert said sharply. We havent discussed the most important things yet.

Im signing off. Until later.

The team leader made a cutting motion across his throat that almost made Kollert choke. The young bastards indiscreet symbol was positively obscene in the current situation. Kollert shook his head and held his fingertips to his temples. We didnt even have time to begin, he said.