We Five (46 page)

In other words, the robots cried just as much as Carrie and her sisters did.

And in a most amazounding turn of events, something very nearly identical took place three quadrants removed in the First Quadrant in which Maggie's mother and Molly's father had been hiding and awaiting similar breakflight: their chamber was identically breached and it was likewise discovered that the chamber's unauthorized occupants included a man who was also suspect in a recent murder. This one involved the gruesome shrusting of one Pat Harrison, also a Crewer's Mate, down the G Station Rubbish Chute from which no human had ever emerged unscissored and unserrated and not in a de-extanted state of unrecognizable man-shreddage.

A freak accident, to be sure, since to fall all the way down the chute to the tooth wheel, Crewer Harrison would have had to plummet down the chute at precisely the moment all three of the upper mesh gates had been retracted, which by tragic coincidence all three had.

In other words, Crewer Harrison died because three different top-level residents of the G Station dormitower chose to shrust their garbage at the very same time.

Molly would not learn of her father's capture for two diurnals. A most difficult time lay ahead for her, due not only to the reality of his incarceration and likely conviction, but also to the guilt of her earlier feelings that he deserved whatever punition was dealt to him.

Carrie sat for a moment after Lyle's wrist-clipped departure and wiped away the last remnant of lachtrickle from her cheeks. She took a deep breath and raised her eyes to look at her four sisters, who smiled the smiles of the well-intended, and gathered about her, Jane sitting the closest in sisterly communion, for Lyle was her brother, and she'd always loved him, but never more so than now, for he had come of late to be the upwardman she'd always hoped he would one day be, only now to find himself whisped off to live the rest of his human analogue life behind transparabars.

“Well, I really see no need at this junxten for us to go to my Uncle Whit's planetoid, do you?” asked Maggie with a brave smile. Though the statement was made in black jest, her companions nonetheless nodded agreement. “So what happens to us now?”

“Colthurst will take us back,” said Ruth. “It's too soon for her to have replaced us.”

“There may be charges filed against us,” said Jane, standing at the observaportal and watching Ramses as it began its final eclipse of Cleopta for that diurnal, the two satellites orbiting one another like dancing dervishons. Jane turned around. “But I think we can convince the judge advocate that it would be a waste to lock us all away when we can be more useful in civic service. Lieutenant Colthurst knows the judge advocate, and can probably put in a good word for us. She'll also remind him that We Five are perhaps the best cooks in the Fourth Quadrant.”

Carrie was sitting in the corner of the room staring at the Manipubox spindled to her chair, but keeping her hands from insertion into its plasmatter. Maggie walked over and sat down next to her. She put her arm around her friend. “You're thinking of your mother, aren't you?” she asked.

Carrie nodded. “And you're thinking of your mother too, aren't you, Maz?”

“They'll lock her up just like Molly's father. For how long is anybody's guess.”

Carrie swiveled the Manipubox Screen out of the way. Though her face registered a great, nagging sadness, there was a glimmer of a smile upon her lips. “I think it's funny how I ended up as a Quadrant cook, considering how claphanded Mama always was in our own galley.”

“And to end up as one of the best to boast!” added Ruth, whose hands were dipped into her own Manipubox, though her manipulation of the holographic images that floated there was more mindless fidget than purposeful arrangement.

A silence followed, broken only by the periodic beep of the vitometer in the corridor outside the Interview room. A few moments later, an older woman entered and said, “You're all free to go now. We'll have each of you in over the next two diurnals for further inquiry. Within half a mensal we should have some idea what the judge advocate intends to do with you.”

We Five nodded thank-yous for their release and started down the corridor to the transportation artery. “I don't want to go home,” said Molly.

“Nor do I,” said Jane.

It was agreed that no one wished to return to their respective living quarters (though the Mobrys would have been happy to see Ruth restored to their loving embracement).

“So what do we do?” asked Maggie.

“I'll say what I'd
like
to do,” said Carrie. “It's been months since we've taken a walk in the Outland. Let's suit up and go.”

“I don't know,” said Molly. “It will bring back so many memories of my excursions with Dad when I was a girl.”

Ruth placed a hand on Molly's shoulder. “We're going to make you a brand-new memory, Molly. Today. Right now.” Ruth smiled. “And as it so happens, Sisters, I've been holding five trektrak passes since the last time we tried to do this and everything fell agang.”

Carrie kissed Ruth on the cheek. “You are such a dearling. I was going to suggest just slipping out without passes and paying the penalty afterward, but now we can do it legal!”

We Five took the arterial to K Station where the Fourth Quadrant's main standport was located. They suited up, choosing rigs in their favorite colors, and Molly requesting a Pulmoassist because the excitement of leaving the Quadrant might accelerate her inhalations and make her expend her standard nitrox allowance faster.

Since it had been quite some time since they'd been in the Outland, it took a while to get used to walking in the heavy suits, but soon they were ambulating comfortably and moving along the paved Prowlpath past holographic markers and informational signage pertaining to the geology and terrain of the Tesla Terranium, which looked very much like the moon except for the occasional bright green takite deposit and the sparkling lemon yellow of the giant xanthite quarry nearby. The Prowlpath had yet to be cleared of most of the debris from the last two meteor showers and there were places where We Five had to sidestep scatterings of inconvenient meteoritic rubble, but there was no difficulty in reaching the observation deck at the terminus of the path.

We Five climbed the stairs and brought themselves up to the highest landing, which commanded the very best view of the sky, set off in sharp perspective by the forewash of the Kepler Peaks.

Not a word was said—though the interpersonal transmitters were still engaged—each sister standing in awe of the deep black, twink-stippled sky. For where were there words to describe such an extraordinary view?

And Molly took Maggie's pudge-gloved hand and Maggie took Jane's and Jane took Ruth's and Ruth took Carrie's, and the five friends who had been friends nearly all their lives, the five sisters-of-the-heart, stood side by side by side by side by side in mesmeric silence and felt tiny and inconsequential in this tuck-corner of a vast, cold universe.

But they did not feel alone.

Not even for a parasecond.

Acknowledgments

The author wishes to thank the following individuals who read the manuscript in early drafts and offered suggestions that were thoughtful and most helpful:

Mary Elizabeth Dunn, Patrick Gabridge, George Ovitt, Jim Davis, Mary Ellen Holman, Tonya Hays, Michael Keith, Carolyn Valtos, Janet Stephenson, Susan Guinter, Laurie Kalet, and Jonathan Odell.

The author also wishes to thank his literary agent Amy Rennert for her many years of support. He is grateful, as well, to be working again with his favorite editor Guy Intoci and his favorite copy editor Michelle Dotter. A special thank-you goes to Patrick Walsh for his fifteen-year advocacy and friendship—happy proof that an Irishman can also be a mensch.