The Golden Globe

A thumbprint is a fairly good means of securing a valuable movable object. For something as expensive as the Halley they went a little further. A dead skin sample was being taken and subjected to a quick analysis to compare with Izzy's DNA. You could make a cast of a thumbprint, but there was no reasonable way to fake the DNA.

The key word there was, of course, "reasonable." What's a farfetched idea to a Plutonian might very well seem reasonable to the more bloody-minded Charonese. Izzy wouldn't have thought twice about severing my thumb, if I had a space yacht and he wanted to borrow it.

I've picked up a fair amount of knowledge concerning door locks in my checkered career. I boned up on more in the Oberon library. I thought I had a better than fifty-fifty chance of getting into the boat. If things went south after that, I still thought I could beat a retreat. A Charonese yacht, naturally, would have either slaughtered an intruder or held him for the later amusement of the owner and his family. Great fun for the kiddies; educational, too.

A green light appeared on the identiplate, and the lock cycled. We entered the ship.

I made my way directly to the control console and pressed the thumb to the second identiplate there. Another green light. And then nothing.

"Um..." I said. "Ah, can we make ready for departure?"

"Certainly, sir," came a voice. And then silence again.

"Ah... Luna. We want to go to Luna. Soon."

"How soon, sir?"

"Right now."

"I'm sorry, sir, I ca

My heart jumped into my throat. At my side, I saw Poly grow pale.

"The earliest departure would be in four minutes. The reactor has to be brought into—"

"Fine, fine. Depart in four minutes, then."

"And what arrival time are you contemplating, sir?"

I gave him the date—all too close, terrifyingly close—that I needed to be on Luna.

There was a long pause. Entirely too long, when I thought about it later. I'd guess it was five or six seconds. That's a trillion years, in computer time.

"Yes, sir," the computer finally said. "Will you be charging this flight to the credit arrangements previously established?"

"Yes, that will be fine."

"Very good, sir. I suggest you leave your luggage in the lock; it is being secured against acceleration at this moment." I heard the lock door cycling. "I have warned the taxicab to stand clear for boost. He has cleared the lock and is on his way. You will have ample time to move into your staterooms when acceleration ends."

I heard sounds behind me as the ship readied itself for departure. A countdown clock started on the console. I looked around, and saw two acceleration couches—like water mattresses, seven feet long and three feet wide—had emerged from the floor. Beside them was a smaller unit with a cage on top. I realized it was a pet bed. I popped Toby into it, which didn't please him at all, with all this new space to explore, and these fascinating new smells to experience. He glared at me as I experimentally pushed on the surface of one of the couches. It conformed to the shape of my hand, and sprang back slowly. It would be like lying on soft putty.

"We have been cleared by the tower," the ship said.

"Yes. Uh, please turn off all but the necessary radio communication."

"Yes, sir." Another pause, this one short. "Sir, an odd datum. I was receiving a message from ground side when you ordered the radios shut off. A person claiming to be the legal lessee of this vessel was attempting to issue an order requiring me to deactivate the entry security system temporarily."

"What does that mean?" How many more surprises could I take?

"He would have had me deny access to anyone, until he could obtain a court order authorizing the local sheriff to accompany him and verify his identity."

"How odd." I gulped. Poly's eyes were wide.

"Yes, I thought so. It makes no difference, of course. I am not authorized to receive instructions from the ground concerning such matters. Even if the caller had the password."

"Did he have the password?"

"I don't know. You instructed me to cut him off before he could use it."

"I see."

"Yes. The password is only used to prepare facilities ahead of time, of course. Meals, extra staterooms, matters of that nature."

This was something Poly and I had discussed for quite a long time. I felt it was a necessary risk, letting Izzy out of jail; it was, in fact, the only reason I had visited her in the first place. Without her cooperation, I could not have him released. But in my reading I had learned that many ships of this class were quite intelligent. The scenario I feared was a simple one: I ask for entry, and the ship wants to know how it is I'm knocking on the door when I'm still in jail. The ship could very easily be monitoring newscasts. If it hears Izzy is out, me showing up with the right thumbprint and the right DNA code was easier to accept.

Was it the right decision? I didn't know, yet. But what at first had seemed a narrow escape had turned out to be nothing of consequence. The ship would have ignored Izzy's attempt to block me anyway, even if I hadn't cut him off in time.

"I suggest you make yourselves comfortable in the acceleration couches," the ship said. "Boost will be in thirty seconds."

Poly and I both climbed into our couches and stretched out. I could see the seconds counting down on a ceiling clock as the passive restraint system bound us securely.

"How much acceleration will it be?" I asked.

"Five gees," the machine replied.

I tried to sit up, but the web wouldn't allow it.

"Five gees?" I shouted. "It'll kill us!"

"According to my data, the human body has a ninety-five percent chance of surviving five gees for an hour or more."

"An hour?"

"We will be boosting for an hour and a half, approximately."

"An hour and a half!"

"To get you to Luna by the date specified."

I wondered if there was still time to abort. I wondered if I wanted to abort. While I was still thinking it over and the last seconds were ticking away, the computer voice destroyed what little wits I might have had left to make the decision.

"It will be quite uncomfortable," it said. "Before we leave, I wonder if you'd tell me something?"

"What's that?"

"Who are you? Are you really Sparky Valentine?"

The acceleration sat on me like a playful elephant, and I felt myself spiraling down, down, down, wild-eyed, sweaty-faced, seeing myself in the third person again, twisting through mad colors and flashing lights like Scotty Ferguson in the grip of his phobia in Vertigo, and I knew I was heading into another flashback.

ACT 4

The ravenous creature had no face. It shuffled down the broad spaceport concourse slow as a glacier but not nearly so quiet. Roughly circular in shape, it had scores of backs and hundreds of legs; approach it from any direction and that was all you saw. Backs of heads, backs of legs, the heels of shoes. It was a hungry ant colony with but one purpose: to feed upon the rays of charisma radiating from the jostling center. To feed, in a sense, upon itself.

In the center of the mass was a small boy, wearing a smile on his face and a jacket of gold brocade on his shoulders. His hair was copper-colored and stuck out stiffly to the sides. He was bathed in shafts of yellow and red and blue light, then momentarily frozen by strobes. Tiny skyrockets shot into the air from somewhere close to him, became dime-sized starbursts as they neared the ceiling.

The era when a paparazzi feeding frenzy like this would include bulky cameras and blinding lights and microphones on the end of poles was long over. These reporters had cameras embedded in their eyes, microphones in their ears. In each face one eye, usually the left, glowed softly with a red laser light. Some carried periscopes to get their points of view above the action.