Engines Of God

It was a glorious day, and Hutch loved everybody. She did a pirouette as they walked back toward Alpha, bringing Carson's admonition that she be careful, zero gravity, magnetic boots, and all that.

George noticed her tracks of the morning, prints that seemed to go nowhere. He frowned and looked at her darkly, but asked no questions.

And while Hutch, in later years, often described herself as having been monumentally obtuse on the Beta Pac flight, she never told anyone she had been outside the shuttle. In her own mind, she was never sure whether she would actually have pulled the trigger.

Three days later, when the shuttle's starboard air tank had been exhausted, Hutch brought the port tank on line. Everyone except Maggie (they had by now established a policy that someone stay with the shuttle at all times) picked up whatever empty containers were available, and advanced on Wink's maintenance section. They used buckets and bowls and plastene housings. They took frames off consoles and uprooted lockers and hauled everything back and set it down before the three main starship air tanks.

Hutch chose the middle one, and dwarfed by the installation, took up a position at its forward end, where the co

"Let's hope so." Hutch walked around to the side of the tank and pressed the firing stud again.

George eased in beside her. "Hold it a second," he said. "If we didn't get rid of all the pressure, this thing could explode in your face."

She nodded. "We should be all right." He reached for the device, but she held it away from him. "Let me do it," he said. "You stand over by the door." "Forget it. Back off, George." She pulled the trigger. The beam touched the plastene, which bubbled and began to peel away. Hutch watched with equanimity. It was going to work.

She refocused the pulser, and fired again. The tank hissed, and a long split appeared. She cut it wider, and someone put a light to it, into it.

It was filled with heaps of snow. Frozen atmosphere. The snow was blue-white, and it sparkled and glowed.

They filled their containers and returned to the shuttle bay and passed them into the Alpha through the cockpit. They dumped the snow into their empty starboard tank. When they had measured out enough, they closed the tank. Several containers remained on the outside deck.

Then they had a party.

And when it was over, and they thought everyone else was asleep, George and Hutch went up to the cockpit and took one another for the second time.

Of course, everybody knew.

LIBRARY ENTRY

/ sailed up a river with a pleasant wind, New lands, new people, and new thoughts to find; Many fair lands and headlands appeared, And many dangers were there to be feared; But when I remember where I have been, And the fair landscapes that I have seen, Thou seemest the only permanent shore, The cape never rounded, nor wandered o'er. — Henry Thoreau from A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers (Copied into his notes by George Hackett, April 5, 2203.)

20

In the vicinity of Beta Pacifica. Friday, April 8; 2110 hours

Melanie Truscott came to the rescue on the fifteenth day after the collision. She arrived in the Catherine Perth, a sleek new transport, and dispatched a shuttle to pick them up.

The transfer craft was one of the new Trimmer types, designed primarily for hauling heavy equipment. Because it was too big to enter Wink's bay, the pilot brought it alongside the main door, where they rigged up a cable. No one was sorry to leave. Maggie, on her way out, commented that it was a good thing they hadn't had to depend on the locals.

The shuttle pilot was a weathered, middle-aged man, jaunty in Kosmik green. He waited in the cargo hatch, gri

When they were all in and belted down, he asked their names, and recorded them on a lightpad. "Only a short flight," he said, tucking the pad under one arm, and retreating to the cockpit. Hutch was trying to pick the Perth out of the starfield, and having no luck, when they pulled away from Winckelma

They disembarked a half-hour later, and found Harvey Sill waiting. Sill wore an open-necked white shirt two sizes too small. He looked not quite as tall as he had on Hutch's overhead monitor. But in every other way, he was bigger. There was something of the rhino, both body and soul, about him. His voice was big, and he oozed authority. He made no effort to hide his disgust at being called out to rescue incompetents.

He delivered a perfunctory greeting to Carson and Janet, whom he knew, frowned at Hutch as if he recalled having seen her but couldn't remember where, and ignored the others. "Please come with me," he growled, and strode off.

The Perth was returning about a hundred members of the Project Hope crew, and their equipment, to Earth. It dwarfed the scaled-down Winckelma

"No justice anywhere," said Hutch, drawing a frown.

They followed him into a board room. The decor was far more luxurious than the Spartan furnishings of Academy vessels. The bulkheads were tastefully paneled in stained walnut. Portraits of stiff-looking elderly men and women ringed the room. The Kosmik seal was mounted between a pair of corporate flags. A carved door was set in the bulkhead on the other side of a broad conference table. Sill waved them into seats around the table. "Wait here," he said. "The director wants to talk with you, and then we'll assign you quarters."

He spun on his heel and left.

"I'm not sure," said Janet, "I wouldn't prefer to go back to the Wink."

Minutes later, the carved door opened, and Melanie Truscott came in. She wore a Kosmik worksuit, without ornamentation. She faced Carson, smiled politely, and offered her hand. "Good to see you again, Frank," she said.

Carson's expression was masked, but Hutch knew he was embarrassed. "We appreciate your assistance, Melanie."

Her gaze flicked across the others. "I know you had a difficult time. I'm glad we were able to help." She moved on to Janet. "Do I know you?"

"Dr. Janet Allegri. I don't think so. I was with the Temple group."

"Welcome aboard the Perth, Dr. Allegri." She gave the name just enough of a twist to suggest that the formality was amusing.

Maggie was next. "I've seen you somewhere. Maggie—"

"— Tufu."

"You're the cryptologist."

"Exoohiloloeist."

"Same thing." Truscott's eyes narrowed. "You were the reason they stayed too long."

To Hutch, it seemed as if everyone stopped breathing. But the statement was delivered as if it were a simple, obvious fact rather than a judgment.

"Yes," said Maggie. "That's probably true."

Truscott took a seat, not at the head of the table, which they had unconsciously left empty, but between George and Janet. "Things don't always work out as we'd like," she said. And, looking across at Hutch: "And you are the pilot."

"I am."

"I know you, too. Hutchins, I believe."

"Yes. You have a good memory, Dr. Truscott."