Chindi

Alyx waved back and followed. The gravity went away and she discovered that floating across to Dogbone came as easily as if she’d been born to it. She was tethered to Hutch, who smiled at her as she arrived, and patted her shoulder. Good show and all that. Alyx glowed in the warmth of her approval.

Bill had matched the tumble and rotation of the asteroid fairly closely so that the Memphis moved only slowly across the sky. That was good. Kept her from getting ill.

The stars rotated pretty quickly though. And there was no horizon. It was like standing on the edge of a piece of rock with a precipice all around and no bottom. The stars rolled up one side, scrambled themselves, and drifted back down the other.

“Don’t look at them,” Hutch warned. “Keep your eyes on the ground.”

Such as it was.

They strolled across Dogbone, examining the terrain. Hutch found what she wanted, a relatively smooth spot in the center of the long axis. “We’ll put the McCarver here,” she said. They wrapped three pieces of cable completely around the object, literally walking around it to do so. Alyx would have preferred to stay put and let Hutch circle the rock, but they were tethered, so she had to follow.

They cinched the cable to secure it. Hutch began looking at the rock, making faces, jabbing her finger, and making comments like “Yes, right here,” and “I think that’ll work.”

Hutch also spent a lot of time talking to Tor. She told him in detail what they pla

Sometimes she handed it off to Alyx, who was too accustomed to having an audience to be able to talk comfortably into a commlink with no indication there was even anybody listening. Nevertheless, she tried. “It’ll be good to have you back, Tor,” she said. And, “Hutch is confident we can pull this off.” And, “We’re pla

Henry Claymoor’s producer, a man named Easter, called over in the middle of everything, while they were co

Of course she would. Claymoor was a popular figure with a big audience. She’d watched him do his commentaries, Claymoor on the Middle East, Claymoor on why religious belief grew stronger as the evidence for a mechanical universe mounted, Claymoor on why we should discontinue the Methuselah Project, which promised a thousand-year life span.

His professional persona had always seemed a bit stodgy, and she’d have preferred an interviewer who was closer in spirit to the younger generation. But out in the boondocks, one took what was available.

With about nine hours to go, they finished everything they could do and sat back to wait for the other ships. “So this is what a comet looks like,” Alyx said, kicking at the frozen surface. “It’s not much of an oort cloud. I don’t see anything else out there at all.”

“You wouldn’t if you were back home in our oort cloud either,” said Hutch. “The rocks tend to be spread out over a pretty wide space.”

The chunk on which they stood was probably several billion years old, left over from the formation of the planetary system. “We’re lucky,” Hutch said. “This thing is in close. It’s right where we needed it to be.”

“How far out is the one at home?”

“The oort cloud? About a light-year away from the sun.”

“And this one?”

“A few light-days.” Hutch kept looking at the time.

“I wonder why that is,” said Alyx.

Hutch shrugged. She didn’t know the details. “Oort clouds form at all kinds of different distances. It seems to be dependent on the number, size, and location of the planets, as well as solar mass.”

“Let’s get to details,” said Alyx. “When the time comes, who’s going to cut the cable?”

“I’m hoping we can find a qualified volunteer on one of the other ships.” Hutch, of course, would be aboard the McCarver. They needed three people on the Longworth.

“You really think you can find somebody?”

“Probably.”

“How about me?”

“You’re not experienced outside.”

“I beg your pardon, Priscilla, but where did you think we are at the moment? Where have we been several times over the past few weeks?”

“I know you’ve been out, Alyx. But you’re still new at this. We’d like to have some experienced people.”

“Look. I can do this. It’s not exactly complicated. Anyway, you’ve already admitted there probably isn’t anybody else.”

“I know. I was going to ask you.” Hutch looked down at the icy surface.

“It’s just a matter of cutting a cable, right? I already know where to make the cut. And the laser seems simple enough to operate. What else do I need?”

“You need to know how to run the go-pack.”

“Why?”

“In case you fall off.”

“So show me.”

“Now?”

“What else do you have to do for the next couple of hours?” Alyx looked deep into Hutch’s blue eyes. “Listen, I’m part of this. As much a part as you are, or anybody else. I want to help. And I’m ready, willing, and able.”

Hutch turned shining eyes on her. “Thanks, Alyx,” she said.

They embraced, briefly. On the periphery of her vision, Alyx noticed a flash, something barely glimpsed, but gone when she tried to focus on it. Starlight and passing ice, she thought.

“The Longworth has just completed its jump into the area,” said Bill. “ETA fifty-six minutes.”

THE LONGWORTH WAS enormous. It dwarfed both the Memphis and Dogbone. And it turned out they had plenty of help. Half a dozen volunteers, some familiar with e-suits, and some apparently learning, piled out and joined the effort to secure the rock to the two ships.

They brought substantially more cable. People in shorts and shirts emblazoned with university slogans swarmed over the ice, stringing lines, co

Mogambo surprised Hutch by seeking her out, introducing her to two people he wanted to take with him on the McCarver. He was trying to be friendly, but he had to work at it. He wanted so desperately to get to the chindi that she suspected he’d have a stroke if the tactic didn’t work and they failed to catch up with it.

His two aides were a physicist and an engineer, a woman and a man, both old enough, she thought, to know better than to board the chindi. But they complimented her on her “ingenuity,” and thereby won her over. Hutch knew she was a sucker for a few words of praise, but then who wasn’t? She advised them to stay away from the chindi, but otherwise let it go.

Mogambo asked whether she had arranged for him to be taken on board the McCarver. “Brownstein’s being a horse’s ass. He doesn’t understand how important this is.”

Hutch had forgotten the request.

She had no social co

“You won’t forget?”

She nodded wearily. “I’ll do what I can, Professor.”

The McCarver reported in. She had materialized on the far side of the uncertainty envelope, but she was en route and would make the rendezvous within two hours.

HUTCH SUPERVISED THE completion of the web. She stayed as close as possible to Bill’s design. But there were areas that created problems, particularly a set of sharp-edged ridges along what would become the rear of Dogbone. The ridges looked capable of cutting through the lines, so they went after them with lasers, but gave up because it was taking too long, and instead redesigned the net.

When they were satisfied it was strong enough, they ran lines up to the Longworth and secured the rock to her underbelly. Bill rotated the Memphis on its long axis and eased her in along the opposite side of the asteroid. Lines were exchanged in both directions, secured, and tightened. The asteroid was now supported between the undersections of the two ships by a network of cables sixty or so meters long.