Chindi

Chapter 9

There are not ten people in the world whose deaths would spoil my di

LETTER TO HANNAH M. MACAULAY,

JULY 31, 1833

MASS DETECTORS WEREN’T entirely reliable, and while they might warn a ship that it was about to materialize inside, say, a planet, there was no guarantee. The jump back to sublight always included a degree of breathlessness.

Consequently, superluminals were more likely, and indeed were required by law, to materialize in deep space. Earthbound ships made their jumps out beyond Mars’s orbit, and then spent the better part of several days coasting in.

Hutch could afford no such luxury if she were to arrive in the Condor’s vicinity in a timely ma

The odds against catastrophe were so heavily in her favor that she didn’t tell her passengers what she was doing. She used the neutron star to gain acceleration more quickly than she would otherwise have been able to do, and the Memphis therefore made the jump into hyperspace less than forty minutes after Preach’s call for help.

Throughout all this the Condor remained silent.

When she had sent off a message to Outpost, and assured herself no one was closer than the Memphis, she retired to her quarters. They were by then into the early-morning hours. She climbed out of her jumpsuit, got into bed, and killed the lights. But she lay awake staring into the dark, seeing Preach’s face.

Accidents were rare among the superluminals. There’d been a couple of instances of runaway engines and malfunctioning AI’s. That was thought to be the cause of the loss of the Venture, which had vanished into the sack, into hyperspace, at the dawn of the interstellar age. The Hanover had been wrecked when its warning systems had inexplicably failed to notice a rock in its path. There’d been a couple of others. But if one calculated the number of flights and distances traveled against mishaps, the possibility became vanishingly small.

Whatever the Condor’s problem, they had the lander available. It would be a bit crowded, but the lander would sustain them all for the couple of days she’d need to get to the scene.

They traveled through the night and into the morning. At 0600, the interior lights brightened, indicating the arrival of the new day. Everyone came down early for breakfast, each inquiring on entry if anything had been heard during the night. Had Hutch ever seen anything like this before?

She hadn’t. It was her experience that ships never vanished, and only lost their communications when the equipment broke down, or when they ran into a storm of radiation.

“The satellite was booby-trapped,” Nick suggested.

Apparently everyone had been thinking the same thing. The possibility had occurred to Hutch, of course, but she could see no sense in it. What would be the point?

“Sheer malevolence,” suggested George. “We tend to assume that anybody we meet out here is going to be reasonable. That might be a misguided notion.”

It had always been Hutch’s view that reason would be required to build a star-drive. No barbarians off-world. Savages need not apply. Maybe she was wrong.

Still, the evidence so far supported that view. The long-gone Monument-Makers had tried to shield at least two primitive cultures from the worst effects of the omega clouds. And a race of hawks had done what they could, a couple of thousand years ago, to assist the undeveloped civilization on Maleiva III from a cloud-induced ice age.

They’d finished eating and were sitting around, worried, frightened, begi

It was Jerry Hooper, who’d been with operations out there as far back as Hutch could remember. He was exceedingly serious, never smiled, looked as if he’d never had a good time. But he was competent. “Hutch,” he said, “we’ve also lost contact with the Condor. They missed their scheduled movement report. We’re putting together a rescue unit. Meantime we are forwarding their approximate last position to Bill. Academy has been informed. Please stay in contact and use caution until we determine what happened.”

“They didn’t hear anything either?” asked Alyx.

“Apparently nothing more than we did.”

“Wouldn’t the AI send out a distress call?”

“If it could,” said Hutch.

She tried to reassure them. Whatever the problem was, their friends were with the best captain in the business. They couldn’t be in better hands. In fact, they’d all heard of Brawley. Even Alyx, who said she’d been thinking about adapting several of his exploits for a show.

Hutch watched the corners of her eyes crinkle, and saw that she’d thought of something else that disturbed her. “If they were in the lander,” she asked, “wouldn’t they let us know?”

“The lander doesn’t have hypercomm capability. Landers don’t generate that kind of power.”

For the moment, at least, they all looked a bit relieved.

THEY STAYED TOGETHER in mission control, and the silence from the Condor became the elephant in the room that no one wanted to talk about. “Maybe they’re still there,” Herman said finally.

“Who’s still there?”

“Whoever built the moonbase. Whoever put up the satellites. Maybe they got jumped by the locals.”

“Do we have weapons?” asked Alyx. “Just in case.”

“No,” said Hutch.

“Nothing to fight with if we’re attacked?” asked Nick. He looked incredulous.

George cleared his throat. “Never occurred to me that we might need weapons. I don’t think anybody else ever put weapons onto a starship.” He looked at Hutch for vindication.

“There’s never been anybody to fight with out here,” she said.

Herman was sipping from a glass of wine. He finished it, put the glass down, looked at her. “Maybe until now,” he said.

No one was hungry, so they passed on di

Only Nick maintained an upbeat mood. “They’ll be okay,” he said. “I’ve read about this guy Brawley.”

Just before midnight Bill informed them the ship was approaching jump. Hutch told them to strap down and went up to the bridge. Tor came in behind her, but hesitated in the doorway. “I thought you’d like some company.” She smiled and waved him to the copilot’s seat.

Bill started a six-minute countdown.

“Crunch time,” she said.

Six green lights lined up on the console. Five passengers and the copilot were buckled in.

“What do you think?” he asked, quietly, as if she were finally free to speak her mind.

“If they got to the lander,” she said, “they’ll be okay.”

Pete’s voice came over the commlink, “Please, God…”

All gauges on the jump-status indicator went to a bright amber.

“Three minutes,” said Bill.

Hutch diverted additional power from the fusion plant. Systems lamps turned green. The power levels of the Hazeltines began to rise. The mass indicator showed zero.

“I’m not optimistic,” said Tor.

She got a red light. Something rolling around loose in mission control.

“It’s my notebook,” George said over the commlink.