Odyssey

When Asquith arrived at his office in the morning, several of his staff surrounded him, telling him how good he’d been, how he’d struck exactly the right note, how he couldn’t have done more for the Academy. Hutch was in the lobby a half hour later when he came out of one of the conference rooms. She saw that the happy talk had had no effect. The commissioner knew. He flicked a pained smile at her and shook his head. Then he was gone, down the corridor that led to his office.

She felt sorry for him. He wasn’t really a bad guy. Had he not gotten into politics, he would probably have been okay.

She returned to her own suite and went back to work on the rescheduling. She was bringing the Colbys back to Union, one by one, and arranging to have them removed from service. That meant telling people who thought they’d arranged transportation a year or so ago that their projects were delayed or canceled.

Four of the eight Colbys were engaged in survey work, which consisted of visiting and mapping star systems along the frontier. She had done a lot of that in her time. It was easily the most exciting assignment a pilot could get because you never really knew what you might find. The researchers had always maintained they were interested primarily in their specialties, gas giant climatology, ring system formation, volcanic influences on the origin of life, and so on. But they were just like the pilots: They lived for the day when they’d blunder onto an advanced society. When they entered a system and somebody said hello.

It had never really happened. Not in the sense that we found our technological equals.

Nor, of course, had we found the possibility that really gripped the imagination: a million-year-old civilization. The evidence so far indicated that societies rose, flourished for a brief period, and declined. Or fell precipitously. It was still too early in the game to draw general conclusions, but Hutch was begi

She reluctantly drew red lines through four scheduled flights. She rearranged things to keep imminent operations on track and give those who were being canceled at least two months’ warning. That meant moving everybody around a bit. She knew sometimes the programs couldn’t be carried out if the timing was thrown off, but she did it anyhow. When she was satisfied she could do no more, she called Asquith.

“I’m going to notify these people today,” she said. “I’m sure you’ll be hearing from them. They are not going to be happy.”

His eyes slid shut. It was hard, being persecuted by a shortsighted world. “Hutch, I wish you would rethink this.”

“I got the report on the Heffernan this morning.” She explained to him how the pressure generated in the jump engines weakens the entire system over time. “Nobody was killed on this flight, but it need not have happened that way. It could have blown up in their faces. There are other problems as well, and they can’t all be fixed. Michael, we do not want to continue with things as they are.”

“I think we need to avoid going off half-cocked, Priscilla.”

She sent him a document. “This is a copy of the maintenance report on the Barringer. It’s Lakschmi class.”

He stared at it. Squinted. “It’s a bit technical. What’s it say? Plain English.”

“Unsafe.”

He stared at her for a long moment. “That’s a ninth ship.”

“It’s going to require extensive work. Costs more money in the long run than replacing it.”

“Okay.”

“Is that okay, make the schedule changes, or okay we’ll buy a new ship?”

“Make the changes, Hutch. Maybe it’s just as well. Maybe it’ll put some pressure in the right places.”

IT WAS TIME. She’d been stalling on the later cancellations, hoping some divine intervention would occur and she wouldn’t have to go through with them. But there was no way that could happen.

She could have simply sent notifications to everybody who was involved. They would have responded by calling Asquith and yelling at him. Which he profoundly deserved. But she couldn’t bring herself to do it.

She’d canceled sixteen missions that would have gone out over the next six months, and rescheduled twenty-seven others. Altogether twenty-three organizations were involved. “Let’s start with the cancellations,” she told Marla. Get the really ugly ones out of the way first.

“Paris Gravity Labs,” said Marla. “Co

Dufresne was her liaison. When he appeared, she explained the situation. Some of our ships are old. Don’t trust them. Terribly sorry. Have to cancel the April mission.

“Cancel?” said Dufresne. He was tall, not young, unfailingly polite. That made giving him bad news even more difficult. “Don’t you mean postpone?”

“Unfortunately not, René. At the moment we have no way to compensate. Gravity Labs has three missions scheduled, with four more in the queue. Something’s got to go. We can’t just back everything up.”

He was seated in an armchair, a sheaf of papers open on his lap. “The director won’t be happy, Priscilla.”

“None of us is happy, René. But the director would be much more upset if we took some of his people out and got them killed.”

“Well,” he said, “can’t you even give us a choice on which projects get canceled?”

“Within limits,” she said. “Give me your preferences, and I’ll try to accommodate. Unfortunately, I can’t promise.”

It made for a long morning. Most of the others were more excitable than Dufresne. A few threatened her, informed her they’d go over her head to the commissioner, insisted they’d have her job. At Morokai-Benton, the liaison was also the chief of the research team. He all but broke down and sobbed.

ASQUITH INVITED HER to lunch. That was a rarity, usually only done when he wanted something. He took her to his club, at the Rensellaer, which was a place of leather, filtered sunlight, soft music, and hushed voices. “Thought you’d like a break,” he said. “My treat.”

They talked about trivialities, perso

“Okay,” she said. “We’ll be ready to go.”

“Good.” He was looking for a chance to introduce whatever it was he had on his mind. “It would be nice if the mission actually showed some results.”

“Yes, it would.” She ordered a burgundy and a steak salad. Asquith went with tuna and a Scotch and soda.

“We’ll get some benefit out of it,” he said, “if it does no more than call attention to the moonriders.”

“Let’s hope.”

“You still don’t believe there’s any rationale for this mission, do you, Hutch?”

“If we had resources, I’d say sure. But we’re tight.”

“We’re always tight. Even when the funds are flowing, there are too many projects. As long as I’ve been here, it’s never been any different.” He adjusted himself, and she knew they were about to get to the point. “The mission would get a lot more attention if the right person went along.”

“Who’s the right person?”

“Your buddy MacAllister.” The drinks came. Asquith watched her try hers, asked how it was, and wondered aloud if the editor would be open to an invitation.

“To go out hunting moonriders?” Hutch couldn’t resist a laugh. “I can’t see that happening.”

“If he were on board, it would guarantee a lot of attention.”

“It would make us look that much more foolish when we don’t find anything.”

“Hutch, we’re not expecting to find anything. All we’re doing is distributing monitors. This sort of thing takes a while. That’s simple enough. People have to have patience.” He bent over the Scotch and lowered his voice. “Look, what I’d really like to do is expose him to what we do, and how we operate. Up close, you know what I mean? Get him out of his office, let him see what’s out there. Maybe we could win him over.”

“I doubt it.”

“You’re so negative, Hutch. What can we lose?”

She sighed. “All right. I’ll do what I can. But if you want him, we shouldn’t make an a

“Not make an a

“Trust me. Keep it quiet for the moment. And tell Charlie not to say anything, either.”

“Okay.” He checked the time. Man in a hurry. “Do we have a pilot yet?”

“I’m working on that, too. I’ll let you know in a day or so.”

“Who did you have in mind?”

“Gillet.”

“I was talking with Valentina yesterday. I mentioned it to her. She said she’d like to go.”

“Michael, I think Gillet — ”

His shoulders sagged. “Hutch, why is everything with you an argument? Valentina’s a better bet.”

“She’s more photogenic.”

“Bingo.”

SHE WOULD USE the Maria Salvator for the moonrider mission.

Orion was providing a ship to carry out the flight for which the Salvator had originally been scheduled. So she didn’t have to cancel anything. But the operation was going to be an embarrassment anyhow. When word got around they were out hunting spooks while simultaneously grounding scientific operations, there’d be a second wave of screams.

Asquith had sent down a stringent budget for the moonriders. She called him, and they bickered back and forth until she’d gotten a little more. Then the cost of the monitors became an issue. It had turned out that the commissioner wasn’t entirely serious, and had shown that lack of seriousness to Mike Cranmer, who’d been charged with putting together the design specs. Hutch talked with Cranmer, and with a few others, and got a sense what the monitors should be able to do.

Mike suggested an upgrade for the sensors. It was also possible to get better analytical gear. Hutch would have liked units capable of giving chase if they spotted something, rather than just sitting there passively. But a serious drive unit would send the cost over the horizon.

She called Asquith and told him the changes they were making, including the drive unit, which she knew would never pass muster. It was a bargaining chip, though, and she ultimately conceded it for the other upgrades.

Then there was the issue of programming the monitor AI. If the moonriders responded to the scan, if they asked the monitor how it was doing, what sort of answer did we want to give? Please hang around; we’re on our way? Where are you from? What’s going on?

Eric put his head in. “You doing anything, Hutch?”

“Other than flushing my career? No. How about you?”