FALLEN ANGELS

State Police: "There have been a number of Eskimo sightings around here over the last few months. There was a fight over poaching out by Anamoose. The white folks chased them off."

"Eskimos," said Moorkith, rubbing his chin. "Good. Native Americans live close to nature. They respect the other lifeforms with which we share this fragile planet. I'm sure they will help us locate the polluting technocrats."

The Angels had help, thought Arteria. Someone came up from the south and took them away to the east. Probably not Eskimos, if they came from the south. That should be obvious, even to this crowd. So. If not Eskimos, who? Given the timing involved, it had to have been impromptu. And, if they had been caught--

People who would risk anything to rescue spacemen, instantly, knowing the government would be searching, too. People who could head straight for the spacecraft without aerial spotters. People who could call down power beams from the stations.

People who thought they could improvise a rescue on the Ice on the spur of the moment and pull it off without getting caught.

Fanac! It had to be fanac.

And if you could think like a fan again, Arteria thought, you might figure out where they'd show up next. She smiled wolfishly.

The response was faint, almost lost in the hiss of static. "Da, we readink, Piranha. Chto khochesh? What want?"

"Thank God. Big Momma, it's cold here. We're going to freeze, all of us. We need heat. Can you give us a microwave spotlight? Have SUNSAT lock one of its projectors onto our transponder frequency and track us across the ice."

"Skazhite. One moment." Alex waited while Big Momma conferred--probably with the Peace Station chief and the SUNSAT engineer. Sherrine asked him what he was doing and he told her. She and Thor exchanged glances.

"Is that possible?" she asked. "To beam enough microwave energy down to keep us from freezing?"

"Sure."

"It won't be, uh, too much, will it?"

Alex gri

Thor gri

Alex made a mental note to find out later what language Thor was speaking.

"The trouble was, we didn't make any contingency plans. Heck. We didn't make any plans." Thor gri

"Roscoe?" Alex asked, but they didn't hear him.

Alex barely managed to confirm the beam density with the Angels before losing contact completely. They must have been at the very fringe of the scoopship relay's range. When he had completed the message, Alex sighed and spat out the tongue switch. "Well, that's that, he said.

"Do you think they got the message?" Sherrine asked. "About the microwaves?"

Alex's eyes were dull with exhaustion and the endless acceleration. "I hope so. They're supposed to lock onto the transponder location and track it all the way to Brandon. We should be warm as toast in a while. If not--" Shrugging would be too much effort.

As they picked their way across the ice, Sherrine waited for evidence of microwave warming. She worried about their equipment. The sledges contained little metal. Her grandfather had made them of wood poles and hide lashings. The two snowmobiles were largely fiberglass, but she wondered what microwave heating would do to the metal engines. Probably nothing. Engines run at high temperatures anyway. But suppose they can't take it? Better than freezing…

After a while, began to feel warm. Was it the microwaves? Or was it only her anxiety? Or just the heat from the snowmobile engine? She saw a crevasse that Mike had flagged and steered around it. Cans of gasohol. What will microwave heat do to those?

The moon rose, half full, over the eastern horizon, creating a startling amount of light on the icy landscape. The crust of snow, reflecting the moonlight, seemed to glow from within itself. She breathed out slowly and saw the flickering rainbow of her breath. She was happy. Even if they died here, it had still been worth the attempt.

Astronauts down. Crashed. She loosened the collar on her parka. Hunted by the government. What else would a trufan have done? Fen loved their bickering and fa

She unzipped her parka. 'Tis a proud and lonely thing to be a fan. She was glad to be back. When she thought of all the years she had wasted in the "danelaw"…

"Sherrine?"

"Yes. Alex?" She kept her eye glued on Mike's back where he broke trail ahead of her.

"Could you take a blanket or two off me?"

She turned around. "What? Oh!" Alex's face was damp with sweat. She realized that she was perspiring heavily herself. She brought her snowmobile to a halt just as Will stopped his and jumped off into the snow and began stuffing ice in his mouth. Now what?

"Fillings," Will mumbled. "Gold caps, teef." He settled back on his heels and breathed a sigh of relief.

"I'm sorry," Alex said. "The calculations must have been off slightly."

"Can you do something about it?" Will asked. "It's like using hot coffee for mouthwash."

Thor rubbed his jaw and agreed. Mike, who had returned from the point and overheard, gri

"Me neither," Sherrine agreed. "But I'm glad I'm not wearing braces anymore." The others laughed.

"Very fu

"No good," said Alex, spitting out his communicator once more. "Damn thing's hot. I can't raise them. Either we're out of range or the radio finally went kaput."

"No big deal,' said Doc. "I'll just keep a mouth full of snow." He took off his parka. "Meanwhile," he said, "it's a little warm for this."

The layered look, Sherrine reflected as she removed her own parka had its advantages. She unstrapped Alex and pulled a blanket off him. Microwaves created heat by friction. They agitated the molecules of an object, penetrating to a certain depth, depending on the material. When the microwaves were shut off, the object continued to heat by conduction to greater depths. She suspected that she would be removing another sweater or two as the night went on.

"Say," said Mike, "you know what we forgot to bring?"

Thor gave him a suspicious look. "What?"

"Beach umbrellas. Aluminum beach umbrellas. In case it gets too hot."

Doc studied the snowball in his hand, looked at Mike, shook his head and stuck the snowball back in his mouth. Sherrine gri

"Hey, guys," said Bruce. "Don't look now, but we got company."