The Precipice

The passageway outside was crammed with men and women in security coveralls, half-a-dozen of her own nanotech people, several medics in white, and Doug Stavenger.

“Are you all right?” Stavenger asked worriedly.

Cardenas felt herself smile a little. “I am now,” she said.

DEATH

“C’mon, boss, wake up!”

Pancho’s voice, muffled, distant. Dan’s eyes were gummy, bleary; it took an effort to open them. He tried to wipe them but his hands were still buried in the loose rubble of the asteroid.

“Dan! Wake up!” He heard the urgency in her voice.

“Yeah. Okay…” His stomach heaved.

“Radiation level’s down almost to normal,” Pancho said. “You okay?”

“Sure,” he lied. He felt too weak to move, too tired to care.

“Time to get outta here.” She was scrabbling, clawing through the gravelly dirt. Dan wanted to help her but he could barely move his arms. All he wanted to do was sleep. Then his guts suddenly lurched and a wave of nausea swept over him. “We’re up, in the open.” Amanda’s voice came through his helmet speaker.

“I’m go

He sensed somebody digging frantically above him, and then strong arms lifting him, dragging him free of the rubble-filled tu

“Hang in there, boss,” Pancho said. “I gotcha.”

Dan thought he heard someone else retching, too. Nothing like the sound of vomiting to make you upchuck, too. I could get the whole Vie

He wavered in and out of consciousness, thinking, That’s the way they get you. They make you so miserable that you’ll be glad to die. He squeezed his eyes shut and tried not to breathe. He desperately wanted to wipe his face but inside the suit and helmet it was impossible.

“Okay, the lock’s cycling,” he heard Pancho say.

“Bring him inside.” Amanda’s voice.

“Take him to his own bunk.”

“Yes. Careful now.”

He didn’t dare open his eyes. At one point he heard Pancho say, “You get him out of his suit. I gotta see how much damage the storm did to the ship’s systems.” After a while he felt something cool and soothing wiping his face. Opening his eyes at last, Dan saw a blurred image of Amanda bending over him, with Fuchs beside her. They book looked worried, grim.

“How do you feel?” Amanda asked.

“Lousy,” he croaked.

Fuchs said, “We are under way. Pancho is accelerating to one-third g.”

“The ship’s okay?”

“Some of the sensors were damaged by the radiation,” Fuchs said. “And the communications equipment, too. But the fusion power plant is functioning properly.”

“The nanobugs didn’t get to the MHD generator’s superconductor?” Dan asked. It took most of his strength to get the words out.

“No, they seem perfectly in order,” Fuchs answered. Then he added, “Thank god.”

We’re on our way home, Dan thought. He closed his eyes. On our way home. “Until you get him here where we can give him proper medical treatment,” Selene’s chief radiation therapist was saying, “there’s nothing you can do for him beyond the chelation pills and antioxidants you’re already giving him.” Pancho watched the medic’s unhappy image as she sat disconsolately in the command pilot’s chair. It had taken more than an hour to contact Selene. Starpower 1’s high-gain ante

But Dan was in a bad way, and the sad-assed medics at Selene couldn’t do any more for him than a bunch of witch doctors. Bring him in as fast as you can. Well, sure! That’s what I’m doin’. But will it be fast enough? And Elly was dead. Just before they had abandoned the ship she had left the snake in her box and put the box in the refrigerator, knowing the cold would put Elly into a torpor, hoping that the fridge would provide enough shielding to save the krait. I should’ve carried her inside my suit, Pancho berated herself. Even if she bit me, I should’ve brought her with me. The radiation had killed the krait, along with the one remaining mouse.

Her thoughts returned to Dan. He’s got it bad. We all took a dose, we’ll all need medical attention once we get back to Selene. The chelation pills are helping, but Dan might not make it. He looks half-dead already.

Amanda came into the bridge and slipped into the right-hand seat.

“How is he?” Pancho asked.

“We cleaned him up and he’s sleeping now.” She made a strange face. “His hair is coming out. In clumps.”

Pancho fought down the urge to go back to Dan’s compartment. Nothing you can do there, she told herself.

She asked Amanda, “How’s Lars?”

“He seems to be fine.”

“Did he take the pills?”

“Yes, of course. He’s working on the high-gain ante

‘That circuitry’s supposed t’be hardened against radiation,” Pancho said angrily.

“We oughtta sue the manufacturer when we get back.”

“Oh, Pancho, it was exposed to such a high level of radiation. That was an intense storm.”

She nodded, but said, “Yeah, but still that comm gear has gotta work right.”

“You need a rest,” Amanda said.

“We all do.”

“I’ll take the co

“Maybe you’re right.”

“Do it, Pancho.”

She looked at Amanda for a brief moment, then made up her mind and slowly got to her feet, surprised at how stiff she felt. “If I’m not back in two hours, wake me up.”

Amanda nodded.

“I mean it, Mandy. Two hours.”

“Yes. I will.”

Satisfied, Pancho made her way back through the wardroom. She hesitated at the door to her privacy compartment, then went a further few steps to Dan’s door. She slid it open a crack. Dan was still sleeping, lying on the bunk, his body sheened with perspiration, the shorts and tee-shirt they had put on him stained by his sweat. His scalp was dotted with bald spots where tufts of hair had come out. God, he’s in a bad way, she said to herself.

He opened his eyes and focused on her.

“Hi, kid,” he breathed.

“How’re you feelin’, boss?”

“Not good.”

“Anything I can bring you? I could fix some broth or somethin’.”

“I’d just chuck it all over myself,” he said.

“We’ll be in Selene in another day and a half. Just rest yourself and we’ll get the medics—”

“Did you send my last will and testament to them?” Dan asked. Pancho shook her head. “Havin’ troubles with the main ante

“How’s the laser?”

“The backup? It’s okay. We’re usin’ it to—”

“Send my will,” Dan said.

“We don’t hafta do that. You’re go

“Send it,” he insisted. He tried to raise himself on one elbow and failed. “Send it,” he whispered.

“You sure you wanta leave everything to me?”

“Will you fight Humphries?”

She nodded solemnly. “Yep. That’s a promise, boss.”