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"I do," Jesus Pietro repeated, and nodded to himself.
Major Jansen turned away. He had no time to feel sympathy for the Head, not while this was going on.
"She welded the hinge side," said one of the cutters.
"How long?"
"Three minutes if we work from both ends."
The ship continued to move, drifting along on its cushion of fire.
Fire swept along the edge of the trapped forest, leaving a line of licking red and orange flame, ignored by the embattled aircars above. Presently there were explosions among the trees, and then the whole tongue of forest was aflame.
Now the Planck had left the defense perimeter and moved into a place of shops and houses. The crew who lived in those houses were awake, of course; nobody could have slept through that continuous roar. Some stayed where they were; some made for the street and tried to run for it. The ones who reached their basements were the ones who lived. A block-wide path of exploded, burning houses was the wake of the Planck.
But now the houses were empty, and they didn't burn. They were of architectural coral, and they had been deserted, most of them, for upwards of thirty years.
"We're through, sir." The words were hardly necessary. The cutters were pushing the door aside, their hands protected by thick gloves. Major Jansen shoved through and went up the ladder with panic at his back.
Polly's control board bewildered him. Knowing that he knew as much about flying spacecraft as anyone behind him, he continued to search for the dial or wheel or lever that would change the Planck's direction. Finally, puzzled, he looked up; and that was his undoing.
The flight control room was long. It projected through the cargo section to where the outer and i
He saw the glow of the drive flames near the bottom of his view. To the right, a coral house exploding: the last house. Not far ahead, the black line of the void edge, coming closer.
And he froze.
"We're going over," said Jesus Pietro, standing under him on the ladder. He showed neither surprise nor fear.
Major Jansen screamed and buried his face in his arms.
Jesus Pietro squeezed past him and into the left-hand seat. His decision was based on logic alone. If Major Jansen had not found the right control, then he was looking at the wrong panel; and this was the only other control panel the colonist girl could reach from where she was sitting. He found the fin controls and tried them.
The ship tilted back and began to slow.
Still slowing, it drifted over the edge.
Jesus Pietro leaned back in his seat and watched. The Planck was no longer supported by the ground effect. Jesus Pietro felt a sensation like an elevator starting down. He watched the cliff go by, faster and faster, a black shadow. Presently it was half the sky, and the other half was stars.
Presently the stars went out.
The ship began to grow hot. It was hot and dark outside, and the ancient walls of the Planck creaked and groaned as the pressure rose. Jesus Pietro watched, waiting.
Waiting for Matthew Keller.
CHAPTER 14
BALANCE OF POWER
HE STRUGGLED half awake, desperate to escape the terror of sleep. What a wild nightmare that was!
Then he felt fingers probing him.
Agony! He braced and tried to draw away, putting his whole body into it. Ms whole body barely twitched, but he heard himself whimper. A cool hand touched his forehead, and a voice--Laney's?--said, "Lie back, Matt."
He remembered it later, the next time he woke. He woke slowly this time, with the images of his memory forming around him. Again he thought, What a nightmare. But the images came clearer, too clear for a dream, and:
His right leg and most of his right side were as numb as frozen pork. Parts of him were not numb; they ached and stung and throbbed. Again he tried to withdraw from the pain, but this time he was tied down. He opened his eyes to find himself surrounded.
Harry Kane, Mrs. Hancock, Laney, and several others he didn't recognize all crowded around his strange bed. One was a big woman with red hands and somewhat crewish features, wearing a white smock. Matt disliked her at once. He'd seen such smocks in the organ banks.
"He's awake." The woman in white spoke with a throaty lilt. "Don't try to move, Keller. You're all splinted up. These people want to talk to you. If you get tired, tell me right away and I'll get them out of here."
"Who are you?"
Harry Kane stepped forward. "She's your doctor, Keller. How do you feel?"
How did he feel? A moment ago he'd realized, too late, that his backpack wouldn't lift him. But he couldn't remember the mile-long fall. "Am I going to die?"
"No, you'll live," said the woman doctor. "You won't even be crippled. The suit must have braced you against the fall. You broke a leg and some ribs, but they'll heal if you follow orders."
"All right," said Matt. Nothing seemed to matter much. Was he doped? He saw that he was on his back, with one leg in the air and something bulky around his rib cage, interfering with his breathing. "Did they put transplants in me?"
"Never mind that now, Keller. You just rest and get well."
"How's Polly?"
"We couldn't find her."
"She was on the Planck. She must have reached the drive controls."
"Oh!" Laney exclaimed. She started to say something, then changed her mind.
Harry said, "The Planck went over the edge."
"I see."
"You got her loose?"
"I got her loose once," Matt said. The faces were growing hazy. "She was a fanatic. All of you, fanatics. She had all the rescuing I could give her."
The room drifted away, dreamlike, and he knew the Planck was taking off. From a distance a woman's authoritarian crew lilt ordered "Out, now, all of you."
The doctor escorted them to the door, and Harry Kane put a hand on her elbow and took her with them into the corridor. There he asked, "How long before he's well?"
"Let go, of me, Mr. Kane."
Harry did. "How long?"
"Don't worry, he'll be no invalid. In a week we'll put him in a walking cast. In a month we'll see."
"How long before he's back at work?"
"Two months, with luck. Why so eager, Mr. Kane?"
"Top secret."
The woman scowled. "Whatever you're pla
"All right. I suggest you don't tell him about the transplants. He wouldn't like that."
"They're in his records. I can't do anything about that. I won't tell him anything."
When she had left them, Laney asked, "Why so eager?"
"I have an idea about Matt. I'll tell you about it later."
"Don't you think we've used him enough?"
"No," said Harry Kane. "I'd like to, but no."
Millard Parlette was near exhaustion. He'd moved into Jesus Pietro Castro's office on Sunday, night, even before the outer wall was replaced, and he'd lived there ever since. His meals were sent in, and he used Castro's cot when he slept, which was rarely. Sometimes it seemed to him, that he was at the end of his life, that he'd waited just long enough to meet this-the crisis he'd foreseen a hundred years ago.