“Or dead,” Stan muttered, but to himself.

30

Back on the Dolomite, Captain Hoban watched the lander spin away on the viewscreen. He felt hollow, useless. There was nothing for him to do at the moment. Gloomy thoughts began to invade his mind.

Captain Hoban had continued to think about suicide. This didn't surprise him. He only found it strange that he hadn't thought of it before, during all the bad days of the trial.

He shook his head. Back then, something had buoyed his spirits, some belief that he was going to come out of this all right. And then his opportunity had seemed to arrive when Stan visited him in Jersey City and made his offer, and here he was in space again. But he had a bad feeling about it. His thoughts were full of foreboding images, and the men torn apart by Norbert hadn't helped his mood any. He suspected there would be a lot more deaths ahead, maybe even his own. Maybe he wouldn't have to commit suicide after all.

On the other hand, he could do it now. Gill could handle the ship all right. Stan and Julie didn't really need him….

Somewhere in his mind, Hoban knew this was a crazy line of thinking. He was a valuable person with reasons for living. He had nothing to be ashamed of. And yet the shame was there, constantly bubbling up from the depths of his mind, a seemingly automatic process that he couldn't shut off.

It obsessed him that he had been dismissed from his own ship. He still burned with shame when he remembered how the authorities had revoked his license. It was all so terrible, and so unfair. Probably there was no hope of real reinstatement. He had let Stan talk him into joining this crazy venture without thinking it through. When he got back to Earth — if he got back — the authorities would be merciless with him. Maybe he'd gone far enough.

He was preoccupied with his thoughts, and so was not pleased when he heard a crisp knock at the door of his stateroom. Now that the lander was away, he'd been hoping for a few minutes alone so he could get caught up on writing the ship's log.

“Who is it?” he asked.

“Crewman Badger, sir.”

Hoban sighed. He still didn't know why he hadn't rejected Badger at the prison, when he had the chance. He had finally remembered where he'd seen him. Badger had been one of the crew of the Dolomite when he'd had his accident in the asteroids, one of the men who had witnessed his disgrace.

Damn, damn, damn.

He didn't like Badger, thought he was sly and untrustworthy. But he had to admit, the man hadn't given him any trouble before. He did know Badger's type. Hoban had looked over the comment sheets on the crew, sheets compiled by other captains on other flights. The word on Badger was that he was cunning, insubordinate, and a troublemaker. There was no specific charge against him on the evaluation sheets, but the implication was clear enough. “Come in, Crewman Badger. What do you want?”

“I have the latest report on the debris in this area of space, sir.”

“Why didn't you just put it on the computer, as usual?”

“I thought you'd want to see this one before it was opened for general access, sir.”

“Why? Is there something unusual about it?”

“I'd say so, sir. Our new radar overlays show there's more than just space junk out there in orbit, Captain. I'm pretty sure there's a wreck in orbit near us.”

“A wreck? Are you sure?”

“Can't be absolutely sure at this range, sir,” Badger said. “But the pictures show smooth metal surfaces that must have been machined. It looks to me like a Q-class freighter, sir. Or the remains of one.”

Hoban took the radar printouts from Badger's hand and carried them over to his desk. He studied them under infrared light, then, using a grease pencil, outlined an area.

“You mean this bit right here?”

“That's it, sir.”

Hoban studied the readouts more closely. He had to admit that Badger had a good eye for this sort of thing. It appeared to be a ship's remains, floating out there in an orbit around AR-32, along with a lot of other stuff, mostly stellar debris.

This, he decided, might be the wreck that Stan Myakovsky had been looking for. Hoban decided to find out and have the information for Stan when he returned.

“We're going to have to check it out,” he said. “Badger, I want you to take one man, suit up, and go to the wreck's location. See if you can find its flight indicator.”

“Yes, sir!” said Badger.

“And don't go talking about this with the rest of the crew. That wreck has probably been there a very long time. No need for them to get excited too soon.”

“Right, sir. No reason to alarm the crew over something like this.”

Hoban nodded, but he didn't like agreeing with Badger. It seemed more natural that he should be on the opposite side of anything Badger felt. But he decided that perhaps he was being unfair. All that anyone had against Badger were rumors, and the man's unfortunate personality. No charge against him had ever stuck. And his decision to bring the wreck immediately to Hoban's attention had been quite correct.

Badger went back to the crew quarters. His sidekick Glint was drinking a cup of coffee at one of the wardroom tables. He looked up quizzically when Badger came in.

“Come on,” Badger told him. “We got a job to do.”

Glint swallowed the rest of his coffee and stood up. “What sort of a job?”

“There's a wreck out there. It's going to take spacesuits.”

“Yeah? What's up, Red?”

“I'll tell you about it as we go,” Badger said.

31

Stan had brought down the lander within viewing distance of the humped-up mound that was the alien hive, which he was able to inspect closely through the viewscreen magnifier. Gill and Julie stood behind him as he manipulated the views.

The hive was not only the largest non-natural feature on this planet; it was also larger than any natural feature Stan had yet seen there. Even the mountains were no more than a few hundred meters in height. The hive, standing over a thousand meters above the windswept plain, was huge, imposing, with a dark majesty. The winds scoured it, grinding it down, and there was constant activity from the aliens, who stood out as little black dots at this distance, building the hive up again like ants repairing an anthill.

Aliens, so soon! But, he reminded himself, he had been expecting them … hadn't he?

“I hope you're taking note, Ari,” Stan said, holding the cybernetic ant on his fingertip so it could get a good view.

“I don't know if Ari is,” Julie said, “but I sure am. I didn't know the hive would be so big. And I didn't know we'd run into aliens so soon.”

“We've got the suppressors,” Stan reminded her.

“Sure,” Julie said. “But are they reliable? It's pretty new technology.” She sighed and looked out across the plain again. “That's one big hive.”

“This one could probably be classified a superhive,” said Gill. “It's far bigger than any other recorded in the literature on the aliens.”

“Why do you suppose?” Stan asked.

“This is only a conjecture, of course, but it seems to me the odds against survival on this planet are so great that the aliens had to concentrate their forces, keep one big hive going father than a lot of smaller ones.”

“Saves us from having to make a lot of choices about which hive we plunder,” Julie said. “Let's get to it, shall we?”

Gill shook his head. “I advise you to wait until the storm activity on the surface has abated somewhat.”

Outside, through the Plexiglas, they could see the raging gale that was the usual weather on this planet. The wind had whipped itself into new heights of frenzy. Sand and small stones were blown across the plain like exploding shrapnel. Larger rocks, swept from the low crags in the distance, tumbled across the plain like steamrollers gone berserk. Lightning forked and crashed in vivid streamers of electric blue.