I understood the logic. Arbre had two hundred missiles. No more. Each just barely capable of getting a tiny payload to a dangerously low and short-lived orbit. There was only so much we could do, working from that. We’d all studied the plan at Elkhazg, come to grips with it, nodded our heads, accepted it.
But that was one thing. To be up here with payloads zooming around chaotically, bumping into each other, getting melted together—hiding under space blankets—there were so many ways this could have gone wrong.
Could still go wrong. Could be going wrong now.
What if I’d been a little hastier when I had reached the nuke, and made a bid to drag it back? We’d all have died.
I was worrying again. Actually, it was worse than that—even more pointless. Rather than worrying about the future—which could be changed—I was worrying about things that might have gone wrong in the past, and couldn’t be changed in any case.
Leave that to the Incanters and the Rhetors, respectively.
Where were all of the Thousanders now? Gathered in a stadium, chanting?
“Raz!”
I opened my eyes. Had one of those moments when I simply couldn’t figure out where I was—could not convince myself that the launch hadn’t been a dream.
“Raz!”
One ikon was visible on the display: Fraa Jesry.
“Here,” I said.
“It’s great to hear your voice!” he exclaimed, sounding enormously relieved.
“Well, I’m touched to hear you say so, Jesry—”
“Shut up. I’m incoming. Get the blanket out of the way so you can get a clue what’s going on.”
“Are you sure? Aren’t we in line of sight?”
“No.”
“I think that we are in line of sight, Jesry.”
“We were, last time. Now we’re not.”
“Last time?”
“We missed you the first time around. Crossed your path, but the altitude difference was too great. Couldn’t raise you on the wireless.”
“This is our second try?” I checked the time. He was right. Ninety minutes—not forty-five—had passed. My oxygen indicator had gone red. I’d slept through the first rendezvous!
I swiped the blanket out of the way. Saw a balloon, a mile away and rapidly getting closer. Tucked up under it was an ungainly structure of inflated grapnel-tubes with dozens of red and blue fuzzballs caught up in it. A few space-suited figures on monyafeeks kept station nearby, all turned to look my direction. The row of ikons flashed up as I rejoined the reticule. But no one spoke except Jesry. He had come out alone.
“If I fail, remain calm and wait,” he said. “There are two layers of backup plans.”
“But they sent the best first, eh?” I kicked away from the nuke, very gently, and fired a grapnel into its net-cloud.
“Thanks, but for doing what you did, you get bragging rights, Raz.” Jesry had floated in range. He spun about, collected himself, and fired a grapnel of his own.
“Maybe we can brag when we’re old,” I said. “What should I do?”
“Orient positive radial,” he said. This meant that instead of facing in the direction of our orbital movement as before, we had to swing around ninety degrees so that our backs were to Arbre. I did it, and bumped lightly against Jesry as we came around side by side.
“Rotate down forty-five degrees and fire a fifteen-second burst,” Jesry said.
Fifteen seconds was huge, and, if the calculations had been wrong, would send us far off course with no propellant to get back. But I did it. Didn’t even think of not taking the suggestion. This was Jesry. He’d been watching me, coolly, as I’d gone out to fetch the nuke. Had done the theorics in his head, and triple-checked it with the syndev. I swiveled and fired. Lost my visual in so doing.
“You are headed for us as if we were reeling you in on a line,” Sammann proclaimed. But his tone of voice was all I really needed to hear.
“Take no action,” Lio warned us. “You’re passing under us—we are coming to grapple you—” And a moment later, two sudden yanks, and a cheer from the others, told me we’d been captured. I took my fingers off the thruster controls just to prevent my trembling hands’ inadvertently firing the thrusters, and let Lio and Osa tow us in.
“Raz, you’re secure,” Lio said. “Sammann, final star check please?”
“We are still shielded by the balloon,” Sammann said.
“Good,” Lio said. “I’m sure everyone wishes to congratulate Fraa Erasmas, but don’t. Save oxygen. Do it later. Arsibalt, you know what’s next—let us know if you need to borrow oxygen from someone else.”
The others had pulled on white overgarments of tough fabric to stop micrometeoroids and to reflect the heat of the sun. These made them look more like proper spacemen. One was given to me, and I put it on. Then, like the others, I snap-linked myself to this huge tangle of nets and payloads and grapnels and tried to sleep while Arsibalt and Lio got the tender online. This meant maneuvering it and the nuke close together and then connecting them. Already connected to the tender was a flexible water bladder. Other cell members had been busy during my absence scavenging water from the reservoirs on the blue payloads and transferring it into this bag, which had plumped out until it was bathtub-sized.
Arsibalt snap-linked himself to the control panel of the nuke and spent a lot of time motionless, which probably meant he was reading the instructions on the virtual screen inside his face-mask and going through checklists. After a while he got to work deploying some long poles that ended up sticking out from one side of the nuke like spines. Petals blossomed from near their ends, blocking our view of whatever was on the tips of those poles. Arsibalt returned to the control panel and worked for a few moments, then informed us, “I have powered up the reactor. Avoid the ends of the poles. They are hot.”
“Hot, as in radioactive?” Jesry asked.
“No. Hot as in ouch. They are where the system radiates its waste heat into space.” Then, after a pause: “But they’re also radioactive.”
No one said anything, but I’m sure I wasn’t the only one who checked his oxygen supply. The water was now being split into hydrogen and oxygen. In a few hours we’d be able to replace our depleted air and fuel supplies, and swap used for fresh scrubbers, at the tender. Until then, we had to take it easy, and share what we had with others who needed it more. Esma, for example, had been responsible for scavenging water from payloads, and had used up a lot of her oxygen.
Lio said, “Everyone except Sammann and Gratho drink, eat, and sleep. If you absolutely can’t sleep, review coming tasks. Sammann and Gratho, connect us.”
Sammann and Gratho clambered free of their monyafeeks and took to shinnying around the payload-tangle. They found some kind of magic box, broke it free from the mess, and got it lashed into a position where it enjoyed a clear line of sight down to Arbre. A few minutes later Sammann announced that we were on the Reticulum. But I already suspected that based on new lights and jeejah-displays that had begun to flourish in my peripheral vision.
“Hello, Fraa Erasmas, this is Cell 87,” said a voice in my ears. “Can you hear me?”
“Yes, Tulia, I can hear you fine. Good morning, or whatever it is where you are.”
“Evening,” she said. “We’re in the equipment shed of a farm about a thousand miles southwest of Tredegarh. What took you guys so long?”
“We were enjoying the view and having a party,” I said. “How have you been spending the time? What is it that Cell 87 does in that equipment shed?”
“Whatever makes things easier for you.”
“Tulia, I’ve hardly ever known you to be so helpful, so compliant…”
“Looks like you need to urinate. What’s the holdup?”
“I’ll get right on it.”
“Any particular reason your pulse is so rapid?”
“Gosh, I don’t know, let me think…”
“Spare me,” she said. “Here’s a picture of the mess you’re in—check it out while you’re peeing.” And just like that, my screen was filled with a three-dimensional rendering of a big silver sphere with a mess of struts, fuzzballs, and color-coded payloads tucked up against one side of it. “Here’s where you are.” My name flashed in yellow. “Here’s where you need to be.” A payload began flashing on the other side of the mess. “We worked out the most efficient route.” A line snaked through, linking my name to the destination.