Red Thunder (50 page)

"I've got the wire cutters. I'm tying them to my suit... closing the tool bag. Now, Alicia, which one should we cut first?"

"That one right there."

"Cutting a thick, green wire... now.... Well, that worked out okay. Pull it to one side, Alicia... there. Now, cutting a thick,
gold
wire.... There."

She cut six wires and pulled them out of the way before she got the
wrong one. As soon as she snipped it everything started to move.

"Move back, Alicia!" Kelly warned, and they moved... and the smallest of the three orbiting pieces of the
Ares Seven
pulled itself free and began to spin off into oblivion. It all happened
soundlessly, but my mind supplied the shriek of straining metal and the
sound of snapping guitar strings as smaller wires, unable to take up
the burden once borne by three or four wires, snapped and popped like
cracking whips. Kelly and Alicia turned their backs to the mayhem. I
saw one snapping wire slap itself across Kelly's backpack. Then the two
remaining pieces of the ship parted company and began drifting apart...
and the safety tether was tied to the wrong piece.

Travis took it in, saw the wayward hunk of junk about to pull the
line taut, and he reached down and pulled the free end of the rope,
which he had tied in a slipknot in case of this very situation. The
rope whipped through the eyebolt and was gone.

"Had to do that," Travis said. "
Had
to do that, it was about to get pulled into a spiral... it would have—"

"Wrapped itself around
Red Thunder
," I said, "and crashed into us."

"Too right. Kelly, check your suit systems, right now!"

"...five by five, Travis." They were still tied to the big piece,
and now they could see themselves drifting away from us. "You'll come
get us, right? I mean... soon? I don't like this very much."

"I'm coming in right now," Travis assured her, and he had already
moved out of my range of vision. We heard the lock cycling, and Travis
made it to the bridge in record time, frost forming on the very cold
surface of his suit.

Dak and I went below and strapped in. We felt a few gentle shoves as
Travis turned the ship, using the small thrusters not very different
from the SMU. Then a mild kick in the pants as he fired the main drive.
Two minutes later, another firing of the main drive, then the slightest
burp, and when Dak and I scrambled up into the cockpit we could see he
had brought
Red Thunder
motionless with respect to the wreck
and the girls, an incredible piece of computerless flying that proved
once more that nothing would ever substitute for a skilled pilot at the
con, no matter what the Chinese said.

"All right, guys," Travis said wearily. "Your point has been proven.
I have to stay here at the controls. Manny, I want you to—"

"We see two space suits!" Kelly said. Travis was instantly at the
porthole beside us. From where we sat, the girls seemed to have moved
to the other side of the ship. We could see their lights from the
reflections on shiny surfaces, but not the lights themselves.

"Didn't I tell you not to move around?"

"Actually, you didn't, Travis, but we didn't move much. This hunk of
junk has picked up a rotation. We've turned away from you. I'm
approaching one of the—"

"
Please
stay put, Kelly."

"I'm barely moving. I... oh my God. Don't be sick, don't be sick, don't be sick."

"Captain, there's somebody in the suit," Alicia said. "Don't look at him, Kelly."

"I'm okay. I'm okay."

"The... ah, one arm is torn off at the elbow. Hard to tell if he died of loss of blood or freezing or anoxia."

"Don't be sick, don't be sick, don't be sick..."

"Can you tell who it is?" Travis said softly.

"Captain, the face is... it's not pretty. I'm not even sure if it's a man."

"Roger."

Kelly seemed to have controlled her stomach. As the wreckage slowly
turned toward us again, rotating at about one turn in three minutes, we
could see them again.

"The air-lock door is free now, Captain," Kelly said. "Can you see it?"

"We see it. I'm sending Manny out to throw you another line."

"Captain," Alicia said, "I suggest you wait on that. You're not going anywhere, right? I mean, now that you're with us again."

"That's right."

"Well, when Kelly lost the hammer I got to wondering what we might
need that we didn't bring with us. Why don't we wait until we've looked
at everything? I don't think we want to make that crossing any more
than we have to."

"I concur, Alicia, now that you mention it. Good thinking."

"We're approaching the air-lock door now."

There was silence for a while. Travis put his hand over the microphone.

"Boys, you're never going to find women with more courage than those
two. And they're smart and beautiful, into the bargain. You better
marry them."

"I've been giving it a lot of thought," I said, and Dak grinned.

THEY MADE THEIR way to the air lock. There was a small
window set into the door at head height, and it was cracked but not
exploded.

"Look at this," Kelly said.

"What?" Travis, Dak, and I said at the same time.

"Frost, Captain. Even a couple little icicles."

"Condensation," Travis said, excited.

"Gotta be," Alicia said. "I think there's still air in there."

"If we can get the door open," Kelly said. "I'm punching the
button... nothing. Trying again. Nothing. Should we whack it upside the
head, guys?"

"Always worked for me," Dak said.

"Whacking... nothing. Whacking again. Nothing. Alicia, can you get
that torqueless power wrench out of my bag? Don't let anything float
away. Damn, what we need for this job is that eight-dollar hammer I
lost, not this four-hundred-dollar piece of NASA surplus. Isn't that
always the way?"

She was talking a lot, not only to calm her own nerves but because
we'd asked her to. Describe everything, Travis had said. In great
detail.

"No action on the door, Captain."

"Kelly, hit it again, then put your helmet in contact with the door."

"Why, Captain?"

"Sound can carry through metal but not through vacuum. It's possible somebody in there hears you knocking on the door."

Any science-fiction reader would have known that, and once again it came to me, hard, that space was
my
dream,
Dak's
dream, not theirs.
We
should be over there, risking our lives. Why is the universe so unfair, so perverse?

"Yikes, that really rang
my
bell," Kelly said.

"What happened?"

"Had my helmet against the door when I whanged on it, like a dummy.
Hitting again, three times." A short pause. "Yes! Yes, I heard three
taps! There's somebody in there! But how are we... wait a minute,
what's this?"

"Tell us, Kelly, tell us!"

"The door is rotating. It's half open... three-quarters open... stopped."

"I can feel somebody pounding on the door," Alicia said. "Put your
hand on it. Feel it? Somebody's in there for sure, Captain. And it
looks like the door cycling switch works from their side."

"Alicia, don't go in, we don't know if—"

"Sorry, Captain, I've got to go in."

"Me, too," Kelly said.

"We're both inside the lock now."

"Kelly, Alicia, I want you out of there in no more than five
minutes, with a situation report. I doubt we'll be able to hear you
once you get inside.
Five minutes!
Got it? Or all three of us come looking for you."

"Got it, Captain. The cycling button in here works. The lock is rotating...."

And then there was silence.

THE AIR LOCK on the
Ares Seven
was a barrel
type, maximum capacity: two suited astronauts. There was an inner
pressure door which you pulled closed behind you. Then the barrel
rotated until the one doorway in it faced the outside. It had been
designed for use on Mars, when people would be coming and going
frequently.

There was a manual crank to turn it, too, which now jammed when it
was almost fully opened. But it still could be cranked, in both
directions. We didn't know that at the time. We thought the lock was
still working electrically.

So Alicia and Kelly went inside, and we waited. Five very slow
minutes. Then we saw a light from the far side of the ship, which had
rotated the lock door away from us.

"Good news first, Travis," Alicia said. "Holly is alive, and she's not hurt."

Travis bit his lip and turned away from us for a moment.

"The guy we found was Dmitri Vasarov. There was an indication of
trouble and three people got into suits to check out the engine. That's
when the explosion came. Holly doesn't know Vasarov was crushed, and we
didn't tell her. She's... well, she's sort of in shock. She saw Welles
and Smith flying away from the ship after the explosion. Smith was
alive. She was struggling. Welles... she's sure he's dead. He was
almost cut in half.

"About, Smith, Captain. Should Kelly and me come back to the Big
Red, and we go looking for her first? If Manny brought over a bottle of
air these people in here would be good for another day or two, easy...
if it doesn't blow out."

"Negative, Alicia," Travis said. "She's dead now. Her suit would have run out of air a long time ago."

"God, that's awful. What a horrible way to die."

"Actually, Alicia, a few people have accidentally drifted away from
a space station, thought they were dead, then got rescued. All of them
said the same thing. After a short time of panic and fear, they
achieved a feeling of peace. I wouldn't know about that, but let's hope
that's what happened to Smith."

"Amen."

"So what's the situation in there? Four survivors?"

"Three. They have the body of Marston, the M.D. Why couldn't
she
have survived? She could have handled this so much better than me."

"Don't think that way. So you've got injuries?"

"Just minor bruises and abrasions on Holly and Cliff Raddison. Cliff might have a fractured arm. Have to x-ray him to be sure.

"Things are a real mess in there. Captain Aquino smashed his head
and got his leg caught somehow. He's got a compound fracture of the
left femur, real bad. He lost a lot of blood. Holly and Cliff stopped
the bleeding. He's delirious most of the time. I only stuck around long
enough to give him a shot of morphine—and I've got to be sure to
thank Salty for getting that for us. Then I came out here so you guys
wouldn't worry."

"What do you need, Alicia?" Travis asked her.

"Okay. First, space suits. Three of them. I think we can use the
empty suit we saw next to Vasarov's body. But we'll need two more."

There was a short silence as the three of us in the ship worked it out. Like that old logic problem:
You have a fox and a goose and a bag of grain to get across a river...

"They can have mine," Dak said bitterly. "All the use
I'm
getting out of it..."

"We're short a suit," Travis said.

"You're forgetting, Travis. Manny can bring over Dak's suit... and Jubal's."

"Jubal's suit is aboard?"

"Kelly told me she stowed it in a locker. The problem is... can Jubal's suit fit on Holly, or Cliff, or Aquino?"

"We'll make it fit, by God," Travis said. "Dak, go get it ready."

"Captain, it's
cold
in there," Alicia said. "About ten below zero, and falling. Is there any way we can heat the place?"

"Is there any power available?"

"That went out completely not long before we arrived. Cliff and
Holly have been sitting in there in the dark, wrapped up in what
clothes they could salvage. They were conserving the one flashlight
they found, using their little bit of power to run a heating element.
They're in danger of frostbite."

"Just a minute, Alicia. Guys, any ideas?"

I didn't have one. We'd backed up the heating system on
Red Thunder,
just like we'd backed up everything. I could have torn out a heater,
but there was no power on the wreck to run it. A simple catalytic tent
heater would do the job. We hadn't brought one.

"A long extension cord?" Dak suggested.

"We don't have anything that long," I said.

"The only thing we can do is to hurry, then," Travis said. "But we've got to hurry
slowly,
okay? I mean, think before you move. I'm not going to lose you, any of you, including the
Ares
survivors."

"Roger. The wreck is leaking, and we don't like the looks of that lock window."

"So what do you need?"

"Jubal's suit, and Dak's. A big bottle of air. Flashlights, the more
the better. Some whole blood, a couple pints. I can't recall Aquino's
type, but it's in my medical file. And patching material, lots of it."

"Roger," I said, and took off.

SOMEHOW I WRESTLED all that stuff out of
Red Thunder's
air lock, all tied together.

Along with everything else I'd brought enough yellow poly rope to
outfit a Boy Scout Jamboree. I got everything tied to an eyebolt so it
wouldn't drift, and started casting. I figured it would take a few
false starts before I got the hang of it. I was right. But on the
fourth try, just as Kelly was coming out of the lock, I got the
weighted end of the line dead center. Kelly only had to reach out and
grab it. She tied it off, and I attached the bundle of junk to it. She
pulled it across, hand over hand at first but then just letting it
drift, because though it was weightless, it still had considerable
mass, something you could never forget out there or you could get
crushed.

When she had the stuff I pulled the rope back, tied it down, then pulled myself along it.
First you take the goose across the river because the fox won't eat the sack of grain...