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waste of your time."
She felt she should add, "Nothing personal," but that would be a lie so she
didn't. As Tregare said, save lying for when you need it.
The intercom sounded. "Captain here, Moray. I'll be up to relieve you on
sked."
"Right enough. There's coffee." Delarov signed off. Lisele turned to deWayne
Houk. "If you want to ask your skipper the same questions you asked me, I'll
go below, out of your way." Seeing how he avoided looking straight at her,
Lisele knew she had him on the run. So she added, "Or you might want to visit
your own duty station. You've been away from there so much, lately, maybe the
place could use some dusting."
"Yes, of course. Good suggestion." As Houk stood, his look said that if he
hadn't been her enemy before, he was now.
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But it also told her that at least she had that enemy's respect. Whether the
changes would work for or against her, she'd have to wait and see.
Over the next few days Houk did keep his distance; during Lisele's watches he
came up to Control only rarely. His stays were brief, and his talk restricted
to the line of business. How he behaved when the captain was on duty, Lisele
had no idea and didn't feel like asking. If Delarov had any grounds for
complaint she didn't mention them.
Nearly three weeks after Lisele had her joust with the Drive Chief, he entered
Control just as she was relieving the skipper at watch. The man looked
worried. "Efficiency's dropping, captain. Nielson Cube, I
mean. After the accident to the Drive-" He gave Lisele a disapproving look.
"-we
44
could manage forty-five percent of redline max force, accel or decel. It's
down to forty-three now, and still losing."
Katinai Delarov said, "What's your extrapolation, Chief? Is the rate of loss
increasing? If so, how fast?"
Houk shook his head. "That kind of math? Not my strong point; for that you'd
need Darwin Pope." Sulkily he added, "Maybe you should put me down and get him
up. As things are, I might as well be froze as the way I
am!"
Now his look at Lisele was a positive glare.
Why?
she wondered. If he was peeved about having no bedmate, why not at Delarov
also? Then she realized: he hadn't dared to approach the skipper, so all his
resentment was focused on herself, for not acceding.
None of that was important now. Thinking fast, Lisele said, "You may have a
good thought there, Chief."
And before Delarov could protest, "You'd want to rouse the First Hat. Better
that she go through the sickness now, out here where we don't need her to
work, than when we get to Goal Star. After she's past it she can wake
Pope-give him and the Chief, here, some time to talk things over. And then see
that Houk goes into freeze safely, before she puts herself back in."
Houk's look lost its rancor. "Captain, in a way I hate to have to say this.
But I think she's right."
VIII
Mei Lu-teng, before the inevitable bout of illness hit, constantly asked
questions to bring herself up to date.
She agreed with the others' planning, and was apologetic when pain and nausea
forced her out of active participation.
Two days later, looking even more gaunt than usual, the First Hat returned to
duty. To Lu-teng, loss of hair was a special affront; hers had been more than
waist length, and its absence bared a skull not smoothly rounded like Lisele's
or Delarov's, but sloping to a central ridge-and behind that, dropping off at
an abrupt angle. Lisele was reminded of pictures she'd seen, of the Easter
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Island statues.
For what the woman may have felt, there was no reme-
45
dy. But while Lu-teng was up and awake, Lisele quietly took care of the extra
share of galley chores.
The First Hat wouldn't have had time for them, anyway. Conferring first with
the captain and Lisele and
Drive Chief Houk, then with the revived Chief Engineer until his own stretch
of illness, Mei Lu-teng was much too busy to bother with cooking or the
cleansing of utensils.
Darwin Pope constituted a different case. Once he was recovered, and had time
for confab with Houk before the latter went to freeze, Lisele explained the
need for cooperation on galley matters. Not seeming to pay much heed, he
nodded. "Oh, certainly. I'll take my turn and keep things shipshape." And
henceforth, he did.
If his altered appearance bothered him, he gave no sign. So far as Lisele
could see, he hardly noticed. And possibly for that reason, the man didn't
seem changed.
Which wasn't to say that Darwin Pope was any great bundle of cheer. He was
pleasant enough, but after talking with Houk and checking the Drive Chiefs
figures, then making a few computer runs of his own, he didn't pretend that
the news was good.
He and Delarov and Lisele, just the three of them out of freeze now, sat in
Control. "Here's what it looks like. We've been losing thrust, and will
continue to do so. We can't maintain the decel we'd hoped to manage."
"And what does that indicate?" asked Katmai Delarov. "When we arrive at Goal
Star."
"Well, obviously," the man said, "we'll be traveling much faster than we
should be."
Leaning forward, Lisele said, "You mean we can't stop?"
For a moment, Darwin Pope frowned. Without eyebrows, the expression lacked
force. "If habitable-sized worlds exist in that system, and I'm getting
computer indications that one or more might be there, we couldn t achieve
orbit around one. Insufficient mass, you see, to slow us properly."
As though she were asking if any coffee was left, Delarov said, "We're dead,
then, no matter what we do?"
While Pope was considering his answer, Lisele's mind raced. What did she know,
that could help? Sling turns didn't lose velocity, they built it. But
still-all right! Just a minute. It's a long chance, but listen.
We know our course, roughly,
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and which way we'd need to turn, to go toward Earth and the colonies. The
shipping routes, and all."
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Delarov shook her head. "You know we'd run out of food-long before we could
crawl, relatively speaking, to those parts of space. Food, fuel, maybe even
recyclable air. So why condemn ourselves to slow starvation?"
"You don't understand yet. If decel isn't going to do us any good, and Mr.
Pope says it won't, let's do
Turnover and go accel. Take a power sling around Goal Star, to head toward
humanspace." Everybody wanted to interrupt, but she didn't let that happen.
"We all go into freeze, and leave Tinhead with a timed command to turn off
every bit of power drain we don't really need. Which would be-" On her
fingers, she checked the needs. "The freeze chambers. Tinhead itself. And a
radiating beacon, telling who we are and what our problem is. So that human
ships could detect us, and make the intercept."
Nobody looked enthusiastic. She said, "I
know it might be a hundred years, even more; I don't like that any more than
you do. But it beats just coasting past Goal Star and starving to death."
Well, she'd said it the best she could. . . .
"Actually," said Katmai Delarov, "I've heard worse ideas."
Darwin Pope shook his head. "In Goal Star's system we can't achieve orbit with [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ] - zanotowane.pl
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