Part 29 (1/2)
”Topanga doesn't like hospitals,” Gollem told them.
”The power units!” Kranz said urgently. ”Call her back!”
They were pus.h.i.+ng Gollem toward the commo board.
”No way. She just blew the last ignition charge. Where she's headed now she goes.”
”What do you mean? To Coronis?”
”Never.” He rubbed his s.h.a.ggy head. ”I-I don't recall exactly. Mars, maybe the sun.”
”With the power units that would have saved these people.” Kranz's face had the expression he probably used on gangrene. ”Thanks to you. I suggest that you remove yourself from my sight for the remainder of our joint existence.”
”There never were any power units,” Gollem said, starting to go out. ”The phagers got my boat and you saw for yourself what that drive was like. Her acceleration would have broken you apart.”
The woman followed him out.
”Who was she, s.p.a.cer?”
”Topanga Orlov,” Gollem said painfully. ”Val Orlov's wife. They were the first Saturn mission. Thatwas their s.h.i.+p, Ragnarok. She was holed up in my sector.”
”You just wanted air.”
Gollem nodded.
They were by the base display tank. The computer was running a real-time display of the oncoming Trojans. The green blip was Medbase and the red blip with the smear was the smaller Trojan and attendant gravel tail. He studied the vectors. No doubt.
It was now dark-period. Sleep time coming up. The people here might eat breakfast, but for true they wouldn't eat lunch. By noon or thereabouts Medbase would be organic enrichment on a swarm of s.p.a.ce ice.
So would ex-Inspector Gollem.
The two medics went out on the wards and Kranz unbent enough to accept Gollem's offer to man the commo board. The s.p.a.cer wobbled in to watch him. The sight of Ragnarok's blast-out had lit his fires.
Gollem taped a routine red-call and began to hunt across the bands. The old man mumbled about s.h.i.+ps. n.o.body was answering, n.o.body would. Once Gollem thought he heard an echo from Topanga, but it was nothing. Her oxy must be long gone by now, he thought. A mad old phage-ghost on her last trip. Where had he computed her to? He seemed to recall something about Mars. At least they wouldn't end in some trophy-hunter's plastic park.
”You know what they got in them coc.o.o.ns? Squatters!” The old man squinted out of his good side to see how Gollem took this. ”Skinheads. Freaks 'n' crotties. Phagers, even. Medics, they don't care.”
He sighed, scratched his burned skin with his stump. ”Grounders. They won't last out here.”
”Too right,” Gollem agreed. ”Like maybe tomorrow.” That tickled the old man.
Toward midnight Kranz took over. The woman brought in some hot redeye. Gollem started to refuse and then realized his stomach wasn't hurting any more. Nothing to worry about now. He sipped the stimulant. The woman was looking at a scanner.
”She was beautiful,” she murmured.
”Knock it off, Anna,” Kranz snapped.
She went on scanning and suddenly caught her breath.
”Your name. It's Gollem, isn't it?”
Gollem nodded and got up to go look at the tank.
Presently the woman Anna came out after him and looked at the tank, too. The old s.p.a.cer was asleep in the corner.
”Topanga was married to a George Gollem once,” Anna said quietly. ”They had a son. On Luna.”
Gollem took the scanner cartridge out of her hand and nipped it into the wastechute. She said nothing more. They both watched the tank for a while. Gollem noticed that her eyes were almost good enough to make up for her chin. She didn't look at him. The tank didn't change.
Around four she went in and took over from Kranz and the men settled down to wait.
”Medbase Themis calling, please come in. Medbase Themis calling anyone,” the woman whispered monotonously.
Kranz went out. It seemed a lot of work to breathe.
Suddenly Kranz snapped his fingers from the next room. Gollem went to him.
”Look.”
They hung over the tank. The red smear was closer to the green blip. Between them was a yellow spark.
”What is that?”Gollem shrugged. ”A rock.”
”Impossible, we scan-swept that area a dozen times.”
”No ma.s.s,” Gollem frowned. ”It's a tank ghost.”
Kranz began systematically flus.h.i.+ng the computer input checks. The woman left the board and came to lean over the tank. Gollem watched absently, his brain picking at phage-warped memories. Something about the computer.
On impulse he went to the commo board and ran the receiver through its limits. All he got was a blast of squeals and whistles, the stress-front of the incoming rocks.
”What is it?” Anna's eyes were phosph.o.r.escent.
”Nothing.”
Kranz finished his checks. The yellow ghost stayed in, sidling toward the red smear. If that were a rock, and it had about a hundred times more ma.s.s than it could have, it just might deflect the Trojan's gravel swarm. But it didn't.
Gollem played monotonously with the board. The old s.p.a.cer snored. The minutes congealed. Kranz shook himself, took Anna out to tour the wards. When they came back they stopped at the tank. The whatever-it-was stayed in, closing on the Trojan.
Sometime in the unreal dimlight hours Gollem caught it, wavering on a gale of s.p.a.ce noise: ”I have contact! Val! I'm coming-”
They crowded around him as he coaxed the tuners but there was nothing there. Presently a ripple of relays tripped off in the next room and they all ran to the tank. It was dead; the computer had protected itself against an induction overload.
They never knew exactly what happened.
”It's possible,” Gollem admitted to them. It was long after noon when they decided to eat.
”While we were on the way here I know I computed that Trojan all the way to Medbase, before that I got really bombed. Maybe I threw a bridge into the course computer, maybe it was already in. Say she took off with no course setting. Those old mechs are set to hunt. It's possible it inverted and boosted straight back out that trajectory to the rock.”