Tales of the Flying Mountains (26 page)

Or solar flares blow them to hellangone
, Golescu thought.

First time it's ever happened
, he reminded himself,
Probably the last time, too. Unique event. I'm priviledged to be on hand for it. What'm I offered, ladies and gentlemen, for my share of this unique privilege?

He noticed, with a slight surprise, that he wasn't afraid. Well, nothing very dreadful was going to take place for several hours yet. Except a lot of hard work. Dreadful enough.
I should'a tried for scoopship pilot. Still, you got to make your money somehow, and the pay here is good, to compensate for having nothing to spend it on. A few more cruises, and I'll have me that stake to go prospecting. Now
, there's
the life!

Passing near the middle of the disk, he noticed the hub in which the sunjammer kept its transmitter and its navigational sensors. Then he had slipped around behind. The monstrous moon turned black for him. He raised his filter and saw it become dim blue with reflected starlight.

Carefully, he moved with Storrs toward the opposite hub. It was linked by a universal joint to a large, dully gleaming cylinder which held the motors. Those drew their power—they didn't need much—from solar batteries in the sunward hub, and used it to control rotation and precession of the sail according to instructions from the pilot computer. For the sunjammer must tack from orbit to orbit, across the ever-radial energy wind. Gravitation helped only on a trip from the outer to the inner system; and even then the reduction vector was a continuously changing thing.

Golescu felt the slight jar as his boots made contact with the precessor hull. They clung, and he rested weightless. The motors beneath had been turned off on radio command from
Merlin
. He stood for a moment letting his eyes complete their adjustment to the wan illumination.

Storrs landed beside him. “Come on,” said the impatient voice. “Get the lead out of your rectifier. We'll need every bit of two hours to unhitch the cargo section as is.”

“Yes, sure.” Golescu began unstrapping the collapsible tool rack from his shoulders. He and his companion were hung about with equipment like a robot family's Christmas tree.

“I haven't worked on one of this type very often,” he admitted. “You'd better be straw boss.” He grinned. “I'll be the straw.”

Storrs made a sour noise.

The gas carriers were a pretty special model at that. Their cargoes must be shaded by the sail, lest temperature go above critical, the liquefied material boil and the containers rupture. The standard form of sunjammer used a curved sail controlled by shroud lines, which pulled rather than pushed the load. Such an arrangement permitted a considerably larger light-catching area and proportionate freight capacity. The drawback was that maintenance crews on a standard vessel had to begin with erecting a shield between them and the reflector—if they didn't want to be fricasseed in their spacesuits.

West called: “Ed speaking. I had to drop behind. The sail was screening me off from you. Everything in order?”

“Just fine,” Golescu said. “Apart from having an itch on my back that I can't scratch, and more work ahead of me than I'd dare load on any machine, and a prospect of getting blown to nanosmithereens, and no women in sight, and hell's own need for beer, I can't complain. Or, rather, I can, but it wouldn't do much good.”

“Don't you ever stop chattering, Andy?” Storrs grumbled.

“Let him be, Sam,” West advised. “We each need some outlet.”

“Well … yes. Mine's hating Earth, I suppose. North America, anyway. You Britishers are still human.” Storrs carried his tool rack to the farther end of the cylinder and set it in place with what should have been a crash but naturally wasn't. “Those Americans—the muckheads don't even have their regular gas boats out here unloading some of this cargo.”

“They can't,” West said. “Remember what Bailey told us. They haven't the capacity. Once the container was put in orbit, two or three luggers would have spent a couple of weeks shunting the contents groundside.”

“Still,” Golescu said, “seems to me that every kilo they can save right now would help. Make matters that much less serious if this thing does blow.”

“Wouldn't make any significant difference, in the short time available,” West said. “And it'd hamper our operations.”

“But doesn't the consignee want his stuff? I checked, and this load is worth eight million dollars F.O.B. That works out to quite a bit per kilo.”

“I just told you, Andy, salvage would interfere with the really important job—keeping those satellites functional.” West's tone became thoughtful. “Y'know, if we do succeed, there ought to be rather a nice bonus for us.”

Golescu snorted. “That's about as likely as the Milky Way curdling. Beltline ain't gonna be happy. Sure, they'll have gained good will Earthside. But they'll have lost a sunjammer and a shipment. Somebody'll have to make the loss good. If it's an insurance company, as I suppose … well, imagine what the premiums are going to go up to!”

“We might get a pat on the back,” Storrs agreed, “and then the Old Man will call us in privately and tell us that the next time we do so poor a job of chestnut pulling, he'll put us on portside duty, latrine detail.”

West sounded shocked. “Are you serious?”

“Uh-huh,” Golescu said. “Asterites can't afford excuses. If you don't cut the mustard, you're apt to be dead, and so are your mates.”

“But I have to cut it for Earth,” Storrs said between his teeth.

Golescu's frame was now also in place. He flitted “up” to install a battery of floodlamps, “down” again to plug them in. Light glared, harsh and undiffused, on the spot where the work must be done.

That was the heavy U-joint connecting precessor with cargo section. The latter was also illuminated in part. Hitherto it had appeared only as a circle of blackness. Now, beyond the framework that held it in place, ponderously counterrotating, the translucent bag glimmered a deep, angry red.

It was not very large to contain so much hell … or so much money, Golescu reflected. Space-cold and liquefied under high pressure, the isonitrate occupied a sphere only some ten yards in diameter. Its substance, even the metal atoms, had been reaped from the atmosphere of Jupiter—a chill great star shining in Gemini, two firefly moons visible beside it, treasure house and grave of more asterites than Golescu cared to think about. They were brave men, too, who manned the orbital station where the Jovian complexes were processed into isonitrate. An accident there would not be quite like a nuclear warhead going off, but the difference was academic.

Yet Earth needed those energy-crammed molecules as the starting point for a dozen chemical syntheses. And Earth was willing to pay. Demand evoked supply, including a supply of men to keep production and the Beltline moving.

Golescu began to unclip his tools and hang them on the rack where they would be ready to hand. A sense came to him of his own muscles, not merely in arms but in legs and belly and neck, constantly interplaying with centrifugal and Coriolis forces to hold him in balance on this free-falling shell. That led him to notice how the breath went in and out of his nostrils, tasting of recycler chemicals, and how his heart pumped the blood slowly around the intricate circuit of veins and arteries, and how that made an incessant tiny throb in his ears. He was getting hungry again, and had not lied about wanting a beer … ah, cool tickling over his tongue, yes, that was why the asterites must sell to Earth, they hadn't yet succeeded in brewing decent beer themselves.…

“Sam,” he said, “I've been thinking.”

“About time,” Storrs grunted.

“No, really. I never wondered about it before. But if this junk is so irritable, how come we can ship it at all? Why doesn't cosmic radiation set it off?”

Storrs sighed. The lamps threw the lean features behind his faceplate into highlights and black gullies. “If you'd spent more time in school learning your science, and less chasing women and beating that guitar—oh, well.” He relented. “I'm no chemist myself, but it's fairly obvious. Isonitrate complex is actually quite reasonably stable. It's plain to see that X-rays and electrons don't bother it. And the probability of a high-energy nucleus breaking up enough molecules to start a chain reaction must be extremely low. Trouble right now is, we're due for one all-time concentration of high-energy nuclei.”

“Uh, yes. If we could screen them off—maybe mount a field generator on the frame——”

“Where'd you get hold of one that puts out the right size and shape of field, in the time we've got? I daresay they'll be provided in future. Hindsight versus foresight, as usual. Now hurry it up there.”

“Wait a bit,” West hailed them. “Just got a signal from the Rescue Service ship. Want me to relay to you?”

“Might as well,” Golescu said. “For the laughs.”

A new voice, accented English: “'Allo,
Merlin
. International Space Commission Rescue Service cutter
Rajasthan
, commanding officer Villegas speaking. Come in,
Merlin.
” Golescu searched for the newcomer, but it must still be only a spark, lost among the stars.

“Acknowledging,” said West curtly, and identified himself.

“We 'ave your position and path,
Merlin
. Do you plan to maintain same for t'e present? Yes? T'en we will adopt t'e same orbit, with thirty-kilometer lag. Unless we can do something to 'elp.”

“Tell him to send over anybody he's got along who has sailship experience,” Storrs said. “With an extra man or two, we'll finish sooner.”

West passed the idea on. Villegas hemmed for a moment before answering, “I am most sorry, but we 'ave no such persons with us. You should 'ave asked for t'em before.”

“We assumed you weren't infinitely dunderheaded,” Storrs bit off. “Our mistake.”

“Don't blow your gaskets, Sam,” Golescu counseled. “Sunjammers are oddball craft. Earth hasn't got any. How could they know?”

“Beltline's got offices and personnel on Earth! Didn't that Bailey snerd even consult them?”

“Maybe no one was on hand except a secretary. This boat wasn't due to make final approach for another two, three weeks. Maybe all our people who could be of any help are out fleshpotting around Earth and not tuning in any newscasts. I hear they've got some mighty fine places there for that sort of thing.”

The byplay had not been relayed. Villegas was saying: “No use to send any of my engineers, yes? T'ey 'ave not t'e special skills. By t'e time t'e men you want could arrive, yours will 'ave finished uncoupling and you will be under acceleration, I trust.”

“Well, you'll take mine aboard first,” West said. “We only need a pilot here for that maneuver.”

“I never thought of Ed as the hero type,” Golescu remarked. He squatted to fit a wrench around a bolthead. “Shall we oblige him?”

“What a dilemma,” Storrs said acridly. “If I do, I'm a coward. If I don't, and we cut cards, I might end up risking my neck for Mother Earth.”

“Come off that shtick, Sam. The war's over, or hadn't you heard? Besides, we may reach jettisoning distance before the flare pops. It's just as likely to be later than prediction as earlier. Or … you know, in armor, with a strong metal shield around him, a man might even survive the explosion. There's no air to carry blast. When
Merlin
breaks apart, he could be tossed into space in one piece.”

“Sure. Into four thousand roentgens per hour. That means nine minutes for a lethal dose. The other ship isn't going to find him in any nine minutes, chum.”

“Hm-m-m … true. Damn! What we need is a pocket-size rad screen generator. Or something very thick to hide behind—”

Golescu's words cut off. He stared before him, into the icy light of Jupiter, until its after-image danced through his vision.

All the stars danced.

“What's eating you now?” Storrs growled. “Get to work.”

Golescu's yell nearly shattered his own eardrums. Its echoes were still flying around in his helmet when West cried, “What is it? I say, what happened? I'm coming, be there in a few minutes, hang on, boys!”

“No … wait … hold everything,” Golescu stammered. “Not so fast. We're okay. Better than okay.”

Storrs closed gauntleted fingers on the other man's shoulder-pieces and shook him. “What's the matter, you clown?”

“Don't you see?” Golescu howled. “We can save the whole shooting match!”

Words flew between sunjammer and herdship. The decision was quickly reached; a spaceman who could not make up his mind from a standing start was unlikely to clutter his profession very long. West called
Rajasthan
. “… Send us every hand you can possibly spare,” he concluded. “I'll raise Bailey and have him rush us more crews from your service's fleet in orbit. But they can hardly arrive for a few hours yet, and we've got to make what progress we can meanwhile.”

“Um-m-m …
nombre de Dios
… no, Captain,” Villegas said. “I am sorry, but I 'ave no authority to do t'is.”

“Eh? You're in command of your own ship, aren't you?”

“Yes, but my orders were only to——”

West surprised Storrs and Golescu with a choice recital of Anglo-Saxon monosyllables. “Very well, we'll get your orders changed,” he said. “Hello, hello,
Merlin
calling International.…”

On the sailship, the asterites were hastily clipping tools back onto their armor. They didn't bother with any they didn't expect to need. Those could be collected afterward, if there was an afterward.

“Craziest thing I ever heard of,” Storrs panted. “It
ought
to work, but—why didn't anybody think of it on Earth?”