Barbary (11 page)

“I still meant it as a compliment.”

“Okay. I believe you. Come on, Barbary, sit up, you’ve got
to get used to ignoring what your balance tells you sometimes. You sort of have
to rely on your eyes.”

Barbary raised her head. The dizziness faded.

“I guess,” she said, “it could get to be fun…”

“Yeah,” Heather said. “Shall I do it again?”

“Not quite yet,” Barbary said with her teeth clenched.

“Okay. I’m not actually supposed to, this close to the
station. Besides, we’ll be at the construction site in a minute.”

“Where is it?”

“Just there.” Heather pointed straight ahead at a cluster of
stars.

“But…”

Sunlight touched one edge of a curve of metal. Barbary
gasped. As the observation platform and the space station moved in their orbits
around each other, the shadow of the station slipped away, leaving the delicate
platform in full sunlight.

“It’s so small,” Barbary said.

“No, it isn’t. It’s huge. Look, you can just see one of the
workers.”

“Where?” Barbary expected someone in a space suit to appear
and scoop up the filigree sphere of the platform like a basketball.

“There. To the left.”

“I don’t see anything.”

“We’re still a couple of kilometers from it.”

The clarity of space had tripped Barbary up. She saw that
she had mistaken something far away but distinct for something close. Now she
could not estimate the platform’s size at all. It grew larger and larger. By
the time Barbary spotted the worker who floated deep within the spindly struts
and braces, the person was the size of a doll instead of the size of a speck.
The platform dwarfed the raft.

“Hi, Heather,” said a disembodied voice.

Barbary started, then realized that the voice had come over
the radio. A space-suited figure made its way out of the interior of the
platform and floated just outside. She looked “up” at them while they looked
“up” at her. Barbary felt very weird.

“Hi, Sasha. This is Barbary.”

Sasha raised the reflective visor of her helmet. She moved
closer to the raft’s bubble and cupped her gloved hands around her faceplate so
Barbary could see her. A yellow headband, bright against her dark skin,
restrained her curly black hair.

“Welcome to Atlantis, Barbary.” She had a wonderful, soft
accent that Barbary could not place, sort of British, sort of Russian.

“Thanks.”

“Are you coming out?”

“Not this time,” Heather said. “I didn’t bring any suits. I
just wanted to show Barbary how the raft works.”

Sasha chuckled. “Yes. I saw your demonstration.”

Heather blushed. “I had to dodge a wrench,” she said.

“Or a foo-fighter?”

Heather grinned. “Sure. Didn’t you see it? I bet it was a
spy from the alien ship.”

“When you see it again, tell those little green people to
stop in for tea,” Sasha said. “Well — Got to get back to work.” She made a
graceful dive to the other side of the raft, where a couple of her co-workers
joined her. Heather extended the arms of the raft. The equipment clanged,
startling Barbary all over again.

“Thanks, kids,” Sasha said, waving, as she helped tow the
equipment over to the platform. “On the way back, don’t hit any of those little
green pedestrians.”

Heather turned the raft end-for-end and headed home. Going
back they were upside-down, compared to the way they had arrived, but after a
moment it no longer felt upside-down to Barbary.

“What’s a foo-fighter?”

“It’s what pilots used to call UFOs — flying saucers — years
and years ago, before anybody ever went into space. Some people thought they
were alien spaceships coming to contact us, or spy on us, or take over our
world, or give us the secrets of the universe. Or something.”

“Does that make the alien ship a foo-fighter?”

After a thoughtful pause, Heather said, “I guess it does.
But nobody ever found any hard evidence that the old UFOs were real. This one’s
kind of different.”

Heather piloted the raft smoothly into its bay and the
airlock began its cycle.

“That was fun,” Barbary said. She still felt dizzy — but the
ride
had
been fun.

“How long does it take to learn to drive one of these
things?”

“Anybody can get in one and ride around in it,” Heather
said. “But really driving it, with the computer overridden I don’t know. I’ve
been doing it since I was a little kid.

“How long does it take other people?”

“Couple months, I guess. Mostly they just let the computer
do it. It’s more fun to drive it, though. Next time I’ll give you a lesson.”

“Great.”

The airlock completed its cycle and the raft slid into the
station. Heather opened the canopy and vaulted from her seat. Barbary followed,
still uncertain in free fall.

“Thanks, Heather, Barbary,” Yukiko said.

“Any time.”

Heather led Barbary from the hub.

“What do you want to see next?” she asked. “The labs are
pretty neat, and the library — or we could play on the computer —”

“I ought to go check on Mickey,” Barbary said.

“Oh, I’m sure he’s okay.”

“Heather —” Barbary said, exasperated. She stopped for a
second to make herself calm down. “I know you want to show me everything, and I
want to see it. But Mick’s my responsibility. I have to take care of him and be
sure he’s all right. Otherwise I just should have let him loose back on earth
where he’d have half a chance without me.”

Heather walked along in silence for quite a way. Barbary
felt certain that her new sister was angry at her. She did not know Heather
well enough to know how she would react when she got mad.

“Yeah,” Heather said, to Barbary’s surprise. “Yeah, you’re
right. I understand. I hadn’t really thought about it enough, but I see what
you mean. You have to protect him. And I’m going to help you.”

Closer to completion, Thea’s contraption sat on the living
room floor. Thea had fallen asleep on the couch. The door to Heather’s room
remained tight shut. Barbary slid it open.

“Lights,” Heather said.

“Hey, Mick,” Barbary whispered.

He made the squeaky-purring sound he always made when he
woke. From the storage shelf of the upper bunk he yawned and blinked at her. He
rose, stretched, and suddenly jumped for the door. Barbary caught him. He
turned in her hands and attacked her fingers, partly in fun, but partly in
earnest.

“He’s bored,” Barbary said. “He’s really bored. He hardly
ever bites.” She tussled with him, letting him fight with her hand even when he
got excited and stuck his claws into her. But he would never get enough
exercise pouncing on her hand. “He used to spend just about all night outside,
even though it was dangerous. What am I going to do, Heather?”

“He needs a place where he can run around, huh?”

“Yeah. But a really private place.”

Heather sat on top of her desk and leaned her chin on her
hand.

“I know where to go,” she said. “Only we have to get him
there. Can you try to hide him in your jacket?”

“Sometimes he’ll lie still for a little while. Not long,
though. Can we go a way that not very many people use? Just in case?”

“We’ll have to,” Heather said, and jumped up before Barbary
could ask what she meant by that. “Where’d you put your jacket?”

o0o

Mick crouched in the secret pocket, but Barbary knew he
would want to get out soon. She followed Heather along one of the corridors
that curved around the inner surface of the station’s wheel.

“Heather,” Barbary said, “am I just imagining it, or does
walking feel different depending on which direction you’re going?”

“It really is different. Because of the spin.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Okay. You’ve got weight here because of the spin, right?”

“Uh-huh.”

“So if you walk plus-spin — that’s the same direction the
station’s spinning — you’re going even faster than the station. Since your
weight is proportional to your speed, you feel heavier. And it makes you feel
kind of like you’re walking uphill. That’s why when you see people jogging in
the one-g level, they usually run plus-spin. They get their exercise faster.”

“I guess I understand.”

“Then if you go the opposite way, minus-spin” — Heather
turned and ran a few steps in the opposite direction — “you subtract your speed
from the station’s speed. That makes you feel lighter. And you think maybe
you’re going downhill.”

“It’s weird,” Barbary said.

“No, it isn’t!” Heather said. “Oh… I guess it is. But you’ll
get used to it. You can feel it even more if you run. Go ahead, try it.”

Mickey squirmed, trying to escape.

“I will later,” Barbary said. “But if I run now, Mick will
have a fit. How much farther do we have to go?” She put her hand on the outside
of the secret pocket and tried to pet Mick to calm him down and hold him still
at the same time.

“To the bottom of the elevator.”

Inside the elevator, Heather opened a panel, pushed a button
marked -3, and slid the panel shut. None of the usual numbers lit up, but they
descended. Barbary leaned against the wall where the outlines were painted,
hoping she would soon get used to the tilt when the elevator moved.

Barbary opened her jacket. Mick stuck his head out of the
pocket. He looked ready to jump any second.

“Stay there, Mick!” she said.

“Hardly anybody ever uses this elevator,” Heather said.
“He’s safe now.”

“Maybe I could let him out?”

“Probably it’d be all right, but we’ll be where we’re going
in a minute.”

The elevator slowed and stopped.

“Oh, no!” Heather said.

Barbary flung her jacket closed, hugging it to her with her
hand still inside. Mickey pressed his head against her fingers.

Jeanne Velory and Ambassador Begay got into the elevator.

“Hello, Barbary. Hello, Heather,” Jeanne said.

“Hi.” Mick’s cold nose and prickly whiskers tickled her as
he nudged around looking for a way out. “Uh —!”

“Hi,” Heather said, detecting the note of desperation. “I’m
showing Barbary around. We already went on a raft ride to the observation
platform.”

“We haven’t had a chance to see the observation platform
from up close yet,” Jeanne said. “You’ve got a good guide, Barbary.”

“I know,” Barbary said.

“But aren’t you hot in your jacket?”

As Barbary tried to think of an answer, Mick hooked his
claws around her wrist.

“You’re Ambassador Begay, aren’t you?” Heather said.

“Yes, I am.”

Jeanne introduced Heather and Barbary to the ambassador, and
for a horrible moment Barbary thought she would have to shake hands, when it
was her right hand inside her jacket holding Mickey still.

But Heather broke in. “Later on I’m going to show Barbary
the computer.” Her voice sounded a little too high and a little too loud. “It
has some great games. Have you tried ‘Snarks and Boojums’? It’s really fun.”

You’re really overdoing it, Heather, Barbary thought,
willing the elevator to stop and open, willing Jeanne to get bored with talking
to two kids, willing the electricity to go out,
anything.
All the
attention was on her and Heather — mostly on Heather; she had to admit that her
sister did a good job of keeping attention off Barbary and Mick — and the whole
business was like a scene out of a sappy kids’ movie.
The Space Colony
Children
or something. Ugh, Barbary thought, aren’t we cute. Mick, if you don’t
stop biting me I’m going to let you get out, and see what happens then.

“I haven’t had time to do that yet, either,” Jeanne said.

“You ought to,” Heather said. “It’s got a lot of physics in
it. The computer’s terrific. You can even make up stories on it.”

“What tales does your computer tell you?” Ambassador Begay
asked.

“You tell it your name and it sort of puts you into the
story. It never tells the same one twice.”

“I see. The stories I know do not change at all. But perhaps
you’ll let me tell you one anyway, if we can find the time.”

“I’d like that,” Heather said.

Barbary struggled to remain expressionless as Mick dug his
claws into her hand.

“Barbary, is your hand all right?” Jeanne said.

The elevator slowed and stopped and the door slid open. But nobody
moved.

“Yes,” Barbary said. “Why shouldn’t it be? I mean… um… I’m
just pretending to be Napoleon. It’s part of the story.”

She looked at Heather and Heather looked at her and neither
one of them could help it. They both burst out laughing. Jeanne watched them
quizzically, then stepped outside. Ambassador Begay followed.

“Getting off?”

“Uh-uh,” Heather said, gasping for breath. “We’re just
riding the elevator. We wanted to come to the bottom and go right back up.” She
caught Barbary’s gaze, and they both laughed even harder.

“Okay,” Jeanne said. “Have fun.”

As she and the ambassador walked away, Heather lunged
forward and jammed her thumb against the “close door” button. As soon as they
were safe, she slid to the floor, giggling.

“Nobody ever comes on this elevator, huh?” Barbary said.

“Napoleon!” Heather said. “Napoleon? That was great!”

“Mickey, ouch, stop it, all right, get down if you have to,
and if they throw you out the airlock it isn’t my fault!” She loosed her hold
on the cat and he sprang to the floor. Barbary slid down beside Heather.
“Napoleon. Good grief. What a dumb thing to say. Now Jeanne must really think
I’m an idiot.”

The elevator halted. Barbary grabbed Mick before the doors
opened. She carried him out into just about the weirdest place she had ever
seen.

The elevator sat on top of a wide platform. Steps led down
on all sides, making it into a ziggurat shape, a stepped pyramid. About twenty
steps below, the stairs disappeared into great piles of dirt and rocks, which
rose to meet the curved horizon. Support beams projected through the dirt.