Infinite Reef (45 page)

“Cross that bridge when we come to it,” he heard Mary say in his mind. At the same moment she spoke aloud to the Commander seated behind them. “Another call from Ned, sir.”

Johnny nodded. “Patch it to the intercom, Mary.” Then, when he heard the click of the cabin speakers, Johnny touched his console again and said, “Yes, Ned?”

“The shuttle bay is cleared, Commander,” Ned’s voice said. “Outer doors opening.”

Diver had matched
Goddard’s
orbital speed and was now positioned a hundred meters from the giant ship’s vast white flank.

The huge door, a large curving rectangle of polyceramic with rounded corners, pushed outward slightly and began to slide to the right.

When it was fully open Alex could see the red strobing lights of the inner bay. When they switched to green he pushed the stick forward slightly. Three minutes later they were inside and the outer doors were closing behind them.

Alex switched off power to the engines as he felt the soft impact of the shuttle bay’s grappling arm attaching itself to
Diver’s
hatch. He let go of the stick. “We’re home, Commander,” he said. “Any idea what you’re going to say to these people?”

“I should leave that to you and Mary, Alex. You got us into this,” mumbled Johnny as he unbuckled his seat belt.

Alex peered out the
Diver’s
front window and noticed several crewmen floating toward them from the rear of the hangar. In seconds they were at Alex’s shuttle and waving. Alex waved back and gave them the thumbs up, indicating that everyone inside was okay.

A few moments later the hatch opened and the Commander’s assistant Ned moved inside wearing a grave expression. By that time Alex, Mary and Johnny were at the inner hatch. Alex turned the lever that opened the door.

Ned’s voice was louder than the hiss of decompression. “Commander,” he almost shouted. “What’s going on?”

“Let’s get to the meeting room, Ned,” answered Johnny. “We’ve got some decisions to make.”

The senior staff was assembled and waiting in a conference room near the shuttle bay. Some of them were floating about in weightlessness while others held on to tethers attached to the walls. All eyes turned toward them as they entered the room. None of them seemed happy to see the Commander, so Johnny didn’t wait for formalities. “I know this is a bit of as shock to all of you,” he said in a voice loud enough for everyone to hear. “But we have to make some quick decisions. That’s why I wanted all of you to meet me here.”

“First of all …” Johnny began.

Ned Binder cut him off. “Sir,” he said. “Titan Base has been calling us constantly asking what is going on. I didn’t know what to tell them. “

“No surprises there, Ned,” remarked Commander Baltadonis. “But if you’ll allow me to speak …”

“Apologies, sir.”

Johnny smiled at his assistant and turned to face the group. “Can everyone hear me?”

When no one responded, Johnny continued: “My sudden return has caused a lot of speculation, I’m sure, so I want to address that now. When our group reached Titan we were met by a military detail, which is no way to treat a guest, I’m sure you’ll agree. The whole tone of our visit began to take on the air of an arrest rather than a cordial briefing.” Johnny pushed off the wall where he was holding a strap and floated to the front of the room so everyone could see him better. As he passed among the group he smiled and nodded at familiar faces but continued his speech. “I don’t want to be an alarmist, but I’m sure many of you will agree that our welcome home has been anything but warm. I know, for example, that most of you are eager to know what’s happened to your families in the year we’ve been away. But the authorities have denied you that.”

A murmur went through the group and a few applauded. Johnny had reached the front of the room. He righted his body and settled against the white wall to the left of a large projection screen. He took hold of a strap and faced the group again. “To me this is unacceptable. And the three of us … Mary and Alex Rose, and myself … all have serious misgivings. There are indications that the
Goddard
will be commandeered and I will be replaced as Commander. “ Johnny grinned. “This unto itself doesn’t trouble me. I never had aspirations to command this ship. But now that I am Commander I mean to do what’s right for all of you. Certainly the last thing I want is for any of the citizens of
Goddard
to be arrested or detained. At the very least we should have been cleared to go back to our point of origin, but they are denying us this and offering no explanation.”

Johnny frowned. “This is why we decided to leave Titan base … while we still could.”

Several hands shot up among the group, but Commander Baltadonis shook his head. “I’m sure many of you have questions but please let me finish. I have little information I can share, and time, I believe, is short. We must decide now what our next step will be.”

At that point Johnny paused and looked at the faces around him. “The only perspective I can give is my own, and what I’m about to say will no doubt be a disappointment to many of you. I believe we should stall our … friends … on Titan and prepare for flight. “

“To where?” asked Ned.

Johnny shook his head. “I don’t know. We’ll have to decide that. But certainly away from here. There are two battle cruisers in our vicinity who could easily cripple our ship. So whatever we do will have to take that into account.” He looked at Ned. “
Goddard
is in perfect shape, is it not?”

Ned thought for a moment, then nodded. “It is, sir.”

“Then perhaps we should launch our vessel toward the inner system. That way we’ll put ourselves on a course toward our home base. If we do that it will be possible to allow some of our crew to disembark, and if we decide to leave the solar system we can use Jupiter’s gravity as an assist.”

Ned’s hand shot up and Johnny acknowledged him. “Yes?”

Ned cleared his throat. “I repeat my question, sir.”

Johnny smiled. “Where are we going? That we’ll have to decide. But at the moment I’m thinking of our point of origin …

Ganymede. ”

Several other hands shot up, waving for attention, but Johnny held up both arms. “I know all of you have questions, but I’m not in a position to answer them now. Believe me, I’ll keep you all informed.”

Johnny then dismissed the group with a general order for them to return to their duties. To Alex’s surprise everyone complied without protest. As they floated from the conference room toward the tubeway Alex guided himself so that he ended up next to the Commander. “I’d say that was relatively painless,” he offered.

Johnny nodded. “It’s good they’re still following my orders. I wasn’t sure …”

“You’re the Commander, Johnny,” said Mary as she caught up with them. “It’s their duty.”

The cylinder was fully operational and brightly lit on its midday mode when they left the tubeway. En route Mary had thought about her cat and decided to check into their quarters immediately. Before they’d left for Titan Base she’d been assured that Captain Wysor’s wife would look after Inky while they were gone, but she wanted to check for herself. Johnny wanted them to join him in Master Control but Alex reminded him laughingly that their cat was a priority. “If you want Mary’s cooperation, Commander, you’d better let her check in with her lover.”

Walking the short distance to their home Mary scanned the giant rotating cylinder. Overhead, the glowing solar strip in the central core was softened by a thin veil of clouds that had formed their own cottony cylinder a few hundred meters above the ground. “I have a feeling this is going to be our permanent home, Alex,” she said.

The idea surprised Alex. “I thought you were itching to return to Gannytown.”

“I was,” she said with a note of sadness in her voice, “but it’s not our home any more. Everyone we know is gone.”

“You can’t be sure of that.”

“I know, but consider the risk we’ll take finding out. And it’s been two decades. We can’t expect things to be the same. Our friends. My pet shop. Your mining job. It would be folly to expect those things to be the same.”

Alex nodded. “It’s hard to accept, my love, even though I know you have to be right. Dingers, Gannytown was the closest thing to a real home I’ve ever known.”

“This is our home, Alex,” Mary replied, looking around the cylinder. “I know what Johnny is thinking. We can’t afford to go back and find ourselves in a hostile world. All that’s there for us are memories. And there’s no way we can find out the conditions without sticking around and risking everything. Even if we were accepted … which I doubt … we’d be starting all over again. That’s true of everyone aboard. “

They reached their home and went to the door, and as Alex turned the latch they could both hear a tiny voice inside. Mary beamed as the door opened and her cat jumped into her arms. She caught Inky handily and hugged him close. “You thought we were leaving you forever, didn’t you, baby?” she whispered, her voice almost drowned out by the cat’s rumbling purr.

The word baby reminded Alex that Mary was going to have a real one of her own soon. And the thought made everything clear.

“You’re right,” he said.

“About what?”

“Everyone knows us here,” replied Alex. “We can have our baby safely and probably without censure.” He sighed. “There’s no way Earthcorp would allow you to keep it. Here, at least, we can live like normal people.”

Mary sat down on the puffy foam sofa with Inky in her lap. She held him close. But her eyes were fixed on Alex, standing at the picture window. “Well … Mary said to Alex’s back. “THAT was something.”

Alex knew exactly what she was referring to. He could hear it in her mind. He turned away from the view and faced her. “Would the Marys want you killed for telling Johnny?” he asked softly.

“I don’t know. No one ever …” Mary averted her perfect eyes. “I’m the first.”

Alex turned back to face the view of their front lawn. Roses were growing there and shrubs, brimming with berries, were full and verdant. Beyond was the roadway that led up to Master Control, and to their left was the great U-shaped Lake Geneva, its surface ruffled by the dolphins playing a game with large floating balls. Alex laughed. He’d never argued with dolphins before this trip; he’d never even seen a dolphin. Now he knew them as brew drinking crewmen. “This ship, Mary. That’s all that matters now. We’ve got to cut and run.” He took a deep breath. “But what ’bout the crew? What’ll they want to do?”

“A lot of people know about the Mary’s secret, Alex. Jeeps, a secret that big can’t be kept.” Mary smiled. “The Marys are good at denial, you see.”

“What did the first Mary teach the rest of you?”

“Languages.”

Alex frowned. “Mary, we’re not supposed to have secrets here.”

Mary grinned. Her perfect teeth sparkled in a shaft of light that poured in from the picture window. “She taught us to appreciate the moment, I suppose,” she admitted with a bob of her head. Inky looked up at her face and extended a furry paw. “Are there other cats in this burg, do you think? I think it’s time to let Inky meet the others. He’s always cooped up …”

Master control was out of sight, up the street at the end of the block. Alex looked in that direction. “Johnny wants us there.”

“What good can we do him?”

“Moral support, I guesses.” Alex chuckled. “He didn’t want this job. He wanted to study plants.”

“He wanted to terraform a ship,” replied Mary. “And he did just that. This is Harold Stubbs’ ship. It’s their idea, but Stubbs made it …”

“Sure. But the moment rules, doesn’t it, my love?” Alex winked playfully. “Weren’t you just saying …?” Alex gave the white curtains a cynical whack and walked toward the kitchen module at the rear of their apartment. The cat’s eyes followed him across the room. Alex poked his chin at Inky. “You want to roam at will, Inks?” Then, a memory shot through his mind: gannybrew. Gee brew, the elixir of space fatigue. “We should at least stop by Gannytown and pick up brews.”

“Don’t bet on it, darling,” Mary Seventeen replied. “I think we’re headed to a star.”

It was that. And more.

5
Now events were progressing quickly. Barely an hour after they arrived the
Goddard
conducted an automated test of the gee-pulse drive modification, the reason given for calling the Commander home. There had been a glitch.
Goddard
had arrived five years behind schedule.

Answers were needed. Science waits for no man. At least that was the reason offered to EarthCorp’s Titan Base and Commander Baltadonis’ cool as Ganny-ice, daughter. For the moment, an apology and a new briefing date seemed sufficient to abate the political powers that be.

This bought Johnny and the crew chiefs time to meet briefly and make a bold decision. It wasn’t as hard as Johnny had expected.

The astronomers had already asked themselves the question, and calculated an answer: a star called Cass, for Cassiopeia. Now this ship of 1200 souls was a life raft that had returned to a home they no longer knew. Everyone, including Alex and Mary, were grappling with that hard reality. If they were to remain free of tyranny or disappointment; free of the pain of lawsuits, of divorce settlements, of missing children … there was only one thing to do. The reception they’d been given had been hostile. It spoke of a militaristic state. But it also could mean that state was afraid of
Goddard
. After all, what had it brought home? Alien diseases? Alien invaders? Reason enough, most thought, to justify being treated coldly by the new EarthCorp. After all, their dealings with EarthCorp had never been warm or cordial. It had always been just business. But now the Corpies had faster than light warships, leviathans with outboard guns that
Goddard
never dreamed might be necessary.

One of the marvels of
Goddard
was its many levels of communication. Its nervous system was tied to a vast net of information.

Some of it was now being broadcast from hundreds of exiled colonists to relatives or friends. Johnny’s first democratic order when he returned to the helm was to allow full access by all crew to their homes (or what could be found that was left of them). The crew was long overdue and chafing to know what had happened during the time they were gone.