Bob Shaw - The Fugitive Worlds

“Have you lost something, young Maraquine?” The voice was that of Commissioner Trye Kettoran, official leader of the expedition, who had chosen to fly in one of the modified ships. He was subject to low-gravity sickness and had hoped that the comfort of an enclosed cabin would lessen the severity of his attacks. His expectations had been in vain, but he was enduring his illness with great fortitude in spite of his age. At seventy-one, he was by far the oldest member of the expedition. He had been appointed by Queen Daseene precisely because he had clear recollections of the old capital of Ro-Atabri and therefore was well qualified to report on present conditions there.

“I have orders to inspect the Inner Defense Group,” Toller said. “The Service was hard pressed to loft twenty ships for this expedition, and as a result we are forced to omit a fifty-day inspection—but if I see anything going seriously wrong I am empowered to divert one of the expedition’s ships for as long as it takes to put things right.”

“Quite a burden of responsibility for a young captain,” Kettoran said, his long pale face showing faint signs of animation. “But—even with the aid of those splendid glasses—what kind of inspection can you carry out at a range of several miles?”

“A superficial one,” Toller admitted. “But in truth all we have to concern ourselves with at this early stage is the general alignment of the stations. If one is seen to have separated from the others, and to be drifting towards Overland or Land, it is simply a matter of nudging it back into the datum plane.”

“If one begins to fall, won’t they all follow suit?”

Toller shook his head. “We are not dealing with inert pieces of rock. The stations contain many kinds of chemicals—pikon, halvell, firesalt, and so on—and a slight change in conditions can lead to the production of gases which could leak through a hull if a seal weakens. The thrust produced may have no more force than a maiden’s sigh, but let it go on for a long time—then augment it with the growing attraction of gravity—and, all at once, one is confronted with an unruly leviathan which is determined to dash itself upon one world or the other. In the Sky Service we consider it prudent to take corrective action long before that stage is reached.”

“You have quite a way with words, young Maraquine,” Kettoran said, his breath pluming whitely through the scarf which was protecting his face from the intense cold of the weightless zone. “Have you ever considered diplomacy as a career?”

“No, but I may have to if I fail to locate these accursed wooden sausage skins before long.”

“I will help you—anything to take my mind off the fact that my stomach wants to rise into my mouth.” Kettoran knuckled his watery eyes with a gloved hand, began surveying the sky and within a few seconds—to Toller’s surprise—gave a satisfied exclamation.

“Is that what we’re in search of?” he said, pointing horizontally to the east, past the three modified skyships. “That line of purple lights…”

“Purple lights? Where?” Toller tried in vain to see something unusual in the indicated part of the sky.

“There! There! Why can’t you… ?” Kettoran’s words faded into a sigh of disappointment. “You’re too late—they have gone now.”

Toller gave a snort of combined amusement and exasperation. “Sir, there are no lights—purple or otherwise—on the stations. They have reflectors which shine with a steady white glow, if you happen to catch them at the right angle. Perhaps you saw a meteor.”

“I know what a meteor looks like, so don’t try to—” Kettoran broke off again and pointed at another part of the heavens. “There’s your precious Defense Group over there. Don’t try to tell me it isn’t, because I can see a line of white specks. Am I right? I am right!”

“You’re right,” Toller agreed, training his binoculars on the stations and marveling at the speed with which luck had directed the old man’s gaze to the correct portion of the sky. “Well done, sir!”

“Call yourself a pilot! Why, if it hadn’t been for this unruly stomach of mine I would have…” Kettoran gave a violent sneeze, retreated into the cabin and closed the door.

Toller smiled as he heard further sneezes punctuated by muffled swearing. In the five days of the ascent to the weightless zone he had grown to like the commissioner for his humorous grumpiness, and to respect him for his stoicism in the face of the severe discomforts of the flight. Most men of his age would have found some means of evading the responsibility thrust upon him by Queen Daseene, but Kettoran had accepted the charge with good grace and seemed determined to treat it as yet another in a lifetime of routine chores undertaken on behalf of the ruler.

Toller returned his attention to the defense stations and was relieved to see that they formed a perfectly straight line. When he had first qualified as a skyship pilot he had enjoyed the occasional maintenance ascents to the stations. Entering the dark and claustrophobic hulls had been a near-mystical experience which had seemed to conjure up the spirit of his grandfather and his heroic times, but the futility of the so-called Inner Defensive Group’s very existence had quickly dominated his thoughts. If there was no threat from Farland the stations were unnecessary; if the enigmatic Farlanders ever were to invade their technological superiority would render the stations irrelevant. The wooden shells were merely a token defense which had in some measure eased the late King Chakkell’s mind, and to Toller their principal value was that maintaining them was a way of preserving the nation’s interplanetary capabilities.

Having satisfied himself that there was no need to make a diversion from the vertical course, he lowered the binoculars and gazed thoughtfully at the furthermost of the other three ships making up his echelon. It was the one commanded by Vantara. Ever since the foreday he had learned that the Countess was taking part in the expedition he had been undecided about which approach to use in future dealings with her. Would an air of aloofness and dignified reproval wring an apology from her and thus bring them together? Or would it be better to appear cheerful and unaffected, treating the incident of her report as the sort of boisterous skirmish which is bound to occur when two free spirits collide?

The fact that he, the injured party, was the one who planned reconciliation had occasioned him some unease, but all his scheming had proved redundant. Throughout the preparations for the flight Vantara had managed to keep her distance from him, and had done so with an effortless grace which denied him the consolation of feeling that he was important enough to be evaded.

One hour after the fleet had passed through the datum plane the group of defense stations had shrunk to virtual invisibility, and the pull of Land’s gravity was imperceptibly adding to the ships’ speed. A sunwriter message from General Ode, the fleet commander, was flashed back from the flagship instructing all pilots to carry out the inversion maneuver.

Glad of the break in the shipboard routine, Toller drew himself along a safety line to the midsection, to where Lieutenant Correvalte was at the engine controls. Correvalte, who was newly qualified, looked relieved when he heard that he was not expected to handle the inversion. He relinquished the controls and positioned himself a short distance away as Toller began the delicate task. The ship had four slim acceleration struts which joined the gondola to the balloon’s equatorial load tape, and which gave the whole assemblage the modest degree of stiffness required for flying in the jet propulsion mode. Although the balloon itself was very light, a flimsy envelope of varnished linen, the gas within it had a mass of many tons, with inertia to match, and had to be coaxed with infinite care when any change of direction was called for. A pilot who was too enthusiastic in his use of the ship’s lateral jets would soon And that he had driven the top end of a strut through the envelope. While not necessarily serious in low-gravity conditions, that kind of damage was difficult and time-consuming to put right—and the offender was always given good cause to regret his error.