Джек Макдевитт - Deepsix

Scolari willed himself to relax. "Well, August, I knew it was something that had to be done. So I just made up my mind to do it." It was a stupid response, but he had suddenly lost all capability to think. What's my name? "I mean, it wasn't something we could just walk away from. It's a life-and-death situation."

He looked over at Cleo, who was gazing innocently at the ceiling.

"And how about you, Cleo?" said Canyon. "It must have been pretty unnerving looking down and not seeing anything."

"Well, that's true, August. Although to be honest I never felt there was a 'down. It's not like being on the side of a building."

"I understand you got hit by a storm of meteors. How did you react to that?"

"I was scared for a minute," she said. "We just hid out until it was over. Didn't really see much."

"Listen," said Scolari, "can I tell you something on my own?"

"Sure."

"Everybody was scared out there today. I never knew when part of me might just disappear. You know what I mean? And even without the rocks, I don't like not having something solid underfoot. But I'm glad I did it. And I hope to God those four people come back. If they do, it'll be nice to know I had a hand in it." He managed a smile. "Me and Cleo and the others."

Miles Chastain was cruising the shaft, moving deliberately from one ship to the next, inspecting the work of the Outsiders.

Maleiva III was framed against the gas giant. The continents and seas were no longer visible, and the entire globe appeared to be wrapped in a thick black pall.

He was impressed that so many had been wilh'ng to risk life and limb during the course of the operation. He'd heard about the other events, the complaints by passengers ob the Star and by the science people on Wendy. He'd been through crises before, and he knew they tended to unmask people, to reveal who they really were, to bring out the best or the worst, whichever way an individual personality leaned. It was almost as if trouble stripped away the pretenses of daily life, the way Jerry Morgan was stripping Maleiva.

He was somewhere between Zwick, his own ship, and the Evening Star, headed down the shaft toward the net. The actual pickup of Hutchins and her people would be made by John Drummond's shuttle. Marcel wanted them out of the lander and the net as quickly as the transfer could be made. Miles's responsibility was to stand by in case of need.

He was alone. He'd returned Phil, the shuttle pilot, the assistants, and the Outsiders to the Star and had taken over the controls himself. He was approaching Zwick, which was facing him.

When the signal came, and they began to draw the shaft out of the atmosphere, they would be moving it into orbit. Once that had been achieved, it would become possible to retrieve the MacAllister party.

His message board lit up. Transmission from Zwick. Emma. Her usually sallow features blinked on-screen, but this time she was glowing. She invariably gave the impression, when she spoke to him, that she was thinking about something else, that she needed only give out

instructions. That Miles himself was somehow inconsequential. Probably, he'd concluded on the way out, it resulted from dealing with too many VIPs. Everybody else became a peasant.

"Yes, Emma," he said, "what can I do for you?"

"Miles, where are you located now?"

"In front of you. Coming up."

"My schedule says you're headed for the pickup."

"More or less. I'm just going down there to be available."

"Good. I want you to stop and collect us."

"Why?"

"It'll only take a minute."

"Why?" he asked again.

"Are you serious? They're about to do the rescue, or not, and you ask why we want to be there?"

He sighed. She was right, of course. "Okay. I'll dock in about six minutes."

"Good. And Miles, would you do something else for me?"

He waited.

"I want you to contact the other pilot, the one who's going to make the pickup. Tell him we'd like to do a broadcast as they come on board. Ask if he'll cooperate."

"Why don't you do that yourself?"

"Well, pilot-to-pilot… You know how it is. He'll be more receptive if it comes from you. A lot of these people out here resent us. They think we're in the way. Except when they need publicity for one reason or another. I just don't want to miss this." She was at emotional high tide. "It's going to be the news story of the decade, Miles."

"Emma, did you know the shuttles can't dock with each other? You'll have to go outside to make the crossing."

"I didn't know. But that's not a problem."

"They're going to be busy. I don't think they'll want to make time for a news team."

"Miles." She came down a bit from her high. "I'd like very much for this to happen."

Frank the pilot looked up at Drummond. "John," he said, "I don't have any objection as long as they stay out of the way. How about you?"

Drummond's immediate instinct was to deny permission but of

hand. But he couldn't really give a reason why except that he disliked Canyon. Nevertheless, there was plenty of room in the shuttle, and he guessed it was prudent to get on the good side of the media. "Okay," he said. "Tell them what you just told me."

Gravity had taken hold of the sack. The net gradually lengthened and began to-tumble toward the troubled atmosphere. The collar was open and easy to see, and the people who'd rigged it had even managed to mark it with a system of lights. If there were no problems on board the lander, if the lander showed up at the time and place it was supposed to, the whole thing should be easy to pull off. Almost anti-climactic.

Frank disagreed. "The collar only looks big because we're right on top of it. And we're descending at the same rate it is. The lander's going to be approaching at a more or less constant altitude. The net goes down and it comes up. The pilot's got to time things so she hits it at precisely the right moment. If she misses, that's the ball game."

They rode quietly. The physician, Embry, stared moodily out the window. Janet Hazelhurst was thumbing through the onboard library, apparently just turning pages. Drummond was sipping coffee, lost in his thoughts.

"Eighteen minutes to rendezvous,"said the AI. "We are on schedule."

The net continued to unfurl as it dropped toward the clouds. Drummond saw no tangles.

Frank slowed their descent. "This is as low as we want to go," he said.

Drummond nodded. "So far, so good," he told Marcel.

Another shuttle appeared and drew alongside. "The media have arrived," said Frank.

Drummond activated his e-suit and went into the airlock, from which he watched two people move clumsily out of the other spacecraft. They floated across the few meters separating the shuttles, and he took each by the hand and pulled them inside.

Canyon wasn't as tall as Drummond had expected, but there was no missing that mellifluous voice. He introduced himself with quiet modesty. "And this is Emma Constantine," he said, "my producer."

"We'll want to set up here," Emma told him, "if that's no problem." She indicated a section adjacent the airlock. "We'd like to do a quick interview with you before the rescue."

"Okay," he said.

"August will be asking you how you plan to go about this, who'll be going out with you-"

"Wait a minute," Drummond said. "I'm not going out. Frank's going to do that."

"Oh." She turned away from Drummond, and her eyes suggested he had just vanished from human memory. Canyon smiled at him and shrugged.

Frank saw something he didn't like on his navigation screen. "Everybody into their seats," he said. "Buckle down."

Nobody had to tell Canyon twice. He dived for the nearest chair. Emma was a little slower.

"What's wrong?" asked Drummond.

"Debris field." As soon as his passengers were locked in he began to accelerate.