Джек Макдевитт - Odyssey

Amy said yes, could they look at the bridge? That was enough to engage Maureen’s enthusiasm.

“Absolutely,” said Hutch. She got Koballah’s okay, and started up the boarding tube, which was transparent from the interior. Maureen looked out at the ship.

“It’s pretty, Mommy,” she said.

ON AN ADJOINING dock, the Academy’s Edward Barringer was undergoing an engine overhaul. The rear of the ship was laid open, and three or four people, all in e-suits, were clambering across the hull. The Barringer was a Lakschmi class. It was of more recent vintage than the Colby, but by no means new.

Hutch used her link to ask Bobby Watson, the maintenance team chief, what was happening.

“It should be junked,” he said, “if you don’t mind my saying so, ma’am.” Watson had been there since before Hutch started her career. He was near retirement, gray-haired, bearded, not inclined to put up with nonsense. “There’s no one single problem, Hutch. As far as we can see, it’s okay. It’ll probably get where it’s supposed to go. It’s just” — he shrugged — “these things have a lot of parts. They reach a point after a while where you don’t trust them.”

“That bad?”

He looked across at her and glanced at the girls. “You wouldn’t want to take those two out on this one.”

“Bobby,” she said, “give me a copy of the report. Okay?”

Amy led the way through the hatch into the Peifer. The engine room had already been sealed off by a maintenance unit, but Hutch showed them the living compartments, the VR tank, the workout area, the common room, and, finally, the bridge.

Amy beamed as she slipped into the pilot’s seat and ran her fingers across the controls, dreaming what it would be like to direct the power of a superluminal. “I don’t suppose we could go somewhere now?” she asked.

Hutch smiled. “I don’t think the mechs would approve.” She activated the status screen. It blinked on, turned red, and flashed NEG. “Needs fuel and a recharge.”

“Do you think I could go out in one of these, Hutch? Not today, maybe, but when you have a chance?”

“I’ll see what I can do.”

She grew thoughtful. “This is the one you piloted, isn’t it?”

“Yes. This was one of them.”

“Why would you ever stop?” she asked. “Now you work in an office.”

“Yes, I do. It’s complicated, Amy.” She looked around the bridge. “Bill, are you there?”

The ship’s AI responded. “Hello, Hutch. Welcome to the Peifer. Are these your daughters?” Amy lit up. Daughter of a star pilot. She liked that. Hutch introduced them. Bill said hello to the girls and commented that Maureen looked like her mother. “Hutch,” he added, “I’ve missed you.”

“I’ve missed you, too, Bill.” The girls were looking through the viewports. All they saw, of course, were spotlights, cables, docks, and bulkheads. “I wish I could take you out,” she told them. “You’d like riding with Bill.” She could have arranged a virtual ride, but they’d know. Amy would, anyhow. And it wouldn’t be the same.

Hutch looked at Maureen, wondering what she would see during her lifetime. Maybe, if Amy’s father had his way, she’d watch the government shut down the interstellar effort. He was right, of course, to worry about the home world. But it didn’t have to be a choice between staving off the greenhouse or continuing deep-space expansion.

FTL was not pork. Maybe it was time for the Academy to adopt a new motto.

“Bathroom, Mommy,” said Maureen.

LATER THEY TOURED the station’s maintenance section and looked at engines. But Amy wasn’t all that interested, so they went back up to the main concourse while the senator’s daughter talked about where she’d go if she had command of the Peifer. “Out to Betelgeuse,” she said. “And to a black hole.” She grinned. “I’d love to see a black hole.”

“There aren’t any close enough to reach,” said Hutch, wondering if you really could see a black hole. That was a flight she’d like to make herself.

“And I’d love to see some of the monuments.”

At first Hutch didn’t put it together. Then she realized Amy was talking about the enigmatic creations left scattered around the local stars thousands of years ago by the inhabitants of Beta Pac III. The Monument-Makers. “There’s one on Iapetus,” she said.

Amy was holding Maureen’s hand. “I know.”

Maureen’s attention had gone elsewhere. “Over there, Mommy,” she said, pointing at Big Bang Burgers.

Hutch looked at Amy. “Hungry?”

“I could eat,” she said.

They started across, but had to give way while a pair of preoccupied middle-aged types, a man and a woman, hurried past. They were shaking their heads, both talking at once. Hutch tried to listen, but the only phrase she caught was “ — How this could happen — ”

They disappeared around the curve of the mall. She took the girls into the Big Bang and both ordered more than they could eat. Shortly after the food arrived, hamburgers, salads, and french fries, Hutch saw John Carter hurry past. Carter had gone through life listening to jokes about his name. At the moment, he was carrying on an animated conversation with his commlink, and he looked tense. Carter worked with the station operations group, which was responsible for scheduling departures and arrivals. They were not connected with the Academy team, which coordinated and tracked missions.

“What’s wrong, Hutch?” asked Amy. There was a tremor in her voice.

“Nothing, Amy,” she said. “Why do you ask?”

“You look worried.”

The tables in Big Bang Burgers were almost filled. Through one of the viewports, the Milky Way was visible, far brighter than it ever appeared from the ground. Hutch’s mother claimed never to have seen it. Too much glare. Hutch herself rarely noticed it in the sky over Washington.

Somebody else charged past. Two of them. Going the other way. What was happening? She opened her link to Mission Ops. One of the watch officers, a woman, replied. “Mason.”

“This is Hutchins,” she said. “What’s going on?”

Mason sounded relieved. “If you’d called a couple minutes ago, ma’am, I’d have told you maybe the end of the world.”

THE ACADEMY’S OPERATIONS center was located down one level from the main concourse. Peter Arnold was on duty. Three or four technicians were grouped around him. They were staring at one another. Nobody was saying anything. “How big was the asteroid?” Hutch asked.

Peter looked simultaneously relieved, embarrassed, grateful. Like a man who’d just walked out of a building and seen it explode behind him. “I do think,” he said, “somebody’s looking out for us.”

“Big,” said one of the technicians.

“Where?”

“Just passed us. Came within two thousand klicks.”

Maureen didn’t understand what he was saying, of course, but she caught the tone and squeezed against her mother. “Are you serious, Peter?”

“Do I look as if I’m kidding?”

“We never saw it coming?”

“Somebody in McCusker’s looked out and saw it as it passed.” McCusker’s was one of the dining areas. Peter took a deep breath. “I heard you were here.” Then he noticed Maureen and Amy and managed a smile. “Yours?”

“The little one.”

He said hello, and Amy asked whether they had any pictures of the asteroid.

“Let me play it for you.” He spoke to the AI and one of the monitors came on. The asteroid was a flattened, potato-shaped object, tumbling slowly, end over end. The long blue arc of the Earth merged into the picture.

“How big?” Hutch asked.

“Four kilometers. Over four. They’re telling us it would have been lights out for everybody. If it had gone down.” The object was growing smaller. The Earth dropped gradually away. “That’s taken from one of the imagers here, on the station.”