Ringclimber

Chapter 11 - Life, Death, Friendship And A Cure

The flight deck is narrow and dark, lit only by the images of the instruments. The stars are too remote in the views to cast light.

"I do this once every ten shifts," Pat is explaining as their vehicle emerges into space over the asteroid. The sun suddenly slashes through the views, and there are a few moments where everything is invisible in the glare. Pat doesn't bother to correct for it, so Anne just waits until her eyes readjust.

They are well into a four-gee burn, and Anne feels acceleration pressing on her chest, tugging the edges of her eyelids.

"They're mostly on their own; families, sometimes single... you know, all kinds. But the automation makes it mostly supervision, planning, and maintenance work. I come by to make sure everything's OK. It's too easy for people handling daily operations to lose sight of safety, and sometimes ethics. My job is to keep things in line."

"You're a cop."

"That's one way to look at it."

"But how did you start? You grew up out here?"

"Oh yeah, but being a cop was another story. I was an itinerant corporate philosopher for six months after I graduated from school. There's a small market for philosophical engineering out here, especially dealing with law, but I'm not much of a specialist. I ended up joining Brinks. Contracting enforcement. Now I'm on my own, competes with them. Not easy, but the personal touch helps."

"And we'll be visiting the whole operation?"

"If you can deal with all the float. You let me know if it starts causing you problems."

"Look, it's just not working out," Phil argues, sitting on the dune, ocean at his back.

"Oh, come on, it's just an argument. It's over."

"Look, you know it's more than that. It's a lot of things."

Sharon sighs, drops the basket.

"Great picnic."

"Yeah." He scratches his forehead.

She walks over to him and looks into his eyes. "I think you're rushing things."

He turns away from her. "Oh, Sharon, damn it." Finally he looks up. "Maybe. Maybe not."

"It's just because I've had to be away so much. We're not able to spend enough time together."

He flops down on the dune. "Yeah."

"Look," she says, "come up to Nimbus with me. It'll be part of my vacation, and yours too. Let's spend some time out and away."

"Sharon, I can't afford to go to Nimbus."

"I can." She grins. "I'll fly you up. No one will care."

Erin is subdued during the party, spending frequent intervals away by herself, often standing by the rail, looking over an ocean that glints with images of a setting moon.

It is a surprising phenomenon, this emotion that struggles with her so strongly that she is unable to set it aside. At odd moments it makes her feel as if she is about to cry, but there is no reason that she can see.

Is it likely? Erin MacReady, a mother? She touches her waist in sympathy. What will it look like? -- distended, taut.... so uncomfortable... It makes the night seem very close, as if the quiet echoes, and the distant lights along the shore are just correct and melancholy enough for a woman who is considering giving up her life.

It's all so foolish, isn't it? The note of commitment makes it as frightening as the view from a pinnacle, and, in a bittersweet way, as attractive.

"Quiet tonight, love?" Gordon asks, enveloping her in his embrace. She smiles.

"Just thinking. Nothing special." She leans back into the angular framework of his arms.

It is their third homestead patrol visit. The asteroid blinks with the location beacons it carries in lines across its side, but no one answers their calls. Pat looks puzzled as she stares at the rock poised beyond.

"They must be working off somewhere without communications. But the car's in..." she mutters. Finally she looks to Anne. "I suppose something might be wrong. I'll link the registry, see if they're off somewhere." Anne nods, uncertain.

But the inquiries bring no result, and the asteroid remains silent.

"All right," Pat decides. "We'll take a walk over." She manuvers the vehicle onto a surface launch bay, then levers herself carefully out of her seat. Anne looks up at her. "Me too?"

"Why not? Just a house. I'm sure there's nothing."

Pat slips away into the narrow corridor that runs the length of the spine. Anne hesitates, then cautiously unfastens her webbing.

Pat demonstrates donning the suit. In basic principle, it isn't much different from a Marsuit. In practice, it is bulky, and studded with complex interfaces to the prosthetic automation. Anne struggles with it, but in the end, Pat has to help.

"Yes? You think it's all right?" Pat asks, anxiously. "All the prosthetics are disabled, and they won't get in the way much."

Anne looks around. The view through the immense dome of the helmet reassures her. She isn't trapped, even though the chin controls are intimidating. The smell is the bracing one of new plastic. "It's OK," she breathes. "Assuming I can get it to walk without denting the plumbing."

"Oh, you'll do fine. Good. Now go ahead into the lock while I get dressed. Then I'll join you. Don't worry, you won't bump anything."

Anne chuckles as she moves clumsily in the suit. "Only me," she replies.

They walk the ropeline from the auxiliary landing area to the lock in silence, except for Anne's irregular breathing.

The door slides open onto an anteroom. The lights are on, but no one is present.

Pat's voice comes over the comm. "Not locked. Someone should be here. People don't go out usually without locking." But she is careful, and does not remove her helmet. She looks around and produces a weapon.

"Trouble?" Anne asks.

"Just being prepared. I doubt it."

"You think they might be sick, or hurt?" Anne asks.

Pat shook her head. "No, it's probably nothing. Still, let's not dress-down till we've had a glance."

They drift the corridors through tunnels of foliage, dappled in shadow. The sound of their movement echoes in their helmets, as they seek any sign of life.

"Oxygen's OK," Anne reports after a while. She is learning how to operate the suit.

"Yeah. Let's wait, anyway. There might be contaminants. Suit sensors are OK, but nothing's foolproof. Or detailed enough."

"Can't you call them?" Moving around in the suit is fatiguing.

"We tried that. They mustn't be here."

"But everything's on."

"People don't turn things off just because they go out, you know."

"I thought they did all the processing here." In fact, the leafy tunnel they travel spirals up around the asteroid core, and the sound of the operation of the processing plant fills the air they refuse to breathe.

"Yeah, yeah," Pat replies, impatiently. She stops by an intercom at a corridor junction, and calls. There is no answer.

"There just isn't anyone here," she says. "Let's rest, then we'll go back." She lifts off the dome of her helmet, and takes a sniff just as the intercom activates with a depressed voice - "Pat? Is that you?"

Pat leans on the switch. "Yes, yes. Everybody all right? We're not interrupting, are we?"

The voice mutters, then become clear.

"We're all very sick, Pat," it whispers.

Pat's prominent eyes widen, and she slams the helmet down on its collar.

Large, polished objects shift across the concrete, whining, roaring; swaths of light shed shadows on the slabs like cloaks under the evening. Loudspeakers punctuate the sounds of energy with cryptic announcements whose meaning, as often as not, is lost in some blast of engines.

Phil has known only quieter technologies. He steps back from the door, hesitating. Sharon is several steps out onto the field before it occurs that she should look back. "Come on," she calls, encouraging. He shakes off the spell and follows her into the shouting darkness. He clutches his bag, afraid to let go. Would he be swept away without its weight?

He feels himself breathing hard, and he tries to hold it back, but that seems to make it worse. He lets out his breath with a sigh, unheard in the cacophony. "This isn't a good idea," he mutters. He has no confidence that he will be able to live up to her expectations of him. He is a rarity, perhaps, never having flown. All the places he had ever needed could be reached on the ground in reasonable time. He is ashamed to say so.

A line of flame forms in the distance, tracing upward slowly. The sound of the stressed engines, dimmed by miles, rolls across the field as the vehicle rises toward space. He links his arm with hers. "Where are we going?" he shouts at her ear.

"Just down here," she replies loudly.

The expression on her face is one Phil will never forget. Her eyes are wide and shining. Her mouth, normally tight, and faintly grim, even when she is pleased, is now looser and smiling with a brief curve at the corners of her lips. He realizes that she is as perfectly at home in this place as she is in the pottery, that for her there is no conflict between the life of technology and the art of life. He is surprised by how proud he is of that. It makes him forget, for a moment, his own fears, even though his arms are still shaking with tension. "OK, let's go."

At the near end of the flight line stands the graceful silhouette of her shuttle. It is much larger than he expects. Too large, he is sure. "This is it?"

"Yeah. Up this way."

She leads him up a well-lit ladder into the belly of the shuttle. The sounds outside diminish into the sounds of their feet on metal.

They proceed down a narrow corridor with flush doors along its length. Her shadow is enormous from the overheads, sweeping back toward him each time she passes under a light. She stops at a forward door and pushes it open. "I'll start the internal preflight. Why don't you put your stuff in there?" She gestures at a cabinet door. "Strap it down, or it'll be all over the place, though."

He nods. She disappears as he stows his bag in the narrow, unfamiliar compartment.

When he steps into the flight deck, it is into a darkened world of symbols and graphics. He thinks there is no way to see out until he hears Sharon mutter, "open view..." Half of the space before him, cluttered with virtual instruments and graphics, is swept aside, and the field, with the stars hidden beyond, looks into the dark chamber.

"Fire abatement," she calls from the left seat.

"Checked," drones the system in reply.

"Doors one through six."

"Sealed."

"Night beacons."

"On."

"Hi, Phil."

"Sorry?" the system asks.

"Sit there," she waves him to the right seat, ignoring the voice. "I'll be done in a second."

"Taxi lights," she continues.

"You've forgotten RUDDER CHECK."

"Right, sorry. Rudders?"

"Left and right, seventy five degrees deflection. Left constrained by one degree, previous maintenance order unclosed."

"Ignore it. Taxi lights."

"On. Ready to taxi. Preflight complete."

"Thanks. Disengage, and provide ground control."

"Good night, Ms. Lazlo."

She smiles.

"Ready to go?"

"I guess," he replies, dubious.

"Just set up your harness," she orders. "Like this." She demonstrates.

He does it, fumbling awkwardly with the clips. The lights shift down to a deep amber. Outside, another shuttle wheels by on its way to the launching pit.

She locks down the control arms on her seat and takes the handle. "Ground, six seven delta for Nimbus on two three zero."

"Six seven delta can roll any time. Have a good flight, Ms. Lazlo."

"Thanks, Wilf. We're rolling."

"They know you," Phil says.

"Oh, yeah." The first movement of the vehicle is a shock. It is as if the view has lurched of its own volition. She steers them down a narrow corridor between blue lights. "It'll feel strange," she warns him. "We go up at four to six gees, so it'll be like there's a very fat woman sitting on your chest. Nothing's going to happen, though. Even if you feel a little faint, it's OK. Once we start the burn, just hang on. It won't be too bad for too long."

"All right." He seeks the arms of the seat, and his hands grip them suddenly, hidden in the dimness. He feels his heart pounding. Surely that isn't normal.

She smiles at him. "Don't worry, you'll do fine. I felt the same way."

"I doubt it," he replies, his smile slightly forced.

"No, really."

He breathes sharply. "Yeah."

They line up behind some others on the taxiway. The flame of a departing flight glares luridly across the coolant pond before being cloaked with steam. The crackling of engines remains an aftershock even as the glow of the exhaust diminishes into the sky. They wait. He finds himself becoming more comfortable. The inside of the shuttle smells like a new car, and the importance of the odd sounds and the knowledge that they are to fly becomes less as they wait. Then they roll out onto the taxiway moving across the bay. Soon they latch down on the rack, and raise for launch.

"One way to go, Horatio" Sharon says the keyphrase, causing ignition.

It slaps him across the chest, like a feeling he remembers from a friend driving recklessly, but it keeps building. The vibration of the engines is like fear. Sharon smiles over at him, obviously hardly affected, and he tries to respond, but the enduring flickering roar feels like sobbing deep in his chest.

The earth swings away below them as the nose disappears; suddenly the glittering black horizon is distant, then it is sliding down the windows more slowly. The clouds descend toward them, race them, then envelop them, cloaking the glittering lights of the cities below.

She steers the vehicle with subtle motions of her wrist, feeling the surge and flow. The entire nose is now window, and they are perched above the world, graphics indicating orientation and the landmarks of the ethereal world of navigation. To Phil it is giddy, disorienting, the way the shapes and symbols wheel across a world growing toward dawn. To Sharon, it is the line of her wings -- and more; the shuttle has dissolved, and she is ascending over the horizon...

Phil narrows his eyes as the shuttle rises further. The light of the sun is beginning to tint the atmosphere, just as the air begins to thin to its ultimate end. He feels the fat woman gaining weight, squeezing the breath from his chest. The stars have appeared, or his eyes are losing sight, even as the sun rises, and the sky glitters -- it feels like the sparkling of eyes looking through his haze of shortened breath.

Now the earth has become an arc, continents dark against the reflective ocean. It diminishes only gradually. Sharon bows her mind to the beauty of flight, grateful, in a personal way, for the ability to experience, and for the gifts provided by those with the ability to produce the tools of her joy.

She sets the parabola and leans back, glancing over to where Phil sits tensely; she touches his hand in comfort.

While Erin considers her developing child, and Sharon rises above the Earth with Phil, Pat is lying in creche at the home of the Andresons, drifting above the mossy curve in her suit. Anne watches carefully from within her own suit.

Isolation is the key, she is sure. She wore her suit; Pat, even though infected and suffering, wore her suit. While they can't go on much longer this way, it provides immediate protection against whatever organisms or poisons are in the air. The Andresons, meanwhile, are each in their separate rooms, and Anne treates them separately, spacewalking between visits, hoping to kill any organisms that might lie on the skin of her suit.

The infection alternates periods of fever and lucidity. Profuse sweating and reddened skins are the hallmark of the illness.

She had called McCoy Hospital under Pat's instructions hours ago. Where is the ambulance? Her hair is damp, clinging to her cheek like spider's web. She wants to scratch. To take a rest. To get her hands on a lab. There isn't a damn thing but metal analysis systems and first aid in the house.

When Pat had passed out, only hours after their entry, Anne had cursed, standing beside the creche. "Nothing but a first aid kit. Don't they expect any accidents?"

Pat is hazy about how exactly she has come to this room. With the suit around her, she at first assumes that she is in space, and second that there is a problem with her life support, because her breath comes hard and rasping. That is when she wonders how she had gotten into this situation, and that is when she realizes that she remembers putting her helmet back on, just before she had felt dizzy the first time. And then, being afraid, stumbling a bit in the suit -- she never did that, but the illness here is a shock, she should make some allowances for herself. Lamper is always complaining about her complaints...

Anne stares at the lock alarm. It is blinking bright red, startling her when she has begun to doze from exhaustion.

"Oh, no," she mutters. She had nearly fallen asleep standing up, drifting in a wilderness of stiff limbs and sweat.

She peers through the door at the bulky-suited two-person team. No equipment? she wonders.

They exit the airlock with a sudden draft of the leftover warming air that blows dust and tiny things across the anteroom. It isn't until their hands move up to their helmets that Anne realizes what is about to happen.

"No! No!" she cries, angrily. "What is the matter with you people?"

They looks at her, bewildered, a man and a dark woman of middle-age.

"Quarantine!" Anne insists.

"Oh," the man apologizes. "Sorry."

Anne shakes her head. "You're lucky. This thing'll lay you out in fifteen or twenty minutes. Hyper-allergic, maybe, I think, it might be contaminants."

That makes them look very concerned as they gather around. "Are you exposed?"

"No."

"Tell us about it," the man asks.

"Well, it's airborne, it causes reddening of the skin, and fever. It's very fast. I came here with Pat, and only about fifteen minutes after exposure the fever reached one hundred and four. It alternates delirium and normality in about two hour cycles."

"You must be medical," the woman says.

"Anne Lambert," she says. "Mostly surgery, but on Mars there's not much room for specialists. Oh, yes, I almost forgot -- they sweat. Rivers. Dehydration had better be a major concern."

"Right. I'm Laryl Hardock; this is Gayn Felice. We're the local cluster meds."

"So, what's on? You have facilities for this?"

Laryl and Gayn trade glances. Laryl shakes her head.

"There's quarantine for all of us till it's isolated. It's not very much fun. You're better off here."

"Listen, there's nothing here. Now, two of the family have been down for over twenty hours. They don't eat or drink, they vomit, and there's no IV equipment here. So just what good is staying going to do?"

"We have a lab in the truck; support systems too."

"You get that in here, then. How much room for the lab?"

Gayn shrugs. "A meter on a side total? It's a Glass/Philac etiometer, some pattern recognition experts, and a linkage synthesizer."

"I haven't used the Glass/Philac; back home I have a Mariner. Still, it can't be that much different. All right, you get what you have, and I'll find a place near the patients. And then... I've got to spend some time out of this suit. I've never even been in one before today." She is embarrassed by her stumbling tongue. They nod. She feels there are only a few minutes remaining before she will have to scream, but with all her energy, she suppresses it.

"Erin, what's going on? You were so strange, so out there, tonight. Is something wrong?" Gordon asks. They lie in the darkness. He hadn't wanted to ask, knowing Erin, who never accepts sympathy.

The sound of the waves and the smell of the summer are the hidden chorus beyond the windows. Faint light from the seaside streaks Erin's face and body. She rolls away, her back to him, climbing muscles a topography of strength. Ever since they had met, he had thought his passion was greater than hers. It hurt him, but he had become reconciled to the loneliness of their separate paths. Now he wants to cry out; his powerful exterior is a front when it comes to her...

"Erin..."

She rolls back and looks at him, her eyes dark, skin faintly pale. There is an extra shine in that dark iris, as if -- no, that would be impossible.

"I'm going to have your baby, Gordon," she says quietly.

For a moment, he doesn't know what that means.

"My ... baby?"

"That's right," she whispers.

"I... don't know what to say."

"Say you love me, Gordon. Please."

"Oh Erin." He embraces her. There is the gentle pressure of flesh as their faces rock side by side. "I love you so much," he whispers. "Of course I love you."

After a while, they look at each other. She whispers, "Gordon, I want this, but... I'm still scared. You don't mind, do you?"

The tears on her face match his.

"No, Erin, I don't mind."

Anne had brought them to the patients, and now, watching as they set up the lab, the fatigue drains all motivation from her, leaving behind a hollow shell; she feels her eyes sinking fast. Finally, blinking hard, she says, "I have to get some sleep."

They look up at once, concerned.

"You're all right, aren't you?"

"I'm just out on my feet. I've been up for eighteen hours, and eight in this suit. I'm not going to be good for anything unless I get some sleep."

"You can't sleep here." Gayn protests.

"I'll sleep in Pat's vehicle."

"I'll take you over," Laryl volunteers. "Come on."

Anne nods. She feels her body take the relief as a signal to relax, but she knows she can't allow it. It is just like climbing. You can't rest until the exit move is complete. That's all. Not yet. Soon.

She monkeys slowly to the airlock with Laryl, who talks on the way. "It's a shame about Pat. She's never been down like this."

"But what is it?" Anne mutters. She looks over to Laryl. "I've never seen anything like it."

Laryl gestures her left hand as they step into the lock. "I have no idea."

The air rushes away into silence. Laryl shows her how to clip herself to the guideline. They walk slowly under the wheeling stars to where the vehicles wait under the floodlights.

Laryl helps her out of the suit and into the web. Anne brushes back her sticky hair as it floats aimlessly, knotting it at the base of her head with clumsy motions. "Thanks, Laryl," she whispers.

"Sure. Get some sleep. We'll check on you in eight hours."

But Anne is already gone.

Nimbus Station is a brilliant speck above the night horizon as Sharon and Phil complete their second orbit. Earth slides slowly below, but Nimbus grows more rapidly to dimensions. Phil is quiet, looking to the side, at the curve below. Sharon watches his profile. What is he thinking? she wonders. He has hardly says a word. Why?

"How're you doing?" she asks, finally.

His eyes snap back to her. "What? Oh, I'm OK. But it's strange. I never imagined your work, you know?"

She laughs. "No. I don't."

His smile is rueful, his voice quiet. "Well, I ... never really thought about it. I mean, I never pictured it. I've seen it on shows, you know. Flying. It's not like what you see. Sure, you know that. Honest, I was scared shitless when we went up."

"Yeah, it's a strange environment at first."

He shakes his head and looks back out the side. "No it isn't, not to you."

"That's true."

"I've never even been off the ground before."

"You're kidding."

He closes his eyes and leans back against the seat cushion. "I wish I was."

A slow smile spreads across her face.

"You're doing fine, Phil."

"Oh, yeah."

"I mean it."

"I feel like I'm going to get sick."

"Really?" She reaches for a sick bag.

"No, not like that." He flutters a hand to stop her. "Just all the time, a little."

"Listen, when I started flying -- air, not space -- I scared the hell out of my instructor, lost my lunch in the middle of an accelerated stall. I was so damn embarrassed. Into a spin. All I saw right then was so perfect a picture of how high I was by diving into the ground, I couldn't help but lose it. He had to pull me out. I have never had a more miserable time. I hope I never have a more miserable time, though short of throwing up in my suit, I can't really imagine anything more awful."

He is chuckling.

"Better?" she asks.

He nods, trying to stifle his laughter. "Every time I think I know where you're coming from, you blow me away."

"Well, thanks," she says.

He shook his head. "You have all this, and I never knew. I guess I thought you were just a rich kid. All the chances, you know."

"What are you talking about?"

"Well, you're wealthy. I mean you've never even been to my apartment, you know that?"

"So what is it? Art student squalor? You think I never lived like that?"

He cocks his head. "I have no idea."

"Oh, man, I have been a failure." She applies a burst to align them with the Nimbus docking beacon.

"Oh?"

"What do you know about me, Phil?"

"Let's see." He ticks off the points on his fingers. "Pilot, teacher, dancer, climber, a potter who's had a show in every major gallery and museum. You're patient but you're fierce... I don't know. I thought you were going to kill me when I did that show. I hated the show. I couldn't even go see it, or read the reviews."

"You're kidding."

He looks direct. "I was so stupid."

"I never told you I went, did I?"

"What?"

"Yeah. I was so angry, I had to."

"What does that mean?"

"It means we're off the track. You're telling me you thought I was a little rich girl. Or is it a rich little girl? Why? Just because I'm doing all right now?"

"It's so natural for you."

"I am not going to tell you my life's story while I'm docking, dear."

"It might not be a bad idea. When else?"

"Look, my parents are dead. They died in a shuttle crash in the Himalayas. They had a big house, which I had to rent out to live. A lot later, I sold it to finance my shuttle lessons, and I lived in a one room apartment in Miami for two years. Flatlands. No climbing. Gyms." Her voice is disgusted. "I flew shuttle for five years, Florida to Gorky and back, three times a week. I saved everything I made, and I worked a part-time job in a dance studio for lessons so I could get to be the teacher's assistant and make a little more. Then I got work on the Venus Darkside Project. Six years later I started Orbitech. Gordon bought me out two years later and made me chief instructor. Now I'm just a consultant, and I make my royalty on input to Gordon's suit designs. I do some teaching. That's my money." She snorts and flinches away. "And right now, I have to do some docking, okay?" Her tone has gradually reached where it sounds almost angry.

He is watching her, astonished.

"Yeah, sure."

She turns back to the consoles, heat rising up her neck, hands faintly unsteady.

Anne stirs in her sleep. dreaming of Mars. In the instant before she wakes, she feels the faint breeze of her home ventilators diminish. Then she awakens to the hum of the systems of Pat's vehicle. It takes her a moment to come out of the dream, to realize that she is lying in the narrow web of her tiny room in the vehicle.

She groans. Her body feels as if she has spent ten hours in the exercise machine. It is that damn suit, she is sure of it.

She remembers.

"Gayn?" she calls. "Laryl?"

No answer. Of course -- they are probably back at the asteroid.

She sits up, moving stiffly.

How is she going to get back? Maybe she can use the communications; she watched Pat; she can call Laryl, have her come back and help with the suit...

No! she thinks. I'll do it myself. Come on.

The suit is standing rigid by the lock, tied to the rack, split down the center. Anne examines it dubiously. Pat had done all of the pre-power checklists from memory, but Anne hasn't a clue as to what they were. There has to be documentation somewhere.

She pokes through the compartments beside the lock, reaching through the nets to rifle through the contents. She checks bags of parts, rags, and old bottles. Nothing. She drifts back, exasperated.

She considers the suit. Backpack, chestpack, chin control rack, glove controllers dangling like severed hands. Pockets.

Pockets!

The pocket on the glove conceals a heavy-duty fabric computer fastened to the broad back of the hand. She unclips the glove, and floating in midair, she watches as the first page of the checklist appears, clearly titled.

"Well, well, well."

She reads it carefully three times, gently fending off the walls and the ceiling as she floats slowly about the room. Suddenly she looks around and laughs. "Why, I'm getting used to this." She grasps a net and pulls herself down to the suit.

"OK," she mutters. "Let's try it."

She is exhausted by the time she has crossed the distance from Pat's vehicle to the lock. The stars are sliding past above and beside, making her dizzy. She falls several times, rebounding and drifting slowly up, caught then by the guideline. It is so much work, thrashing and fighting in the nearly non-existent gravity to get her feet under her. She nearly panics once, but clinging to the line as she swings slowly around, she talks herself out of it.

She activates the lock as she had seen Pat do; first the safety latch over the console, then the clearly marked open button, which she pokes with an unwieldy pinky. Then she is inside, and the doors are closed; the faint hiss of air becomes a roar, thickening, then dying into silence. She takes a deep breath and sighs.

"Come on, Anne," she warns herself. "You're just getting started."

"Any luck?" she asks.

The suited figures look up from where they crouch over the large display spread across the floor. Laryl shakes his head. "This is mostly diagnostics," he says. "Not well suited to this sort of thing." He looks haggard, wisps of hair dragged oily across his scalp, as if he had somehow reached up inside his suit to brush it back at one time or another.

"What about the patients?"

The meds exchange glances.

"It's getting worse," Gayn mutters, looking back at the display.

"What about chemical poisons?" Anne asks, feeling a desperate shiver.

"Uh uh," Laryl replies. "Very unlikely."

"Viruses or bacteria then."

"Yes, but we're not having much luck figuring out what. It must be a mutant. We're not getting any good guesses from this unit, though."

Anne drifts over and inspects the diagram. It is a relatively straightforward inference chart.

"Great. All right, let me have more on the patients."

Gayn takes that one, drifting back from the wall, looking sadly at the chart. "The children are the worst. The IV is keeping the dehydration down, but the pulse is sporadically irregular. The parents are doing a bit better, and Pat is doing best of all."

"OK, so it's progressive," Anne says. She scans the chart for the appropriate line of reasoning. "We've got that. What's this?"

"Classification splay."

"Not much pruning there."

"We don't have much in the way of limiting factors."

"What about monitoring?"

Laryl spoke up. "We tried that. Nothing much came out of it though."

"Oh, come on. What did you run?"

"Lucidity, brainwave, renal, poisons."

"What about heart and lymph?"

"Well we ran lymph for infection, but there's nothing."

"Nothing! With a fever like that? Look, go check those probes again, make sure you're looking for lymphocytes -- in fact, check for decreases as well as activity. Get a heart monitor on. I bet we've got some irregularities there. Now, listen, we haven't got much time, we can't mess around with certainty -- we're going to have to do some treatments to symptoms as well as to causes. The IV's is just a start. Can you guys call me up an inventory of what you've got? I need some ideas..."

Sharon watches the darkened images on the wallboards. Beside her, Phil drifts uneasily in sleep.

They had just outlined the distinction between their attitudes.

He had been petulant with weightless sickness, and they had done nothing all day. When even the slightest movement seemed to depress him, she had complained, igniting a bitter fight, in which he had shouted her down for forcing him here. It is true enough to provoke her into an icy silence.

This area of her life is closed to him. It can't be shared, except in some remote way she is unwilling to try.

She unlatches her hammock and drifts up into the room. She dresses quietly, suspended beside the closet, waiting for signs of awareness. She freezes, feeling guilt at the thought that he might awaken while she is gone.

But her skills and her need is pulling at her, she realizes suddenly. Her every action is a counterweight to guilt. Rael's death crippled her, because she was unable to bear the price for her responsibility, and because her guilt deserves that no action seem answer enough.

And what about this? Her new love. Is that more guilt? Is she going to be satisfying others now for the rest of her life?

No wonder Anne climbs solo. No one to depend on; no one depending...

She finishes dressing. Phil stirs, muttering softly in his sleep. Sharon turns to the wall console, where she keys in a message for him.

The door slides aside onto a field of light. She blinks and rubs her eyes like a sleeper awakening at dawn.

Alone with her sudden freedom, she hangs in the center of the corridor, trying to decide what to do. She wants some time outside -- in space. She has been denying herself for too long. And then, some time in the lounge with the crews, talking the technology. Easy to escape failures this way, some nasty portion of her mind reminds her.

She shrugs it off. Change is her strength. She can walk away from something not going well and turn to something that is, until she is ready to go back and fight it out. Oh, Rael, I misunderstood so much when they said you wouldn't want it this way. You wouldn't want me to destroy myself for you.

She floats to a wallphone and calls Lock Services.

The sound of depressurization roars into silence and the lights dim to amber. The metal of the helmet ring gives off a luster like burnished brass, color of the sun, and the reflection of a streak from the curve of earth, color of electricity, more precious than any jewel. She steps forward slowly, each movement of her legs adhesive as the boots cling to the floor of the lock for a single instant, then release. Above, infinity, and hidden by the glare of the earth, stars. Below, a fall of unmeasurable distance.

She steps out into the void. For a moment, she thinks she should have brought a lifeline.

Come on, woman. You're a professional.

She powers up the drivers and lights them off. She lifts gently from the lock edge into space, leaving the obvious movement along with the reference points behind her.

Patience comes in space, because there is only time. A funny aphorism, because it could be arranged so many ways and still be true.

She checks the locations of the beacons using her helmet services. Nimbus is only a half hour away. She calls for clearance. The crew chief knows her and obtains it in record time. She orients and performs the burn. Except for the instruments, nothing changes. The earth remains a wall, but it is far above, and beautiful. Nothing can come between her and the earth now.

"Okay, so see, it's the low lymphocyte count that's opening them up to infection. We're maybe not even looking at primary symptoms," Anne insists. "So we've got something that kills lymphocytes. Something airborne. Anybody know what the hell they are working on? Gayn? Gayn, where the hell are you?"

Gayn looks over from where he stands with Laryl. "Listen, we've got to get a break."

Anne feels a sudden anger seize her. She knows it is unjust, she knows how they feel -- she is fresh and they is not. But she is so close. So close. And Pat...

"All right, listen. Get some broad-spectrum antibiotic into everyone. Call back to the hospital for bloods. Do you guys keep clone marrow from these people?"

"Yeah, there's samples at every blood bank," Laryl replies. Her voice is heavy.

Anne grins. "Great. Get whole white out here, stat. Get some generic, too, in case the kids aren't on file yet. Then, once you've got that in motion, get out of here and catch four hours. No more, though. OK? By then the bloods ought to be in... Now, what the hell was I thinking of? Allergies? I haven't done this for years."

Sharon floats back to the lock, quiet and still inside her suit. She settles gently on the in ledge, steps through, and waits while the lights come up from amber to white. She sighs as she steps out of the warming chamber into the web; she waits for a moment, then, finally, unclips her helmet and removes it.

A figure hangs in the darkness of the empty, nearby lounge, limned with the faint blue light of the earth. She realizes it is Phil.

"Hi, Sharon."

The energy seems to drain out of her. She swings slowly in the air and clings to the web, racking her helmet on the strap. Finally, she glances at him. He waits in the doorway.

"Hi, Phil." Her voice is toneless, tired. Damn, I don't want to be that way.

"Can I come in? I mean, it's allowed?"

"Sure it's allowed." She unlocks the suit and drifts out of it.

He moves cautiously, staying with the webs along the wall. He stops near where she works in the web, eyes flicking from her face to her hands.

"I... wanted to apologize."

She looks at him sharply. "What do you mean?"

He smiles, sadly. His eyes are faintly gleaming. "I overreacted."

She sighs and leans back into the web, tugging at her suit fastenings. "Mmmm."

"I was watching. You really moved beautifully out there."

Her pride sneaks up on her and curves her lips in a smile. She bows her head and stows the suit in the locker, while Phil looks on with uncertainty. She moves out of the web and touches his shoulder. "You don't have to do this for me, Phil. I don't want you doing things you think I want. If you can't be involved with my kind of life, that's okay. You're not wrong, you know, just .. It's just... maybe we're different."

"Sharon, give me a chance, will you? To get a word in?"

"Sorry." She can see his knuckles are pale on the webbing, and she realizes how much the journey from the cabin must have cost him.

"I think I'm getting better. I'm not quite so... queasy. Well, sure, I can stand it. I even found my way here. Isn't that something?"

She wants to cry. Quietly she grasps his upper arm through the web. "Yeah."

They have dinner in the gravity section at a table with candles whose light flows and flickers in the movements of air. There is only the sound of low conversation and the clicking of utensils, only the stir of humans and robots moving gracefully. The wine pours with a strange curve in the complexity of rotational motion.

I am not going to quit, she thinks.

While Anne is waiting for the blood, she floats in front of the inference board, thinking of the next course. She has a lightweight treatment worked out, yet, despite her optimism, she is not close enough to the cause for the optimism to feel fully justified. Her mind is turning toward chemical poisons. Lymphocytes are sensitive to a few diseases -- cancer, aids, maybe a few other odd viruses, like the mutant feline leukemia. But the action in this case is far too fast. It indicates an initial, drastic drop in the number or effectiveness of the lymphocytes, follows by a marginal gain in potency. Diseases are normally much more protracted in their etiology.

But chemical poisons...

At least, that hypothesis made her decision to keep everyone in their suits look more sensible. But what about the source of the poison? The type. The potency. Could it be effective in the traces on the suits...

She feels suddenly cold. She slept an entire night in a vehicle with the suit. Assuming it was a virus or a bacterium, she had felt safe. Vacuum and UV would have certainly kill it. Now it is beginning to appear she might have been wrong.

All right, there were no ill effects so far. She could draw a blood from herself and run tests during her next rest period. Not here. Not now. Instead, the thought she had -- the one which had eluded her... What was it?

Of course. The work. What is the work they were doing here? Smelting. But maybe some experimentation? On what? Where would she find that information?

She notes her ideas onto the inference board, which promptly volunteers a map of the station, and asks if she'd like access into the station systems for a search. She takes it, surprised at the comprehensive capabilities of the expert. She hadn't expected any help on this end of the hypothesis.

"Well, well," she mutters.

It takes three hours to search the indices. She had received the bloods, strapped up the IVs through the suit ports, and now stands indecisively at Pat's creche for a while. Pat is flushed, tossing in the suit, then quiescent. Anne sighs. The pace is getting to her, she is exhausted again.

She checks vital signs for everyone. They are still extremely sick. The children are the closest to losing their grip. She feels a momentary spasm of sadness slip though her professional disposition. I can't think about that, she insists. But those small faces seem to be pleading in their distress...

Back to the records, while Laryl and Gayn carry the animals in, setting them up for exposure tests, getting ready for autopsies. She glances over as they rack the vacuum units over the cutting tables, and she has a sudden picture of Pat or one of the children lying under those harsh lights, dead, but knowing. Oh, no.

She pulls herself out of it. Not now. Not if you want to avoid that. Come on.

She checks the displays of the vitals that Laryl had racked beside the inference board, like a racer watching the clock.

Come on, the systems.

It takes some time to figure out someone else's filing system, and some of the metallurgical/chemical notations are obscure to her. "Hey, Gayn," she calls. "Can you read this stuff?" He drifts over and peers past her shoulder.

"A little."

She hisses with frustration. "There must be some damn way to program this thing to give me toxicity on the byproducts from these process files." Her hand weakly clutches at the edge of the board.

Laryl reaches over. "Listen, I know how to do that. Back off, everyone."

They float slowly back as she moves in. Her fingers connect symbols on the board, and bring up a window with toxicity reports. "How's that?" she grins proudly behind the glass.

Anne releases a sigh, and with a reflex she thought she had overcome, she reaches up to rub the back of her head, encountering the helmet. She grins ruefully. "That, my dear, is just what we need." She looks around. "Gayn, you can take those animals back to the vehicle, we won't need them. You see this one here?" She points to a line on the report. "That's the one." Her hand is shaking.

"We did the right thing. Just keep the bloods going. In a little while, they should be strong enough to get into the vehicle. Then we're going to the hospital for chemical decon on them..." She feels the shaking travel with shocking speed across her body, and suddenly she is crying, curled up, floating in the air. Gayn helps Anne to a corner, where she crouches, her sobs filling their ears, until she quiets, tears streaming along her cheeks and wandering through the helmet.

"I can't believe we found it," she whispers, shaking her head. "I can't believe it."

They transfer to McCoy on the ambulance.

Pat shifts in the hospital webbing, and Anne awakens instantly. The room is padded with vines, and they hiss under her fingers as she rolls.

For a moment, it is unclear what is happening. She remembers a frightening dream, with a terrible sense of loss. Then the events of the last few days come back to her and she is fully alert, wondering.

Pat's eyelids shift, and Anne can see, even in this dim light, the movement of her eyes beneath them. Perhaps she is finally coming awake.

Content, Layout, and Images Copyright © 1999 by Mark Cashman except where indicated (NASA photos)