"I can see the bus. She’s following me down."
"Good."
Quinda again: "Chase, you won’t have any trouble getting out of the skimmer, will you?"
"No," she said, her tone softening slightly. "I’ll be all right."
"Chase? Is that your name?" It was the bus pilot.
"Yes."
"Okay, Chase. We’re going to stay right with you. And your friends are coming. You’ll be all right."
"Thanks."
"I can’t get you out of the water. Ocean’s too rough for me to come close enough to try to reach you."
"It’s okay."
"I mean, I’ve got twenty people on board."
"It’s all right. Who are you?"
"Hock. Mauvinette Hochley."
"Thanks, Hoch."
"Water coming up. You’re going to hit in about twenty seconds."
We were down near the surface now. The boiling sea unrolled, and the wind screamed. Quinda had gone quiet again. I was starting to coil the cord.
One of the monitors blinked on. "Feed from the bus," Quinda said. We were looking at the stricken aircraft from slightly above and nearby. The bus was angled so that its running lights illuminated the scene. We could see Chase in the cockpit, pushed back into her seat, clinging to the yoke. The skimmer was shredded, undercarriage gone, holes punched in the fuselage, tail crumpled, one of its stubby wings shattered.
"How much longer?" I asked.
"Three, maybe four minutes."
"There’s no way," I whispered, covering the commlink with my hand so Chase wouldn’t hear.
"We’ll get there," Quinda said.
She hit hard. The skimmer slapped down into a trough and the ocean rolled over it.
We were all calling Chase’s name, but nothing moved in the cockpit.
"It’s sinking," said Hoch.
The skimmer wallowed in white water; a wing lifted momentarily, and broke off, its lights still burning brightly.
"We’re right overhead," said Hoch. "I wish to hell there was a hatch on the bottom of this son of a bitch." She sounded distraught.
Quinda’s breath was coming in short sharp gasps. "She’s not getting out," she said. "Alex—" Her voice started up the scale. "She’s not going to get clear."
The bus pilot whispered her name. "Come on, Chase. Get your ass out of there."
Nothing. The wreckage slipped beneath the water.
We hurtled across the heaving, white-flecked ocean.
"Hey!" It was Hoch’s voice. "What are you doing back there?"
Another outside camera switched on. We had a view of the bus’s main hatch. A crack of yellow light appeared around it, and then the door swung outward. A woman who’d been pushing on it nearly fell out.
There was a burst of profanity from Hoch.
A man—his name was Alver Cole, and I’ll remember it all my days—appeared in the doorway, hesitated, and jumped out into the ocean. He vanished immediately into the black water.
Quinda hit the braking jets. "About a minute," she said.
One of the bus’s lights stabbed down and picked up Cole, who had surfaced and was struggling toward the cockpit.
Hoch increased her magnification on the scene in the water. Swimmer and wreckage were lifted high on a wave. "I don’t know," said the bus pilot, "whether you can see this on your screen or not. But it looks as if he’s reached her."
"Hoch," I said. "Your door’s still open. You’re not going to let anybody else jump, are you?"
"I damn well hope not." She directed someone to see to it. Moments later, the light vanished.
"Patrol coming fast," said Quinda. "Be here in four or five minutes."
A cheer went up in the bus. "He’s waving," said Hoch. "He’s got her." Hoch continued to maneuver the big vehicle, trying to keep her winglamps on the water.
"We’re seconds away," said Quinda. "Get ready."
She pushed the braking jets to full throttle, and the skimmer went into a mild spin. But we stopped hard. I released the canopy lock and pushed it up out of the way. Snow and spray poured in, and I looked out across a slippery wing surface into blazing lights and rough ocean.
Quinda rotated the rear seats, and depressed their backs, giving us two couches. "Over to your left," came Hoch’s voice.
"There," said Quinda. I looked just in time to see two heads vanish beneath a wave.
Uncurling my cord, I crawled out onto the wing. It was icy, and my hands froze to it. A sudden burst of wind struck me, and I skidded wildly, sliding toward the ocean. But I got hold of a lamp, a flap, something, and ended up twisted over on my side, both legs dangling, still headed for the water. Quinda was out the door immediately, sprawled across the wing, holding me by an arm and a leg. I could hear Hoch’s voice over the shrieking of the storm, but I couldn’t tell what she was saying. The ocean was turned on its side, and my legs were tangled in the cord.
Quinda shifted around to get a better grip. A wave pounded into the skids, rocking the skimmer violently and sending cold spume into the air. "I’ve got you," she said.
"Hell of a rescue team," I grumbled, finally getting my balance, and rolling clumsily back into a sitting position.
"Okay?" she asked.
"Yeah. Thanks."
She gave me a thumbs-up, and ducked back inside just as we got hit again. The skimmer lurched, and icy water washed across the wing. Quinda produced strips of cloth from something and passed them out to me. I wrapped my hands in them.
I could see Chase and the man from the bus. But it was a long way down to them. Maybe eight meters. "Take it lower," I shouted.
"I think we’re already too low," Quinda said. "A couple more minutes of this and we’ll be swamped."
"A couple more minutes of this and it won’t matter." I went flat on my belly, wishing there was a way to jettison the skids. The swimmers were almost directly below me. Chase was either unconscious or dead. Her rescuer was doing his best to hold her head out of the water. Her leg floated at an odd angle. I watched it bend as they disappeared again into the turbulence.
In that moment, I could have killed Quinda Ann.
The man with Chase hung on. She coughed and threw her head back.
Alive, at least.
He seemed at the end of his strength.
I threw the line toward him. It fell close by, but his hands were frozen. He couldn’t get hold of it. I tried to drag it closer. He got it finally, and looped it around Chase. Quinda appeared beside me again. "Stay at the controls," I said.
"They’re on automatic."
"That won’t help if the ocean knocks us sidewise."
"That’s going to be dead weight coming up. You want to handle it alone?"
The man in the water waved. Okay.
We pulled the line tight. The ocean lifted her toward us, and then fell away. I heard encouragement from Hoch as Chase came out of the water. We were both on our knees now, taking advantage of what purchase we could get, hauling hand over hand.
Chase’s arms hung loosely at her side, and her head lolled on her shoulders.
When she was close enough, I reached down and grabbed her jacket. Her face was deathly white, and splinters of ice crystals clotted her hair and eyebrows. "Watch her leg," said Quinda.
We got her up onto the wing, and I got the line off her and threw it back into the ocean. Quinda climbed inside the cabin, and I passed Chase through. "Hurry," said Hoch. "You’re losing the other one." I left her for Quinda to move to the far couch, and went back for her rescuer.
He was trying to hold onto the line, and not having much luck. Too cold. He held one arm weakly toward me, and slipped under.
Quinda was back.
I handed her the end of the line, and was about to slide over the side, but she shook her head vehemently. "How do you expect me to haul him out of there? Or you afterward?"