“That may be. But your proposal is likely to accelerate that loss.”
“I’m still Admiral!” she screamed. “You handle your job, Transfer back to your segment, and leave me alone!” And she proceeded out of the control room, angling to counter the slant of the deck. Hardly a gallant exit!
Llume followed. “I join you, if I may.”
When friends deserted, support by the enemy was welcome! “You may.”
But Llume halted. “It is necessary to bring the discipline-box. Once I pass out of its range…”
“That box became inoperative when ship’s power was cut,” Melody said. “Didn’t you notice?”
“You should not take the risk.”
“If you want your freedom, get on a lifeboat,” Melody snapped. “I can’t use you unless you’re with me all the way.” And she moved on, Slammer following.
“You have the courage of a fool,” Llume said, spinning her wheel in her haste to catch up.
“That is a compliment to a Tarot fanatic.”
They entered one of the long stem-to-stern access-halls. Motion was awkward because the anchors were still slowing the ship’s rotation. The decline was jerky, as first one strand went taut, then the other, then both together. This threw them against the walls, bashing into the metal handholds. The passage was in the inner section of the ship, positioned to facilitate efficient transport by reducing gravity—and gravity itself was diminishing erratically.
“Like a crazy house!” Yael said, enjoying it.
Crazy house; but Melody did not need to delve for the underlying concept. Any species capable of enjoying disorientation like this was crazy!
Slammer shot off down a side passage. “That’s not the route!” Melody called. But it was soon out of sight in the dusk. The reduced power made a twilight zone of the entire ship, giving the passages an eerie quality.
“Slammer probably needs stoking,” Yael said.
Good guess. Melody had snatched bites to eat along the way, hardly consciously; the crew stewards, like the Slaves of Sphere Canopus, were very obliging. But she hadn’t thought about the magnets. “We’ll wait a few minutes,” she said aloud. “Slammer will return.”
“He can readily locate us,” Llume pointed out. “The loss of the ship’s power has no effect on magnets.”
Melody nodded. She was tired and hurting again, but she didn’t have to manufacture pretexts to rest! “I’m not thinking straight. Of course you’re right. We’ll go on.”
“Permit me,” Llume said, twining her tail around Melody’s torso. For a moment Melody resisted; if Llume were going to do her harm, the absence of the magnet would make this the ideal time. But then she felt the aura, so very like her own. The most compatible sister-aura she had ever encountered. How could she distrust an aura like that?
She yielded. The Polarian form, adapted to balance, was much better suited to this mode of travel than the Solarian form. Llume picked Melody up and accelerated down the hall. The added weight restored the wheel’s traction against the deck.
Then Melody heard the whine of a rapidly traveling magnet. She looked back, and there was Slammer, gaining on them. He had a satellite: Beanball. “Of course!” Melody exclaimed, relieved. “We couldn’t leave the baby alone in that cabin!”
The group continued on down the length of the ship— and almost collided with a group of crewmen who emerged suddenly from a side passage.
“Sirs, the evacuation route is this way,” one said, saluting.
“We know,” Melody said. “We are going to remove the anchors.”
The crewmen did a doubletake. “Sir… weren’t you… ah, informally… hullside with Gary’s team?”
“You were on that job?” Melody asked as Llume set her down.
“No, sir. It’s just that word gets around. But we have met.”
“March!” Yael exclaimed joyfully. “The man we traveled with in the shuttle!”
So it was! “Of course, March,” Melody said, as if she had never been in doubt. “We can use you now, if you care to volunteer. But if you do, you will miss the life-craft out, so don’t do it unless—”
“Sir, I understand,” the man said. “I shall remain with this ship.” He turned to his companions. “Get the hell on to the boats!”
The others moved on wordlessly. “Sir,” March said. “I don’t know much about hullside work, but you’ll need three more.”
“We’ll make do with whatever we have,” Melody said.
“I mean, to carry the laser torch. It weighs two hundred pounds. The foot-magnets won’t hold.”
Melody visualized a two-hundred-pound weight hanging from the hull, and remembered her jaunt into space. She shivered. The man was right; it would take a proper crew. “We’ll just have to see,” she said.
The lights failed. The hall became absolutely dark, for this was no planetary surface with diffused light. But in a moment Llume glowed, illuminating her own way. She depended more on sound than sight anyway.
They took the chute down to the hull, but now it was a giddy ride through the impenetrable dark. Melody felt as if she were floating upward. She had increasing doubts that what she was doing was wise. If they turned about right now, they could still catch a lifeboat…
And maybe give the segment to the Andromedans.
“Of course you’re right,” Yael said. “We can’t do that.”
“You mean that was your thought, about turning back?” Melody asked.
“I guess so. It’s funny. I always liked adventure, and you didn’t. But when it comes to the crunch, you plunge in while I waver.”
“I have a more galactic view.”
“You have more damn courage!”
“Me? I’m just an old—”
“An old Mintakan neuter liar!”
“No, really; I’m terrified. But my life is mainly behind me, so I don’t have much to lose, and when something has to be done—”
“That’s what I mean,” Yael said. “Being scared simply doesn’t stop you. You keep saying how old you are, but I’ll bet you were the same when you were young.”
When she was young… She had been a conceited fool, a real one, not a symbolic Tarot fool. The Tarot fool had substantial redeeming qualities, while young Melody, in contrast, had thrown away her life. She had paid with eight subsequent Mintakan years of isolation. Only here in the human host had she really come alive. But how could she explain that?
“You don’t need to,” Yael said.
“I have no choice,” Melody said, reverting to the first subject. “If I had a way to save the galaxy without risk to myself, I’d take it.”
“Big concession!”
Melody realized she was no longer moving. She extended her feet and found the floor beneath the chute exit. They had reached the suiting room.
In a moment a brightening glow announced the arrival of Llume. Dim as this illumination was, Melody found it enough; her human eyes had adjusted, and she could now see most of the room.
Two more men arrived down another chute. “Didn’t you get the word?” March demanded. “Evacuation. Now.”
“We got the word,” one said. “We’re staying with the Ace.”
There was no further conversation, but Melody felt an overflowing of pride. This quiet patriotism in the face of threat—these men knew they were likely to die, but they weren’t fazed. “There is true courage,” Melody told Yael. “You and I are ignorant—”
“Babes in the woods.”
“Yes. We don’t know the risks. But March and his companions understand completely—and they are taking this risk. What finer recommendation of character can there be than that?”