Sheena waggled her head ponderously and her net slid clattering to the floor.
She huffed and stared at the net at her feet. Then she picked it up and draped it over her head again. Grant expected her to try to tie its loose ends, but instead she simply looked down at her open hands.
“No,” she said, and Grant thought it sounded discouraged, disheartened.
She looked at Grant. “Hands … no … Sheena can’t do.”
Grant felt a wave of sadness wash over him. She knows her hands aren’t dexterous enough to tie the ends. She knows how limited she is.
“Grant do,” said Sheena.
“Sure, Sheena,” he said, scrambling toward her. “I’ll be happy to help you.”
“Grant help Sheena.”
“Yes, I will.” He knelt before her powerful body, feeling the heat of her, knowing that those arms of hers could crush his ribs, and carefully tied the neural net under her chin.
“There,” he said, sitting back on the floor again. “Now we’re the same.”
“No.” Sheena swung her heavy head from side to side slowly. “Not same. Sheena not Grant. Grant not Sheena.”
He gulped once, wondering what he could say. When he found his voice, he replied, “I’m your friend, Sheena. You and I are friends.”
“Friends.” Sheena seemed to think that over for a while. Then she said again, “Grant help Sheena.”
“Yes,” he said. “I’ll help you all I can.”
When the overhead lights went down to their nighttime level and Sheena lumbered into the corner of her pen where the plastic padding had been wadded up into a sleeping nest, Grant climbed wearily to his feet and stepped out into the narrow corridor.
“Good night, Sheena,” he called.
She must have already fallen asleep, because she did not reply. Grant tiptoed to the electronic console sitting a few meters up the corridor. Gingerly he flicked on the power and activated the scanners.
Four small display screens along the top of the console lit up. Green worms of lines crawled across them. Squinting in the dim lighting, Grant checked to make certain that the equipment was recording Sheena’s brain waves. He nodded, satisfied, hoping that the data would cheer Pascal before she left on the deep mission. Maybe we’ll catch her dreaming, he hoped.
The next morning he located Pascal in the lockers where the mission crew changed into their wetsuits. No one else was in the locker area. The others had already gone to the aquarium for the day’s simulation tasks.
Pascal was pleased that they were getting data at last, but Grant could see that her mind was obviously focused on the mission.
“By the time you get back,” he said, trying to sound cheerful, “you’ll have enough data to write a book.”
“If we get back,” Pascal muttered.
“If?”
She zippered up the front of the suit, then reached for the plastic full-face mask on the shelf above the empty suit rack. Grant realized that her legs were bare. Glittery electrodes lined the outside of both legs from her hips to halfway down her calves. They looked like the ends of silver bullets embedded in her flesh. It took a conscious effort for Grant not to stare at them.
“The closer we get to launch, the more fearful I become,” Pascal confessed.
“That’s natural, I suppose,” said Grant. “Nerves.”
“Yes,” she said bitterly. “Entirely natural. But not pleasant to experience.”
Pascal headed for the doorway, her bare feet padding softly on the plastic tiles. Grant saw that she had forgotten her air tank. He picked it up from the floor of her locker, surprised at how heavy it was, and started after her.
Christel Krebs appeared at the doorway, her bulky form effectively blocking it. Pascal stopped, holding her transparent mask in both hands in front of herself, as if for protection.
Krebs stepped awkwardly toward her. Her thick legs were studded with electrodes, too, Grant saw.
She seemed to peer at Pascal quizzically.
“I’m sorry I’m running late, Dr. Krebs” Pascal began. “You see—”
“Dr. Pascal,” said Krebs, as if recognizing her for the first time. She blinked, then went on, “The others are all waiting for you. We have no time to waste.”
“Yes, I understand,” said Pascal.
“Irene,” Grant called. He held out the air tank. “You’ll need this, won’t you?”
Pascal hesitated, then put her mask down on the floor, and allowed Grant to help her slip the tank’s straps over her shoulders.
“Archer, isn’t it?” Krebs said.
“Yes, ma’am.”
“You should be at the control center, not here.”
“That’s right, ma’am,” Grant replied. “But I wanted Dr. Pascal to know about last night’s work with Sheena.”
“That is of no relevance to this mission,” Krebs snapped, her voice sharp as a whipstroke. “Get to your post immediately.”
“Yes’m.”
It was tense in the control center. Even Dr. Wo, sitting in the center of the crowded, overheated chamber, looked coiled tight with tension.
This is the last simulation, Grant knew. If there are no slip-ups today, tomorrow they practice in the sub itself.
Krebs floated above the four crew members, snapping commands, hovering over their shoulders as they stood at their positions, held down to the deck by foot loops, and went through the procedures for separating the ship from the station and launching it into an independent orbit around Jupiter.
O’Hara, Pascal, Karlstad, and Muzorawa worked together like a smooth, well-oiled machine. They barely had to touch the manual controls. Even Krebs’s snarls toned down almost to a purring satisfaction with their performance.
Grant watched, fascinated, as the simulator’s equipment responded to their control, untouched. It’s like magic, he said to himself, awed even though he knew the biochips were transmitting control signals to receiving electrodes in the ship systems.
Out of the corner of his eye, Grant could see Dr. Wo studying the displays on his console. He wasn’t watching the wallscreens at all, so intent was he on the readouts that showed the simulated ship’s systems and the medical monitors of the five people in the aquarium tank.
Grant concentrated on his own display screens. He was responsible for the propulsion and electrical power systems, which were running just a shade below design optimum. He could goose either one for more power if necessary, but the simulation did not require it unless there was an emergency.
Which Dr. Wo suddenly provided.
In the simulation, the crew had successfully separated the submersible from the station. They were on their own now, as far as the sim was concerned, running on the ship’s internal power.
Wo tapped a single button on the console keyboard before him and abruptly half of the lights on Grant’s console turned a baleful red.
“Power outage!” Grant yelled, just as Muzorawa said exactly the same words—but in a much calmer tone.
“Switch to auxiliary power,” Krebs called out.
Grant knew that he was supposed to keep his hands off the controls in front of him and let the crew work out the problem. But the temptation to cancel the outage and return the simulator to full power made him twitch with anticipation.
“Auxiliary power,” Muzorawa announced.
Glancing up at the wallscreen, Grant saw that the simulator was now dimly lit, and red lights glared across half the consoles in there.
“Life support decaying,” O’Hara said, her voice tight, pained. “The circulation pumps need more power.”
“Return to the station,” Krebs commanded. It was standard operating procedure. This soon after separation, the safest thing to do was to return and hook up with the station’s power supply. If they lost power later in the mission they would have to solve the problem on their own, Grant knew.