“Corporal Dan Johnson reports the same phenomenon.”
This is the first time she’s mentioned DJ. “He’s alive?” I ask.
“So I’ve been told,” Borden says.
“He hears from Captain Coyle?” Coyle had told me she liked him better. Sometimes I have a hard time putting two and two together.
Borden nods. “Nobody has answers, but it could be part of a pattern.”
“Do my buddies dream of being bugs?”
“Some of them, something similar,” Kumar says.
“Wow,” I say.
“Wow,” Borden echoes dully. She looks out through the little port, angles her head to see better.
“We’d all like more clarity,” I say.
Borden nods. “Yup.”
I’d section 8 myself if I was in charge. “Maybe we should ask the Gurus. Walker Harris told me the Gurus might allow such things in their metaphysics.”
“As I said, I do not know a Walker Harris,” Kumar says.
“He claimed to be Wait Staff,” I say.
“Other than me, you were never visited by Wait Staff,” Kumar says.
“Well, that’s what he called himself. And he pronounced me cured. Safe.”
“Right before they finalized orders for your execution,” Borden says.
A FEW MINUTES later, we arrive at a broad, tan stretch of long-gone prairie, sun high overhead, a few cotton-ball clouds pieced out along the horizon. The jet lands on a long runway and swings about to a small terminal. We exit from the rear. The Texas air hits us like a hammer after the cool inside the jet. Heat rises from the concrete in rippling waves.
A few klicks to the north, alongside complexes of support hangars and fuel depots, lines of squat, blunt-nosed heavy lifters rise from concrete pads like the columns of a roofless temple.
“One of those is our next ride,” Kumar says.
We’re met by a small blue bus. “Apologies for the heat, folks,” the bus says; again, no driver. “Please climb in! It’s cool inside.” Not a human in view besides us. The entire spaceport seems to be automated, at least for this launch. Borden lets me go first up the step and into the bus’s air-conditioned interior. I settle into a seat, looking around with that feeling of extreme displacement I’ve had since leaving SBLM….
I hear a low murmur from outside. Kumar is conferring with Borden. I can’t hear what they’re saying. They look serious. I don’t care. I’m floating, in a way: a worrisome lightness.
“Good for you, too, Bug?” I ask my inner crustacean.
“Yep,” I answer for the sublimated presence. “Pillar of fire, then orbit, and after that—we’re going home, right?” I have no idea how true that’s going to be, and how soon. “In your opinion, Bug, am I fit for any sort of duty?”
Kumar and Borden put their conversation on pause and join me on the bus.
OH FOR COSMOLINE
The compact passenger cabin of the Blue Origin lifter—accessed from a cherry-picker elevator carried on another truck—is trim and comfortable. Kumar peers in from the elevator door, observes as Borden and I are strapped in by our seats…. And then, a little awkwardly, he crawls behind us, barely avoiding my nose with his knee.
“It’s been a few years since I’ve crossed the vac,” he confides.
The cabin is too warm. Noises rattle up from the structure below—pops, clangs, something like a vat of gurgling, ricocheting ice cubes. All chemical. Hydrogen and liquid oxygen. Old-school, low pollution. As we’re lifted into space we’ll leave behind a plume of steam.
A ride up on a Hawksbill is a sweet, high-g swoop from the skyport runway, then—froomb! Spent matter boosters take us through eight g’s to orbit in a few minutes. Guru tech aplenty. But here—no spent matter, no re-ionizing shockwave and sound dampers—proudly, purely human. Early century twenty-one. We had heard about some civilian launch centers shying away from Guru advances but never quite understood why, and our briefings never touched on those matters—any more than we received detailed briefings on Muskies. Not our concern. If companies want to be wallflowers at the Guru orgy, they have that right; the Gurus do not complain, nor should anyone else. Survival of the fastest, right? Yet here are twenty or more Blue Origin lifters, capable of running themselves and apparently in fine condition. Making money. Surviving outside the orgy. I find that reassuring.
The hatch seals. Lights flicker around a wide touch monitor. Another small, sweet voice instructs us. From side pouches on our armrests I extract goggles for an external 3-D view. Borden leaves hers in the pouch. Behind us, Kumar is goggled and smiling. He looks like a mad scientist.
The elevator pulls away and the hatch swings in and seals. Cool air quickly fills the cabin. I wait for the noises below to settle into a musical routine. A couple of seconds later, the popping and gurgling stop. Almost immediately, we hear a thin whine—pumps, I assume—and then a low, bowel-loosening growl. The candle is lit! We’re enveloped by a ragged, powerful animal noise that ranges high and low, through bass and treble, into power.
We’re pressed back, and in four smooth shoves, Texas dwindles beneath us until it’s barely visible through a hot blue and orange corona of chemical thrust. The sky turns black. Old-fashioned is kind of a sweet rush. I like it.
But once the rockets cut out and thrust drops to zero, Borden decides to be violently ill. Kumar stretches forward, releases a convenient mask cup, and reaches around to press it over her face before she spatters.
I’m doing okay. I feel superior, happy—for about five minutes. Then it’s my own dry heaves for the next hour. Borden starts up again midway through my torment. Humans don’t belong in zero-g. That’s why Skyrines soak in Cosmoline during the long haul upsun and back.
DAY ONE
Goggles tell the tale: Our lifter is entering orbit at about three hundred klicks. Minutes later, the lifter shudders and we hear another series of echoing rattles and clangs. The small sweet voice says we’ve hooked up with a transorbital booster. Borden is no longer sick, but she’s irritable. We don’t say much. A more gradual boost again presses us back. The weight feels good but doesn’t last. After twenty minutes we coast. We’ve reached escape velocity. My stomach is done twitching. Through the port, I glimpse that we’re pulling away from Earth. The motion is barely obvious.
“What next?” I ask.
“Six hours transit,” Kumar says.
“Love these antiques,” I say.
“You’ll soon feel more at home,” Kumar says.
Borden closes her eyes and takes a deep breath.
“What’s our next ride?”
Neither will go into details. Maybe they don’t know. Little tubes pop from the sides of the neck rests. I suck on mine. It supplies a sweet reddish liquid. No food. That’s fine. I’m not going to be hungry for a while. Borden’s eyelids flutter like she’s dreaming. Her skin is pale.
“Problems?” I ask.
“Nothing you want to hear about,” she says around an acid urp.
“Try me.”
“Too damned warm in here!”
“Shall we crack a window?”