could not stop his mask from slipping. He spoke honestly, from the heart, without calculation.
“We’re going to go down there and take a closer look.”
Like he could trust her; like she was on his side. Always it was “I” or “the Department” or “the League.” Never “we.” Never himself and another, partners and equals, peer to peer.
A subtle slip, but his life had become a pirouette on the razor’s edge, and subtlety had become the only flavor left.
Trudging down the crater’s edge to the alien ship, he resolved not to make any more mistakes.
Melvin screamed something, but the wind took it.
Kyle turned his helmet mike on. “No point in radio silence now, people. But consider this a crime scene. Don’t touch anything. Do I make myself clear?”
Melvin’s voice rattled in his ear. “We’re not bio-sealed! How do you know it’s safe?”
Prudence answered, the voice of spacer wisdom. “Melvin, we can’t get sick from aliens. For crying out loud, we can’t even eat native plants.”
Everything the human race had, they’d brought with them from Earth, or made since then. Life was a complex orchestra, and one wrong note made it incompatible. It wasn’t just the molecular composition of proteins: it was the shape they folded into. Sometimes the local flora was poisonous, but usually it was just inert, like eating cardboard. The dreaded space-plague was a feature of science fiction, not reality.
Kyle added his own reasoning, trying to reassert control from that one foolish moment he’d let it slip. “If they had a biological attack vector, they would have already used it. None of the colonists were dying from disease.”
Even while he spoke, a thousand warnings rattled through his mind. There were so many ways this could end in death: automated defense systems, a wounded but still living pilot, a booby trap, or just industrial hazard. What if the fuel source was toxic? What if the ship was on fire, internally, and about to explode? What about radiation?
He worried about these things, but he didn’t stop walking. Curiosity and the proverbial cat. Thinking about cats made him think about Prudence, so delicate and reserved in repose, but feral in movement.
He turned to look at her, coming down the slope after him with Jorgun in tow.
“The locator doesn’t read any signal other than the distress beacon,” she said over the radio. “There’s no distortion in our communications. And the snow hasn’t melted. This wreck is cold.”
She had done more than just think about the dangers. She had looked for them.
“Good,” he said, because he couldn’t think of anything else to say.
“Quite brave of you to assume it was safe.” She was mocking him again.
“No, it was stupid. I’m tired. Don’t let me make any more stupid mistakes.”
Melvin was still standing at the top of the crater, holding a rifle. She wasn’t making mistakes.
“This whole expedition is stupid,” she told him. Floundering in the snow, she leaned on the big Jorgun for support, let him help her through the drifts. Kyle was seized with a completely unreasonable pang of jealousy.
“Then why are you down here?” he asked.
The two of them had caught up to him, close enough that he could see her face.
“I had friends here,” she said softly.
“I have friends on Altair,” he answered. Not that it was strictly true. He had comrades, acquaintances, and enemies. But he was loyal to Altair’s millions of citizens in the abstract, in the sense of duty to the innocent, even if he wasn’t personally attached to any of them as individuals. “Imagine Altair like this. Imagine fifty million targets, not fifty thousand.”
“You have a fleet.”
She put a lot more stock in Fleet than he did.
“Altair would be down by one patrol boat if it weren’t for your assistance. Unless you’re volunteering to be admiral, I’m not sure we should rely on Fleet.”
Jorgun laughed. “Admiral Prudence! Does that mean I
“We’re going to go down there and take a closer look.”
Like he could trust her; like she was on his side. Always it was “I” or “the Department” or “the League.” Never “we.” Never himself and another, partners and equals, peer to peer.
A subtle slip, but his life had become a pirouette on the razor’s edge, and subtlety had become the only flavor left.
Trudging down the crater’s edge to the alien ship, he resolved not to make any more mistakes.
Melvin screamed something, but the wind took it.
Kyle turned his helmet mike on. “No point in radio silence now, people. But consider this a crime scene. Don’t touch anything. Do I make myself clear?”
Melvin’s voice rattled in his ear. “We’re not bio-sealed! How do you know it’s safe?”
Prudence answered, the voice of spacer wisdom. “Melvin, we can’t get sick from aliens. For crying out loud, we can’t even eat native plants.”
Everything the human race had, they’d brought with them from Earth, or made since then. Life was a complex orchestra, and one wrong note made it incompatible. It wasn’t just the molecular composition of proteins: it was the shape they folded into. Sometimes the local flora was poisonous, but usually it was just inert, like eating cardboard. The dreaded space-plague was a feature of science fiction, not reality.
Kyle added his own reasoning, trying to reassert control from that one foolish moment he’d let it slip. “If they had a biological attack vector, they would have already used it. None of the colonists were dying from disease.”
Even while he spoke, a thousand warnings rattled through his mind. There were so many ways this could end in death: automated defense systems, a wounded but still living pilot, a booby trap, or just industrial hazard. What if the fuel source was toxic? What if the ship was on fire, internally, and about to explode? What about radiation?
He worried about these things, but he didn’t stop walking. Curiosity and the proverbial cat. Thinking about cats made him think about Prudence, so delicate and reserved in repose, but feral in movement.
He turned to look at her, coming down the slope after him with Jorgun in tow.
“The locator doesn’t read any signal other than the distress beacon,” she said over the radio. “There’s no distortion in our communications. And the snow hasn’t melted. This wreck is cold.”
She had done more than just think about the dangers. She had looked for them.
“Good,” he said, because he couldn’t think of anything else to say.
“Quite brave of you to assume it was safe.” She was mocking him again.
“No, it was stupid. I’m tired. Don’t let me make any more stupid mistakes.”
Melvin was still standing at the top of the crater, holding a rifle. She wasn’t making mistakes.
“This whole expedition is stupid,” she told him. Floundering in the snow, she leaned on the big Jorgun for support, let him help her through the drifts. Kyle was seized with a completely unreasonable pang of jealousy.
“Then why are you down here?” he asked.
The two of them had caught up to him, close enough that he could see her face.
“I had friends here,” she said softly.
“I have friends on Altair,” he answered. Not that it was strictly true. He had comrades, acquaintances, and enemies. But he was loyal to Altair’s millions of citizens in the abstract, in the sense of duty to the innocent, even if he wasn’t personally attached to any of them as individuals. “Imagine Altair like this. Imagine fifty million targets, not fifty thousand.”
“You have a fleet.”
She put a lot more stock in Fleet than he did.
“Altair would be down by one patrol boat if it weren’t for your assistance. Unless you’re volunteering to be admiral, I’m not sure we should rely on Fleet.”
Jorgun laughed. “Admiral Prudence! Does that mean I
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