Lifeline

Wiay Shen’s voice came over the link. Her responses were beginning to lag, indicative of the small but noticeable light delay. “Our last Doppler reading confirmed your acceleration, Clifford. You haven’t deviated one part in a million. Pretty steady machinery they got up there. How’s it feel to be a fish on a line?”

“Don’t know. I never went fishing.”

“Never?” Shen’s voice sounded surprised. “Clifford, you’re culturally deprived. I’ll have to take you, next time we’re back—” She cut herself off, as if realizing what she had been about to say. The awkward silence lasted for a moment.

McLaris interrupted, calling across to Clancy. “Ask her how Orbitech 1 is taking all this. Is Brahms setting up a reception or what?”

“There hasn’t been this much excitement since construction on Orbitech 2 began. Remember, the Filipinos sent out their own representatives almost two weeks ago—that Dr. Sandovaal character and his assistant. They’re practically on top of L-5. The Aguinaldo has declared a national holiday. When you all get there it’ll be like a family reunion.”

McLaris remembered how bothersome he had always found family reunions to be. He turned away from the flatscreen. Shen and Clancy’s constant communication sometimes gnawed at him—it reminded him how he would never talk to his wife Diane again. But that was only part of it. Now that he had been traveling for two and a half days, now that they were almost to Orbitech 1, the self-doubts began to bubble into his consciousness. The last thing in the world he needed was time by himself to sit and think. That proved far more dangerous than Clancy’s engineering problems. He kept asking himself why he had volunteered to come.

It’s easy to sign up for the Foreign Legion when you’re sitting in an armchair.

McLaris tried focusing his eyes on the two holes in the wall opposite him. Only two and a half days ago the acceleration chairs had been fastened to that wall, secured to the Phoenix by protruding bolts. Soon after the weave wire had yanked them off the lunar surface and Orbitech 1 had started reeling them in, he and Clancy had moved the seats to where they were now for the gut-wrenching deceleration when the Miranda’s engines blasted one last time.

He kept picturing Jessie in her enormous space suit. I am brave! she had said.

McLaris let his arm fall to his side; a startling jangle of musical notes rang out. Clancy glanced over his shoulder, smiled with amusement, then returned to speaking with Shen.

McLaris lifted Jessie’s battered old “keeburd” from the deck. Besides a few changes of clothes and the d-cubes he had accumulated at Clavius Base, the programmed keyboard was the only personal item he had brought with him to Orbitech 1. It was useless, sentimental … and absolutely necessary to him. There were too many memories, too many demons to slay once he got back aboard Orbitech 1. He needed every tie to the past, every tangible object that meant something to him.

The fresh start on Clavius Base had brought him back from personal damnation. His horror and guilt had abated in the last two months, once Philip Tomkins had given him important work to do. He had rebuilt a defensible wall of self-esteem, brick by brick.

He clutched Jessie’s keyboard close to his breast. He activated one of the preprogrammed routines, and listened to “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star,” conjuring up visions of his daughter plinking along and trying to chase the lighted keys with her fingers in an imitation of playing the song. Clancy ignored the music as McLaris closed his eyes and drew in a deep breath of the warm, recycled air. The Moon was no place to leave the only link he had to his past.

He would need all his strength to confront Brahms.

Even Hitler had executed less than 10 percent of his own people. By that criterion, Brahms stacked up against the worst of them. McLaris wondered if anyone really thought Roha Ombalal had been responsible for the RIF.

Damn you! Brahms had shouted to them as Stephanie Garland had pulled the Miranda out of the docking bay and launched it toward Clavius Base. McLaris couldn’t imagine that Brahms would ever forgive him.

A cold thought struck McLaris. Had he been the factor that had forced Brahms over the edge? Had he pressed Brahms into a no-win situation by taking the only shuttle, the last hope of Orbitech 1? McLaris did not feel strong enough to shoulder any more blame.

But Brahms would be waiting for him, nevertheless.

Chapter 54

KIBALCHICH—Day 72

The command center around her was empty, comforting. Anna Tripolk closed her eyes, letting relief mask her fear. The decision rested strong in her—the one path out of her maze of contradictory thoughts.