Lifeline

Through the camera, Ramis watched a suited figure move his arm rapidly up and down, signaling that everything looked good. The sail-creature started to slowly rotate, orienting its sails to the sun. He turned his receiver back on and listened to the chatter. The movement seemed to take forever.

“Prepare for release when the sail-creature is fully turned.”

“I am ready,” Ramis said.

When the bioengineers released the tether, Ramis did not even notice the slight acceleration. Inside Sarat, he imagined motion, knowing that he would start falling again—this time swooping toward Earth. He stared at the video monitor, but found it disorienting.

“Safe journey, Ramis. Travel swiftly.” He recognized Magsaysay’s voice. Then, in Tagalog, “Good luck, my son.”

Solar photons struck the creature’s vast sail surface and increased its momentum, little by little. Pushed at an ever-accelerating snail’s pace, Sarat drifted down toward Earth.

Chapter 21

CLAVIUS BASE—Day 26

Damned dirty socks again.

Clancy tried to ignore the smell, but the suit refused to cooperate. Lunar rocks, their edges razor sharp in the direct sunlight, stared him in the face as he stepped around them. His foot slipped. Cursing, he kicked up a volley of pebbles and caught himself before falling in slow motion.

From up on the wall, he could see Longomontanus Crater unfold before him—sixty miles of unbroken smoothness. A five-mile-long track ran through the dust from the point where the wall-kelp had hit the lunar surface. The Filipino scientists couldn’t have aimed the package any better: the container had struck at one and a half kilometers per second, nearly tangential to the ground. Maybe it was even still intact.

“The Lunatics think we’re a bunch of rednecks, Cliffy,” Shen’s voice came over the suit radio. “But look who gets to go out on a two-day wild-goose chase for a package of space seaweed?”

“Gives you a chance to stretch your legs. Nice legs, too.” Clancy grinned inside his helmet. She gave him a raspberry over the suit radio. “Is that beeper still going strong?”

“Intermittent now—the battery must be almost dead.”

“Doesn’t matter, Cliff,” Homann’s voice interrupted. “We can see the track now. Piece of cake. It’s like a giant arrow pointing straight to the pot of gold.”

“I thought it was rainbows that pointed to the pot of gold,” Shen said.

“Can’t get any rainbows here. No atmosphere.”

“Well, let’s just find it and get back to base,” Clancy interrupted them. “Wooster’s probably screwing up my score in the docking simulator.”

At Clavius Base the Orbitech 2 engineers kept to themselves. Once in a while Clancy had to step in and bash heads together, but in general the engineers were well-behaved. The other Lunatics resented the unwelcome guests, though, begrudging them the precious supplies they consumed.

But while the Lunatics sulked, Clancy’s engineers had taken over the mundane grit work that the Clavius Base scientists had to do—hydroponic gardening, ice mining, equipment repair. It was “busywork” for the engineers, Clancy knew—and so did they—but it kept them from being bored silly.

Left to his own intuition, Clancy would have suggested some sports activity, maybe a regular jaunt outside—it did no real harm, and the oxygen tanks were readily replenished from processing lunar rock. But Dr. Tomkins had suggested low levels of physical activity to decrease food consumption. He expressed optimism at the hydroponics teams working to increase productivity in the underground garden tunnels.

“Aww, Tomkins can’t even make up his own bed, not to mention his mind,” Shen had complained. “He’s so wishy-washy, he’ll have things in complete disarray before long.”

Clancy held up his hand, cutting short any echo of her complaints. “Tomkins might not be the most outstanding administrator around, but he’s been in charge of Clavius Base for years. If he wasn’t capable, NASA and the U.N. would have canned him years ago. Let’s see how he does with this kelp stuff.”

Spirits had lifted noticeably around Clavius Base when the container had hit the Moon. Most of the Lunatic scientists had been dubious about the slingshot scheme—especially after they found out the idea came from the arrogant and unpredictable Luis Sandovaal.

The Filipino scientist’s thick white hair stood out in the holotank. His blue eyes blazed; his face filled the unit as he shouted.

“What do you take us for—idiots? Of course we plotted the trajectory. Ten days and the package will intersect the Moon, but you will have to locate it yourself. We put a homing beacon on it. The wall-kelp is our gift to you. And once you see its growth characteristics, you will think it is manna from heaven.”

Tomkins had done his best to appease the temperamental scientist. “You have our thanks, Dr. Sandovaal. We will be in contact if we have any questions, and to describe the progress of your wall-kelp.”