Approaching Oblivion (Jezebel's Ladder Book 4) (2 page)

Interrupting his next complaint, Mercy
bounced out of the room behind him, wearing a large T-shirt like a muumuu. She
looked like she’d come straight off her private beach in Brazil, complete with her bikini bottoms and tan.
Lou’s
attention had made her blossom. Mercy seemed more comfortable in her own skin
and with the mess that went along with life. Recently some of the men asked if
she had started wearing makeup or if she’d always been that pretty. The
newlywed
launched herself like an acrobat toward the dining commons on
the far side. “I’ll make you some eggs.”

Feeling the breeze and hearing the
thump on the far side of the chamber, Lou shouted, “Slow down. You’re carrying
a baby.”

Crouching on the wall, Mercy put
her injured hand on her hip while hanging from a strap with her left. “You
didn’t ask me to slow down last night. I believe you argued
vigorous
exercise would be healthy for both of us.” When Lou had no comeback, she
wiggled saucily into the dining room and sealed the door behind her.

Red chuckled. “You can’t have it
both ways, Lou. I warned you about those Smith women—stubborn as they are
fertile.”

“Help me,” he pleaded.

“Z told me to never interfere in an
argument between a man and a woman—both would beat me up. Besides, you have no
room to complain. No one else in command center has someone poaching eggs
inside a cute little hole in the toast.”

“Hey, Toad in the Hole is great.
Grandma always made that for me.” Lou lowered his voice. “I worry about her. She
runs
down those steps to get to the chickens.” The stairs were a few
thousand antigravity dominoes that could be programmed into almost any configuration,
like remote-control Legos. Currently, they formed a spiral staircase that
descended from the control saucer to the interior of the hollow, spherical ship.
“She’s a bloody rocket scientist. Does she have to pull poultry patrol every
morning?”

“When we’re not on duty, we all do
chores. She loves those birds, and I swear they come to greet her.”

“Yeah, they also poop and scratch
like crazy. Her hand could get infected. Worse, the drop is 120 meters. I’m
afraid she’s going to trip, and . . .”

The appeal echoed her own
sentiments for Zeiss, and Red considered. “Are you scheduled for next shift?”

“Yeah.”

“I’m over my interface hours, but Z
wants us to start a minimum-fuel course for the jump point. We’re orbiting above
the nexus already, so we just need to circle around to approach it from the proper
angle and speed. Snowflake has the vectors.”

Lou had a gift for riding the
curves, as he called it. Between his own page talents, sailing skills, and the
gravity sense he gleaned from bonding with Mercy, he could steer the starship
in-system better than anyone. He knew the solar winds so well by now that his
instincts outperformed her computer plots. “No problem.”

“If you get that course started, I’ll
talk to Auckland. Since Mercy’s not officially back from her sabbatical for the
honeymoon, we could delay her return to duty pending a fitness review.
Meanwhile, we’ll sign an order that all planners have to use elevator mode for
safety’s sake.” Lou, Auckland, and now Zeiss already had to rely on this mode
of transportation.

“The team hasn’t approved the final
flight plan yet,” Lou noted.

“Minutes count when hitting a launch
window this narrow. We’ll still have another day to fine-tune after the vote.”
When he seemed reluctant, she added, “I can arrange the new rule while you eat
breakfast.”

“Deal.”

“Just to clarify, this doesn’t mean
that you won the argument,” she said as she hopped toward the med-lab door.

Lou held up both hands. “I admit this
isn’t about logic. Thanks for humoring me.”

She smiled. “No, Lou. Thank you. You
take care of Mercy. That girl is becoming the sister several of us never had.”

“The bossy, older one who always
knows best?” he said more loudly to cover the increased distance.

“I heard that!” came Mercy’s
muffled voice from the dining hall.

****

In the medical bay, Auckland dozed in a chair beside the cot where Zeiss slept. Red kissed her husband on the
forehead before prodding the doctor. “Hey, Doc. I’m almost ready for the meeting.
Sojiro said he’d help me with the visuals during the presentation.”

“Z wanted me to warn you about
Rachael and Yuki. They can still cause trouble for you.”

Red nodded. “I have a distraction
lined up for them that will hit two birds with one stone. I’ll arrange for Herk
to drop the bombshell so they don’t suspect a setup.”

“Are you taking over?”

“No, I’m just buying us some time. We’re
going to reach Oblivion to complete this test if I have to carry the whole damn
ship myself.”

By e-mail, Red changed the location of the team meeting to the
large storage area in Olympus, where she could manage things easier. In
requesting the change of venue, she reasoned that everyone should be able to
attend. The control saucer had to be manned by three crew members, while the enormous
ecosphere didn’t need anyone on guard. Only Yvette declined the invitation.
With Toby in the suspended-animation chamber, the fifteen remaining astronauts
gathered to watch Red’s presentation in the storage room. Seated on the first
of three benches, Zeiss handed Red the gavel. Auckland, Mercy, and Lou helped
block access to their under-the-weather commander.

Red paced at the front. She
couldn’t afford for Zeiss to answer questions because he still had trouble
locating words. She also couldn’t let the opposition ask how long the ecosphere
would last once they reached Oblivion.

As sergeant at arms, Herk brought
the meeting to order and opened the log recording with the date, time, and the
list of those present. With his mussed black hair, stocky build, and all the
sun he’d been getting, he looked more Polynesian than Polish. The shorts and short
sleeves on his shirt helped add to the casual illusion; however, the Rescue
Corps tattoo on his forearm hinted that he could turn serious in an instant.

As secretary, Mercy hit the
highlights of the previous meeting, ending with, “Point of order, due to her
medical disability, Yvette has entrusted her proxy to me. The meeting is now
open. Madam Chairwoman?”

Red’s whole strategy revolved
around the rule limiting team meetings to one hour. She couldn’t talk that long,
but others could. If she could end with no time for discussion, she’d win by default.
To that end, she had Mercy arrange a few worthy topics guaranteed to generate
lots of rabbit holes and controversy. Red announced, “I’ll begin with old
business by committee. Chair recognizes Mayor Pratibha for the committee on public
works.”

Since Toby’s capture, the mayor was
in charge of the nanofabricators—the alien technology to extrude, print, or
weave materials at nearly the molecular level. Although they worked best merely
reshaping the raw materials dumped into them, like linen or nylon fibers, they
also could print complex, multi-layer structures like computer chips. Under her
administration, she had converted fabricator time into a form of ship’s currency.

The Indian woman stood, displaying
her new sari. Her nut-brown skin was highlighted by the gold accents in the
green cloth. “
We have a petition from Yuki
to increase the manufacturing priority on her prosthetic arm. The committee
looking into it reported that there are 150 sensors in the design. Those are
the hardest parts to create. Each one takes a full day—a citizen’s allotment
for weeks. Even if we skip the sensory feedback for now, it will still need 100
sensors.”

“That
would be the whole camp’s quota for fourteen weeks,” Red noted. “We need chips,
survival gear, and weapons to get ready for the next landing.”

“That’s
with only one of the three fab units active,” Yuki said. She had a dancer’s
hard body and black hair so perfectly straight and shaped it could’ve been a geisha
wig for clubbing. She also showed off her legs in a blatant effort to sway as
many of the male votes as possible.

Pratibha
shook her head. “We have to keep the other units as spare. Without replacement
parts from Earth, fabricators have an expected lifespan of twenty years each.
If we use them all up now, our children won’t have anything.”

Realizing
Yuki was half her core opposition on the push toward Oblivion, Red threw her a
bone. “Motion for any allotment spent on the current highest medical priority to
count double. Auckland will decide the highest.”

“That
will still mean dividing the pie by another share, lowering everyone’s output
by about 5 percent,” the mayor warned.

“I
could live with that, knowing I’d be taken care of if I took a hit for the
team,” said Herk.

After
a moment of silence, Red called for a vote and the measure passed.

Yuki
snorted. “Thanks. If I don’t buy any luxuries like clothes, I can earn my replacement
arm in a couple years.”

Things
had wrapped up too quickly, so Red signaled Mercy with a stretching motion.
Mercy popped out of her chair. “Madam Mayor, the chapel exploratory subcommittee
is ready to give a report.”

Pratibha
nodded. “Ah, yes. I remember that memo. To remind the crew, Mercy collected
signatures for converting that round niche in the spinward wall into a
meditation chapel. I yield the floor to Ms. Smith.”

“Mrs.
Llewellyn,” corrected Lou.

The
room went silent for a moment, and then people swarmed the couple to offer
congratulations. Herk stood to establish order again, but Red shook her head.
She needed this to drag out. When the noise died down, Mercy stood before the
group. “I wanted to build this chapel not only because we all lost someone in
the bombing of Alcantara Space Center, but also to express thanks to a higher
power for our good fortune so far. All labor and materials would be donated.
I’m offering these three benches, while Risa and Herk volunteered to build a
simple hexagonal roof. Sojiro has offered to paint the ceiling and wanted to
show us all his vision.”

The
Japanese artist was dressed conservatively with a pressed uniform, short hair,
and impeccable nails. He appeared younger than most of the other astronauts, as
if he were still in his late teens, although he was actually two years older
than her. She’d heard that people who both looked younger and loved their work
lived longer. If so, he’d outlast them all. His eyes sparkled as he brought up
a presentation on Raphaelite paintings.

As
it loaded, someone noticed the numbering on the left side. “523 slides?” The
crowd groaned, and eyes glazed over.

Red
grinned. The stalling tactic would work.

Suddenly,
during the first cherub detail shot, Rachael shouted, “Objection. Religious
discrimination. Christian bias.” She had light-brown eyes and curly, dark-brown
hair. Her eyebrows were plucked thin to accent the feminine aspects of her
face. In contrast, she wore her Israeli military uniform.

A
stultifying discussion followed where they agreed the memorial could be built
as long as they called it a barn.

The
meeting had half an hour left, and Red could only talk for ten minutes. She
broadcast desperation toward her friend. Mercy blurted, “Point of order. Red is
going to discuss aliens, and that’s too vague for me as secretary. Before she
can begin, I need to be able to distinguish one race from another.”

Red
expected a flurry of discussion, but the lecture on papal ceilings had bludgeoned
the crowd into a stupor. Only Sojiro was still alert. “
Maybe the first
ones we encountered can be helpers or mentors.”

“Too vague, and if we fail, we
can’t call them that anymore,” Mercy replied.

“We just had Christmas, so I’ll go
with that theme. Since they were wise men bearing gifts to our people, we could
call them the Magi.”

People muttered opinions, but Red
couldn’t follow who said what.

“It fits because their technology
seems like magic.”

“They told us to follow the star.”

“What will get us to the cookies
faster?”

“Seconded,”
said Rachael.

Frustrated,
Red shouted, “What? You object to cherubs and chapels, but you promote the Magi?”

“I’m
an O. Henry fan,” replied the Jewish woman.

“No
more discussion?” Mercy tried.

Silence.
Pratibha took over the vote, which passed, and control was returned to Red. She
delayed while Mercy caught up on her air-typed notes and Sojiro loaded her
charts in the projector.

The
first slide read ‘The Path to Oblivion.’ Red made eye contact with each member
of the audience, ending with Zeiss. “Together, we’re undertaking the farthest
mission ever attempted by the UN.”

She
clicked the button to advance to the second slide, showing the star chart and
subspace highways—like creases in a bedsheet—between major gravity sources in
their area. “Based on the extreme range, we must spend at least 62.5 days under
Einstein’s Rubber Sheet, below normal space. The fewer the hops and the less
correction we have to do, the more water we save. Z knocked himself out getting
it down to just two hops.” A few eyebrows were raised at this feat. “The first
one is a simple jump to here,” she said, pointing, “taking only 14.5 days.”

Rachael
burst in. “That means the second jump will be thirty-eight days, twice our
record. We can’t do that. Last time, we had to prepare for winter.”

“We
will again,” Red admitted. “But we can use our water reserves as a thermal
battery if we raise the average daily temperature to 90 degrees Fahrenheit.”

Yuki
chimed in, “Looks like I won’t be needing clothes after all. Whoo-hoo. Beach
party!” A few male heads swiveled her way, already picturing the new wardrobe. Women
frowned. “If you don’t want to see it, find a way to use the gravity
differentials to generate heat for our homes. If
Sanctuary
were a car
instead of a starship, we would be able to tap some part of that incredible
energy with a cigarette lighter adapter.”

Park
scribbled a note on his computer pad. “I’ll investigate.”

The
volunteer action robbed Red of another potential rathole to waste time. Why
didn’t meetings go this fast when she
wanted
them to? “We’ll have time
to plan because the secret to the fuel savings is not chasing the nexus as it
moves through this solar system, but waiting for it to reach us. It will take
about six months for the jet-stream entrance to intersect our orbit.”

Red
switched slides again to the Oblivion solar system. “Then we need to accelerate
and time our entrance to the second. We’ll be going into the system at high
velocity because there are two suns circling each other. Our exit is more or
less between them. We’ll need to close all the shutters for the first day so we
don’t boil off what’s left of our water, but then we should be fine.”

“Wait,”
said Rachael. “Didn’t Z reject Alpha Centauri because entering a dual system
was too complicated?”

Nodding,
Red said, “He’s written a general solution since then. We can enter safely for
a narrow window every eighteen months, when the suns are at their apogee and
solar flares are at the low point in their cycle. Exiting the system when we’re
done will be our real problem.”

“Worse
than becoming popcorn?” asked Johnny, Rachael’s boyfriend. He was the only man
on the crew with hair past his shoulders. His greatest virtue was the ability
to make even the most bizarre raw materials into a dessert.

“Z
has worked out every aspect of the approach, and we all cross-checked several
times. We’ll be perfectly safe. The rest is only a matter of patience. The only
exit from the Oblivion system requires an astral conjunction that won’t happen for
six Earth years past our arrival. Unfortunately, that particular back road
leads us temporarily away from Earth.”

When
Rachael began objecting, Lou interrupted. “The wind isn’t Red’s fault. The prevailing
cosmic current goes one direction, and we just have to tack against it. Sailors
do it all the time. We can all wait a little longer to get home safely. Right?
I mean, how long are we talking?”

Red
admitted, “Getting home again will take over seven additional years and may
require multiple fuel stops.”

The
crowd’s buzz was deafening, and Herk had to shout for order. Red hollered,
“I’ll take questions when the presentation is complete. The arc you see is the minimum-fuel
approach to the second planet in the Oblivion system. Sensei has directed us to
the fourth moon. We’ll orbit B4 for a month while Yuki does a complete
topographic and mineral map.”

Although
her presentation was over, Red tried to pad. “We’ll get
Sanctuary
as
deep in the atmosphere as we can and launch a satellite from the shuttle bay. Hopefully,
visual, IR, and radio scans will tell us where there are concentrations of
intelligent life. Nadia can sense power sources for any technological society. If
we can’t find cities that way, Z can use his skills with Collective Unconscious
to locate native populations.”

“NASA
would never approve a half-assed plan like that,” Pratibha muttered.

Red
defended the roadmap.
“We all agreed to this mission. We’ve plotted out
the only part we can, emphasizing caution and conservation.
Our only directive from the Magi is that ‘the
hand of the uplifter cannot be seen.’
” Red was sweating. She had fifteen
minutes left, and they were going to find some reason to reject the proposal or
delay the only choice until it was too late. “We’ll need to form a winter
committee to chop firewood, insulate Garden Hollow, and set up the Olympus duty rotation. We may even want to freeze-dry more food in preparation for the
landing.”

When Rachael raised her hand for
what promised to be an embarrassing question, Red scratched her ear to signal
Herk and called on him first.

The
sergeant at arms announced, “I have one more item of old business that can’t
wait till next week. Doctor Toby Baatjies has been held without arraignment for
a week, without a lawyer, food, exercise, or a bathroom.”