Lifeline (20 page)

“This is what I propose: We should start construction of something that will set the stage for our eventual expansion—something that will provide a foundation for growth. At the same time, this project has to have utility. It can’t just be make-work; there’s plenty of that around as it is. What we do has to impact not only
Clavius Base
, but the future of the human race. It has to be a Holy Grail for us, if you want to think of it like that. Imagine what it would do for morale—not just here, but everywhere, once we broadcast it over ConComm.”

McLaris stood again, pushing the chair behind him. Tomkins looked as if his interest was piqued, and Clancy seemed intrigued to see what the challenge would be. McLaris thought rapidly,
Okay, so what next?
He’d taken them this far in the hopes that they would both jump in, come up with a solution. Instead, they waited patiently for him to continue.

“Okay, first we’ll have to get the automatic processing plants stepped up again. Someday, with all the brainpower combined on the three colonies—or four colonies, if the Russians ever decide to break their silence—we might be able to design a bargain-basement spaceship that’ll take us back to Earth. Also, we need to have the mass driver functional.
Orbitech 1
and the
Aguinaldo
will run out of the raw materials they’ve got up there eventually, and they’ll be asking for more.”

“You’re assuming that we’re all going to survive,” Tomkins said.

McLaris looked at him until the big black man broke the gaze. In a determined voice, McLaris answered him. “Yes. I am assuming we’re all going to survive.”

Out of the corner of his eye, McLaris caught a glimpse of Tomkins’s sketches hanging on the wall. He remembered his initial meeting with the chief administrator, back when he first left the infirmary. And then it hit him. He smiled.

“If we’re ever going to leave the Moon again, if we ever hope to grow beyond these tunnels, we’ve got to keep our Golden Age alive. Dr. Clancy, your crew can construct just about anything, am I correct?”

“Within reason,” Clancy said. “If you’re thinking about that spaceship, though, forget it. It would take years to gear up for that, not to mention the lack of hydrogen and nitrogen for chemical fuels, or even atomics.”

“No, no.” McLaris shook his head. He perched at the edge of his chair. “Maybe in a decade we’ll be willing to tackle something like it, but not right now. This is a precursor to all that. If we can pull it off, this could be the largest solo construction project since
Orbitech 2.”

He took a deep breath and turned to the chief administrator. “Dr. Tomkins, how would you like us to build your giant radio telescope—your lunar Arecibo?”

“A radio telescope?” Clancy flopped back in his chair. “What in the world do we need a telescope for?”

But Tomkins’s dark eyes sparkled. “Didn’t you hear him, Clifford? The largest construction project since
Orbitech 2.
Wouldn’t that excite your men?”

“My
people.
But what’s it going to be used for?”

Tomkins shushed the head engineer. “What does it matter? Isn’t the challenge enough? That’s the beauty of it.”

Clancy ran a finger over his lips. “I thought you did radio astronomy with aperture synthesis now? There’s no need for a giant telescope—you just hook a bunch of smaller receivers together along a big baseline.”

“You need two ends of a baseline for that to work,” Tomkins said. “And our Earth end is no longer communicating.”

McLaris spoke up. “If you need a different reason, Dr. Clancy, then how about as a communications focal point? The ideal would have been to place the telescope on Farside, away from Earth’s noisy radio environment.” He hesitated.

“Well, that isn’t a concern anymore, but it just amplifies my point. We can place it here at Clavius-B to probe Earth, to look for the milliwatt home transmitter that someone built, trying to raise communications with the rest of the world.”

Tomkins’s smile seemed filled with unspoken ideas. “Or we can use it as humanitarian aid, to supplement the geosynchronous navigation satellites knocked out during the War, when the people on Earth get back to that stage again.” His voice grew quieter. “Or maybe even use it as an anchor back to our solar system if we head out for the stars.”

Clancy struggled to his feet, and McLaris saw clearly on his face the point when he dropped his skeptical resistance to the idea and embraced it. “We’d need to completely revamp our technology base here on the Moon. Upgrade the mining and smelting facility—”

Tomkins broke in, smiling. “Refurbish the machine shops, electrical labs.”

McLaris nodded, ticking off items on his fingers as they occurred to him. “The welding capability, generators, power supplies, control panels, diagnostics. I think you get the idea. Dr. Clancy, do you think you could convince your crew to take on this project?”

“You’re wasting time, McLaris!” He stood with his feet wide apart, looking ready for action.

“All right. Dr. Tomkins, do you think you’d be willing to oversee this project? Coordinate things?”

Tomkins straightened and towered over both McLaris and Clancy. “I’m the chief administrator, so I’m supposed to be good at delegating responsibility.”

He placed a massive hand on McLaris’s shoulder. “I think I’ve found my niche—and yours, as well. I’m officially appointing you base manager. That’ll involve some restructuring, but I’ll turn my daily responsibilities over to you.”

McLaris sputtered. He hadn’t intended that at all. “I can’t do—”

“What do you mean,
can’t?”
asked Clancy, waving the protest away. “Practice what you preach, McLaris.”

Tomkins steered McLaris over to where Clancy stood beside the photograph of the original Arecibo telescope on Puerto Rico. “Clifford is absolutely right. I told you I was a scientist, tied down by a bureaucratic job. You’ve got managerial experience, you’ve proven you can handle the job, and you actually like the horrible stuff. No excuses allowed. This job is your punishment, remember?”

McLaris stood quiet for a moment, unsure what to say. Things seemed to be moving too fast. After all, it had only been a month since he had left
Orbitech 1,
since killing Jessie. He had to do his best, to make up for what he had done. He had fled
Orbitech 1
because he had known what Brahms would do, and he had turned coward when perhaps he should have stayed and used all his skills to convince Brahms to follow a different course of action. While lying in the infirmary bed feeling the anger of the other people around him, McLaris had sworn never to step aside again when an opportunity presented itself.

“I’ll do it.”

For the first time since the War, McLaris felt as though he had a purpose, a future. And he could sense it in the others, as well.

***

Chapter 26

ORBITECH 1—Day 35

Curtis Brahms sat up straight behind his desk as Linda Arnando walked in. He had made her wait in the corridor while he combed his hair, dabbed cool water on his red eyes. Now he appeared a model of composure. He brushed his hands across the flat desktop and stared at her.

Linda looked at him, puzzled.

Brahms kept his voice neutral as he spoke to her. He intentionally made no greeting. “Close the door behind you, please. And seal it.”

As the silence lengthened, Linda began to appear actively uncomfortable. “You asked to see me?”

Brahms took no pleasure in watching her squirm. He drummed his fingertips on the desktop, then straightened his eyeglasses. “You’ve been caught. I took Dr. Aiken under restraint an hour ago.”

Her eyes widened.

“You’re just as guilty as he is.” Brahms felt his voice grow heavy. He seemed very tired, without energy, though he had been trying to get enough sleep despite the nightmares that plagued him of the RIF, of obese Tim Drury looking betrayed.

He lurched forward across the desk. “How could you act like this? I trusted you!”

Linda bowed her head. “How did you find out?”

Brahms realized in disgust that the only reason she wanted to know was so she could cover her tracks better the next time. His shoulders slumped, but he saw no reason to keep it to himself.

“You don’t hang around scientists, Linda. We know you better than that. You just don’t. I had Terachyk check Aiken out. Once we looked, we saw what you found—yes, he had manipulated his data and, yes, he had greatly exaggerated his results.

“And then, you know what? I had a strange idea. Call it a hunch—that’s what I’m supposed to be good at. But when we looked into
your
records, Linda, you know what we found?” He felt hot and feverish with his anger, as if sweat prickled and boiled up under his scalp. “We found out you’ve been using your computer access to increase your own allotment of rations.”

Linda sat up straight, indignant. She brushed her dark hair back. The sparse silver strands seemed to be getting more prominent. “My job is important. I didn’t do it very often, only when I really needed—”

Brahms closed out her words. He felt anger rushing up inside, and he lashed out and slapped her across the face.

Then he strode around the desk. “How dare you! How
dare
you claim that you’re better than anyone else on this station! How dare you imply that your job is more important than anyone else’s here!”

Linda looked stunned. A red splash of flushed skin showed where he had struck her cheek. Brahms hooked his fingers together and clenched them.

“Four division leaders, and I killed Tim Drury because his score was lowest. It was a show of my faith, of how honest I was trying to be under the circumstances.” Brahms
felt the blood pounding in his temples. Fury made it difficult for him to see straight.

“McLaris …” Brahms ground his teeth together. “Stealing our shuttle! You—a traitor!”

He turned away, feeling his face flush. He was losing control. He took a deep breath, let it out slowly. “And Allen—he’s so wrapped up in his own misery he can’t even pay attention to what he’s doing.”

Brahms stood stiffly. He didn’t know what to do. This wasn’t supposed to happen. Curtis Brahms
never
lost control.

Linda brushed at her uniform, as if trying to regain a semblance of dignity. “It won’t happen again.”

The anger surged back behind his eyes again, making him so outraged he could find no words. He threw his eyeglasses down at the desk; one of the flat lenses shattered. Brahms looked at the glasses as if they were a strange animal, then brushed them onto the floor. He stared at Linda, eyes blazing.

“You’re damn right it won’t happen again!”

She shifted in her chair, avoided his gaze for an instant, then looked back at him, refusing to retreat. But that didn’t make any points with Brahms. He lowered his head as the bright anger backed off a bit. His voice dropped to a sad whisper.

“You really don’t understand, do you? You really don’t get it?” Brahms tapped at the intercom link. “Send Dr. Aiken in.” He pushed another button, which unsealed the door.

Linda maintained her silence, puzzled, looking uneasy. He heard footsteps on the thin carpet, then two Watchers in spring-green jumpsuits came to the doorway, holding Daniel Aiken up between them.

The two watchers—an older man and a sour-looking woman—held Aiken’s hands behind his back, but he seemed to be in no condition to struggle.

He had been beaten badly. His upper lip was smashed into an angry, blood-coated wound that had been cleaned and tended but not bandaged. His hair was rumpled, his eyes bloodshot, his skin scuffed with new bruises that would soon turn purple. The way he acted made him look like a lost animal, utterly helpless.

Linda looked at Aiken, and her false repentant expression dropped away like a sheet. She stared, then whirled to gape in horror at Brahms. He waved away her accusation before she could say anything.

“Two of the watchers … misinterpreted my instructions. They have been reprimanded, don’t worry. You’ll be getting punishment enough, both of you.”

Now Linda began to look very afraid. Brahms watched it creep up on her: Her skin became pale and grayish, and a sheen of sweat appeared on her forehead. Brahms turned away from her. He began to talk in a low voice as he stared at a picture on the wall. It was a reprint of an old Russian masterpiece by Ilia Repin, a dramatic portrait of Ivan the Terrible in the moment of shock after he had accidentally killed his own son, his only hope for the future of his dynasty. Now the tsar’s problems seemed trivial and melodramatic.

Brahms’s words were low and ominous, but they built in intensity.

“I trusted you, Linda. And I don’t trust people lightly. You were supposed to be concerned for the safety and the future of this colony. You were not to use your position for your own ends. You have let me down. Do you realize that? Do you even know what you’ve done?”

Brahms glared at her, then at Aiken, with undisguised disgust. “If I can’t trust my own assessors, we’re all doomed. You know the magnitude of trouble we’re in, and you still think you can do whatever you want, that your actions have no consequences.

“You and this … worm of a scientist who tried to bankrupt our hope—you are lower than any of those who went out the airlock first. I can’t have it.”

He shook his head stiffly, like a ventriloquist’s dummy that could rotate only a little from side to side. He clutched his fists, then released them. His whole body stiffened. He felt his muscles locking.

“I can’t have it!”

Then it all ran out of him. He let his voice drop to a dead, uninflected tone. “You, Linda Arnando, and you, Daniel Aiken, will be RIFed. Tomorrow.

“It will be broadcast live. Everyone on this station will be given the full story. Everyone will know what you have done, how you betrayed us. All of us. It’s your fault entirely.”

Linda blinked her eyes, absolutely astounded.

“But you … can’t. I’m one of your division leaders, for Christ’s sake! How can you—”

But Brahms was not even listening. Aiken seemed to collapse in on himself. He made no sound, did not beg for his life or plead for mercy. He just shook with silent sobs. His puffed eyes were shut tight. Tears streamed down his bruised cheeks.

Brahms pushed the intercom button again. “Come and get them.”

The two watchers came back in and escorted Linda Arnando and Daniel Aiken out.

“See that they stay in their cabins. Seal the doors.”

One of the watchers lifted an eyebrow. It was the woman, Nancy Winkowski. “There’s nowhere for them to go, Mr. Brahms.”

“Seal it anyway.”
There’s no place for any of us to go,
he thought.

***