Anderson, Poul The Avatar

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"No! I have my orders!"
"It mightn't be safe for you to know, eh? Well, from our viewpoint, we've zero to lose. If we go to
Phoebus, the way things are, we're dead. Jumping off into the galaxy, we have the teeniest chance of
finding help somewhere. We don't count on that, of course. But we'll have several extra years of life while
our supplies last. I don't think this will bother your bosses much. If anything, they should be glad to get rid
of us so cheaply."
"My orders say, either see you off to Phoebus or kill you. If you don't return at once, you'll not get an
hour of those years you mention."
"We're armed too, Captain. We can block your missiles for a bit. Meanwhile we'll broadcast -- in
Spanish, visual, at full power. Can you be certain they won't tune in aboard Copernicus? Or chance to
catch it on a different spacecraft? We've wattage aplenty to be received ten million kilometers off. It's a
story which will bring down some big people. In cases like that, little people get carried along...I wish you
would let me talk to you, Lawes."
"No." Torment. "Have you anything further to say before we start shooting?"
"Why, yes. I have this suggestion." Brodersen thrust his whole personality forward.
"Call Earth and ask what to do. We'll be zigzagging on, sure, but you're aware of how long a proper
transit pattern takes, and we'd much rather come out in a planetary system, at a T machine, than in the
middle of interstellar space. The best guess is, this means we have to pass from beacon to beacon -- the
more, the likelier -- and swing straight inward from the last. You've time for a call. Meanwhile, unless you
shoot, we'll stay quiet."
"Well- You have no right to bargain!"
"I am bargaining, though. Hear me. What I wish you'd do is direct your message not to the office
you're supposed to, but to your own high command. Lay the matter before them. You'll find them
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astonished at what's been going on."
"We're under security."
Brodersen sighed. He'd expected nothing else. "Okay, as you choose." Louder: "But call!"
After more argument he won his point. The screen blinked and he collapsed, breathing hard. It would
take about three-quarters of an hour for an interchange, via the relay satellite, between here and Earth.
By then, at her headlong pace, Chinook should be deep into the transport field.
Stars exulted. He stirred and said through the intercom: "You heard that, boys and girls? We're this
far along. Rejoice."
A few small cheers replied. Caitlin struck a ringing chord from her sonador and declared, "You
carried us, Daniel."
"No, you all did," he answered. "Hey, Pegeen, I love you."
"Wait till I get you to myself again," she said.
Joelle is listening- By tacit agreement, conversation died away. Occasional words went around, most
of them functional. Tastes in music varied too widely for a shared concert. Folk at their posts remained in
their lonelinesses. Brodersen relived his latest passages with Caitlin; the first had rated twelve on the
Beaufort scale, the second had been as gentle as that final union, close to dawn, in the cave beneath
Mount Lorn...He even dozed for a spell. The ship roused him, changing direction, squandering chemical
auxiliaries as well as expending nuclear fuel in order to keep hard on her way.
He was bobcat-alert before the response from Earth came due.
Dozsa's voice delivered it, a shout: "Missiles!"
The decision was, "Kill," Brodersen realized. Quick, or whoever is at the other end, is afraid we may
have a plan.
He must sit with nothing but fingernails in his fists. Survival had ceased to be any affair of his.
At high accelerations, crossing the gap in a couple of minutes, though they changed vectors at varying
intervals to confuse counterfire, the torpedoes homed on Chinook. Nobody aboard was spacesuited. If a
nuclear warhead exploded near the hull, that was that.
Brodersen spied the exhaust streaks, silver and narrow. Sensors locked onto the tubes. A computer
extrapolated. Zarubayev had fine-tuned the system. Fire sprayed across darkness as energygorged laser
beams found their targets. An "All clear" jubilated, telling humans they would not die in the next few
seconds.
The ship trembled. Von Moltke had launched missiles of her own. This was her ultimate job, to
outguess a living opponent.
Chinook was not only much bigger than Alhazen, she carried throw weight out of proportion.
Watchships weren't really intended for battle. Their weapons were partly a relic of the Troubles, partly a
concession to vague fears...which Quick's faction strove to entrench.
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The vessel surged around Brodersen, plunging toward her next way station.
Twinkles in heaven- "Gunner to captain," von Moltke intoned, "they stopped our barrage."
"They were meant to, this first time," he reminded her. "A lesson. Stef, have you got contact?...Okay,
put me through."
His intention was to repeat his original threat, negotiate for the escape of his command. He did not,
repeat and repeat not, wish to kill more men who were doing what they'd been assured was their duty.
The stars were beginning visibly to crawl in the viewscreen. Soon he'd be in such warped space-time
that no rocket would have a prayer of tracking him down. Of course, any signal he transmitted from there
would be hopelessly garbled. Well, everybody would be satisfied, sort of --
"Missiles!" Dozsa bawled. He spat an oath and rattled off RA, dec, approximate vectors. They had
to be from Copernicus.
Judas priest, this was my worst fear, that Quick's influence would be strong enough to compel
Janigian's honest crew- "Missiles!" Those came from Alhazen, one, one, one, one, as
fast as the tube could launch them.
"Captain," von Moltke said starkly, "I do not belieff we can strike that many in a flock."
Granville's wail: "No, I compute we cannot. Mon pere -- " Joelle, like steel striking steel: "We can
reach the next beacon and accelerate straight inward before they arrive."
Brodersen surged against his harness, even as weight returned. "No!" he bawled. "We'll end up
anywhere -- " Knowledge smote home. "Carry on."
The ship blasted. Almost, he imagined he saw the T machine grow before him, whirling and whirling.
He did see the first few splashes of flame, as Frieda parried. Then Sol was gone from its screen. The
stars were an altogether different horde. The sun was not white nor yellow nor the bloodorange of
Centrum, but ember-hued and shrunken. Tawny beneath colored bands, thrice the width of Luna seen
from Earth, stood a planet. Frighteningly close gyred a great iridescent cylinder.
Brodersen let himself tumble for a minute into a night that roared.
Winter fell downward, white around the tower in Toronto.
"Well," Quick said at last. "They're gone."
"You are sure?" Makarov demanded through a choking haze of smoke. He lacked the scientific
education to follow each detail of what had just come in.
"Yes," Quick told him. "Whatever scheme they had -- if they did -- I suspect they were in fact
running off at random, except for trying to...to maximize their probability of- Oh, how can you estimate
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it?...Never mind. They were forced to make their gate entry from the spot where they happened to be.
They are gone, Makarov. I beg your pardon. They are gone, Premier Makarov. Like the thousands of
probes our species wasted, searching for new guidepaths. We can forget about them."
Makarov hunched his bulky frame. "You are quite certain?"
"Yes. Absolutely." Quick sagged and covered his eyes. Exhaustion shuddered in him. [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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