Perihelion Summer

by Greg Egan

  He clawed his way upward until he reached the point where the net was joined to the pontoon; his motion was now virtually the same as if he’d been lying in his bunk or standing on deck. He was blind, but he could tell that the center lay to his left, from the way the rim of the net sloped down when he was at his highest point. He followed the rim, reaching back with one hand and sliding it along the slightly slimy hull.

  His fingers struck one of the crane hooks. He pulled a length of rope out from the coil cinched to his belt, slipped the clamp ring over the hook and spun the barrel to tighten it, then swam back under the pontoon and approached the surface on the outside, rising high enough to breathe just as his lungs were getting serious about punishing him for the delay.

  Someone grasped his shoulder. When he turned he could see nothing but a silhouette, but that was enough for him to be sure that it was Luís. For a couple of seconds they were caught in an awkward dance, like two people trying to give way to each other in a corridor, then they crossed over. Matt swam down and found another hook, this one closer to the outer ring of the pontoon, and after securing the rope to it he swam up for a breath then followed the rope back down, past the hook, groping the hull as he went to check for seams and ridges. So far, the plan was working: his rope and Luís’s formed an X with its center over the access hatch.

  Back outside the ring, he collided with Aaron, and they spent some time checking that they weren’t tangling each other’s ropes up. Then Aaron continued to complete his arm of a second, taller and skinnier, X. As he left, Luís and Thiru arrived, and the three of them waited, bound to the hull by their ropes, with enough slack to let them rise for air but not so much that they ended up battered.

  Aaron joined them, and Luís swam down; he had his sling now, to stabilize him as he worked on the hatch. There were eight bolts: one inset at each corner, and one at the center of each side. Matt knew how tricky it would be to attack them with the pontoon rocking and bouncing in the waves, but the only strategy there was patience: the hatch was not so big that two people could have worked side by side without elbowing each other constantly. Each time Luís came up to catch some air, Matt started counting, and he never got further than ninety before starting again. That was the safety margin, then: if he ever reached a hundred, he’d go down and check that nothing had gone awry.

  The twelfth time Luís ascended, he gently slapped Matt on the side of the arm with a plastic bag full of bolts. The plan had been to take out seven completely, and loosen the eighth just enough to pull the panel away from the hull and pivot it around. Luís must have repeated the gesture with everyone, because they all took a final breath then followed the arms of the X down.

  Thiru reached the center first. There was just enough light diffusing through the water for Matt to see that he was grappling with the panel, and then his silhouette wavered and Matt felt a tickling on his neck as a stream of bubbles escaped from the gap and dispersed. A few seconds later, Thiru disappeared into the hull.

  Matt waited to be sure he wasn’t blocking Aaron, then he unclipped the rope from his belt and moved hand over hand along the X, until he found he could poke his head up inside the pontoon. As he clambered over the edge, Thiru turned on a small flashlight—mercifully not pointed straight at him—and the whole fiberglass cave materialized out of the darkness. The layout was familiar from the inspections he’d made during the construction phase, but seeing it now was like falling through an alien portal at the bottom of an Egyptian pyramid and finding himself back in some cobweb-strewn version of his childhood bedroom.

  Aaron’s head poked up, but then he seemed to be stuck, so Matt crawled over and gave him a hand. The three of them removed their masks and snorkels and sat in the growing puddle beside the hatch, exchanging warily satisfied glances. Then Luís appeared, and took out his mouthpiece. “Good luck,” he whispered. Matt nodded, and Aaron gave him a thumbs-up. He put the mouthpiece back in and retreated into the water, then the panel swung back into place. Matt could hear the wrench tapping and scraping against the hull, but he doubted that anyone up on deck could have picked it out against the general creaking of the Mandjet.

  The loudest noise in the cave was the hissing of the pistons in the wave-power generators at each end. The space in between was essentially a sewage treatment plant, processing excrement and supplying the result to the garden. Matt was surprised that it didn’t smell much worse than it did; either the seals were holding up better than he had any right to expect, or he’d simply grown more tolerant. In any case, he wasn’t gagging, and his face wasn’t streaming with tears.

  Thiru lit the way as they crawled along the bottom of the pontoon through the maze of pipes and tanks. The small amount of seawater they’d let in hadn’t spread far, but there was a moist, dark residue on the floor that must have long predated their incursion. Above them, there were cabins full of hostages, but it would have taken half an hour with a screaming circular saw to reach them.

  Below the toilet, there was a built-in ladder leading down from the hatch. Matt found the sight of it eerie now—as if he’d somehow anticipated what it would be used for when he’d sat tinkering with the CAD file years before—but then, if he’d ever had to come down here to fix a problem, he wouldn’t have wanted to go spelunking with a rope, or clambering over the scaffolding of pipes.

  Thiru was in front; Matt caught up with him and whispered, “When you get below the hatch, switch off your light and wait for your eyes to adjust. If there’s someone up there, you should see the light showing around the rim of the hatch.”

  “Okay.”

  When the flashlight went off, Matt froze in the darkness, but no faint circle appeared above them. He heard Thiru turn the handle and raise the hatch, and this time a gray disk materialized, then the flashlight was back on, aimed down toward the foot of the ladder.

  Aaron was right behind Matt. They had agreed to cycle through the three roles, but for now Aaron’s job was to wait on the ladder so they could pass the first body down to him. Matt nodded to him then ascended, feeling bad about leaving him behind despite the fact that he’d be the farthest from danger. Maybe it was the thought that, if something went wrong, he’d be the last of the three of them to die, alone in this place as the hijackers hunted him down.

  Matt followed Thiru up into the room, then Thiru turned off the flashlight and carefully closed the hatch. The darkness was imperfect here—the toilet had a small, opalescent window—but in any case, they both knew the layout, and even in the gloom it was easy to find their way to the door. It was built to open inward, and Thiru took his place by the hinged side, leaving Matt with the earliest unimpeded access to whoever entered. At night, the light was set to come on as soon as the door opened; Matt had agonized over the geometry, but he was sure now that the mirror on the side wall would not betray anything, whichever way their victim happened to glance.

  He took the garrote out of the pouch on his belt and tugged cautiously on the handles, reassuring himself that the fishing line remained securely attached. Then he stood with his arms hanging down, keeping his grip loose so he didn’t tire the muscles in his forearms. It might be hours yet until the moment came.

  The Mandjet creaked and hissed as the floor swayed; Matt found himself measuring the waves in his head. Thirteen meters. If he lost his nerve now, all three of them would die—and maybe Arun, Yuki and Jožka as well—and even if the hijackers spared everyone else, the ocean would soon claim its share of the survivors. So what had these people expected when they came on board with guns, if not to be killed at the first opportunity? This wasn’t a fucking oil tanker that they could seize and then wait for the ransom. They could have asked for food and water, they could have asked for shelter. They’d done this to themselves.

  He heard footsteps on the deck and quietened his breathing. He gripped the handles tightly, checked that the loop was wide and clear, then raised it high above his head. None of the hijackers were too tall or too short, and the drop he’d practi
ced on Eduardo should catch any of them.

  Centimeters away from him, Yuki spoke, loudly and irritably. “If you stand outside the door, I’m only going to take longer.”

  A man chuckled.

  “I’m serious. Give me some privacy or we’ll be here all night.”

  “Okay, okay.”

  She stepped into the room, the light came on, then she closed the door firmly behind her.

  As she turned, Matt saw no trace of surprise on her face. She backed away, gesturing to him and Thiru to approach her and join her in a huddle.

  “Whatever you’re planning,” she whispered, “don’t risk it. I think we have a deal, and if they stick to it they’ll be leaving tomorrow.”

  Matt stared at her in disbelief, not trusting himself to keep his voice low enough if he put the obvious question into words.

  “They think the Mandjet’s too much for them to handle,” she said. “We blinded them with science, we made it sound like running the LHC. So they’re going to take as much stock as they can fit in a trailing net of their own, a big box of maggots, plus one spare water-purifying unit that Arun’s set up to run on solar power.”

  Matt turned to Thiru; he seemed torn between relief and doubt. “You trust them to leave?” he asked.

  Yuki said, “Everything they’ve talked about for the last two days has been about making their own setup work. They really don’t want to stay here; they’re sure they bit off more than they can chew.”

  “How did you know we were in here?” Matt asked.

  “Arun saw the change in the pontoon’s pressure sensor—but don’t worry, no one else understood what it meant. He and Jožka are okay, everyone’s okay. We just have to hold on one more day.”

  “Hurry up!” the man yelled from outside.

  “One minute!” Yuki shouted back. She went and pulled some toilet paper off the roll, dropped it in the bowl, then flushed. As she washed her hands, she glanced back at the two would-be assassins, waiting for some sign that they wouldn’t interfere and try to take things into their own hands.

  Thiru nodded silently, then Matt did as well. They moved back into position, out of sight from the deck as she walked out and closed the door behind her.

  The light stayed on. Once the sensor had been invoked when the door opened, nothing would change until it reported that the room was empty. Matt was paralyzed for a moment, then he reached up and brushed his thumb over the switch and the room went dark.

  “You must be some special kind of lady. I didn’t hear a single fart.”

  “Don’t be disgusting,” Yuki replied.

  The man laughed, and the two of them walked away across the deck.

  * * *

  Just before dawn, Matt heard footsteps above, and voices speaking in Tamil. Thiru whispered, “They’ve let some men out of the cabins to help them move the fish.”

  Matt wasn’t sure how the hijackers planned to scoop the cobia up and haul them out of the ring, but he was glad they weren’t attempting to make the transfer underwater, by cutting open the net. The stock would replenish itself in time, so long as enough remained to breed.

  Aaron said, “How do we know they won’t take Yuki and Jožka with them? They’re the biologists; they’re the ones who can keep it all working.”

  “Yuki didn’t seem to think that was a threat,” Matt replied. And if they were prepared to take permanent slaves, they might as well have hung on to the Mandjet as well as the experts who knew how to run it. Yuki and Jožka had gambled against that, and all he could do now was trust their instincts until there was a chance to see how things unfolded.

  Passing the hours waiting in the dark, listening to grunts and thuds and shouts, Matt could imagine how it must have felt for the people locked in their cabins from the start, with no idea what was happening. But at least there was motion now. The hijackers really were departing—and he did not believe they would harm anyone at the last moment. If they turned their guns on the people at their mercy here, the whole flotilla would remain as witnesses, more inclined to revenge than ever.

  Thiru offered occasional commentary gleaned from exchanges between the Sri Lankan men, but late in the morning Matt noticed a shift in their tone that required no translation. People were laughing, subdued at first, but then they were shouting ecstatically, and there were women and children joining in.

  Thiru moved toward the ladder, but Matt grabbed his arm. “If they see us appear from nowhere, that could fuck things up, even now.”

  “All right.”

  A few minutes later, the hatch opened and daylight streamed in. Arun called out, “Anyone down here?”

  Thiru ascended, and Matt and Aaron followed. Out on the deck, squinting in the sunlight, Matt turned to see the hijackers’ boat departing, trailing a circle of bright floats, presumably holding up their own small net full of cobia.

  Across the Mandjet, people were embracing each other, weeping and yelling. Matt looked around, beaming, infected with their joy, but at the same time he felt as weak as if he’d been beaten all over.

  “Are you okay?” Arun asked.

  “Me? You’re the one who’s had a gun in his face for four days.”

  Arun said, “They were shit people, but they weren’t sadists. And Yuki really figured out how to play them.”

  Aaron and Yuki joined them, then Arun spotted Jožka and called her over. She grinned at Matt and hugged him.

  “Welcome back, Captain Matt,” she said.

  “Don’t call me that.”

  “What was Perth like?”

  “I’ll tell you later.” Matt didn’t want to douse the celebratory mood. He could see Thiru embracing Suthan, their faces on each other’s shoulders, both of them weeping. “We need to find a way to stop this happening again.”

  “Metal detectors at the docking pen,” Aaron suggested. “And spikes and hot oil dispensers all around the outside of the decks.”

  Yuki said, “Maybe. But maybe we can also preempt some attempts by making the ad hoc solution official. We offer to give away breeding stock, and to teach people how to farm it themselves. The more we make that known, the more stake everyone around us will have in ensuring that the Mandjet doesn’t end up in the wrong hands.”

  14

  Matt couldn’t sleep beneath the midnight sun, so he left the camp and headed west along the shoreline. When he looked out across the water, there was no more hope of glimpsing the horizon behind the assembled ships than if he’d tried the same thing with skyscrapers in Manhattan. Every day the anchorages grew more crowded, and for all he knew the row of vessels stretched right around the continent.

  Inland, the ground was thickly covered in moss, and though he’d left the rush of the Mawson River behind, he kept encountering small streams of meltwater that he had to jump or wade across. People had set up camps all along the coast, and he wasn’t the only new arrival having trouble adjusting to the perpetual light. Some of the other insomniacs called out to him amiably, some glared warnings, and some looked too shattered to care about a stranger wandering by.

  “Are you all right?” a woman asked. She was stooped down in the soil, planting something.

  “I’m fine,” Matt replied, not sure what he’d done to look so lost. “Can I ask where you’ve come from?”

  “Zanzibar.”

  “I’m from Australia. My name’s Matt.”

  “I’m Rayah.”

  “Pleased to meet you.”

  She nodded and smiled. Matt approached, but kept a respectful distance, imagining himself stopping at a yet-to-be raised fence around the garden in progress.

  “How was your journey?” he asked.

  She shook her head sadly. “So hard. But we had one thing to help us: the seaweed. Without it, I don’t know if we’d be here.”

  “Seaweed?”

  Rayah explained about the seaweed she and her fellow villagers had grown in nets, long before Taraxippus. When they’d had to leave their homes, at least they’d been able to take tha
t with them.

  Matt told her about the Mandjet. “Maybe we can trade,” he said. “Or exchange ideas.” The CRISPR’d flies needed seaweed in their diet, and the Mandjet’s own system could always be improved.

  “Of course,” she replied.

  Matt took his leave and headed back the way he’d come. While the sun hung low above the crumbling ice cliffs to the south, above the ocean the moon made a stranger sight. The pattern of maria was still recognizable, but the rabbit he’d known all his life was being slowly pushed aside. In another two years the view from Earth would encompass the whole of the former far side.

  As he approached the camp he saw that Jožka was up too, pacing the muddy ground.

  “We need sleeping masks,” Matt joked.

  “I don’t want to sleep,” she said. “I’m trying to figure something out.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Outside the meltwater zone, the krill numbers are exploding. There are probably more than we can use for food alone, but that won’t last forever; as the fresh water spreads, it’s going to push the fertile layer down out of the sunlight. So we need to start making biodiesel while we still have the chance.”

  Matt boggled. “Out of what?”

  “We can use krill oil as feedstock,” she explained. “You know a lot of these ships don’t have enough fuel to make it back north? If Yuki can get the right genes into a bacterium . . .”

  Matt left her muttering to herself and entered the tent he was sharing with Selena and his mother. He’d expected to find them both asleep, but his mother was sitting on a folding chair, smoking a cigarette. He’d never seen her do that before in his life, and he was afraid to ask which of their possessions she’d had to trade for it.

  “When the summer’s over,” she said, “what do you think will be left to go back to?”