Deepsix

by Jack McDevitt

  “Over here,” Kellie told him.

  Nightingale caught a glimpse of their lander. It had taken off, was in the air, trying to get away from the quake. “MacAllister’s stealing the lander,” he said.

  “Talk to me later. Where’s Toni?”

  “Don’t know. Still inside.”

  “How about Chiang?”

  “Chiang’s here. He’s with us.”

  “Toni?” said Hutch.

  Nothing.

  “Toni!”

  Still no answer.

  “Isn’t she below with you?” Chiang asked her.

  “She was headed topside.”

  Nightingale was knocked down again at the same moment that he heard a distant explosion.

  Hutch was still calling Toni’s name.

  As she moved through the tunnel with her artifacts, Toni was acutely aware of the considerable weight of rock, dirt, and ice overhead. Given her choice, she’d have taken permanent guard duty, preferably at the top of the tower.

  She was on her hands and knees, the slabs slung in a pack around her shoulders, thinking about Scolari. He was alone in Wildside with Embry. She had no reason to be jealous, but she felt a stab anyhow. It was hard to imagine that they had not been together these last couple of nights.

  She was trying to decide how much responsibility Hutch bore for her loss when the quake came.

  The floor shook. Dust rained down on her, the room sagged, and a crossbeam crashed down directly in front of her. The room continued to tremble, and she threw herself flat out and put her hands over her head. Her lamp went out. She tried crawling past the fallen beam but the room kept moving, tilting, and then a terrible grinding began above her. The overhead grated and rasped and screeched. Something cracked, loud and hard, like a tree broken in two. Or a backbone.

  A weight fell on her, driving the air from her lungs, pinning her to the floor. A darkness, deeper and blacker than that in the chamber, rushed through her. She couldn’t move, couldn’t breathe, couldn’t call anyone.

  Somewhere, she heard a voice. Hutch’s, she thought, but she couldn’t make out what she was saying.

  Her last thought was that all her plans, her new career, Scolari, her return home, the child she hoped one day to bear, none of it was going to happen.

  She wasn’t even going to get off this goddam world.

  Hutch was crawling through the dark when Nightingale came on the circuit. “I think we’ve got some bad news out here,” he said.

  “What?” she asked, bracing herself.

  MacAllister watched with horror as first Wetheral and then the Star spacecraft disappeared into the chasm that had opened, that was still opening, like a vast pair of jaws. Wetheral had frozen, not knowing which way to run, had slipped and gone to his knees, and the crevice had come after him like a tiger after a deer while he futilely jabbed that pathetic pile of sticks at it as if to fend it off. He was still jabbing, falling backward, when it took him and, in quick succession, took the lander.

  Their own vehicle was shaking itself to pieces. He looked at Casey, and her eyes were wide with fear.

  The ground beside them broke open, and the lander began to sink. The hatch, which was not shut, swung wide, and MacAllister stared down into a chasm.

  Got to get out. They would die if they stayed where they were. But the only exit was through the hatch, which hung out over the hole.

  He searched for something he could use to knock out a window. Casey read his mind and shook her head. “They’re not breakable,” she cried.

  A door in the rear of the cabin led through to the cargo locker, but he’d never fit. The angle kept getting more pronounced. They were sliding into the chasm. MacAllister leaned hard to his right, in the opposite direction, pushed against his chair arm, as if that might slow the process.

  “My God, Casey.” His voice squeaked. “Get us out of here.”

  “Me?” Her face was pale. “What do you expect me to do?”

  “You said you could fly these damned things.”

  “I said I had some experience with landers. This is a bus.”

  “Do it. Try it, for God’s sake, or—”

  She got up and climbed into the pilot’s seat, taking care not to look toward the hatch.

  “Use the autopilot,” MacAllister urged. “Just tell it to take off.”

  “It doesn’t know who I am,” she said. “It has to be reset to respond to me.”

  “Then reset it.”

  They were sliding.

  “That takes time.” She blurted the words.

  “Casey—”

  “I know. Don’t you think I know?” She was bent over the control board.

  He was pushing hard, trying to get as far as he could from the airlock. “Do something!”

  “I have to figure out how to disengage the autopilot.”

  “Maybe it’s that thing over there.” He pointed to a yellow switch.

  “This is going to go a whole lot better if you don’t talk too much just now. I’ll…” She pressed a stud, apparently having found what she was looking for.

  MacAllister heard a few electronic bleeps, then the soft rumble of power somewhere beneath the seat. The restraints locked him down, and he gripped the chair arms and closed his eyes.

  The seat lifted, and the spacecraft seemed to begin righting itself. Locked behind squeezed-shut eyelids, he couldn’t be sure what was happening and was afraid to look. He was regretting the stupidity that had brought him down to this despicable place. His life for a pile of rubble.

  Gravity flowed away, and the lander began to rise. “Good, Casey,” he said, speaking from his long experience that one should encourage people when they’re doing what you desperately want them to do. As if she might otherwise crash the spacecraft.

  He slowly opened his eyes. She was moving a yoke, pulling it back, slowly, cautiously, and he saw that she was every bit as terrified as he was. The ground was several meters below, dropping away. Thank God.

  They rose over the crevice. It appeared still to be widening. Great mounds of earth and snow were crashing into it.

  The vehicle dipped suddenly, and Casey fought for control.

  “You’re doing fine,” MacAllister pleaded. “Beautiful.”

  “Please shut up,” she snapped.

  He wished she sounded more confident. He wished she would head for the north, where there was plenty of space, worlds of space, of quiet flat plain, and just set it down. It seemed easy enough. She’d already done the hard part. Yet she continued to wrestle with the yoke and the engine made odd noises and they spurted across the sky and then she slowed them down and a sudden wind hammered at them.

  “Is something wrong?” he asked.

  The vehicle lurched. Dropped. Soared. “The spike,” she said through clenched teeth. “It’s different from the system I trained on.”

  “Just take your time.”

  “Need to use the thrusters,” she said.

  “Can you do it?”

  “If I can figure out how to aim them.”

  MacAllister caught a glimpse of Nightingale kneeling in the snow, watching. Lucky bastard, he thought. Luck of the draw. The crevice opens under us instead of under him. In the end, survival goes not to the fit, but to the fortunate. It explains a lot about the way Darwin really works.

  At that moment the thrusters roared on. The seat came up and hit MacAllister in the rear. The ground blurred beneath him, and Casey yelped and began frantically doing things to the console. He decided that his Darwinian thought would be his last, and composed himself for the inevitable. Dead in a spacecraft accident on a distant world. But not in the canyon, at least. Not buried.

  They raced over the ground toward a line of hills in the northwest, and it occurred to him that they would not be able to take him back for proper disposal. Because the madwoman at the controls was about to wreck the lander. And nobody was going to volunteer to come down from orbit to pick up the pieces.

  The spacecraft was tryi
ng to turn over, and it didn’t look as if Casey had any idea what she was doing. The roar of the thrusters filled the cabin and then suddenly the thunder was gone. She must have found the cutoff switch and she’d now be looking for whatever constituted the brakes.

  The hills were coming up fast, and the only sounds were the wind whipping over the fuselage and the frantic pleas of his pilot.

  “Come on, you son of a bitch.”

  She yanked back on the yoke. The slopes rolled beneath them. Beyond the land flattened. The spacecraft, having apparently spent all forward energy, and having somehow lost the levitating power of the spike, began to fall.

  “Damn,” said Casey.

  MacAllister squeezed the arms of his chair, and they slammed into the ground. The impact jarred his neck, snapped his head back, twisted his spine. But the damned thing hadn’t blown up. Casey slumped in her harness. He started to release his restraints, heard an explosion in back and smelled smoke.

  He climbed out of his seat and noted that they’d never closed the hatch. Just as well. Save him the trouble of opening it.

  The seats were crushed together, and he had to struggle to get to Casey. She was covered with blood, and her head lolled back. A massive bruise was forming on her jaw, and her eyes had rolled up into her head. Another blast rocked the lander. Flames began to lick up around the windows.

  He released her from her harness and backed out through the airlock, half carrying, half dragging her. They were just clear when it erupted into a fireball.

  Nightingale watched the thick pall of smoke rising from behind the cluster of hills to the northwest. He wasn’t aware of the true significance of the last minute until he heard Kellie’s voice on the circuit.

  “Marcel,” she said, “I think we just lost both landers.”

  X

  Faith has its price. When misfortune strikes the true believer, he assumes he has done something to deserve punishment, but isn’t quite certain what. The realist, recognizing that he lives in a Darwinian universe, is simply grateful to have made it to another sunset.

  —GREGORY MACALLISTER, Preface to James Clark: The Complete Works

  Hours to breakup (est): 255

  “Both landers?” Marcel was horrified. “When?”

  “Just now.”

  “For God’s sake, Kellie, how could that happen?”

  “The Star’s boat fell into a hole. Ours went down behind a hill and exploded. Randy and I are on our way over there now. But there’s a lot of smoke.”

  “Who was in the lander?”

  “MacAllister and the woman he came down with. Both passengers from the Star. They must have tried to get clear, but I don’t think whoever was flying knew what they were doing.”

  “Anybody else hurt?”

  “Their pilot’s gone, too. I’m sure he’s dead. Fell into the same hole as his lander.”

  Marcel stared openmouthed at Bill’s image, which was watching from the overhead monitor. Nobody from either of the Academy ships had been hurt But it sounded as if it had been a clean sweep for the Evening Star. What the hell were those people doing down there in the first place?

  “Okay,” he said. “I’ll let Captain Nicholson know. And I’ll arrange to get another lander out here. Keep me informed.”

  “Will do, Marcel. We’re on our way out now to the crash site.”

  Marcel signed off and massaged his forehead. “Bill,” he said, “who’s close enough to get here in time?”

  “I’ll check,” the AI said. “Should be somebody.”

  Huddled in the tunnel, Hutch had a more immediate problem. The roof had fallen in and blocked her exit. Nevertheless, the implication left her chilled. “Both of them? Well, that’s sure good news.” She played her lamp beam against the rock, rafters, and dirt that sealed the passageway. “I hate to add to your problems,” she said, “but I could use a little help myself.”

  “Chiang should be there any minute.”

  One dead. Maybe three or four.

  “Kellie,” she said, “call Marcel. Tell him what happened. We’re going to need another lander.”

  “I’ve already done that. He’s working on it. Told me not to worry.”

  “Uh-oh. I always get nervous when people tell me that.”

  “Have no fear.”

  “Hutch.” Chiang’s voice. “How’re you doing?”

  “As well as could be expected. I’m not hurt.”

  “Did you want us to hang on until you get out?” asked Kellie.

  “No. Leave Chiang. But do what you can for MacAllister and the woman. And Kellie…”

  “Yes?”

  “Try to salvage the lander. I don’t need to tell you how helpful that would be.” She switched back to Chiang. “Where are you?”

  “I’m in the far passageway, near the armory.”

  “No sign of Toni?”

  “Not yet.”

  She felt cold.

  “I’ll start digging,” he said.

  “Be careful. It probably wouldn’t take much to bring more of this place down.”

  “Okay.”

  “I’ll start from this end.”

  “It’s going to take a while,” he said.

  “At your leisure, Chiang. I’m not going anywhere.”

  She heard his laser ignite. Hutch put her lamp down and got to work.

  MacAllister had no idea what to do. He shut off Casey’s suit and tried to revive her, but she didn’t respond. Thirty meters away, the lander lay in the snow, scorched, crumpled, burning, and leaking black smoke.

  He surveyed the place where they’d come down: flat barren hills, a few trees, some brush. He felt terribly alone. Where was that idiot woman who wanted to run everything? Now that he could use her, she was nowhere to be seen.

  He contemplated the odds against a quake hitting just as he was doing the interview, and considered not for the first time whether the universe was indeed malicious.

  They had crossed a line of hills, so he could no longer see the tower. He sat helplessly, cradling Casey’s body, feeling responsible, wondering how he could ever have been so stupid as to leave the safety of his stateroom on the Star.

  He was immensely relieved to see two figures come out of a defile. One was the woman they called Kellie. The other was Nightingale. They paused and looked his way. He waved. They waved back and started toward him, trying to hurry through deep snow.

  “Mr. MacAllister.” Kellie’s voice in his earphones. “Are you all right?”

  “Casey’s not breathing,” he said.

  They struggled up to his side and Kellie sank into the snow beside him. She felt for a heartbeat, then for a pulse.

  “Anything?” MacAllister asked.

  Kellie shook her head. “I don’t think so.” They worked on her for a while, taking turns.

  “Looks as if we wrecked your lander,” MacAllister said.

  “What happened?” asked Nightingale. “Don’t you know how to fly it?”

  “I wasn’t the pilot,” he said. “Casey was. I don’t have any experience with these things.”

  “What went wrong?”

  “She wasn’t used to it. It was too big. Or something.” He looked down at her limp, broken form. “She was out here on a birthday gift. From her parents.”

  After a while they gave up. Kellie sighed and laid Casey’s head gently in the snow and walked silently over to the wrecked spacecraft. She circled it a couple of times, and they heard her banging on something on the far side.

  “What do you think?” asked Nightingale nervously.

  She reappeared from behind the tail. “It’s scrap. We’ll want to see what we can salvage.”

  MacAllister tried to read her eyes, to see whether she was worried. But her expression was masked. “We’d better inform whoever’s in charge,” he said.

  “It’s been done.”

  He was weary, exhausted, frightened. He’d brought two people with him, and both were dead.

  MacAllister had trained himse
lf over the years to avoid indulging in guilt. You have to beat your conscience into submission, he’d once written, because the conscience isn’t really a part of you. It’s programming introduced at an early age by a church or a government or a social group with its own agenda. Avoid sex. Respect authority. Accept responsibility for things that go wrong even when events are out of your control.

  Well, earthquakes are goddam well outside my control.

  Bill’s bearded features reflected the general concern. “Yes, Marcel?” he asked. “What can I do?”

  “Inform the Star, personal for the captain, that there’s been an earthquake at the site. Ask him to call me.”

  “I will get right on it.”

  “Tell him also that his lander was wrecked. Ask him if he has another on board.”

  “Marcel, our data banks indicate the Star carries only a single lander.”

  “Ask him anyhow. Maybe there’s been a mistake somewhere. Meantime, do a survey. I need to know who’s within six days’ travel time. The closer the better. Anybody with a lander.” Most vessels did not carry landers. There was usually no need, because ports were all equipped to provide transportation to and from orbit. Routinely, only research flights to frontier areas in which a landing was contemplated, or cruise ships, which occasionally scheduled sight-seeing tours in remote locations, made room for one.

  Beekman came in. “I heard,” he said. Several others entered behind him. “Are Kellie and Chiang okay?”

  “As far as we know. But we’re going to bring them home. The ground mission is over.”

  “I concur,” Beekman said.

  Marcel was angry, frustrated, weary. “How much time do we have to get them off?”

  Beekman glanced at the calendar. “They should be reasonably safe until the end of the week. After that, it’s anybody’s guess.”

  Marcel tried to call Hutch on the private channel. But he couldn’t even pick up a carrier wave.

  “Is she still in the tower?” asked Beekman.

  “Yes. Last I heard.”

  “Marcel.” It was the AI. “I’m sorry to break in, but your message to the Star has been delivered. And I can find only one ship with a lander within the required range. The Athena Boardman. It’s owned by—”