Outward Bound

by Juanita Coulson

  Derek muttered something that might have been an apology. By the time they got to the service elevators, Brenna relented enough to grant him a slight smile.

  Yuri Nicholaiev and one of Hiber-Ship's lieutenants, Lilika Chionis, were waiting for them. They had put corporate rivalry aside, for the present. As Brenna and Derek rushed into the foyer, their aides sealed the security doors behind them and Yuri tumbled the programming. If the gypsy newshunters were On Brenna's trail, the tactic would delay them, at least for a while. The four climbed into one of the elevators and started the long ride up through the mountain's interior. Derek peeled out of his travel coverall, with Lilika's assistance. "Whew!" he said. "That was a melee and a half down there on the platform. I'm surprised the enforcement officers aren't breaking it up."

  "Not during Colony Days, Captain Whitcomb," Yuri said. He was holding Brenna's kit while she discarded her outer clothes. Yuri's eyes widened with approval when he saw the rainbow-patterned formal jumper she wore. Derek straightened his uniform. Lilika Chionis brushed a bit of lint off the officer's insignia on his shoulder. Yuri went on to explain, "They won't stop the celebrations unless there's mayhem."

  "It's close to that, if you ask me."

  Brenna watched the levels ticking off as they climbed five kilometers up Tharsis Ridge. Readouts showed they were passing some of the residential and commercial stories at express speed. Brenna gulped at a painful lump that extended into both her ears. Doctors could cure free-fall and Coriolis problems and compensate for gravity with a few pills. But for this age-old difficulty of altitude adjustment, they still advised patients to swallow a few times. So much for modern medicine! The elevator cab moved along vertical, angling, and horizontal tracks, rising steadily. Brenna kept swallowing and used the gleaming wall as a mirror to check her appearance before they arrived at the gala. She combed her short auburn curls with her fingers. "Has anybody figured out our arrival point yet?"

  "No. Morgan arranged everything," Yuri answered her. "I do not think he even told your parents where you were."

  "That's so, Captain. The secret was well kept." Lilika Chionis chimed in. Her attitude implied that the Russian's word alone wasn't good enough.

  Yuri eyed the woman belligerently. "Morgan told the vid columnists that you and Captain Whitcomb would be arriving in your private craft at the northwest V.I.P. station. They have sent their camera crews down there. Some of them have been at Gate Two since the gala started."

  "Gate Two? Not Gate One?" Derek feigned wounded pride. "Our celebrity status must be slipping, Bren."

  Unfortunately, Yuri didn't take that as sarcasm. "Not at all, Captain. Morgan said that using Gate One would be ostentatious."

  Derek grinned at him, and Yuri belatedly realized he had been set up. His square Slavic face stiffened. Lilika Chionis had the grace not to smirk.

  "Do you have the update?" Brenna asked hastily.

  Still visibly sulking, Yuri nodded and aligned his mini-memory terminal alongside Brenna's. Their wrist units began the transfer of information. Brenna's unit absorbed personal business data, the latest fine-tuning on the Breakthrough Unlimited test schedule, and whatever other material Morgan and George Li and the ramrods knew she would need after five days of being out of touch. Later, when she had some leisure, Brenna would play back the data on the miniaturized terminal so that she would be fully briefed when she arrived at the shuttle hangar tomorrow.

  From the corner of her eye, Brenna studied Lilika Chionis. Like Yuri and Brenna, the pretty Greek lieutenant and Derek were swapping information on their mini-memory terminals. Brenna wondered if that data included things like notes on a voting proxy, which Morgan might have had to use during Brenna's absence. Hiber-Ship Corporation, though, was organized far differently from Breakthrough Unlimited. Derek and Lilika were employees of their company, not co-owners. Lilika was Derek's crewmate. They were cogs in a massive machine-biological cogs, intended to fit genetically and produce a second generation of colonists on a distant, as yet uninhabited planet. Brenna didn't know if Derek had ever been sexually involved with Lilika or with any other woman of Hiber-Ship's crew. She had made it a point not to ask. Years ago, she and Derek had agreed not to let jealousy enter their relationship. Yet she couldn't pretend people like Lilika Chionis didn't exist-especially after Derek's announcement last evening. Lilika and hundreds of other women volunteers would be sleeping in their icy cubicles when New Earth Seeker was launched next March.

  The male-female ratio on the colony ship was lopsided. More biological planning. If all went as planned, the passengers would awake from cryogenic stasis when New Earth Seeker established orbit around the planet the Vahnaj had reserved for them. They would shuttle down to the surface and restart human civilization there, several women taking the part of Eves to each of the ship's genetically approved Adams. One of those Adams would be Derek Whitcomb.

  The data transfer was complete. Brenna massaged her wrist nervously. "We saw you guys on the vid," she told Yuri, "these past few days. Looked like everybody got a good chance to show off."

  Except me. I was hiding. Letting you and Morgan and the rest do my dirty work ...

  Yuri didn't seem resentful. "Indeed! It became boring after some time. Rue Polk and Joe Habich doing interviews on Tuesday, Tumaini and his wife and children being domestic for the reporters on Wednesday, Hector and Adele on Thursday. Shoje and I have been handling PR with Morgan the past two days. Shoje Nagata said he was going to stuff several particular newscasters in the shuttle's fuel tanks when we take off tomorrow, just to get even."

  Lilika giggled. "I'll bet Hector strutted his stuff, though," Derek said. "He and Tumaini are old hands at test-pilot PR."

  "Nyet. Not this time," Yuri corrected him. "Mrs. Beno and Tumaini's children were there, which ... uh ... caused problems. And Hector met a certain woman he knew when he and I were in Space Fleet. He and she disappeared soon afterward," Yuri said, reddening slightly.

  That was a familiar report. Brenna shook her head. "Well, Hector's sex life is publicity of sorts, too. Poor Carmelita. I'll bet she never even opened her mouth when Hector dropped out for some fun-on-the-side. Hector's lucky she doesn't have Aluna Beno's temper..."

  The service elevator stopped. As the four emerged and started across the hall toward the executive elevators, a gypsy newshunter suddenly jumped out from behind a corner, running, his camera pendant ready. Yuri hit the overload set on his wrist mini-terminal. Breakthrough Unlimited's equipment was designed to work at considerable distances. The power output in the little terminal easily blitzed the reporter's audio link with his superiors. The man yelped and jerked the tiny receiver out of his ear. Yuri swung in behind him, seeming eager to help. Instead, he shoved the man into the service elevator. Lilika hesitated. Hiber-Ship Corporation wasn't usually so rough with gypsy newshunters. But when Derek nodded, Lilika moved in at the reporter's side. "Is there a problem, sir?" she asked with apparent concern. "Let's check that feedback reading." Before the man could stop her, Lilika detached his camera pendant and held it out of his reach.

  Yuri grinned from ear to ear. He waved as the doors slid shut on the newshunter's irate protests. For a change, Lilika and Yuri were allies, and the roving reporter had lost his gossip item.

  When the cab descended, Brenna smiled. "Thanks, Derek. Lilika wouldn't have done that if you hadn't given the okay."

  Derek shrugged. "That pushy character deserved it. I'm surprised Yuri didn't knock him cold, strictly as a favor to you."

  "Standby on that."

  They went on to the executive elevator banks. Brenna's palm print identification opened the doors for them, and they began a second rapid ascent through the administrative levels of Pavonis City. Displays on the cab's vid screen pictured a Mars-wide party going on around the planet, both day and night sides. Officially, there were four more days of festival. But this was the big one, the President's gala. The nearly million permanent and transient inhabitants of Mars were making the most of it.
>
  Brenna touched the tiny ruby com-jewel she wore at her throat, then spoke. "We're almost up to the rotunda. Yuri and Chionis just dusted a cretin newshunter at the crossoverpoint. Is it all clear there?"

  Her com-jewel earrings fed back her cousin's basso voice. "Right now it is. But you'd better hurry," Morgan warned. "The enemy is getting trickier. You've got two minutes. Hear me, partner?"

  "We'll make it."

  The executive elevators moved even faster than the service cabs, and Brenna was gulping frantically by the time they reached the top. The capital city lay below them, level upon level burrowed into the Martian bedrock, drawing water from wells drilled far into the crust or brought in from the asteroids. This was Mars Colony's highest inhabited point.

  Brenna led the way through the life-support and food-supply tunnels. Robot waiters conveyed empty trays and drinking glasses in one direction and moved fresh snacks and full bottles toward the rotunda. The tunnels were cluttered and noisy, but there were no newshunters here, nor were any likely to be. This was not the V.I.P. entrance! Derek hurried in Brenna's wake. He spoke into his collar insignia com button, a stylish masculine version of the com-jewels Brenna wore. "Shelley? Chionis gave me the update. Liftoff at 0600. Got it. I should have recuperated from this damned soiree by then. Affirmative and underline."

  Using the small personal communicators was a gamble when they were this close to the newshunter networks. But the devices were shielded. Even though this event would draw gossip collectors from the Kirkwood Asteroid Satellites and elsewhere, some newshunters using super scanners, Brenna thought it would be too late for anyone to intercept them. The gauntlet was nearly run. There was only one more identity plate between the two pilots and the rotunda.

  Derek opened the door, pressing his palm against the screen. He still held his top-security clearance, a rating he had had since he joined Space Fleet—and while he had been part of Breakthrough Unlimited. The computers recognized him at once, permitting him and Brenna to pass through.

  As the doors whispered shut, Brenna blinked owlishly. They had stepped from brightly lit service tunnels into a dim, plushly carpeted hall. Her eyes were still adapting to the sudden change when Morgan loped down the corridor from the rotunda. He greeted them enthusiastically, sweeping an arm around Brenna's waist and lifting her into a bearhug while he pummeled Derek with his free hand.

  "Fun and for-ni-ca-tion!" Morgan said with a laugh, imitating the most popular current vid entertainer. "I knew you'd be late. Knew it when you set up this romantic getaway. I trust you enjoyed yourselves out there in the badlands? You'd better have, after all I went through covering up for you..."

  "See?" Derek said, spreading a hand to show his innocence. "Here's where I learned all those lewd and lascivious terms— from this redheaded monster."

  Morgan scowled at the epithet. His hair was sandy blond, not red. And though he was a big man, he was no "monster." He had inherited his father's ruggedly attractive features. Morgan and Derek exchanged a few more friendly verbal jabs. Then Derek carried his and Brenna's travel kits to the nearby check-in alcove. Government employees and Saunder Enterprises Security maintained a storage service there for the convenience of the President's guests.

  The moment Derek was out of hearing, Morgan dropped the vid-comedy cracks. "Are you all right?" he asked Brenna. He had set her back on her feet, and began gently rubbing the nape of her neck. Brenna knew he could feel the tension knotting her muscles.

  "Derek's leaving," she blurted. "That's what this little tryst was all about. Damn him. He waited until yesterday to tell me. Morgan, the Hiber-Ship's actually going to go. They're launching next March. And Derek..."

  "I know." Brenna gazed up into her cousin's gray eyes. Morgan's sympathy and strength enveloped her. "I found out a couple of days ago, while you were gone. I'm sorry. We knew they meant business, Brenna. There's a way to stop them, though."

  This was the private side of Morgan, the side the public rarely saw. Not the playboy, the wealthy scion of the Saunder-McKelvey clan. Morgan Saunder McKelvey, ace test pilot, co-owner of Breakthrough Unlimited, capable businessman, an expert at reading Brenna's anguish as well as her joys.

  The worries and fears were there, buzzing in the back of Brenna's mind. But now another element shoved at them. New confidence. Morgan, reminding her of what would happen when they succeeded.

  "Prototype II," Brenna whispered. Derek was chatting with some of the check-in employees, and she seized the opportunity, conspiring with Morgan. "We'll break the light-speed barrier."

  Morgan's smile lit up the dim hall. "You and me, partner. Eight more days. And then we've got manned FTL flight. Hiber-Ship will be obsolete. They can convert her into a satellite and leave her in solar orbit. Keep remembering that, Brenna."

  He shared her doubts. His parents had died in Prototype I. But Morgan wasn't going to let her drift off the track. They had each other. They had to win. There was no other possibility. Morgan wouldn't allow it!

  "Derek will..." Brenna didn't put the wish into words, afraid she might jinx it.

  Derek will come home then. To us. To me. His pride will be hurt. He backed the wrong spaceflight program. But that won't matter. We'll be together again.

  And Breakthrough Unlimited will start a new era for mankind—opening the way to the stars.

  CHAPTER THREE

  Reunion

  Brenna hugged Morgan, her gratitude pouring out into physical expression. "Thanks," she murmured. "God, but I needed help."

  "So did I," Morgan said. Brenna blinked, taken aback, as Morgan went on. "It's not easy, carrying the whole load for both of us. Never fear. The sum is greater than the parts, as Dad used to say...

  It wasn't exactly an accusation, but it put everything in perspective for Brenna. She felt as if she had been given a new spine and looked back on her self-pity with embarrassment.

  They did help each other. Morgan put matters into focus, telling her to keep her eye on the target. That wasn't easy to do when Derek was around, and especially when he was dropping news like that on her.

  On course again. The problems under control. They were going to pull off a successful test. Okay!

  Morgan saw Derek walking toward them and obligingly adopted his former, joking stance. He posed, arms akimbo, inviting attack. Derek threw a mock punch at the taller man's midriff. Then they wrist-wrestled for a second, laughing. The scene was a replay of a thousand earlier roughhouses. The men were too mature to push the routine past momentary horseplay now, yet the scuffle took Brenna's thoughts back fifteen years— Perek and Morgan brawling like lion cubs, and she egging them on, or as often as not diving into the scramble herself. The space brats. Prankish juvenile conspirators, sometimes outwitting the adults in their lives, sometimes ganging up to tweak Stuart Saunder's nose. Brenna's older cousin had always tried to join in their games—and dominate them. But Stuart had never succeeded. She, Morgan, and Derek had been like siblings united against the universe, pals and loving competitors.

  It was no longer a game, though. The race was serious, and they were all trying to win it. The prize would be the greatest one in human history.

  Not even Derek's defection to Hiber-Ship Corporation had lessened the affection between him and Morgan. They jostled one another boisterously and then abandoned the make-believe contest, slapping each other on the back. Morgan flung his long arms around his friend and Brenna. "Enough of this time-wasting." He pushed them ahead of him, up the ramp leading to the rotunda. They went along without any real struggle as he chanted, "March! March! Perform! Perform!"

  "His brain's fused a circuit," Brenna said with a chuckle.

  "Undoubtedly," Derek agreed. "Either that or it's rampant hormones out of control. I told him all that womanizing would catch up with him..."

  "Insults won't save you," Morgan said.

  Brenna and Derek took turns teasing him. "Didn't he ask you for an intro to that cute little sergeant dispatcher on the Mars-Luna shuttle?" Brenna
inquired, shamming a frown.

  "Right. He's insatiable," Derek replied, keeping the gibe going. "We saw you on the vid, Morgan, half buried in beautiful women. How do you keep track of them all? Jutta Lefferts, Pauline Bigalow, Cecily What's-her-name..."

  "Newkirk," Brenna supplied. She simpered, mimicking the Commissioner of Martian Agriculture. "Cecily's a bit overage for you, isn't she, Morgan? Oh, well. Give the old girl a thrill..."

  As they mounted the ramp, the dim hallway lighting gradually was replaced by ever-brighter panels. The shift gave Brenna plenty of time to get ready for the full daylight filling the bubble-domed rotunda at the end of the incline.

  "He's got to be taking eroticism enhancers," Derek was saying. "That's the only way he could possibly cope with so many demands on his virility."

  That, too, was an old byplay between the men. Morgan reacted with a disdainful sneer. "I don't need those. Nothing impure is going to interfere with my natural gifts, dust-brain. You're thinking about Stuart, not this prime specimen."

  "The man with something for every woman, correct? What about Chin Jui-Sao? We haven't noticed you tumbling for her."

  Morgan's face twisted with outrage. "Quol-Bez's translator? You're kidding. She's off-limits."

  "You got along okay with the last translator they assigned to the Vahnaj Ambassador," Brenna reminded him. "Maybe that's why they replaced her. You distracted her so much she couldn't keep her mind on her job."

  A trifle primly, Morgan responded. "I don't think it's politic to speculate about Sao's private life. For all we know, she and Quol-Bez have a thing going."

  Derek stared in disbelief. "Her gray-skinned boss? Come on! There are limits to interstellar amity."

  "And how," Brenna muttered. "I like Quol-Bez, but he gives me the shivers."

  "That's atavism," Derek said, quoting from the diplomatic information tapes they had all read. "Instinctual. Probably caused by different evolutionary patterns. After all, Quol-Bez's species did evolve light-years away from Earth. Everyone gets the shivers around him now and then. He does around us, too. Mere side effect. But it may mean Sao's wasting her time if she's got hormones for him."