Starclimber

  I slowed myself with my air pistol and looked up at the counterweight. I hadn’t seen it properly before now. It was truly enormous, rising up like the Eiffel Tower, and looking bizarrely out of place in the astral ether. It seemed incredible that it had been able to blast off from earth. Carefully I maneuvered my body and, with a pulse of compressed air, guided myself up beside the counterweight’s hull toward the access hatch.

  I had no watch, and every moment out here was so absorbing that I lost all sense of time. Tobias was our clock, calling out every five minutes; and the gaps between some times seemed an age, and other times little more than a few heartbeats.

  “We’re at the hatch,” the captain said, when we’d secured ourselves to the hull.

  “This is very good,” came Dr. Turgenev’s voice now. He’d managed to rig our radios so he could communicate with us from the bridge and give us directions once we were inside. “You are three minutes ahead of schedule.”

  “Off to a good start,” the captain said.

  The hatch wasn’t exactly like our own cargo door, but not far off. It was the handholds that were the problem. They were in different places, and it took me a while to get into a proper working position. As I readied my tools, the music of the spheres played in some secret part of my mind, soothing me. I worked steadily, without talking, without thinking of anything except the next motion of my body. I thought I was doing well until I heard Tobias’s time call and realized I was nearly behind schedule.

  I looked over to see Captain Walken working on his last bolt; I was just finishing my second. I tried to hurry and very nearly lost my wrench.

  “Steady, Mr. Cruse,” said the captain. “You’re doing well.”

  I fought my frustration and kept going. Never did I forget that time was streaming past, even though I couldn’t tell how quickly or slowly. When my last bolt finally drifted off, I almost cheered.

  The captain turned the handle, and I pushed. The hatch popped in and folded back on its hinges against the hull.

  “We have the hatch open,” the captain reported.

  “You are five minutes behind. This is not bad,” said Dr. Turgenev.

  My limbs felt shaky with fatigue. It was the longest any of us had been out at one time. Moisture had started to form and freeze along the bottom of my visor.

  “We’re going inside,” the captain said.

  I felt the tight grip of claustrophobia. The hatchway was small, and it was pitch-black inside. The captain went first, and I followed, checking our umbilicuses once more. I was grateful for our helmet-mounted lamps, which cast powerful beams of light.

  It was like stumbling upon something from another civilization, a cathedral or a factory. The inside of the counterweight was a vast spoolworks, an intricate arrangement of gears and colossal cylinders welded into place, one above the other, carrying tens of thousands of miles of astral cable. Most of the spools were empty, but a hundred feet above me, near the counterweight’s peak, I saw several cylinders still wound with tight rows.

  “I see some cable,” I said, with huge relief. Dr. Turgenev was right. The counterweight had never gone high enough and never paid out its full length of astral cable. It was still there, just waiting to be deployed.

  “Yes, is good,” said Dr. Turgenev, sounding unsurprised. His matter-of-factness reassured me. Maybe our plan was possible after all. “Now, please find control panel.”

  From the blueprints, I knew the panel wasn’t far from the access hatch. A spindly catwalk had been built around the inside hull, and my beam of light picked out a massive control panel about twenty feet along.

  I kept checking back over my shoulder as we moved toward it, making sure our umbilicuses ran clear. It would be all too easy for them to get tangled up on something.

  “We’re at the panel,” the captain said.

  There were no proper footholds here, so we had to make do gripping the railing with one hand and floating before the controls. Our lamps illuminated the familiar array of switches and buttons, dials and lights, organized into different sections, each labeled with a capital letter. I’d rehearsed this so many times, I’d memorized the entire ignition sequence. But I was very glad Dr. Turgenev would be talking us through it, for I was tired and I didn’t want to make a mistake. From our tool pouches we each took a pair of needle-nose pliers. We’d all rehearsed managing different banks of controls.

  “Please find section F,” Dr. Turgenev told us.

  “I have it,” said Captain Walken.

  “Press white button to test battery,” the scientist instructed.

  “The indicator light flares green,” the captain reported back.

  “Good. We still have charge. In section G is gauge with four-digit number. You see it?”

  Captain Walken leaned closer and read the number to Dr. Turgenev.

  “Ah,” the scientist said. “This explains great deal. This number is seconds of rocket burn. Rockets shut off five seconds too early. Must be defective fuse. Now to check fuses. Please find section A.”

  My eyes went to the proper place.

  But I saw no row of fuses.

  “Do you see fuses?” came Dr. Turgenev’s voice again.

  “I just need a second….” My eyes were darting everywhere, and I felt a flare of panic. In my mind I could see the mock-up we’d built; I could see the fuses. But there as nothing in front of me right now. Was I starting to hallucinate?

  “They’re not here,” I said.

  There was a brief silence. “You are sure?” said Dr. Turgenev.

  Captain Walken floated closer. “I confirm that,” he said. “The fuses are not in section A. Is it possible they’re somewhere else?”

  “Yes, please look,” said Dr. Turgenev. “I work from memory only….”

  I started searching through section B, and in section C I found a row of fuses.

  “There’s six,” I reported. Our mock-up had only four. “Are these the ones?”

  “Yes, yes, must be,” said Dr. Turgenev, but he sounded flustered, and a terrible wave of doubt broke across me. He’d been working the whole time from memory, under terrible stress. If he could forget one thing, what else could he forget?

  “Please to check fuses now, starting from left.”

  Two of the fuses had blown, and I started to replace them. We’d practiced this in the trials, but my gut told me it was all taking too long.

  “Now fuel gauge in section D. Please read me weight of fuel.”

  That was on the captain’s side. The pause that followed was too long.

  “The needle shows empty,” came the captain’s voice in my helmet.

  “This is not possible,” said Sergei.

  “It’s on empty, Dr. Turgenev.”

  I felt like I might throw up. No fuel. Without fuel there was no rocket burn. Without rocket burn the counterweight would continue to fall out of orbit, taking us with it. All our hope and work was to come to nothing.

  “The fuel’s weightless up here,” said Tobias from the air lock.

  “Yes, he is right!” said Dr. Turgenev with a slightly hysterical chuckle. “Of course! Gauge was not meant to be read in outer space. I am fool! No problem now. Is fuel, I am sure.”

  I let out a deep breath. My pulse slowed.

  “So now,” said Dr. Turgenev, “we have good chance for reignition.”

  “Chance?” I said in surprise.

  “Is small possibility engines are too cold to ignite,” the scientist replied.

  “You didn’t mention that earlier,” Captain Walken said.

  “Small possibility, very small possibility,” said Dr. Turgenev hurriedly. “Now find please section B. Do you see dial?”

  “I’ve got it,” I said. This, I knew, was the timer to ignite the engines. We needed thirty minutes to get back to the Starclimber, and another thirty minutes for the Starclimber to get safely clear.

  “Turn all the way to right until number says sixty,” Dr. Turgenev told me.

  The
maneuver was tricky with the needle-nose pliers, but I gripped hard and managed to turn the dial. The numbers flickered up: twenty…thirty…forty…fifty…and there it stuck.

  “It’s stopped at fifty,” I said.

  “It goes to sixty,” said Dr. Turgenev.

  I tried again. “It must be jammed,” I said.

  Captain Walken came over and tried, with no more success. “I don’t want to force it.”

  “No, no, do not force!” said Dr. Turgenev. I heard him clear his throat. “Fifty minutes only…”

  Captain Walken and I turned to each other. I couldn’t see his expression through his mirrored visor, but I got the feeling he was thinking the same thing as me.

  “Is that enough time?” I said quietly.

  “It’ll have to be,” he said. “The ship needs thirty minutes to get to a safe distance. That means we need to get back in twenty. We can do it. Dr. Turgenev, we need to keep going, please.”

  “Find ignition button in section A,” the Russian scientist said. “Push until green light comes on. And remember, once you see green light, there is no stopping.”

  I found the ignition button. I pushed it hard.

  There was no sound in outer space, but I could feel through my feet a stuttering vibration, like an engine struggling to start in cold weather.

  Whrrrr…whrrrr…whrrrr.

  “Do you have green light?” Dr. Turgenev asked urgently.

  “I have no green light,” I said.

  I pushed again, felt the same shaking vibration through the catwalk.

  “I have no green light!” I said again.

  I kept pushing.

  Everything was too cold: the wires, the batteries, the mechanics. The rocket was built to launch from earth, not from the frozen ether. Suddenly the vibration at my feet strengthened, and did not falter. The indicator light flared green.

  “I have a green light!” I cried out.

  “Go!” shouted Dr. Turgenev.

  We had only twenty minutes, so we would need to be all the faster now. Immediately Captain Walken and I pushed off the catwalk toward the hatch. I was closest and swam through first, fairly blinded by the sun and starlight blazing off the counterweight’s silver hull.

  I looked back at the hatch, waiting for Captain Walken to emerge. He jetted through but was suddenly jerked back. In alarm I saw that part of his umbilicus was still inside the counterweight.

  “I’m snagged on something,” he said. “Go on ahead, Mr. Cruse. I’ll sort this out.”

  He turned himself and started back inside. With a burst of my air pistol I followed him.

  “Mr. Cruse, return to the ship!” he said sharply when he caught sight of me.

  He was already maneuvering himself up toward a complicated mesh of gears beside one of the empty cylinders. In the combined blaze of our headlamps, I saw his umbilicus caught amid the machinery. It must have drifted up and gotten snagged while we were at the control console.

  “You have only fifteen minutes to return to ship,” Dr. Turgenev said over my radio.

  “Mr. Cruse, you are directly disobeying an order,” the captain said. We’d both reached the spot where the umbilicus was caught. My throat went dry when I saw it. It was trapped between the teeth of two meshing gears. The captain reached for the umbilicus, and I held on to him, helping anchor him as he tried to pull it free. It wouldn’t budge. He tried once more, and this time the gears moved, meshing even tighter, pinching the umbilicus.

  “Ten minutes,” said Dr. Turgenev.

  “Mr. Cruse—” said the captain.

  My words came out in desperate gasps. “Sir. I am—not going—back alone.”

  “If I pull any more, I may sever the umbilicus. I’m stuck, Matt. You need to return.”

  “We’ll cut you loose,” I said, taking my knife from my hip pouch. “We’ll cut your umbilicus a few feet from your suit. You grip the end tight—you won’t lose your air and pressure.”

  I was lying, and we both knew it. No matter how hard he squeezed, his oxygen and heat would find a way out. How fast was the only question.

  “Cut it,” said Captain Walken.

  He measured a length of umbilicus from the back of his suit and held it in front of him, clamping it tightly in his fist. I started sawing. The material was thick and resilient, and it seemed to take forever before I heard a hiss and saw a line of escaping vapor. The captain squeezed tighter. I sawed harder.

  “Five minutes!” cried Dr. Turgenev. “You must return to ship!”

  At last I cut all the way through. The ship’s end of the umbilicus started whipping around, venting oxygen into space. There was absolutely nothing connecting the captain to the Starclimber now.

  “Grab hold!” I told him. I needed one hand for my air pistol, so we linked our free arms as tightly as we could. I jetted us back toward the hatch. Glancing back to check my own umbilicus, with horror I saw it looping out behind me, dangerously close to the gears. It was too late to slow down, so I just gave us another burst of speed, terrified I’d feel a great backward jerk as we snagged. But we made it through the hatch and were outside.

  “Tobias! Start reeling in. I’ve got the captain.”

  We were unwieldy, the two of us locked together, and with the air pistol it was almost impossible to move us in a straight line. We tumbled down past the counterweight’s hull, went too far, and my umbilicus brought me up short, almost jerking the captain free of my grip.

  “You all right, sir?” I knew that with every second he was losing more and more oxygen and air pressure.

  “Yes,” he said, but his breathing was labored.

  Now to get between the counterweight’s engines and to the Starclimber’s air lock. Tobais was very slowly reeling me in—he couldn’t do it too quickly or he’d send us slamming into the engines. With little bursts from my air pistol I lined us up. The air lock was dead ahead, Tobias in the hatch.

  We passed between the counterweight’s giant engines, and I was startled to feel their heat as they warmed up.

  “We are out of time!” said Dr. Turgenev.

  “We’re almost there!” I shouted. We were endangering the entire ship now, but I could see the air lock. “Don’t leave without us!”

  “We cannot wait long!” said the scientist.

  “We’re coming!”

  I felt the captain’s grasp weaken and he slipped off my arm. He started to drift away. I dropped my air pistol and just managed to grab hold with both arms. I saw the trail of his oxygen, venting from his severed cable, more rapidly now as his grip faltered.

  “Bring us in, Tobias!” I shouted. “Fast as you can!”

  “Hold tight!” he said.

  The tug on my umbilicus spun me around, and I hurtled backward toward the Starclimber, praying I wouldn’t lose my grip on the captain. Without my air pistol I had no way of steering now, and with a jarring thud, we scraped the side of one of the rocket engines and deflected off, tumbling. Then there was another great thump as we hit the Starclimber, knocking the wind out of me. I felt a sharp tug on my line and there was Tobias, leaning out from the hatch and grabbing hold of me. He pulled the captain and me inside and shut the hatch.

  “We’re all in!” I shouted into my radio. “Dr. Turgenev, we’re all inside. Reverse!”

  “Beginning descent,” he replied. “We are nine minutes behind.”

  Through the porthole I saw us slide down past the counterweight’s engines. They were already glowing orange. I hoped we weren’t too late.

  “Pressurizing air lock,” said Tobias.

  “Need air,” gasped the captain, teeth chattering inside his helmet.

  I grabbed hold of the stump end of the captain’s umbilicus and squeezed hard, trying to hold in whatever remained of his oxygen and air pressure. I watched the pressure gauge in agony.

  “We’re almost there, sir, almost there,” I said, “just a few more seconds, you’re doing fine.” The moment the air lock was at proper pressure, I unclamped his he
lmet and yanked it off his head. His face was gray, his lips blue with cold, and he was struggling for breath. Tobias placed an oxygen mask over his face.

  Tobias and I removed each other’s helmets. The captain was breathing easier now, and some color had returned to his face. He removed the mask and looked at me. “Mr. Cruse, I’ll be in your debt till my dying day.” He gave my arm a squeeze. “Thank you for disobeying orders.”

  “I won’t make a habit of it, sir.”

  Captain Walken seemed miraculously recovered, and we hurried out of our suits and jetted up the stairs to the bridge. Shepherd was still there, strapped into one of the pilot’s chairs, looking wretched. But it was Dr. Turgenev who was at the helm, the throttle pushed to flank speed. Overhead, the counterweight still seemed uncomfortably close, its four rocket engines glowing red-orange now.

  “Three minutes to ignition,” said Dr. Turgenev. “This is not so far away as I would like.”

  We were already at top speed, and all I could do was watch, willing the counterweight to get smaller and smaller.

  “Good work out there, Cruse,” Shepherd said to me quietly.

  I looked at him, completely surprised. “Thanks,” I said. It wasn’t an apology exactly, but it was probably the closest thing I’d ever get from Shepherd.

  “One minute….” said Dr. Turgenev.

  I had no idea what to expect. Would the cable be able to withstand the strain? Would it snap free back on earth?

  “Ten seconds,” said Dr. Turgenev.

  I finished the countdown in my head and watched as the engines erupted with flame. It seemed to engulf the entire counterweight, for all I could see was a great sphere of fire hanging in the ether.

  “We have ignition!” cried Dr. Turgenev.

  A huge shudder ran through the Starclimber.

  The ball of fire seemed to be shrinking with unbelievable speed.

  “It is working!” cried Dr. Turgenev. “It climbs! Cable is unspooling!”

  And suddenly the flame disappeared and all I could see was the tiny dot of the counterweight, incredibly far away and climbing heavenward.

  “That was five-second burn,” said Dr. Turgenev.

  “That’s it?” Tobias said.