The ride continued. Nightingale came over, looked out, but was careful not to get too close. There was still nothing to see except the gridwork, moving sporadically past as they continued down.
"I think we're in the basement somewhere," she said. And then, moments later: "I can see daylight below."
The elevator rattled and shook, and there were squeals and shrieks in the floor and ceiling. Suddenly a void opened. The mist was gone, and they were dropping through bright day.
"Where the hell are we?" demanded Nightingale.
She looked down the side of a sheer gray wall that fell forever toward green hills. "This is how the crickets got up to the skyhook."
Nightingale peered out and trembled. "You don't think we're going all the way to the bottom, do you?"
"That would be my guess. Unless their technology isn't too good. If that's the case, we might stop partway down and be expected to switch to another elevator."
It was hard to determine whether Nightingale thought that would be good news or not. There were a few clouds below them and others out on the horizon. Nightingale steeled himself, looked down, and gasped. "My God," he said.
"Stay away from it." She pulled him back.
Kellie heard it. "I don't care what you say," she said. "We're going to saddle up and come over there."
"No point. You can't reach us. Wait until we see how this plays out. I want you to be ready in case we need you in a hurry."
"Okay." She sighed. "Keep the channel open."
The banging and grinding subsided somewhat, and the ride smoothed out, became more constant, less bone-rattling, as if the machinery was becoming unlimbered.
They slowed, accelerated again, and jerked finally to a halt.
She looked down at a river valley so far below it made her head ache. They were, she realized, on the north face of the mountain, the section that appeared to have been artificially carved.
"What are we going to do?" breathed Nightingale. "We're stuck here."
The elevator trembled.
"Quake, I think," she said.
"That's what we need." He looked at her, his eyes full of fear. "Hutch, we need help."
"You've a talent for understatement, Randy."
"Can you give us a description," asked Kellie, "of where you are?"
She told her, and added "Pretty high up. I guess we're going to need air-to-air."
"Okay. Sit tight. We're on our way."
"How do you mean, 'air-to-air'?" asked Nightingale privately. "That doesn't mean what I think it does, does it?"
"Unless you want to try climbing down." Above them she could see the framework of girders, crossbeams, , and diagonals, the grid within which the elevator rode. The rear of the elevator was fitted against the face of the mountain. They were about fifty meters down. The cliff, as best she could see, was lined with shelves and outcrop-pings and even a few trees, but it would under no circumstances provide a means to scramble back up to safety.
"Can they really get us out of here?" asked Nightingale.
"It's lemon pie," she said.
The comment did nothing to alleviate his state of mind. "How?"
"Just ferry us out. Sit tight until she gets here."
He looked down, and she watched the little color that was left drain out of his face. The elevator dropped again, slightly, probably no more than a few centimeters. He gasped and turned a terror-stricken face toward her. "Best to stay away from it," she said.
"What are we going to do? Jump?"
"Something like that, Randy. But you'll be tethered, so you can't fall."
He shook his head. "Hutch, I don't think I can do it."
"Sure you can. No matter what, we can't stay here."
She could see that he felt humiliated as well as frightened.
They began descending again, slowly and steadily. "We're getting there," he said. "If we're patient, maybe everything'll be okay."
She said nothing, but simply sat down and waited for the lander to appear.
"What's holding the elevator up?" Marcel asked.
"The cable, I guess," said Hutch. She heard the welcome rumble of jets.
"That's a negative," said Kellie. "We do not see a cable."
Marcel made a worried noise. "Are you sure?"
"Yep. No cable."
"Then," pursued Marcel, "it must be a different kind of system from the one we use. Maybe they don't use cables. Maybe they glide up and down some sort of magnetic rail."
"I don't think so," said Kellie. "It has a cable mount on top."
"You sure?" asked Hutch.
"There's a couple meters of cable dangling from it."
XXXII
Everybody complains about the weather, and we have the technology now to do something about it, should we choose to. But we don't. The fact is, we need bad weather. A day at the beach is much more enjoyable if we know that somebody, somewhere, is getting rained on.
— Gregory MacAllister, "Reflections," Collected Essays
Hours to breakup (est): 27
Abel Kinder watched the numbers rippling across his screens. Off-the-chart high-pressure front moving down into the Nirvana Ocean to collide with extreme low pressure along the eastern coastline of Transitoria. Tornadoes spawning inland. Hurricanes boiling across waters normally too cold to support hurricane activity.
He punched Marcel's button.
"What do you have, Abel?" the captain asked.
"More heavy weather. When do we make the pickup?"
"Nineteen hours and change."
"I don't suppose you can speed it up."
"Negative. The schedule's out of our control. How heavy?"
"Extremely. I've never seen these kinds of readings before. Tell them to expect wind and rain. Especially wind."
"How much?"
"A lot"
Tom Scolari and Cleo, who had watched the asteroid rise into the night with such unabashed pleasure, were taken afterward to the Zwick. It was a small, boxy ship, bristling with antennas. universal news was emblazoned on its hull.
Janet informed him that they were assigned to the onboard Outsider team. "There's another job coming up in about seven hours. Until then, you can relax."
They were taken in charge by a short, unobtrusive man who might have been a librarian, and a tall willowy blonde with the manner of an aristocrat pretending to be a commoner. "Name's Jack Kingsbury," he said. "I'm the ship's welder." He managed a grin.
The woman was Emma Constantine. "It's good to have you on board," she said, with affected interest. "You people have been doing an extraordinary job." She had perfect diction.
"You're the rest of the team, I assume," Scolari said.
Emma wasn't. "I'm August Canyon's producer." She inspected them. "You two have a change of clothes with you? Damn, I don't understand that. They promised they'd see that you had some fresh clothes."
"Who promised?" asked Cleo before Scolari could react.
"My contact on Wendy. We wanted to do an interview. Live. But you both look a trifle mussed. Let me see if we can get something that fits."
Marcel had lost contact with the ground party. He sat disconsolately on the Star's bridge while Lori tried to raise less through the electrical storms that now blanketed the atmosphere.
The Star's working spaces were far more luxurious than Marcel's cramped command area on Wendy. The bridge had leather panels, soft-glo lighting, full-wall flexscreens, and a captain's chair that would have looked good at the C.O. Club.
He understood why this was so: On the Star, the bridge was part of the tour. It was the only operational part of the great ship that the passengers actually saw, so power and opulence were de rigueur. Only when they commenced the final series of course adjustments would the visits be halted.
Nicholson irritated Marcel. It was hard to say why. The man was friendly enough. Having reached the decision to assist, he never failed to respond quickly and effectively to the needs of the operation. He did what he could to make Marcel and his people comfortable, and he went out of his way to tolerate Beekman, who was capable