"It sounds fantastic," said Alex. "Where can you find this bug?"
"A. eutrophus? In the hold of the Flying Dutchman. It's just a story that agents pass around. The test plot was abandoned when genetic engineering "was outlawed. Later, it was burned by a Green hit squad."
Doc grunted. "Hunh. Burning plastic corn? I'll bet it released a toxic smoke cloud."
"Sure. But that was the fault of the scientists, not the arsonists. They burned one of the scientists, too."
"My grandmother would know," said Sherrine.
Heads turned.
"My grandmother. She's a genetic engineer, remember? If anyone knows where we could lay hands on a culture of this A. eutrophus, she would."
Alex felt a tingle in his limbs. They weren't just joking around any more. They could make it work. Foodstuff. Seeds. Vitamins. Spices. Plasi-facient bacteria, for crying out loud! They could actually make it happen. They knew where to find the stuff. Or they knew people who knew. He glanced at Gordon, who was looking straight at him, reading the hope in his eyes.
Sure. Make the payload valuable enough and Lonny Hopkins himself would fly out and grab it, Alex MacLeod and all.
"How would you handle meat, though?" asked Doc. "No seeds. No pills."
"Small animals. Rabbits. They breed fast and they're relatively meaty for their size."
"Guinea pigs? The Incas used those."
"Chickens."
"Hold it. Hold it. This rocket is starting to sound like a Central American bus."
"Forget the chickens," said Mike. "Take fertilized eggs. They take up less space. Hatch 'em in an incubator. Use the hens for egg production. Keep a rooster or two for breeding stock and use the rest for meat."
"But we don't have a chicken incubator," said Gordon.
"Build one. We can put the design and operating manual on a disc."
"Hell's bells," interjected Doc. "Give 'em a whole library on disc. SF, too, of course. They must be getting tired of reading the same books over and over. As for the rabbits and guinea pigs, just take the germ plasm. You have a sperm bank, don't you?"
"Well, uh, yes. For humans."
"Good. Frozen sperm, then. Frozen ova, too. Mix 'em in vitro. Though you'll still want to take a few females along, just in case. Ova are more delicate than sperm."
"Is diversity problem in sperm bank," said Gordon thoughtfully. "Gene pool is limited."
"Mars Needs Women!" shouted Mike. Sherrine looked up from her notepad and blushed a deep crimson. Before she could say anything, Bruce Hyde spoke from the doorway.
"Do I want to know what this discussion is about?"
Sherrine and the others told him, all talking at once. He looked at Alex. "Will it work?"
Alex shrugged. "Why fly an empty truck? As long as we have enough fuel to lift the mass." And that would be a pretty problem! Trading altitude for cargo. There had to enough cargo to make a rendezvous cost-effective. The more, the better. But more cargo, less altitude; and Lonny would have to use more fuel to match orbits, and… Where was the break-even point? It was a question of minimizing the rendezvous costs while maximizing the cargo value. A minimax problem. But it wouldn't do any good to try and calculate an answer. Too many indeterminates--Lonny would be making his own decisions anyway.
"Alex?" Steve was waving a hand at him.
"I'm sorry. What did you say?"
"I asked about spare parts and fittings," said Steve.
"We can fabricate most of what we need," Alex told him, "if we have the materials and the machine tools." Maintenance was the one activity in the habitats that was absolutely crucial. "We can scavenge and salvage most materials, although we're always short and more would always be welcome; but machine tools and dies for the machine shop are essential. Some of our blades and drill bits and molds have been reground or resharpened until they're useless."
"Machine tools would be small," said Mike, "but heavy."
"No critiques, yet," Sherrine reminded him as she wrote. "What else?"
"Surgical implements," said Doc. "I'm sure people up there still suffer injury and illness." He shuddered. "I'm trying to imagine resharpened scalpels and hypodermics."
Alex nodded. "You're right. I'd forgotten. Shots hurt."
"And medicines," continued Doc. "All sorts. You must have to ration what medicines you have mighty close."
Doc might as well have pierced him with one of his scalpels. Rationing… In a society of scarcity there was always rationing; and some people were on top of the rationing list and others were at the bottom. If Lonny or Mary or hydroponics chief Ginjer Hu fell sick, there would be medicine available. "Essential personnel." If Alex MacLeod fell sick…
And if he did climb back into orbit with a rocketful of goodies, would his name move up the list? More to the point, how much could they realistically take with them in a Titan, anyway? Brooding, Alex dropped out of the brainstorming session.
"Not only medicines," said Sherrine, "but other chemicals, too. 3MJ has chlorine for his pool right here. He might let us have some."
"Metals, too," said Gordon "… Nah. Too heavy. We would not lift enough metal to matter."
Bruce laughed. "What do you suppose the Titan is made of? If we can loft it hard enough, we can put the booster into a recoverable orbit. Then your people can mine it to their heart's content."
Later, when they were alone for a few minutes, Gordon looked at him with widened eyes. "It cannot work, but they believe--do you believe, too?"
Alex arranged the blanket around his legs. He smoothed the green paid cloth, tucking the folds out of sight. Experimentally, he pulled on the chair's wheels and was pleased to see that he could roll himself across the room. As Doc had told him, the upper body strength would come first. It was the muscles needed for standing and walking that needed the training. That and replenishing the bone calcium. He looked at Gordon.
"I think it could work. The essence of trade is 'Cheap here; dear there.' Make the cargo valuable enough and get the rocket close enough and, yes, it damn well could work." Gordon's blanket was a dull monochrome, which secretly pleased Alex.
"But, there are so many things that could go wrong…"
Alex slashed the air with his hand. "Of course there are! Don't teach your grandmother to suck eggs--"
"Sorry, Alex."
"--We don't even know if we have a ship. Or whether we can fuel it. Or a thousand other things. We don't know how much cargo we can load; or what kind and how much will convince the station to bring us in. It's got to be the right stuff. And we can't ask Big Momma without tipping our hand and maybe losing the fans' help. There are a thousand details, and if any one of them fails, the whole idea collapses like a burnt-out star. So what do you want to do? Give up and stay down here in the Well for the rest of your life?"
"No, but you don't have to prove--"
"What do you know what I have to prove?"
Gordon pressed his lips together and looked away. "Nichevo."
"Damn right." Alex turned his wheelchair away. So, why was he being so hard on the kid? Deep down, he knew that they were cut off from home forever. This business with the Titan was just half-baked wish fulfillment. What did the shrinks call it? Denial? Crash a scoopship, did you? Stupid dipper fell into the Well? Hey, no problem. We'll just patch together an old derelict missile; stuff it with a cornucopia of wonderful goods, and sail home to triumph. Lonny Hopkins will be humiliated, and Mary will be so enchanted that she will finally leave him and we will all live happily ever after.