“I’m torn between probability vectors with mutually exclusive benefits and the likely destruction of different targets and I can’t find a trajectory that avoids all of the negative outcomes without a radical shift in the entire matrix, which we haven’t the capability to carry out anyway, and I have a headache.”
Simon hesitated. “I’ll get you something for the headache,” he said.
Mark gave them their beers and then acted as if they’d never met. Mal led Zoë to a corner table and sat down.
“It’s a bad idea, sir,” she said.
“Most like it is.”
“Okay. How are we going to do it?”
“I guess we should see if Wash can find us a layout of the local lockdown.”
He felt Zoë studying him. “You don’t like this either, do you sir?”
“Not all that much.”
“Is it really necessary?”
“Your beer’s getting warm.”
“Thank you, sir. I wouldn’t want to get killed with the taste of warm beer in my mouth.”
“Zoë—”
“Maybe I should order a raw egg.”
“Zoë—”
“Think they have raw eggs here? I mean, real ones?”
“Zoë—”
“A fake egg in my beer before dying wouldn’t be at all the same thing. Don’t you agree, sir?”
“Zoë, what the gorram hell are you doing?”
“Trying to figure out what the gorram hell you are doing, sir. I can’t back your play if I can’t see it.”
“Zoë, I can’t—”
“You need to let me in, sir. I can’t help from the outside. Not this time.”
Mal leaned back in his chair and stared at his beer, trying to keep all expression off his face, so Zoë wouldn’t see that he was feeling the walls closing in. She waited, silent, with all the patience she’d learned in the war, waiting for attacks that they knew were coming, but never knew when or what form they’d take.
Patience was a powerful force. They drank their beers and waited for each other.
Eventually, Mal started speaking.
The alarm never went off.
The first warning he had, less than a minute after disconnecting with Mal, was when Serenity shook and pitched about three degrees to starboard before righting herself again.
“Wang ba dan,” he said, his hands already finding the emergency warm-up sequence. With his first spare fraction of a second he punched the intercom and said, “Kaylee!” and checked to see which indicators were blinking red, which were solid red, and which were green.
The grav-boot was still good, the engines would fire, and—
In less time than it took to think about it, Serenity was off the ground. She wasn’t happy about it; she moaned, and the controls fought him and complained, and he didn’t dare leave atmo. But they were airborne before whatever it was that had happened had time to happen again.
Kaylee’s voice came back. “I’m looking.”
“Hull integrity is breached, so we can’t get too high, but I can go up. I need to know if I can count on all my attitude adjusters.”
“Top of the list, then. Ninety seconds.”
“Go.”
Her voice sounded icy calm.
Serenity fought him; a sensation he liked not at all; somewhere not too far below the surface was the panic you feel when you try to open your eyes but they’re already open; when you reach for a glass and your arm doesn’t move. And not too far below that was the memory of the one other time he’d felt controls act like this; and the knowledge that there was no ejecting from Serenity.
Three kilometers up the air was noticeably thinner; the ship tried to grasp and claw at what there was, and hated it that there was nothing to hold on to.
Kaylee’s voice came back. “I found your control problems. Half the starboard extender is gone.”
“Copy that, Kaylee.”
Damn. If it was the whole extender; or, better yet, both extenders, this would be much easier. No wonder she was fighting herself.
“I’ll get you more when I have it.”
He didn’t dare take her any higher. And he wasn’t terribly excited about trying to land her. And he couldn’t keep control of her of this way for much longer.
His whole body was committed to keeping her in the air; leaving his mind free to reflect on which way to go, when all the ways led the same way: down, and much too fast.
Chapter 10
My Own Kind of Courage
“So then, Mister Cobb—if that’s your name—what will it be? Spend the rest of your life digging bauxite, or answer a very simple question?”
“I don’t know. Sounds kinda complicated to me. I’m a pretty simple guy at heart.”
“Of course, you might not be digging bauxite; you might be hauling topsoil. A sack at a time, on your back. That sound like fun?”
“I always did like the outdoors.”
“I’m losing patience, Mister Cobb.”
“Yeah, well you’re breaking my heart, Mister—what did you say your name was?”
“I didn’t.”
“Well, ain’t we gonna be friends?”
The officer’s mouth worked, then he said, “Rennes. Officer Rennes.”
“Yeah, well my heart is breaking, Officer Rennes.”
“It isn’t your heart we’re going to break.”
“Careful. If you scare me, I might faint.”
“You aren’t in any bargaining position, Mister Cobb. If you don’t want to tell us, that’s fine. We don’t need to know.”
“That’s ruttin’ good, because I don’t need to tell you.”
“Are you sure, Mister Cobb?”
“Yeah, tell you what. I’ll answer your questions gen wo de jiba jiangu de cha zai ni de zuiba.”
Officer Rennes punched a button on his desk. “Come take this man back to his cell,” he said. Then he shook his head, sat back, and folded his arms.
It took her about five minutes to conclude that there was no way to fix the extender without landing, so she turned her attention to the ugly hole in the aft hull, starboard side. It had come right through to the Engine room, not three feet from her hammock.
Wash’s voice came through. “Kaylee, is there anything you can do to give me some stability? I can’t hold this much longer, and there’s no way we survive a landing like this.”
“I could maybe boost the attitude adjusters, but I’d have to run them parallel to the thrusters.”
“Which means?”
“More engine, more juice, more I-grav, more gees, more thrust, more power on attitude, less control, more—”
“Okay, I get it. How long to set it up?”
“I don’t know. I’ve never tried it before. The engine’s going to cut out while I’m hooking it up.”
“Kaylee…” She could hear the strain in his voice. She’d never heard that from him before. “If the engine cuts out, we die.”
“I’m only talking about half a second or so, while I switch lines.”
“Half a second? Okay, maybe I can hold her. Set it up, but let me know before you do it.”
“I will.”
“And Kaylee, it would be very helpful you could hurry on this.”
“It’d be easier out of atmo, so we’d stop bucking.”
“Kaylee, I can’t hold this much longer, and the airtight won’t respond from here.”
“I’ll go close it; I’m right there.”