“I never thought this kind of thing would happen to me,” Nicklin said. “James Nicklin—space traveller!”
Hoping he had achieved a natural-sounding change of subject, he tried to work out why the figure Hepworth quoted had drawn a cold feather along his spine. Fifteen hours at say 5G would be… His skill with mental calculation seemed to desert him as he realised that by this time the ship should have been on full gravity, its drive becoming more efficient as the build-up in speed allowed the intake fields to gather increasing amounts of reaction mass. The current acceleration felt more like a third or a quarter of the optimum, and there might have been fluctuations while he was asleep, causing the dreams of falling…
“Don’t overload that walnut you use instead of a brain.” Hepworth spoke in friendly tones and returned the flask to Nicklin, good evidence of his not being antagonised. “Under normal conditions we’d have been a lot farther out by this time.”
“I…ah…didn’t want to open my big mouth too soon.”
“I know—you were being tactful.” Hepworth gave him a quizzical look. “I never noticed you trying to be diplomatic before. What’s the matter, Jim—are you sick?”
Nicklin tried to smile. “I have my off days. What were you saying about the engines?”
“About the engines? Nothing! Not a word! Not a peep, not a cheep! The engines are fine.”
“But you said-”
“I said that under normal conditions the ship would be travelling a lot faster.”
“So what’s wrong?”
“Space itself is wrong,” Hepworth said peacefully. “You must remember that we’re in an anti-matter universe now, Jim. Some things are different here. It’s too soon for me to say exactly what the differences are—it could be something to do with the density or distribution of interstellar dust, or it might be something more basic than that.
“If some nuclear interactions are different—as with cobalt 60—then some of the ship’s performance parameters might also be different. For instance, our intake fields might be slightly porous to anti-matter ions. I tell you, Jim—whole new areas for research are opening up all around us.”
Nicklin took another drink of luke-warm gin.
I’m going to put all my trust in this man, he thought, repressing a grimace as the alcohol burned in his throat. I’m going to accept everything he says. I’m going to have total faith in him because nobody—not even the Great Prankster—would cast a hundred souls adrift in a ship that can’t fly.
Again, there were dreams of falling.
In one of them the ship was in orbit around a green planet. The planet had no cloud markings, no oceans, no polar caps. It was a sphere of unrelieved colour—pantomime scenery green, children’s paintbox green, remembered holiday green—too rich for normal vegetation. Megan Fleischer had come to Nicklin and confessed that she was unable to fly the pinnace. He had taken over for her, and now he was in the pilot’s seat as the little craft plunged—buffeted by turbulent atmosphere—towards the virescent bauble. He glanced down at the controls and terror gripped him as he realised they were a meaningless array of levers and dials. He knew nothing about flying, nothing at all! What madness had made him think he could pilot any kind of spacecraft or aircraft? The poisonous green surface was rushing upwards, expanding, spinning in the windshield. He could see now that it was a swamp—heaving, bubbling, gloating. The pinnace was hurtling into it at many times the speed of sound.
And there was nothing he could do but wait to die…
On the following morning, the second day of the flight, Nicldin decided that the only way to survive a prolonged journey was by making himself genuinely useful. The simple disciplines of hard work had sustained him for the year in which the Tara had been dragged, inch by inch, from Altamura to Beachhead City, and the experience had taught him a valuable lesson.
“You can trust work,” he announced to the emptiness of his room as he got out of bed and began to dress. “Work isn’t fickle. Work never lets you down.”
There was, he knew, a ready-made outlet for his particular abilities and knowledge. Jock Craig, the electrician, had a good record as a general handyman and had been promoted—in the vague way that Montane handled such things—to the post of “maintenance supervisor”. The job would have required Craig to mend anything from a lighting switch to a ventilation fan, but he had been among those who failed to board the ship in time for the escape from Orbitsville.
Nothing had broken down at this early stage of the voyage, as far as Nicklin was aware, but there was one major item of housekeeping which cried out for his attention. The gangway which passed through every deck had been vital for mobility while the ship was lying on its side in dock. Now it was an encumbrance which hindered access to the single longitudinal ladder which ran the length of the ship—and it was time for it to go.
Within an hour Nicklin had eaten a solitary breakfast, sought out Montane and appointed himself maintenance supervisor in Craig’s place.
The gangway was made of pressed metal in some places, and in others of simple wooden planks which still bore dusty footprints. Nicklin started at the upper end of the ship, removing sections, cutting them into convenient lengths and storing them in an empty room on 5 Deck. As he cleared each deck he checked that its sliding anti-fire hatch could be moved freely. The work was aided by the low gravity, but hampered by the number of people moving between levels. Having spent one ship day adjusting to their surroundings and getting used to the idea of being in space, the emigrants were beginning to establish the life patterns which might have to serve them for many months.
Looking along the ladder was, for Nicklin, like taking a core sample of the activities on the seriate decks. In the dwindling companionways he could see knots of men and women in conversation, while others progressed between the two public levels of the canteen and washrooms. Children were visible almost everywhere, establishing their hold on new territories or being harried by adults. At one stage there was a bible class going on below Nicklin, a committee meeting of some kind on his level and what seemed like a choir practice several floors above him.
Inconvenient though the continual traffic on the ladder was, he derived comfort from the abundant evidence that the human spirit was irrepressible. Many of the emigrants spoke to him in a friendly manner, some—having tapped into an information grapevine—expressing gratitude for the part he had played in getting the ship off the slideway. These men and women were obviously more in touch with the realities of their situation than his anti-religious prejudice had allowed him to expect, and the idea that they might form a viable colony on a new world gradually began to seem less preposterous.
Twice during the morning’s work he saw Zindee White coming towards him. Unable to meet her eyes, he moved as far off the ladder as possible and kept his back turned while she was passing. On the first occasion he allowed himself to hope that she would speak and show some sign of forgiveness, but no contact was made. That’ s that, he told himself grimly. To use one of Corey’s best cliches-I’m reaping what I sowed.
There was little to tax his mind in the dismantling of the gangway, but he gave the task full concentration, using the physical labour to ease the pressures of self-reproach and recrimination. Having shut everything but bolts, clamps and lashing ropes from his personal universe, he felt a dull sense of surprise when—some time later—he became aware of Nibs Affleck beckoning to him from higher up the ladder.