One of the guards descended into the cargo area, the other went aft. “All set, Priscilla?” Broderick asked, lowering himself into a seat.
“I will be in a few minutes,” she said.
“Good. We’re going to be working together, so you might as well call me Howard.”
“All right, Howard.”
“And you can relax. I don’t bite.”
“I’m aware of that.” His manner was relentlessly formal. Not an easy guy to take on a first-name basis. She was glad he wasn’t coming along.
“You know how to get to Selika?”
“Yes, Howard.” She made no effort to keep the annoyance out of her voice.
“I’m just kidding.”
“I know.”
“Okay. You should get back here several days before the ceremony. But don’t push it, okay? I suggest you don’t stay out there to visit the way some of our people do.”
“Okay.”
“And don’t forget you’ll be bringing Dr. Wolf back with you.”
“Sure. Is she okay?”
“She’s fine. Just wants to come home.”
“Anything else?”
“That’s about it. And, Priscilla, I appreciate your willingness to take this on at short notice. I know we interrupted your plans. But I won’t forget.” He got to his feet. “Enjoy your trip. And I’ll see you when you get back.”
They shook hands. His grip was firm and somehow encouraging. A smile flickered across those thick lips. Then he turned and left.
Fifteen minutes later, the two security guys told her the ship was clean. Then they, too, departed. She closed the air lock, did a quick inventory, and went onto the bridge.
Time to get started. She put on her cap, squared her shoulders, grinned at her own exaggerated sense of accomplishment, and sat down in the captain’s chair. “Ready to go, Lily?”
“Yes, indeed, Captain. At your pleasure.”
“Very well.” Priscilla leaned over the mike. “Ops,” she said, “this is the Venture.” She smiled. “Ready to move.”
A male voice responded: “Very good, Venture. There’s nothing in the neighborhood. We’re opening the launch doors now. Depart at leisure.”
“Roger that.”
She sat quietly for a few moments. Unlike the Copperhead, Venture did not have shielded ports. She could actually see outside. The docking area, illuminated by sunlight, was big, large enough to accommodate eight vehicles.
My first solo. “Ready to go, Lily?”
“Whenever you are, Priscilla.”
They were facing into the docking area, so she’d have to back out.
A couple of guys in chocolate-brown work suits, protected from the void by Flickinger fields, were outside moving boxes from one storage unit to another. They turned toward her to watch. She paused, enjoying the moment before giving her first order as a ship’s captain: “Lily, start engines.”
She heard the low rumble as they came to life.
“Release the lines.”
Lights blinked on the control panel, and she felt a slight tremor as the magnetics shut down and the Venture began to drift away from the dock. “Lines released, Priscilla.”
She pulled her harness down over her shoulders. “Activate forward thrusters, Lily. Back us out.”
The dome’s vast curved interior began to move past.
God, this felt so good. She was tempted to take the ship out herself, but standard protocol leaving the station was to turn everything over to the AI. So she did.
Somebody behind one of the observation ports waved. Priscilla would have liked to blink her lights, but that would have been unprofessional. Not that anyone would have taken offense, but she would have known. It was time to play the role.
Only one other ship was present: the Baumbachner, lying dark and inert on the far side of the port. She watched it pass out of view as they approached the launch doors. The Venture moved through into the void. Lily waited the requisite six minutes. Priscilla adjusted course toward the target star, 107 Piscium. Then she fired the engines and began to accelerate.
Forty-eight minutes later, with the Earth and Moon both dominating the sky behind her, the Venture jumped into transdimensional space.
* * *
IT WOULD BE a long ride out to Selika. Eight days submerged, and another two or three days after arrival to get to the world itself. At least, this time, she had ports and a wraparound that weren’t blocked by shielding. That was the good news. Unfortunately, there was nothing outside save the dark mist, which moved slowly past. The Venture could easily have been traveling at about two knots.
Located in the direction of the constellation Pisces, 107 Piscium was an orange-red main-sequence star. It was about six billion years old. The planetary system consisted of two gas giants and two rocky worlds, one of which was two billion kilometers from the sun, frozen beyond any possibility of life.
The other rocky world was Selika. It was in a Goldilocks situation, orbiting at a range that provided a temperate climate. The name derived from Roger Selika, the billionaire explorer, who’d designed and built his own ship and had been first to arrive in the system. He was rewarded by the discovery of what was then, other than Earth, only the fourth known living world.
The ship’s library was loaded with material about the planet, pictures of vast forests and broad prairies, of rolling hills and jungles with vegetative growths that looked like nothing she’d ever seen. There were beautiful images of inordinately high mountains, broad oceans, and a snow-covered landscape, often illuminated by two or three of Selika’s moons. And of a swirling chaotic surf, its confusion probably caused by the multiple satellites.
Priscilla was intrigued by the animated vegetation. It was somewhat disorienting when she first looked at it, vines and branches and sometimes even stems that stretched and weaved and literally reached out for her. And the animals: Some looked lethaclass="underline" creatures that might have been crocodiles walking on two legs, others with large claws and feline grace bearing a resemblance to tigers except that they, too, were bipedal. And there was something that seemed to look out of a web of six tentacles with eyes that were eerily human. That was the sexapod. Somebody had shown a sense of humor. The sexapod was by far the most chilling creature Priscilla had ever seen. She couldn’t help noticing that none of these monsters had shown up in Leon Carlson’s appeal. After she’d turned off the sexapods, which had watched her as holograms from the other side of the passenger cabin, she found herself listening for strange sounds elsewhere in the ship.
Enough of that. She took to concentrating on friendlier animals. And there were plenty. Some looked as if they would indeed have made exquisite household pets. Furry, cuddly creatures that would nuzzle you, that would want to share a bed with you.
* * *
WHEN SHE’D BEEN on the qualification flight with, first, Harry Everett, and then Jake, they’d watched a lot of HV. They’d enjoyed concerts, watched episodes from the new Sherlock Holmes series, and laughed at the antics of Venable High, which recorded the adventures of the students at a private girls’ school who, definitely, were not to be taken lightly. “Here at Venable High,” the headmistress said at a graduation ceremony, “we expect that anyone who underestimates our young ladies will pay an appropriate price.”