"Richard." Hutch, who had guessed this was coming, tried to use her most serious, don't screw-around-with-me voice. "Don't forget we're supposed to be here to take these people off. Not augment them."
"I know. Hutch. And I won't forget." He took her hand, squeezed it. Their Flickinger fields flashed. "Be careful," she said. "What's the other job?" asked Carson. "We need as precise a measurement of the inclination as we can get. On both round towers. And we need to ensure that the lowest point on each roof really does match up with the central square." He winked at Hutch. "Maybe"-he beamed—"we have something."
June 6, 2202 Dear Dick,
…Thank God for the round towers and the slanted roofs. It is all that adds any touch of reason to the entire business.
You would have been amused at how we behaved. Very quiet. We kept our voices down, as if we were all afraid someone might be listening. Even Frank Carson. You haven't met him. He's not the sort of man to give way to anyone. But even he kept looking over his shoulder.
Truth is, there is a presence in those streets. You can't help but feel it.
Poor Hutch. She sees no rationale whatever, and consequently she was damned near unhinged at the end of our tour. Even with the small insight I have (and I know you have guessed what it is), I too feel unsettled. Oz is not a place for anyone with a halfway active imagination…
Richard
— Richard Wald to his cousin Dick Received in Portland, Oregon, June 24
PART TWO
TEMPLE OF THE WINDS
6
On board Alpha. Sunday, June 6; 1830 hours
Hutch was glad to get back to the Winckelmann. It was an ungainly, modular vehicle, little more than a set of rings (three on this voyage) connected to a central spine. She activated its lights as she approached. They illuminated the shuttle bay and silhouetted arrays of sensors and maintenance pods and antennas. The ship was warm and familiar, a utilitarian and undeniably human design floating against a starry backdrop rendered suddenly unsettling.
The moods of deep space didn't usually affect her as they did many others who traveled between the worlds. But tonight, ah tonight: the ship looked good. She'd have liked company, somebody to talk to, someone to fill up the spaces in the vessel. But she was nevertheless relieved to be home, where she could lock doors and do a simmy.
The Academy seal, a scroll and lamp framing the blue earth of the United World, was emblazoned prominently on the A ring, near the bridge.
The moon and the planet floated in a black, starless sky. Quraqua lay on the edge of the Void, the great rift that yawned between the Orion and Sagittarius Arms. The opposite shore was six thousand light-years away, visible only as a dim glow. Hutch wondered about the effect on a developing species of a sky half-crowded with stars and half-empty.
Alpha entered B ring, and settled into its cradle. The big doors swung satisfactorily shut on the night. She pulled off her Flickinger harness and stowed it in the compartment behind her seat. Five minutes later, she was on the bridge.
The message board blinked. There was a transmission in the holding tray from the Temple site, routine precedence. Too soon for Richard to have arrived. Time enough to look at it later. She went to her quarters, removed her work clothes, and stepped into the shower. The spray felt good.
Afterward, still dripping, she ordered steak. Her cabin was decorated with pictures of old friends, of herself and Richard on Pinnacle, of Alpha floating nose to nose with the Great Hexagon Monument near Arcturus, of a group of planetologists whom she'd joined for a beach party at Bethesda (and who had hoisted her on their shoulders for the photo). The air was sweet with the breath of green plants, lemon thyme and bayberry and honeysuckle.
The demon moon rolled across her view. Oz, on the far side, was not visible. Annoyed at her own disquiet, she closed the panel.
Richard had given her a medallion years earlier, a lovely piece of platinum, a copy of a talisman he'd brought back from Quraqua. This was in the days before Oz had been found. A winged beast and a six-pointed star were engraved on one side, and a gracefully curved arch on the other. Arcane symbols lined the rim. The beast and the star designate love, Richard had told her, and the arch is prosperity. Both will be yours as long as you wear the medallion.
Tonight, it was soothing. She looped it over her shoulders. Local magic.
She dressed and, when the dinner bell rang, strolled by the galley to pick up her steak. She added a bottle of wine, and took everything to the bridge.
The message board was still blinking.
She sliced off a piece of meat, tasted it, and opened the bottle. It was a Chablis. Then she keyed the message, and got a trim, blond female with spectacular good looks. «Winckelmann» she said, "my name is Allegri. I'll be coordinating the evacuation. We have fourteen people to take off. Plus Dr. Wald, who is enroute here now. We want to begin departures in forty-eight hours.
"I know that's later than the original plan, but we've still got work to do. For your information, Kosmik will begin operations at ten A.M. our time Friday. Temple time. This transmission contains time equivalents. We want to be out with twenty-four hours to spare. We also have artifacts to move, and we should start with those as soon as possible. Please contact me when you can."
The screen blanked.
Hutch pushed back in her chair. People in these remote places usually took the time to say hello. She wondered whether Allegri had been underwater too long.
She put Quraqua on the main display, went to mag 32.
Sunlight flooded the cloud cover, illuminating a world of mud-colored prairies, vast green forests, sprawling deserts, and winding mountain chains. Neither of its oceans was visible. There were two, both shallow, and not connected. It was generally a parched world, a condition that Kosmik hoped to cure during the first phase of its terraforming operation, which it had dubbed Project Hope.
The southern ocean surrounded the icecap, creating a circular body of water averaging about five hundred kilometers in width. Beyond, several finger-shaped seas pushed north. The longest of these was Yakata, a local term meaning Recreational Center for the Gods. It penetrated about three thousand kilometers into the land mass. At its northernmost extremity, just offshore, lay the Temple of the Winds.
She'd read somewhere that Quraqua was thought to be entering an ice age. Whether true or not, both caps were quite healthy. When they went, they would make a substantial splash. And, if the experts were right, Quraqua would get instant oceans.
Ten o'clock Friday morning, Temple time. When was that? She called up the data Allegri had sent.
Quraqua's day was twenty hours, thirty-two minutes and eighteen seconds long. Everyone understood the psychological importance of using the familiar twenty-four hour clock, but adjustments were necessary whenever humans set down for an extended stay on a new world. On Quraqua, timepieces were set to run until 10:16:09, A.M. and P.M. Then they leaped forward to noon and midnight. This method eliminated time from both sleeping and waking cycles.
Coincidentally, it was now Sunday at the Temple of the Winds, just as it was on Wink. Terraforming would begin in something over ninety hours. Henry Jacobi wanted to complete the evacuation with a one-day safety margin. And they had two shuttles to work with. It would be easy.
But she was uncomfortable. It did not look as though getting clear was at the top of Jacobi's agenda. She directed the navigational computer to lift Wink out of lunar orbit and make for Quraqua. She entered both deadlines into her personal chronometer, and set the ship's clocks to correspond to Temple time.