Only the personnel chief, this young Lane woman, seemed at all helpful.
“We could shift a few technicians temporarily,” she offered, “and maybe offer overtime pay for those who’d be willing to do the assembly work after their regular shifts.”
But without the materials and electronics equipment, Urbain knew, the technicians would have nothing to assemble.
“I must insist,” he said, forcing his voice to remain calm, trembling only slightly, “that this work be given the highest possible priority. The success of this community’s very raison d’etre depends on it.”
They cleared their throats and shifted uneasily on their chairs. They gave excuses. They waved their hands. It was only after nearly an hour of fruitless wrangling that Urbain realized that the department heads did not look at him when they spoke, they looked at Eberly.
He holds the strings, Urbain finally understood. They will procrastinate and evade the issue until he tells them to do as I wish.
Suddenly he shot to his feet. “Bah! This pointless bickering is stupid. If you will not help me I will proceed without you.”
“Now wait a moment …” Eberly pushed his chair back from the conference table but did not stand up.
“I have waited long enough,” Urbain snapped. “I will launch our existing satellites into orbit around Titan. That will leave us with nothing in reserve, no satellite platforms in storage. If some need for further satellites arises, then you will understand how stupidly you have behaved.”
With that, he stormed out of the conference room.
Eberly made a rueful smile. “Emotional, isn’t he?”
The other two men got up from their chairs and, after a few words of conversation with Eberly, headed back to their own offices. Holly got up, too, but lingered at the conference room’s door.
“Can you really get a team together for Urbain?” Eberly asked her.
“Sure. No prob. And Di Georgio and Williams can make the materials and equipment available, too, if they have to.”
Eberly half-sat on a corner of the conference table, realizing all over again that Holly was as sharp as they came.
“You think I should order them to cooperate with Urbain?”
She looked right into his eyes. “I think that’s what you’re going to do, sooner or later. You just want to make Urbain squirm, make him understand who’s boss.”
Eberly pretended astonishment. “Why, Holly, what do you think I am?”
Holly shook her head. “Doesn’t matter. But I don’t think you ought to be playing power-trip games with Urbain. He’s got some strong connections back Earthside to the ICU, y’know.”
Eberly gave her a long stare. “Perhaps you’re right,” he murmured.
Standing in front of him, returning his gaze unblinkingly, Holly said, “Malcolm, there’s something else we need to talk about.”
“Something else?”
“The ZPG protocol,” she said.
Eberly said nothing as he slowly got up from his perch on the table’s corner and dropped back into his swivel chair.
“Sit down, Holly,” he said, gesturing to the chair nearest him. “Tell me what’s on your mind.”
She could see the wheels turning in his head as she took the chair. He’s always trying to figure out how he can benefit from any situation, she told herself. Guess that’s why he’s the chief around here.
“What about ZPG?” Eberly asked.
Holly took a breath, marshalling her thoughts. “Remember the Mishimas? The couple that froze their fetus, back when we’d just left Earth? They want permission to have their baby.”
Eberly pursed his lips.
“If and when they do,” Holly continued, “a lot of women in this community are going to want to have babies.”
“Then we’d better not grant permission to the Mishimas. Not yet, at least.”
“You can’t put this issue off forever,” Holly said. “It’s as natural as breathing, Malcolm. Women want to have babies.”
“Do you want a baby, Holly?”
She smiled at him. “Don’t try to put me off by making the issue personal. Sooner or later you’re going to have a tidal wave bearing down on you, Malcolm. This ZPG protocol could bury you.”
He steepled his fingers and tapped their tips lightly in front of his face. “I’ll have to think about it.”
“You surely better,” said Holly. “You can’t keep this genie in a bottle forever.”
“We’ll see.”
Holly laughed. “That’s what a father tells his child when he doesn’t want to face the consequences of saying no.”
“I understand what you’re telling me, Holly,” Eberly said in his sincerest mode. “I appreciate your bringing this to my attention.”
Holly knew that what he was really saying was: I don’t want to deal with this. Not now. Maybe not ever, if I can get away with it.
Getting to her feet, Holly realized that if Eberly wouldn’t deal with this issue, she would have to.
Titan Alpha
Slowly, with an unwavering patience that only a machine could exert, Titan Alpha extracted itself from the quickly refreezing lake. Its biology program reviewed the available sensor data and concluded that the protocellular organisms in the water were being immobilized as the water crystallized into ice. It routed this information to the central processor’s master program. For nine billion nanoseconds the master program halted Alpha’s drive engines as it compared this information against its major objectives and restrictions, and then reviewed its conclusion three times, as required by its programming.
The organisms were not being killed, it concluded: merely frozen into immobility, their life functions suspended, not extinguished. Even if they were being killed, there was nothing that Titan Alpha could do about it. The action that precipitated this environmental crisis was entirely involuntary. The best plan of action, consistent with all the master program’s objectives and restrictions, was to exit the area with as little additional environmental damage as possible. Organisms at deeper levels of the lake would be protected from environmental harm once the surface of the lake refroze completely.
Its drive gears in dead-low reverse, Alpha inched out of the lake, recording sensor data nanosecond by nanosecond. The biology program checked and rechecked the status of the samples obtained from the lake. Satisfied that the samples were safely stored, the biology program reverted to its normal passive review of incoming sensor data.
Free of the lake at last, Titan Alpha pivoted forty-seven degrees right, engaged its forward gearing, and began a slow, purposeful circumnavigation of the ice lake. The jagged breach it had smashed into the icy surface was quickly refreezing. Off beyond the low rounded hills of ice on the other side of the lake, sluggish dirty orange clouds were precipitating fat drops of liquid ethane onto the rough dark landscape.
Titan Alpha surged ahead, gathering data, trundling purposively across the rolling, spongy ground as the ethane rainstorm slowly enveloped it.
7 January 2096: Evening
Urbain received two messages just as he was rising from his desk chair after another exhausting day of frustration and delay.
His chief of engineering appeared at the door of the office, the expression on his face morose and apprehensive at the same time. Urbain could see it was bad news before the man said a word.